The Two Boyhoods.*

' AVith such circumstances round him in youth , let us note what necessary effects followed upon the boy . I assume him to have Giorgiono's sensibility ( and more than Giorgione's , if that be possible ) to colour and form . I tell you father , and this fact you may receive trustfully , that is sensibility to human affection and distress was no less keen than even his sense for natural beauty—heartsight deep as eye-sight . Consequently , he attaches himself with the faithfullest child-love

to everything that bears an image of the place he was born in . No matter how ugly it is , —has it anything about it like Maiden-lane , or like Thames' shore ? If so , it shall be painted for their sake . Hence , to the very close of life , Turner could endure uglinesses ivhich no one else , of the same sensibility , would have borne with for an instant . Dead brick walls , blank square windows , old cloths , market-womanly types of humanity—anything fishy and muddy , like Billingsgate or Hungerford Market , had great attraction for him ; black barges , patched sales , ancl every possible condition of fog .

You will find these tolerations and affections guiding or sustaining 'him to the last- hour of his life ; the notablest of all such endurances being that of dirt . No Venetian ever draws anything foul ; but-Turner devoted picture after picture to the illustration of effects of ¦ dii-giness , smoke , soot , dust , and dusty texture ; old sides of boots , weedy roadside vegetation , dung-hills , straw-yards , and all the soilings and stains of every common labour . And more than thishe not onlcoulcl endurebut enjoyed and

, y , 'looked for litter , like Covent Garden wreck after the market . His pictures ave often full of it , from side to side : their foregrounds differ from all others in the natural way that things have of lying about in them . Even the richest vegetation , in ideal work , is confused ; ancl he delights in shingle , debris , ancl heaps of fallen stones . The last words he ever spoke to me about a picture were in gentle exultation about his St . Gothard ; "that litter of stones which I

endeavoured to represent . " The second great result of this Covent Garden training was , understanding of and regard for the poor , whom the Venetians , we saw despised ; whom , contrarily , Turner loved , and more than loved —understood . He got no romantic sight of them , but an infallible one , as he prowled about the end of his lane , watching night effects in the wintry streets ; nor sight of the poor alone , hut cf the poor

in direct relations with the rich . Ho knew , in good and evil , what both classes thought of ) and how they dealt with , each other . Heynohls and Gainsborough , bred in country villages , learned there the country boy's reverential theory of "the squire /' •and kept it . They painted the squire ancl the squire ' s lady as centres of the movements of the universe , to the end of their lives . Hut Turner perceived the younger squire in other aspects about

his lane , occurring prominently in its night scenery , as a dark figure , or one of two , against the moonlight . He saw also the working of city commerce , from endless warehouses , towering over Thames , to the back shop in the lane , with its stale herrings—highly interesting these last ; one of father's best friends , whom he often afterwards •visited affectionately at Bristol , being a fishmonger and glue-boiler ; which ives us a friendlturn of mind towards herring-fishing

g y , whalihg , Calais poissardes , and many other of our choicest subjects in after life ; all this being connected with that mysterious forest below London ISridge on one side;—and , on the other , with these masses of human power and national wealth which weigh upon us , at Covent Garden here , with strange compression , and crush us into narrow Hand-court .

"That mysterious forest below London Bridge" —better for the boy than wood of pine or grove of myrtle . How he must have tormented the watermen , beseeching them to let him crouch anywhere ; in the bows , quiet as a log , so only that lie might get floated down there among the ships , and round and round the ships , ° and with the ships and by the ships , and under the ships , staring , and clambering —these the only quite beautiful things he can see in all the world , except the sk hue thesewhen the sun is on their sailsfilling 01

y ; , , falling endlessly disordered by sway of tide and stress of anchorage , ¦ beautiful unspeakably , ¦ which ships also are inhabited by glorious creatures—red-faced sailors , with pipes , appearing over the gunwales , true knights , over their castle parapets—the most angelic beings in the whole compass of London world . And Trafalgar happening long before we can draw ships , we , nevertheless , coax , all current stories out of the wounded sailors , do our best at jiresent to show Nelson

