DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.68074#0091
INDEPENDENCE 51
Of Dog Trump nothing has been heard since Ireland’s time,1 and our debt
to him for reproducing a subject so much outside the usual range of Roubiliac’s
art is proportionately great; it must have been modelled out of compliment to
Trump’s owner, who has recorded his own affection for the beast on more
than one canvas, but the sale catalogue mentions other dogs also. Dr.
Johnson’s appreciation of works of art was, as we all know, very limited ; but
when one day, in discussing allegorical painting with some persons unnamed,
he gave vent to the saying, ‘ I had rather see the portrait of a dog that I know
than all the allegorical paintings they can show me in the world ’,* can he have
been thinking of Dog Trump ?
The portrait of Ware alluded to by Vertue is unfortunately lost, though a
later bust will be described elsewhere (p. 108). We pass on to the fourth portrait,
the model probably of the noble bust at Windsor in nightcap and tasselled
gown, inscribed Handel Aetatis Suae 54. M.D.CC.XXXIX (Plate x «), which
seems to have been accepted as the typical portrait at the time, since it was
selected for reproduction at the first Handel Festival of 1784. One of these
reproductions, in biscuit china, I saw in the possession of the sculptor’s great-
great-granddaughter in 1923. The original was given by Handel to his devoted
amanuensis J. C. Smith, who in 1773 appropriately presented it to George HI.
The plaster model, perfect save for slight damage to the drapery done in the
course of an air raid, is at the Foundling Hospital, to which it was presented
in 1863 by Lord Chief Baron Pollock, under the belief that it was ‘ the original
work from which the Vauxhall Handel and that in Westminster Abbey (!)
were made’, and once belonged to Bartieman.3
It is possible, however, that Vertue’s note refers to a lost portrait of unknown
date, No. 1326 in the John Blackwood sale of 1778, ‘ Roubilliac, marble busto
of Handel on a pedestal ’, which fetched £13 2s. 6d. according to the anno-
tated copy of the Catalogue in the British Museum; or it may have been that
executed from the admirable small terra-cotta in the National Portrait Gallery
(Plate x />) acquired in 1892 from Mr. Richard Clark, Pittanciary and Senior
Vicar Choral of Westminster Abbey and a pupil of Bartieman. Clark had it
from Sir George Smart, who had bought it at the sale either of Bartieman’s or
able; that it is the work of Roubiliac there is no
doubt. One would gladly see in it the lost bust of
Thomas Carter, but as no portrait of that worthy
appears to exist, the question must remain open.
1 The statement of MM. Audin and Vial that
it is at the National Portrait Gallery is incorrect.
» Birkbeck Hill quotes the saying from the
1787 edition of Johnson’s Works, vol. xi, p. 387;
it has nothing to do with the famous conversation
as to the Dog of Alcibiades recorded by Boswell.
3 Brownlow’s Foundling Hospital, 3rd edition,
1865, p. 149. I owe this reference to Mr. Reginald
Grundy. Whether the plaster bust as big as life of
Mr. Handel, No. 77 of the Blanckley sale of 9th
April (chap, viii, n. 9), was of this type or another is
uncertain.
Of Dog Trump nothing has been heard since Ireland’s time,1 and our debt
to him for reproducing a subject so much outside the usual range of Roubiliac’s
art is proportionately great; it must have been modelled out of compliment to
Trump’s owner, who has recorded his own affection for the beast on more
than one canvas, but the sale catalogue mentions other dogs also. Dr.
Johnson’s appreciation of works of art was, as we all know, very limited ; but
when one day, in discussing allegorical painting with some persons unnamed,
he gave vent to the saying, ‘ I had rather see the portrait of a dog that I know
than all the allegorical paintings they can show me in the world ’,* can he have
been thinking of Dog Trump ?
The portrait of Ware alluded to by Vertue is unfortunately lost, though a
later bust will be described elsewhere (p. 108). We pass on to the fourth portrait,
the model probably of the noble bust at Windsor in nightcap and tasselled
gown, inscribed Handel Aetatis Suae 54. M.D.CC.XXXIX (Plate x «), which
seems to have been accepted as the typical portrait at the time, since it was
selected for reproduction at the first Handel Festival of 1784. One of these
reproductions, in biscuit china, I saw in the possession of the sculptor’s great-
great-granddaughter in 1923. The original was given by Handel to his devoted
amanuensis J. C. Smith, who in 1773 appropriately presented it to George HI.
The plaster model, perfect save for slight damage to the drapery done in the
course of an air raid, is at the Foundling Hospital, to which it was presented
in 1863 by Lord Chief Baron Pollock, under the belief that it was ‘ the original
work from which the Vauxhall Handel and that in Westminster Abbey (!)
were made’, and once belonged to Bartieman.3
It is possible, however, that Vertue’s note refers to a lost portrait of unknown
date, No. 1326 in the John Blackwood sale of 1778, ‘ Roubilliac, marble busto
of Handel on a pedestal ’, which fetched £13 2s. 6d. according to the anno-
tated copy of the Catalogue in the British Museum; or it may have been that
executed from the admirable small terra-cotta in the National Portrait Gallery
(Plate x />) acquired in 1892 from Mr. Richard Clark, Pittanciary and Senior
Vicar Choral of Westminster Abbey and a pupil of Bartieman. Clark had it
from Sir George Smart, who had bought it at the sale either of Bartieman’s or
able; that it is the work of Roubiliac there is no
doubt. One would gladly see in it the lost bust of
Thomas Carter, but as no portrait of that worthy
appears to exist, the question must remain open.
1 The statement of MM. Audin and Vial that
it is at the National Portrait Gallery is incorrect.
» Birkbeck Hill quotes the saying from the
1787 edition of Johnson’s Works, vol. xi, p. 387;
it has nothing to do with the famous conversation
as to the Dog of Alcibiades recorded by Boswell.
3 Brownlow’s Foundling Hospital, 3rd edition,
1865, p. 149. I owe this reference to Mr. Reginald
Grundy. Whether the plaster bust as big as life of
Mr. Handel, No. 77 of the Blanckley sale of 9th
April (chap, viii, n. 9), was of this type or another is
uncertain.