Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 68, No. 417, July, 1850

Driven to our utmost limits, we must conclude, without further mention than we have already here and there made of the Society of British Artists in Suffolk Street; and we do so with the less regret because that gallery contains but a small proportion of pictures of merit. Mr Anthony contributes a very large number of his odd paintings, some of which are rather effective at a distance; but it is not a style we admire. Finally, we have with pleasure noticed, during our many rambles through the different galleries, that the public not only visit but buy; and we trust that the year 1850 will prove profitable and satisfactory to British artists, in the same proportion that it undoubtedly is creditable to their industry, and, upon the whole, highly honourable to their talents. One word more we will say at parting. In this article we have written down opinions, formed neither hastily nor partially, of whose soundness, although critics will always differ, we venture to feel pretty confident. We have applied ourselves to point out merits rather than defects, and to distribute praise in preference to blame; but we should have failed in our duty to ourselves and the public, had we altogether abstained from the latter. We well know, however, the many difficulties and discouragements that beset the path of the painter. And it would be matter for sincere regret to us, if, in the freedom of our remarks, we had unwittingly hurt the feelings of any man who is honestly and earnestly striving in the pursuit of a very difficult art – although his success may as yet be incommensurate with his industry and zeal.

THE YEAR OF SORROW. – IRELAND – 1849

SPRING SONGOnce more, through God's high will and grace,Of Hours that each its task fulfils,Heart-healing Spring resumes its place; —The valley throngs and scales the hills,In vain. From earth's deep heart o'ercharged,The exulting life runs o'er in flowers; —The slave unfed is unenlarged:In darkness sleep a nation's powers.Who knows not Spring? Who doubts, when blowsHer breath, that Spring is come indeed?The swallow doubts not; nor the roseThat stirs, but wakes not, nor the weed.I feel her near, but see her not,For those with pain-uplifted eyesFall back repulsed; and vapours blotThe vision of the earth and skies.I see her not; I feel her near,As, charioted in mildest airs,She sails through yon empyreal sphere,And in her arms and bosom bearsThat urn of flowers and lustral dews,Whose sacred balm, o'er all things shed,Revives the weak, the old renews,And crowns with votive wreaths the dead.Once more the cuckoo's call I hear;I know, in many a glen profound,The earliest violets of the yearRise up like water from the ground.The thorn I know once more is white;And, far down many a forest dale,The anemones in dubious lightAre trembling like a bridal veil.By streams released that singing flowFrom craggy shelf through sylvan glades,The pale narcissus, well I know,Smiles hour by hour on greener shades.The honeyed cowslip tufts once moreThe golden slopes; – with gradual rayThe primrose stars the rock, and o'erThe wood-path strews its milky way.– From ruined huts and holes come forthOld men, and look upon the sky!The Power Divine is on the earth: —Give thanks to God before ye die!And ye, O children worn and weak,Who care no more with flowers to play,Lean on the grass your cold, thin cheek,And those slight hands, and whispering, say,"Stern Mother of a race unblest —In promise kindly, cold in deed;Take back, O Earth, into thy breast,The children whom thou wilt not feed."

IRELAND – 1849

AUTUMNAL DIRGEThen die, thou Year – thy work is done:The work ill done is done at last.Far off, beyond that sinking sun,Which sets in blood, I hear the blastThat sings thy dirge, and says – "Ascend,And answer make amid thy peers,(Since all things here must have an end,)Thou latest of the famine years!"I join that voice. No joy have IIn all thy purple and thy gold,Nor in the nine-fold harmonyFrom forest on to forest rolled:Nor in that stormy western fire,Which burns on ocean's gloomy bed,And hurls, as from a funeral pyre,A glare that strikes the mountain's head;And writes on low-hung clouds its linesOf cyphered flame, with hurrying hand;And flings amid the topmost pinesThat crown the steep, a burning brand.Make answer, Year, for all they dead,Who found not rest in hallowed earth,The widowed wife, the father fled,The babe age-stricken from his birth.Make answer, Year, for virtue lost;For Faith, that vanquished fraud and force,Now waning like a noontide ghost;Affections poisoned at their source:The labourer spurned his lying spade;The yeoman spurned his useless plough;The pauper spurned the unwholesome aid,Obtruded once, exhausted now.The weaver wove till all was dark,And, long ere morning, bent and bowedAbove his work with fingers stark;And made, nor knew he made, a shroud.The roof-trees fall of hut and hall,I hear them fall, and falling cry —"One fate for each, one fate for all;So wills the Law that willed a lie."Dread power of Man! what spread the wasteIn circles, hour by hour more wide,And would not let the past be past? —The Law that promised much, and lied.Dread power of God! whom mortal yearsNor touch, nor tempt; who sitt'st sublimeIn night of night, – O bid thy spheresResound at last a funeral chime.Call up, at last, the afflicted RaceWhom Man not God abolished. Sore,For centuries, their strife: the placeThat knew them once shall know no more.

