John Leechs Pictures of Life and Character | Page 3

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John Leech's Pictures of Life and Character
by William Makepeace Thackeray

* Reprinted from the Quarterly Review, No. 191, Dec. 1854, by
permission of Mr. John Murray.
We, who can recall the consulship of Plancus, and quite respectable,
old-fogyfied times, remember amongst other amusements which we
had as children the pictures at which we were permitted to look. There
was Boydell's Shakspeare, black and ghastly gallery of murky Opies,
glum Northcotes, straddling Fuselis! there were Lear, Oberon, Hamlet,
with starting muscles, rolling eyeballs, and long pointing quivering
fingers; there was little Prince Arthur (Northcote) crying, in white satin,
and bidding good Hubert not put out his eyes; there was Hubert crying;
there was little Rutland being run through the poor little body by
bloody Clifford; there was Cardinal Beaufort (Reynolds) gnashing his
teeth, and grinning and howling demoniacally on his death-bed (a
picture frightful to the present day); there was Lady Hamilton (Romney)
waving a torch, and dancing before a black background,--a melancholy
museum indeed. Smirke's delightful "Seven Ages" only fitfully relieved
its general gloom. We did not like to inspect it unless the elders were
present, and plenty of lights and company were in the room.
Cheerful relatives used to treat us to Miss Linwood's. Let the children
of the present generation thank their stars THAT tragedy is put out of
their way. Miss Linwood's was worsted-work. Your grandmother or
grandaunts took you there and said the pictures were admirable. You

saw "the Woodman" in worsted, with his axe and dog, trampling
through the snow; the snow bitter cold to look at, the woodman's pipe
wonderful: a gloomy piece, that made you shudder. There were large
dingy pictures of woollen martyrs, and scowling warriors with limbs
strongly knitted; there was especially, at the end of a black passage, a
den of lions, that would frighten any boy not born in Africa, or Exeter
'Change, and accustomed to them.
Another exhibition used to be West's Gallery, where the pleasing
figures of Lazarus in his grave-clothes, and Death on the pale horse,
used to impress us children. The tombs of Westminster Abbey, the
vaults at St. Paul's, the men in armor at the Tower, frowning
ferociously out of their helmets, and wielding their dreadful swords;
that superhuman Queen Elizabeth at the end of the room, a livid
sovereign with glass eyes, a ruff, and a dirty satin petticoat, riding a
horse covered with steel: who does not remember these sights in
London in the consulship