Edward Burney Jones

“ Cousins Richard and Edward were younger sons of Uncle Richard Burney, of Worcester. Edward was successful as an artist, especially as a book- illustrator. He painted the portrait of Fanny Burney, a reproduction of which forms the frontispiece to the present volume. Some of his work may be seen in the South Kensington Museum. Chesington, where we shall presently find Fanny on a visit to Mr. Crisp, was an old roomy mansion, standing in the midst of a lonely common in Surrey, between Kingston and Epsom. ”

“ The old story of the king who succumbed to the charms of a simple beggar maid has inspired many artists, but none have rivalled Burne-Jones in appreciation of the artistic possibilities of the subject. His picture on its appearance at the Grosvenor Gallery in 1884 set the seal on his reputation, and put an end to whatever doubts remained then in the public mind as to his right to serious consideration. It is in many ways the finest of all his works, the most ambitious and the most exacting in the technical problems presented, and it is certainly the most notable in accomplishment. ”

“ Delany to wait in London, the queen had ordered some apartments in the Castle, which lately belonged to Prince Edward, to be got ready with all speed, that she might reside in them till her own house was finished.
This is the state of her affairs. I am now with her entirely. At first I slept at home; but going after supper, and coming before breakfast, was inconvenient, and she has therefore contrived me a bed-room....
FANNY BURNEY TO MRS. LOCKE. St. James's-place,
Aug. 29.
All our movements are at present uncertain; Mrs. ”

“ Saturday, July 26.—The royal party were to be Out the whole day, and I had her majesty’s permission to go to the play at night with Miss Port and her friends, and to introduce MISS Planta to them for the same purpose. The breakfast was at seven o’clock; we were all up at half after five. How sorry was I to see Colonel Gwynn enter alone, and to hear that Mr. Fairly was again ill.
Soon after the king came into the room and said, “So, no Mr. Fairly again?”
“No, sir; he’s very bad this morning.”
“What’s the matter? His face?”
“No, sir; he has got the gout. ”

“ Did you ever read any of his books? so many people now seem to me to make things unnatural—it is a curious thing to think so, but I’m sure it is that they do—and the natural is so much greater. They like things odd—eccentric.
She never missed an opportunity of seeing Burne-Jones’s pictures. Here are two of a hundred instances:—
Kate Greenaway to Ruskin
Jan. 19, 1899.
I am going to-day to see the Burne-Jones drawings at the Burlington Club. His drawings are so beautiful. I do wish you could see the large painting of King Arthur at Avalon. How you would like to have it to look at for a time! ”

“ The year 1861 must be particularly noted because it marks the commencement of an undertaking with which Burne-Jones was closely associated for the rest of his life. William Morris, who had also left Oxford in 1856 without waiting to take his degree, had gone for rather less than a year into the office of George Edmund Street, the well-known architect, with some idea of [Pg 35] adopting that profession; and then, becoming quickly disillusioned, had after some experiments in painting settled down for a while to literary work. ”

“ Dr. Johnson came in: we told him what we were about.
“Ah, madam,” cried he, “Goldsmith was not scrupulous but he would have been a great man had he known the real value of his own internal resources.”
“Miss Burney,” said Mrs. Thrale, “is fond of his 'Vicar of Wakefield.' and so am I;—don't you like it, sir?”
“No, madam, it is very faulty; there is nothing of real life in it, and very little of nature. It is a mere fanciful performance.”
He then seated himself upon a sofa, and calling to me, said “Come,—Evelina,—come and sit by me.” ”

“ Among figure-painters the 'Pre-Raphaelites', Rossetti, Holman Hunt, and Millais, with their forerunner Madox Brown, are the first to win attention by their earnestness, their romantic imagination, and their intense feeling for beauty: in these qualities Burne-Jones carried on their work and retained the allegiance of a cultured few to the very end of the century. Two solitary figures are more difficult to class, Alfred Stevens and Watts. Each learnt fruitful lessons from prolonged study of the great art of the past; yet each preserves a marked originality in his work. ”