IRELAND – 1849

WINTER DIRGEFall, Snow, and cease not! Flake by flakeThe decent winding-sheet compose:Thy task is just and pious; makeAn end of blasphemies and woes.Fall flake by flake: by thee alone,Last friend, the sleeping draught is given:Kind nurse, by thee the couch is strewn,The couch whose covering is from heaven.Descend and clasp the mountain's crest;Possess wide plain and valley deep: —This night, in thy maternal breastForsaken myriads die in sleep.Lo! from the starry Temple gatesDeath rides, and bears the flag of peace:The combatants he separates;He bids the wrath of ages cease.Descend, benignant Power! But O,Ye torrents, shake no more the vale;Dark streams, in silence seaward flow;Thou rising storm, remit thy wail.Shake not, to-night, the cliffs of Moher,Or Brandon's base, rough sea! Thou Isle,The Rite proceeds: – from shore to shoreHold in thy gathered breath the while.Fall, snow! in stillness fall, like dewOn temple roof, and cedar's fan;And mould thyself on pine and yew,And on the awful face of man.Without a sound, without a stir,In streets and wolds, on rock and mound,O omnipresent comforter,By thee, this night, the lost are found.On quaking moor, and mountain moss,With eyes upstaring at the sky,And arms extended like a cross,The long-expectant sufferers lie.Bend o'er them, white-robed Acolyte!Put forth thine hand from cloud and mist,And minister the last sad rite,Where altar there is none, nor priest.Touch thou the gates of soul and sense:Touch darkening eyes and dying ears;Touch stiffening hand and feet, and thenceRemove the trace of sin and tears.And ere thou seal those filmed eyes,Into God's urn thy fingers dip,And lay, 'mid eucharistic sighs,The sacred wafer on the lip.This night the Absolver issues forth:This night the Eternal Victim bleeds —O winds and woods – O heaven and earth!Be still this night. The Rite proceeds.

LONDON AND EDINBURGH CHESS MATCH

If we pique ourselves on anything, it is on our invincible good-nature. We are as slow to be roused as a brown bear in the midst of its winter sleep; and, if we were let alone, we very much doubt whether, by any conceivable exertion, we could work ourselves into a downright passion. But, somehow or other, it constantly happens that people of a less tranquil mood step in to deprive us of the enjoyment of our untroubled repose. At one time some worthy fellow entreats us to take up the public cudgel and belabour a blatant Economist. At another, we are pathetically besought to administer due castigation to some literary sinner who has transgressed the first principles of decency, morality, and taste. One friend implores us, with tears in his eyes, to take up the case of the oppressed and injured washerwomen: a second puts a tomahawk into our hand, and benevolently suggests the severment of the skull of a charlatan: a third writes to us regarding a rowing match, in which he opines gross injustice has been done by the umpire to the Buffs, and he fervently prays for our powerful assistance in vindicating the honour of the Blues.

In all national questions, it seems to be expected that we are to act with the devotion of a knight-errant. Whenever Scotland is assailed, the general impression is that we are bound to stand forth, and incontinently give battle to the enemy: and we believe it will be admitted that we have done so before now with no inconsiderable effect. It so happens that, at the present juncture, several of our most esteemed compatriots, feeling themselves deeply aggrieved by the outrecuidance of the Southron, have laid the story of their wrongs before us; and, after a deliberate review of the whole circumstances of the case, we feel ourselves compelled to come forward in behalf of our countrymen. Let no man venture to say that Chess is an ignoble subject. It is, if properly considered, as recondite a science as mathematics. Kings, conquerors, and sages have not thought it beneath them to ponder over the chequered board; and it may be that the noble game has contributed in no light degree to the success of their most triumphant efforts. We know of no absorption more complete than that which possesses the mind of a true votary of chess. Watch him as he is contemplating his moves, and his countenance is a perfect study for the physiognomist. He may not perhaps be the most agreeable of companions, but we cannot expect loquacity from men of high intellect whilst engaged in deepest rumination.

