PHILIP GILBERT HAMERTON (1834—1894)
was an English artist and author. In 1866 he published his standard work
on Etching and Etchers. He was also an art critic to the Saturday
Review. In 1870 he established an art journal of his own, The Portfolio,
a monthly periodical, each number of which consisted of a monograph upon
some artist or a group of artists, frequently written and always edited
by him. The monographs were accompanied by the original prints taken from
the plates, specifically prepared by eminent artists of the day for the purpose
of being published in The Portfolio. A limited number of etchings
was printed.
OUR present etching is from one of the most popular pictures
in the National Gallery, though it is not a representation of the human
form divine, but is of the canine species, and from the pencil of a hand
endowed with wondrous skill in depicting animal life. Sir Edwin Landseer
has left us many striking examples of his exceptional power in reproducing
on his canvas both the semblance and the life of the varied class of subjects
that he made peculiarly his own, and with which he constantly delighted
the English public for a period extending over more than half a century.
He has gone, but his dogs, horses, and deer, happily remain amongst us,
a lasting source of delight, and a noble record of his powers. He portrayed
the body and the spirit too, but in this present case the spirit had flown.
Our picture is called the Sleeping Bloodhound, but it really represents
a dead bloodhound; and its owner and the original owner of the picture
has left us his own account of the catastrophe. The dog was a bloodhound
bitch called 'Countess,' belonging to Mr. Jacob Bell, and on one Sunday
evening, while sleeping on the top of a balustrade at Wandsworth, suddenly
startled by the arrival of its master's vehicle, she lost her balance,
and fell over to a depth of twenty-three feet; this fall was fatal, and
the hound died the same evening.
On the next morning, Monday, she was carried in a cab
to Edwin Landseer's, in St. John's Wood, with the hope that he might be
induced to make a sketch of her as a reminiscence of an old favorite.
' This is an opportunity not to be lost,' said the painter: ' go away;
come again on Thursday at two o'clock.' At the appointed time there
was the finished picture, as large as life, now known as the Sleeping Bloodhound.
The hound is lying on a whitish skin, on a reddish drugget, and the rich
brown and black tone of the dog is skillfully helped by the simple accessories
introduced, of which a helmet with a red plume is the principal.
The picture is on canvas, 3 feet 3 inches high by 4 feet i inch wide.
It has been engraved by Sir Edwin's eldest brother, Thomas Landseer. It
came to the National Gallery as one of the valuable Bell bequest, in 1859.
This Sleeping Bloodhound is an early work, executed in the painter's thirty-third
year: it was exhibited in the British
Institution in 1835. Edwin Landseer
never executed a more effective or masterly work than this;
it has all the freedom of a sketch from nature, yet nothing is wanting:
no further finish could have helped it, or in any way enhanced its effect.
[Source: The Portfolio for 1875, pp. 66.]
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