Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1863-12-31
How Some of the Men of Fame Lacked,

| three portraits one above another These are
| pictures of Wolsey, of Richard he Third. and
of Henry the Eighth, The portrait of VOL
! sey Is well known-a profile with regular fea-
lures, and with keen, eager eye, which en-
| tirely counteracts the heaviness of the lower
| part OF the face. There is no such redeeming
teatureto do as much for the gross, heavy
eountenance of Henry, and the impressions
left on the mind by the two fat men are con-
| sequently widely different. But it is the third
| portrait, which divides these two, that seizes
the attention most forcibly. The picture may
or may not be genuine. The internal evil
! dence Is strong in favor of its authenticity
The restless misery of this face of Richard
| absolutely excites feeling of pity. There is
almost deformity in the features of this great
criminal; the eye and the mouth are drawn
up on the left side, all the parts of the face
| are contracted in an excess Of peevish irrita-
| blllty, which is also expressed with remarka-
bic force in the very peculiar action of the
small, woman-lke hands-tell-tale extremi-
ties always. The king has screwed the ring
nearly off his right little finger, working the
trinket backwards and forwards in nervous
anguish with the forefnger and thumb of his
| left hand.
There is a noble contrast to this painful
| picture, close beside it. The portrait of the
| Lord Keeper, Sir Nicholas Bacon, father of
the illustrious philosopher. There is no tidg-
ETY. uneasiness about this Sir Nicholas Bacon.
| He IS considerably fatter than Henry the
| Eighth his face is a kind of clay color all
over; hps-which are turned inside out-in-
Guided; and his little eyes have a twinkle in
| them which makes it easy to believe "that
he was remarkable for his apt sayings and his
ready wit" 1t is, moreover, said of this iol-
| ly old gentleman, that because of his fat he
| walked with difficulty, and that, "after tax
ing his seat upon the bench, he used to give
three taps with his staff on the floor as a
| sign that he had recovered breath, and that
business might proceed" The artist has rep
| resented Sir Nicholas with his staff in his
hand, lifted as if in the act of administering
| the three taps to the floor. Take the staff
| away, and change the costume and the Lord
Keeper would look not unlike one of the
three fat men, who always appear like jury
seated behind a counter in the entrance of
| French theatre
In this same room is a portrait of Sir Wal
ter Raleigh, which, if it be good likeness,
shows that nc had a very sly and unprepos-
| sessing expression about the eyes; indeed, in
the account given of this picture in the au
| thorized catalogue, there is quotation from
! an old writer who, describing it, says of Ra-
| leigh that " he had most remarkable aspect
an exceeding high forehead, long-faced, and
sour eielidded, a kind of pigge-eie" 1t
would be difficult to give better description
of the hero of the velvet cloak, as he is here
represented.
What a blow is administered to the science
of ysiognomy-considered as a science
by the well-known profile portrait of Wolfe
exhibited in this gallery. From the extreme
tip of little, mean, turn-up nose, the line of
the profile recedes, at full gallop, to where
the still retrcating forehead is lost in the
cocked-hat; while the lower part of the face
falls away almost more violently from that
same point of departure, the end of the nose.
The upper lip recedes from the nose, the IN
der lip recedes from the upper lip, and the
chin is so small and so retreating that it is,
as feature, almost wanting; it might be one
of the folds of skin about the neck. And this
is Wolfe-W olfe the heroic, the wse-the
man whose judgment and discretion were so
early proved, that he was entrusted, at the
age of thirty-four, with that great and impor-
tant expedition against Quebec, in the sue
cessful crisis of which he, to use his ows
words, "ded contented"
Another remarkable instance of ahead cal
culated to surprise the student of physiogno-
my is the portrait of Jeffreys, the cruel and
uni lust Judge, This cruel, violent, drunken
Judge has, at first sight, the countenance of
| a holy, sensitive, reflective person, with reg
ular, handsome features, and an expression
Of refined melancholy. Close scrutiny, how
ever, reveals something cruel as well as mel
ancholy in the heavy eyes.
These, however, are exceptional cases in
most instances, the portraits in the collection
are wonderfully true to the preconceived idea
of the persons represented. Take, for in
stance, the beautiful terracotta bust of Hamp-
| i T. l. j
| thing finer. Indeed the head is almost ideal
in its splendor. This bust of Hampden is
placed as pendant to one of Cromwell, and
it is interesting to study the difference be-
tween the two men, allied in a common cause.
The energy expressed in the bust of Crom-
well-which was modelled from life-is so in
| tense that you almost expect the cold clay to
burst into action as you look at it. To stand
before it, is like being near loaded Arm
| strong gun; steam engine waiting for the
twist of handle to tear along the road;
horse held back at the starting place -
To change the destinies of a great country
to convulse it from end to end, and from side
| to side, seems too small a work for the thou
| sandman power of such giant. Hampden's
| face and head are of a different type With
| less of energy than Cromwelps-though with
| enough too, Heaven knows-there is more of
| q
! gentleman, in courage not second even to
| CROMWELL i'll honor and integrity unimpeacha-
| BILE. When one takes with these two the
portrait of Ireton, also in this collection, Ire
| ton -" taciturn and reserved" the man who
| was never diverted from any resolution he
| had TAKEN" one can wonder at nothing which
| their united efforts were able to achieve. 1t
would be a curious thing to compare these
| three heads of the men who headed an En-
| glish revolution, with those of the chief ac-
tors in the French Reign of Terror
| Widely different from these portraits of
| Cromwell and Hampden is painting of the
celebrated Earl of Chesterfield, the author of
| those renowned letters to his son, which were
once thought to embody the perfection of
| (worldly) wisdom. In one respect this por-
trait is allied to those of Hampden and Crom-
well, for it carries out ones previously formed
| idea of the man as completely each of
| theirs does. Those refined, symmetrical fea-
lures, the dark eyebrows contrasting with the
| powdered hair, the cold, courteous composed
countenance could belong surely to nobody
| but this man, distinguished in literature, IN
| the Senate, ana in the drawing-room; the
| prince of cOurtiers.
| How MEN FIND Our THE Truth IN Them
Of practical teaching, the first task and the
| hardest is TO convince men OF the truth Lney
know already. And howl this done ? By a
logical process? No; by a vital one. Rea-
son about a natural conscience and the eter-
nal distinction of right and wrong, and at best
| you will only make tame theorist neat
casuist. Throw a man of honest impulses in
to a scene of danger, or show him the actual
doing of any enormity, and away go his theo-
| ries to the winds; he feels and acts as man.
| So labor to convince men OF the speculative
truth of religion, stopping with that, and you