Lavengro by George Borrow (read me a book txt) 📕

has condescended to paint a portrait; however, that Norman arch will enable him to escape from their malice⁠—that is a capital idea of the watchmaker, that Norman arch.”

I spent a happy day with my brother. On the morrow he went again to the painter, with whom he dined; I did not go with him. On his return he said: “The painter has been asking a great many questions about you, and expressed a wish that you would sit to him as Pharaoh; he thinks you would make a capital Pharaoh.” “I have no wish to appear on canvas,” said I; “moreover, he can find much better Pharaohs than myself; and, if he wants a real Pharaoh, there is a certain Mr. Petulengro.” “Petulengro?” said my brother; “a strange kind of fellow came up to me some time ago in our town, and asked me about you; when I inquired his name, he told me Petulengro. No, he will not do, he is too short; by the by, do you not think that figure of Moses is somewhat short?” And then it appeared to me that I had thought the figure of Moses somewhat short, and I told my brother so. “Ah!” said my brother.

On the morrow my brother departed with the painter for the old town, and there the painter painted the mayor. I did not see the picture for a great many years, when, chancing to be at the old town, I beheld it.

The original mayor was a mighty, portly man, with a bull’s head, black hair, body like that of a dray horse, and legs and thighs corresponding; a man six foot high at the least. To his bull’s head, black hair and body the painter had done justice; there was one point, however, in which the portrait did not correspond with the original⁠—the legs were disproportionably short, the painter having substituted his own legs for those of the mayor, which when I perceived I rejoiced that I had not consented to be painted as Pharaoh, for, if I had, the chances are that he would have served me in exactly a similar way as he had served Moses and the mayor.

Short legs in a heroic picture will never do; and, upon the whole, I think the painter’s attempt at the heroic in painting the mayor of the old town a decided failure. If I am now asked whether the picture would have been a heroic one provided the painter had not substituted his own legs for those of the mayor, I must say, I am afraid not. I have no idea of making heroic pictures out of English mayors, even with the assistance of Norman arches; yet I am sure that capital pictures might be made out of English mayors, not issuing from Norman arches, but rather from the door of the “Checquers” or the “Brewers Three.” The painter in question had great comic power, which he scarcely ever cultivated; he would fain be a Rafael, which he never could be, when he might have been something quite as good⁠—another Hogarth; the only comic piece which he ever presented to the world being something little inferior to the best of that illustrious master. I have often thought what a capital picture might have been made by my brother’s friend, if, instead of making the mayor issue out of the Norman arch, he had painted him moving under the sign of the “Checquers,” or the “Three Brewers,” with mace⁠—yes, with mace⁠—the mace appears in the picture issuing out of the Norman arch behind the mayor⁠—but likewise with Snap,150 and with whiffler,151 quart pot, and frying pan, Billy Blind, and Owlenglass,152 Mr. Petulengro and Pakomovna; then, had he clapped his own legs upon the mayor, or anyone else in the concourse, what matter? But I repeat that I have no hope of making heroic pictures out of English mayors, or, indeed, out of English figures in general. England may be a land of heroic hearts, but it is not, properly, a land of heroic figures, or heroic posture-making. Italy⁠—what was I going to say about Italy?

XXXIX

And now once more to my pursuits, to my Lives and Trials. However partial at first I might be to these lives and trials, it was not long before they became regular trials to me, owing to the whims and caprices of the publisher. I had not been long connected with him before I discovered that he was wonderfully fond of interfering with other people’s business⁠—at least with the business of those who were under his control. What a life did his unfortunate authors lead! He had many in his employ toiling at all kinds of subjects⁠—I call them authors because there is something respectable in the term author, though they had little authorship in, and no authority whatever over, the works on which they were engaged. It is true the publisher interfered with some colour of reason, the plan of all and every of the works alluded to having originated with himself; and, be it observed, many of his plans were highly clever and promising, for, as I have already had occasion to say, the publisher in many points was a highly clever and sagacious person; but he ought to have been contented with planning the works originally, and have left to other people the task of executing them, instead of which he marred everything by his rage for interference. If a book of fairy tales was being compiled, he was sure to introduce some of his philosophy, explaining the fairy tale by some theory of his own. Was a book of anecdotes on hand, it was sure to be half-filled with sayings and doings of himself during the time that he was common councilman of the city of London. Now, however fond the public might be of fairy tales, it by no means relished them in conjunction with the