“ True, she must die at last, but who must not?
Feb. 2.—The king always makes himself much diversion with Colonel Goldsworthy, whose dryness of humour and pretended servility of submission, extremely entertain him. He now attacked him upon the enormous height of his collar, which through some mistake of his tailor, exceeded even the extremity of fashion. And while the king, who was examining and pulling it about, had his back to us, Colonel Wellbred had the malice to whisper me, “Miss Burney, I do assure you it is nothing to what it was; he has had two inches cut off since morning!” ”

“ Little wonder then that to the dream-fed soul of the younger painter, whose art as yet lacked the means to fix in form and colour the thronging visions that must have already crowded his brain, the friendship of such a man must have seemed a priceless possession; and although, with the patient and gradual assertion of Burne-Jones’s individuality, their ways in the world of Art divided, yet even in that later day each knew well how to measure the worth of the other. ”

“ When they rose to take leave, Miss Palmer, with the air of asking the greatest of favours, hoped to see me when I returned to town; and Sir Joshua, approaching me with the most profound respect, inquired how long I should remain at Streatham? A week, I believed: and then he hoped, when I left it, they should have the honour of seeing me in Leicester Square. [61]
In short, the joke is, the people speak as if they were afraid of me, instead of my being afraid of them. It seems, when they got to the door, Miss Palmer said to Mrs. Thrale,
“Ma'am, so it's Miss Burney after all!” ”

“ They talked a good deal of his late lady; none of them knew her but very slightly, as she was remarkably reserved. “More than reserved,” cried General Budé, “she was quite cold. Yet she loved London and public life, and Fairly never had any taste for them; in that they were very mal assortis, but in all other things very happy.”
“Yes,” cried Colonel Goldsworthy, “and how shall we give praise enough to a man that would be happy himself, and make214 his wife so too, for all that difference of opinion? ”

“ He accompanied me, however, not losing one moment in continuing his exhortations: “If you do not quit, ma’am, very soon, some violent measures, I assure you, will be taken. We shall address Dr. Burney in a body; I am ready to make the harangue myself. We shall fall upon him all at once.”
I stopped him to inquire about Sir Joshua; he said he saw him very often, and that his spirits were very good. I asked about Mr. Burke’s book.339 “O,” cried he “it Will come Out next week: ’tis the first book in the World, except my own, and that’s coming out also very soon; only I want your help.” ”

“ When Burne-Jones spoke of his own art it was always with complete understanding of its many and divergent ideals, and I have heard him appraise at its true value the genius of men with whom he himself had little in common. Among his contemporaries he could speak with generous appreciation of the great gifts of Millais, and of the acknowledged masters of the past. ”

“ All astonished and impatient, Lady Elizabeth was sent out on inquiries. She returned, and said Dr. Warren was gone.
“Run! stop him!” was the queen’s next order. “Let him but let me know what I am to do.”
Poor, poor queen! how I wept to hear those words!
Abashed and distressed, poor Lady Elizabeth returned. She had seen Colonel Goldsworthy, and heard Dr. Warren,-with the other two physicians, had left the house too far to be recalled they were gone over to the Castle, to the Prince of Wales.
I think a deeper blow I have never witnessed. Already to become but second, even for the king! ”

“ He is just made under-secretary at the Treasury. He is a tall and handsome man, and seems to have much dry drollery; but we saw no more of him.
After our return to the house, and while Sir Joshua and I were tete-a-tete, Lord Cork and my father being still walking, and Miss Palmer having, I suppose, some orders to give about the dinner, the “knight of Plympton” was desiring my opinion of the prospect from his window, and comparing it with Mr. Burke's, as he told me after I had spoken it,—when the Bishop of St. Asaph and his daughter, Miss Georgiana Shipley, were announced. ”

“ He was one of at least four brothers, probably not the eldest, though death apparently put him early into the possessions of his family. He had, however, adopted the church and the law for his profession, and appears first as a clerk of Prince Edward, to whom he attached himself very early in life, and whose intimate friendship he soon obtained. In November 1260 Burnell accompanied Edward to France. Three years afterwards he had obtained sufficient wealth to begin to acquire large estates in Shropshire. ”