' s funeral streaming up the Thames , and vow that Trafal gar shall have its tribute of memory some day . "Which , accordingly , is accomplished—once , ivith all our might / for its death ; twice with all our might , for its victory ; thrice , in pensive farewell to the old Tcmcraire , and , with it , to that order of tilings . _ Now , this fond companying with sailors must have divided his time , it appears to me , pretty equally between Covent Garden and Wapping ( allowing for incidental excursions to Chelsea on one side ,

and Greenwich on the other ) ivhich time he ivould spend pleasantly , but not magnificently , being limited iu pocket-money , ancl leading a kind of " Poor . Tack" life ou the river . In some respects , no life could be better for a lad . P-ut it was not calculated to make his ear fine to the niceties of language , nor form his moralities on an entirely regular standard . Picking up his first scraps of vigorous English chiefly at Deptford and in the markets , and his first ideas of female tenderness and beautamolig hs

y nymp ofthe barge and the barrow , another boy might , perhaps , have become what people usually term ' - ' vulgar . " Hut the original make and frame of Turner ' s mind being not vulgar , but as nearly as possible a combination of the minds of Keats and Dante , joining capricious waywardness , and intense openness to every fine pleasure of sense , and hot defiance of format precedent , with a quite infinite tenderness , generosity , and desire of justice and truth—this kind of

mind did not become vulgar , but very tolerant of vulgarity , even fond of it in some forms ; and , on the outside , visibly infected by it , deeply enough ; the curious result , in its combination of elements , being to most people wholly incomprehensible . It was as if a cable had been woven of blood-crimson silk , and then tarred on the outside . People handled it , and the tar came off on their hands ; red gleams were seen through the black , underneath , at the places where it had been strained . Was it ochre ?—said the world—or red lead ?

Schooled thus in manners , literature , and general moral principles at Chelsea and Wapping , we have finally to inquire concerning- the most important point of all . We have seen the princijial differences between this boy and Giorgione , as respects sight of the beautiful , understanding of poverty , of commerce , and of order of battle ; then follows another cause of difference in our training—not slight—the aspect of religion , namely , in the neighbourhood of Covent Garden . I say the aspect ; for that was all the lad could judge bDisposed

y . , for the most part , to learn chielly hy his eyes , in this special matter he finds there is really no other way of learning . His father taught him " to lay one penny upon another . " Of mother ' s teaching , we hear of none ; ' of parish pastoral teaching , the reader may guess how much .

I chose Giorgione rather than A eroiicse to help mc in carrying out this parallel ; because I do not find in Giorgione ' s ivork any o the early Venetian monachi ' st element . He seems to me to have belonged more to an abstract contemplative school . I may b wrong in this ; it is no matter;—suppose it were so , and that h came down to A eniee somewhat recusant , or insentient , concei-nin the usual priestly doctrines of his day—how ivould the Venetian re lig-ion , from an outer intellectual standing-point , have looked to him

He would have seen it to be a religion indisputably powerful in human affairs ; often very harmfully so ; sometimes devouring widows' houses , and consuming the strongest and fairest from among the young ; freezing into merciless bigotry the policy ofthe old ; also , on the other hand , animating national courage , and raisingsouls otherwise sordid , into heroism : on tiie whole , always a real and great jiower ; served with daily sacrifice of gold , time , and

thought ; putting forth its claims , if hypocritically , at least in bold hypocrisy , not waiving any atom of them in doubt or fear ; and , assuredly , in large measure , sincere , believing- in itself ) and believed .-a goodly system , moreover , in asjiect ; gorgeous , harmonious , mysterious : —a thing which had either to be obeyed or combated , but could not he scorned . A religion towering over all the city—manybuttressed—luminous in marble st . itelii . es .- -, as tho dome of our Lady of Safety shines over the sea ; many-voiced also , giving , overall the eastern seas , to the sentinel his watchman , to the soldier his war-cry ; and , on the lips of all who died for Venice , shaping the whisper of death .

I suppose the boy Turner to have regarded the . religion of his citj also from an external intellectual standing-point . What did ho see in Maiden-lane ? Let not the reader bo offended with me ; I am willing to let him describe , at his own jileasui-c , what Turner saw there ; but to me it seems to havo been this . A religion maintained occasionally , even the whole length of the laneat jioint of constable's stall ' butat

, ; , other times , placed under the custody of the beadle , within certain black and unstately iron railings of St . Paul ' s , Covent Garden . Among the wheelbarrows and over the vegetables , no jiei-cejitible dominance of religion ; in the narrow , disquieted streets , none ; in the tongues , deeds , daily ways of Maiden-lane , little . Some honesty , indeed , and English industry , and kindness of heart , and general idea of justice ; but faithof any national kindshut up from one

, , Sunday to the next , not artistically beautiful , even in those Sabbatical exhibitions ; its paraphernalia being chiefly of high pews , heavy elocution , and cold grimness of behaviour . AVhat chiaroscuro belongs to it — ( dependent mostly on candle light)—we will , however , draw , considerately ; no goodliness of escutcheon , nor other respectability being omitted , ancl the best of