The Indianapolis journal., 1885-06-06
CARLYLE'S PEN PICTURES.
What the Sage of Chelsea Thought of
Many of the Noted Men of the World.
Just and Unjust Portraitures of Literary
Lights by Master of the Craft
Touches of Dyspepsia Shown.

Collected and Arranged by Susan Coolidge in the
Literary World.
Portraits of eminent persons by an eminent
person must always have particular value for
they possess the double interest of depicting not
their reputed subjects only, but, in certain
sense, and urconsciously to himself, the painter
as well. In them we get glimpse of his point
of view, his gift of insight of that individual
power of discrimination and delineation which
is the endowment of the true artist. Viewed
from this standpoint, it has seemed worth
while to collate from the voluminous
journals and letters of the truly eminent man
whose name heads this paper, a few of his many
brief and brilliant descriptive sketches of those
noteworthy men and woman who during the
halfcentury of his gradually growing greatness,
passed before his eyes or into the circle of his
more intimate acquaintance
Every artist has his good days and his bad days,
days when imagination halts and stumbIes,
and others when sudden flash of revelation
shows the face of the sitter in new and unfa-
miliar light, and the hand becomes the glad
servant of the will. Even SO with these por-
traits in pen and ink here the pen spattered,
there it dipped itself into some corrosive fluid,
again. it with happy swiftness and with
1T may be objected that here and there one side
of sketch would seem to contradict the other
side, but these discrepancies must be allowed
for on the score of mood-temper-the more or
Hess Of bodily malaise which influence the artistic
more than they do the commonplace tempera-
ment. obscurlng the recognition and clouding
the judgment
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. 1885.
did not expect much, but got mostly what 1
wanted. The old man has fine shrewdness
and naturalness in his expression of face, a long
Cumberland figure; one finds, ALSO kind of
sincerity in lis speech But for proliXity. thin
ness endless diluton, it exces all the other
speech / had heard from mortals. genuine
man. which is much, but also essentially small
genuine man. Nothing, perhaps is sadder (of the
glad kind than the unbounded laudation of such
"a man. sad proof of the rarity of such. fancy,
however he has fallen into the garrulity of age.
and is not what he was; also, that his environ
ment and rural prophethood has hurt him much.
He seems impatient that Shakespeare
should be admired. $50 much out of my own
pocket" The shake Of hand he gives you is
feckless, egotistcal. / rather fancy he loves
nothing in the world as much as one could wish.
When | compare that man with great man,
alas! he is Ike dwindling into contempt
ibility. Jean Paul, for example neither was he
greatl, could have him in finger-ring.
The languid way in which he gives me handful
of numb unresponsive fingers is very signlf-
cant The style in which he. clipping qualify
ing and wearisomely questioning without an
guessing that to me he was all too little in COM
parison, was melancholy to hear. No man that
i ever met has given me less, has disappointed
me less. My peace be with him, and happy
evening to his on the whole, respectable life.
ROBERT soUTHEY. 1885
Went last night. in wet. bad weather, to Tay-
lors, to meet Southey, who received me kindly.
A lean, gray, whte-headed man OF dusky com
plexion. unexpectedly tall when he rises, and
still leaner then-the shallowest chin, prominent,
snubbed, Roman nose small, care-lined brow,
huge bush of white gray hair on high crown and
projecting on all Sides the most vehement pair
of faint hazel eyes have ever seen-a weread,
honest, limited tstraight-laced even), kindly
hearted most irritable man. We parted kindly,
with no great purpose on either side, | imagine,
to meet again
SIR WALTER SCOTT. 1882.
Sir Walter Scott died nine days ago. Goethe
at the spring equinox, Scott at this autumn one.
a gifted spirit, then. is wanting among men.
Perhaps he died in good time, so far as his own
reputation is concerned He understood what
history meant; that was his chief intellectual
merit AS thinker, not feeble-strong rather,
and healthy-yet limited almost mean and
kleinstadtisch Inever spoke to Scott chad once
small epistolary intercourse with him
the part of Goethe, in which he behaved not
very courteously, | thought), have a hundred
times seen h:m from of DID, writing in the courts.
or hobbling with stout speed along the streets of
Edinburg: large man, pale, shaggy face fine,
deep-browed, gray eyes, an expression of strong,
homely intelligence. of bumor and good humor,
and, perhaps lin later years among the wrlnkleS,
of sadness or WEAKNESS. A solid well-built eff
fectual mind; the merits of which. after all this
delirious exaggeration is done and the reaction
thereof is also done. will not be forgotten He
has played his part and left none like or second
to him. Plaudite.
CHARLES LAMB. 1881.
return from Enfield where / have seen
Lamb, etc. Not one of that class will tell you
straightforward story, or even credible one
about any matter under the All must be
packed into epigramnIatic contrasts, startling
exaggeratons clap-trap that will get plaudit
from the galleries. Wearisoine, inexpressb!y
wearisome to me is that sort of clatter; it is not
walking ITO the end of time you would never ad-
vance, for these persons, indeed, have no
whither it is not bounding or frisking in grace
full natural JOY, it is dancing-a st. Vitus dance.
Heigh he! Charles Lamb l sincerely believe to
be in some considerable dsgree insare A more
pitiful, rickety, gasping staggering, stammerng
Tomfool / do not know. He il witty by
denying truisms and abjuring good manners
His speech wrigges hither and thther with an
incessant. painful tuctuation, not an opinion in
It, or fact. or phrase that you can thank him
for-more like CONFUSION fit than a natural
systole and dastole Besides, he is now a con-
frmed, shameless drunkard asks vehemently for
gin and water in strangers houses, tipples till he
is utterly mad, and is only not thrown out of
doors because he is too much despised for
taking such trouble with him. Poor Lamb.
Poor England, when such dispicable abortion
Is named genius
J. G. LocKHART 1892
Lockhart. whom did not know. requests to be
introduced TO me-a precise, brief, active per-
son of considerable faculty which, however has
shaped itself dramatically only. Fond of quiz
zine, yet not very maliciously. Has broad
black brow, indicating force and penetration,
but lower half of face diminishing into the
character at best of distinctress, almost of
triviality. Rather like the man, and shall like
to meet him again.
JAMES HoGG. 1892
Hogg is little red-skinned stiff sack of
body, with quite the common air of an Attick
shepherd, except that he has highish though
soping brow (amongst his yellow, grizzled hair),
anu two clear little beads of blue or gray eyes
that snarkle IL not with thoueht vet with ami