“ She carries on the business, with the help of her daughter, a girl about fifteen.
I inquired of her if she had seen the royal family when they visited Devonshire? “Yes, sure, ma’am!” she cried; “there was ne’er a soul left in all this place for going out to see ‘em. My daughter and I rode a double horse, and we went to Sir George Young’s, and got into the park, for we knew the housekeeper, and she gave my daughter a bit to taste of the king’s dinner when they had all done, and she said she might talk on it when she was a old woman.” ”

“ The king, at the instance of Sir George Baker, had consented to sleep in the next apartment, as the queen was ill. For himself, he would listen to nothing. Accordingly, a bed was put up for him, by his own order, in the queen’s second dressing-room, immediately adjoining to the bed-room. He would not be further removed. Miss Goldsworthy was to sit up with her, by the king’s direction.
I would fain have remained in the little dressing-room, on the other side the bed-room, but she would not permit it. She ordered Sandys, her wardrobe-woman, in the place of Mrs. Thielky, to sit up there. ”

“ Morris, I think, was not easy to know well. There was a certain rough shyness in his manner that kept him aloof from the initial advances of ordinary acquaintance, and it was only as an acquaintance that I knew him. But he must{210} have had deeply lovable qualities to have become so endeared, as he was, to Burne-Jones. It was their custom for years to spend every Sunday morning together in Burne-Jones’s studio; and on the many occasions when Burne-Jones has spoken to me of him, I can recall no word of abatement from the deep and lasting affection in which he held his life-long friend. ”

“ In speaking, therefore, of the deep poetic impulse that lay at the back of all Burne-Jones’s achievement in design, I have no thought of seeking to rest the reputation [83] which he will ultimately hold upon any other considerations than those which are proper to the field in which he laboured. He has left enough, and more than enough, to vindicate his high claim to rank among the masters of art, but it is certain, none the less, that his profound interest in those other fields of expression in which the imagination finds utterance, gave him infinite charm as a man. ”

“ I was in an agitation that half killed me, that shook all nerves, and made me unable to sleep at nights, from the suspense I was in! but I could not cry, for excess of eagerness.”
“I only wish,” said the duchess, “Miss Burney could have been in some corner, amusing herself with listening to us, when Lord Weymouth, and the Bishop of Exeter, and Mr. Lightfoot, and Mrs. Delany, and I, were all discussing the point—of the name. So earnest we were, she must have been diverted with us. Nothing, the nearest our own hearts and interests, could have been debated more warmly. ”

“ I shall write to our dear father, and Etty, and James, and send to Norbury Park - but I shall wait till to-morrow, not to infect them with what I am infected.. . .
O my Susan! that I could come to you! But all must depend on Mr. Keirnan's decision. If you can come to us with perfect safety, however slowly, I shall not dare add to your embarrassment of persons and package. Else Charles's carriage—O, what a temptation to air it for you all the way! Take no more large paper, that you may write with less fatigue, and, if possible, oftener;—to any one will suffice for all. ”

“ Thrale, “see his Nativity?”
“No, madam,—but I know his pictures very well; I knew him many years ago, in Minorca; he drew my picture there; and then he knew how to take a moderate price; but now, I vow, ma'am, 'tis scandalous—scandalous indeed! to pay a fellow here seventy guineas for scratching out a head!”
“Sir,” cried Dr. Delap, “you must not run down Sir Joshua Reynolds, because he is Miss Burney's friend.”
“Sir,” answered he, “I don't want to run the man down; I like him well enough in his proper place; he is as decent as any man of that sort I ever knew ”

“ Delap and you strut at each side of me, one with a dagger, and the other with a mask, as tragedy and comedy.”
“I think, Miss Burney,” said the doctor, “you and I seem to stand in the same predicament. What shall we do for the poor man? suppose we burn a play apiece?”
“Depend upon it,” said Mrs. Thrale, “he has heard, in town, that you are both to bring one out this season, and perhaps one of his own may be deferred on that account.”
On the announcement of the carriage, we went into the next room for our cloaks, where Mrs. Thrale and Mr. Cumberland were in deep conversation. ”