The Sun.
London, England, 1856-04-25 00:00:00

BRUIN'S PEACE.

Say, is Old England knave or fool ?
Which evil is the stronger—
Thus to wrap Bruin's claws in wool,
To let them grow the longer
MARCO.

GRINLING GIBBONS' CARVINGS.

RESTORED BY W. G. ROGERS.

It is a melancholy fact that the exquisite wood
carvings of that Velvet Brueghel of the chisel,
that Michelangelo del Catupidoglio of the wainscot,
Grinhug Gibbons—are crumbling to dust upon
the walls of various public churches and private
mansions throughout the United Kingdom. Won-
derful works of art—works of art quite matchless
in their way—these carvings by Gibbons are
perishing (not becoming merely injured, but lite-
rally perishing) at Wollaston, Petworth, Burleigh,
Belton, Chatsworth, Oxford, Windsor, Cambridge,
Cashiobury, Hampton Court, Gosford House,
Lowther Castle, and elsewhere. A little while
longer—and there must be an end to even the
faintest hope of their preservation. A terrible
decay has been slowly consuming their very sub-
stance during upwards of a century and a half—
insects honeycombing the interior, and mildew
spreading insidiously over the exterior, of these
rare and inestimable productions. The destruc-
tive effects of this double disease (from within
and from without) have already so far advanced
in regard to the majority of these same famous
carvings from the chisel of Grinling Gibbons, that
any one on examining into their condition might
reasonably enough suppose that, even now, it were
altogether hopeless to dream of saving them from
total, and apparently inevitable, destruction.
Imagine for icstance—some of these most beauti-
ful old " carvellings," masterpieces of artist-
handicraft from the hand that fabricated Lord
Orford's celebrated " point lace knot," once the
pride of Strawberry Hill, and now the property of
Miss Burdett Cuutts : imagine for an instant, we
say—some of these •
exquisite carvings by Gib-
bons (festoons of flowers for example litre
those preserved among the art-collections of
the Earl of Ilchester): imagine these lovely
but ill-fated products of genius, taste, and
ingenuity, so decayed,so worm-eaten, so mildewed,
that a child might crumble them up to dust by
the mere pressure of them between thumb and
finger ! And observe—this is- no exaggeration
The carvings of Grinling Gibbons are in the vast
majority of instances thus decayed, and worm-
eaten, and mildewed. Light and brittle as poppy-
husks with the gnawing of insects at their interior !
Booming with a faint whitish superficial bloom by
reason of the outer mildew—a bloom as charming
in its way but as fatal as the heetio of couump-

tion ! What is that our poet-laureate sings about
the sea-shell in " Maud" ?
See what a lovely shell,
Small and pure as a pearl,
Lying close to my Hot,
Frail. but a work divine,
Made so fairily well,
•
With delicate spire and whorl,
How exquisitely minute,
A miracle of design.
14 j'eN for all the world, just the very image of a
shell, a flower, a fruit, carved " fairily well " in
wood by the magical tools of Grinling Gibbons !
But—mark what Tennyson adds while still musing
over the sea-shell—

Slight, to be crushed with the tap
Of my finger nail on the sand,
Small, but a work divine.
The carvings of Griuling Gibbons still to a T—
this delicate description ! As slight, as fragile—
time has rendered them by reason of the worm
preying at their heart and the mildew deposited
upon their surface. Yet thus perishing, thus
blighted, thus eaten into a honeycomb, these
same wonderful carvings have been proved
to be capable, even now, of the most effec-
tual, the most complete, the most perfect pre-
servation. Several exquisite specimens restored
all but miraculously by Mr. W. G. Rogers—an
artist-carver, thoroughly imbued with a love for
the genius, and an appreciation of the works of
Grinling Gibbons--have within the last two or
three days been on view at No. 54, Strand. They
are specimens from the walls of Belton House, the
domain of the Earl of Browulow. They repre-
sent " drops" of dead-game, fruit, and flowers.
Originally—before they were touched by Mr.
Rogers—they were in the deplorable condition we
have described. Shaken—they showered down a
cloud of dry powdery dust ! Compressed—they
crumbled into so much fibre, like mere touchwood!
Now—on the contrary—they are firm, hard,
solid ; shining with all the gloss of their first
polish, but dark with the mellow darkness of age
—and so far, at least, we may be certain, more
beautiful than when they first left the workshop-
studio of the Great Carver ! Yet they are strictly,
and li'erally, and actually the works not of Rogers
—they are strictly, and literally, and actually the
works of Gibbons. The modus operandi of the
restorer may be readily enough described. Impri-
mis be carefully takes photographs (for after guid-
ance and comparison)—photographs of the carvings
prior to their removal from the place where they
have been slowly perishing as very precious but ne-
glected ornaments. Next—he immerses these
worm-eaten carvings bodily in a strong solution
of corrosive sublimate, thereby most successfully
" destroying" the secret cause of " destruction."
Subsequently he restores the original colour "to
the wood (lost by the influence first of all of the
mildew, and afterwards of the corrosive subli-
mate), doing this by means of another very simple
chemical application. Thereupon having
adroitly accomplished all this—be most ingeni-
ously imparts strength and body to the fragile
wood work by injecting into its honeycombed in-
terior, little by little, a magical compound of
vegetable gum and ge'atine. Ultimately—to
crown all—putting the separate pieces delicately
together according to the original design of
Grinling Gibbons as preserved in the photograph
—and so—voila tout—here before us is the solid,
sulsstantial, accurate, all but miraculous restora-
tion ! Here and there of course a chipped-off
fragment has to be supplied, but this only when
such an addition is perceived to be absolutely
necessary for the sake of completeness. Yonder
a bunch of primroses—here the claw of a duck
—there two or three of the wing-feathers of a
woodcock. But invariably—at these times where
a positive flaw has to be rectified, or a splinter
repaired—the addition is eflected by the restorer
with a wonderfully reverential regard for the
obvious design of the broken masterpiece. Out
of all which delicate care, and exquisite caution,
and scrupulous and conscientious handling of
these lovely fabrications of the taste and genius
of Grinling Gibbons—there come forth (under
the loving hands of one of the latest and most
successful of his disciples) these marvellous, and
almost magical, and all but miraculous restora-
tions.

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