Let us, however, dispense as much as possible with preface, and come to the actual offence which has induced us to take up our pen in vindication of the national honour. Our attention has been called to what is undoubtedly a departure from the fair and liberal spirit which ought to actuate antagonists – in short, by an attempt to deprive the Edinburgh Chess Club of laurels which were fairly and honourably won. It is all very well for men who have been beaten to apply salves to their wounded vanity, and to persuade themselves that they have failed rather through misfortune than from any deficiency of skill. Napoleon used to amuse himself at St Helena by demonstrating that he ought to have won the battle of Waterloo – a position in which, we doubt not, Count Montholon and General Bertrand entirely concurred, though, after a certain time, they must have been tolerably sick of the subject. But these affirmations of the Emperor did not serve the purpose of reinstating him on the throne of France; and, in like manner, opine that the writers who, at this time of day, are, applying themselves to the task of persuading the public that the great match at chess between Edinburgh and London, which was won by Edinburgh in 1828, ought to have terminated otherwise, are losing their labour, and, moreover, placing themselves in a very ridiculous position.

We like to see a man take a beating in good part. The Southron may come here and vanquish us at cricket, and we shall submit to be bowled or caught out with the utmost equanimity – no member of the Grange Club will retire to the cloister in consequence. He may extinguish our renown at rackets, or even soar considerably above our mark in the altitude of the flying-leap. We shall not cavil at the result, should some Southron Robin Hood defeat the Queen's Body Guard in the toxophilite competition which is about to take place in this city. We shall not be jealous if the stranger beats us; and if, in return, we should extinguish him utterly at golf or throwing the hammer, we promise to crow as mildly as the plenitude of our lungs will permit. But we have no idea of pushing complaisance to such an extraordinary point, as to permit our real victories to be perverted and annulled at the hands of a defeated adversary. Hector might have beaten Achilles, but he did not; and the mere fact of a remote possibility having once existed, will not justify us in giving the lie to Homer. We make every allowance for testiness; still we cannot help thinking it extraordinary that those feelings of mortification, which might perhaps have been excusable in the defeated party at the moment of the antagonist's triumph, should manifest themselves as strongly as ever nearly a quarter of a century after the contest – and that, too, in persons who took no actual share in it, and are comparatively strangers to the views and opinions of those really concerned.

English chess-players have the command of all the chess-periodicals, which emanate chiefly, if not exclusively, from the London press; and which have, for many years back, been made the vehicles of repeated observations intended to depreciate the triumph of Scotland. Of late these have been even more than usually frequent. And within the last year, the Quarterly Review, which, like the trunk of an elephant, is as ready to pick up a pin as to uproot a tree, has opened its pages for remarks on the chess match, conceived in no very handsome spirit towards the Scotch champions. This we do not consider to be justifiable conduct on the part of our bulky contemporary. In the accomplished editor – himself a Scot – it is in direct antagonism to the principles of Richie, the servitor of Nigel, who made so vigorous a stand for the credit of the Water of Leith; and we regret to observe so palpable a falling off from the fervid patriotism of the Moniplies. The uniform burden of the song is, that the event of the match was determined by an accident, – or by what they reckon as nearly equivalent to an accident – an oversight upon the part of the London Club, to which the best of players are liable, and which in this instance is said to have been rather ungenerously taken advantage of by Edinburgh. The Scottish players have hitherto said very little upon the subject, contenting themselves with a short but perfectly satisfactory answer, made immediately after the termination of the match, to some observations of Mr Lewis, in which, while they conclusively disposed of his views and inferences, they at the same time stated, that they were "far from begrudging to the London Club the usual consolation of a beaten adversary – of going back upon a game, and showing that, if they had played otherwise at a particular point, they could have won the game." The constant reiteration of the English statement, however, is calculated to produce an erroneous impression in the minds of those not acquainted with the merits of the question.

The London and Edinburgh chess match, which was played by correspondence, was begun in the year 1824. It was the result of a challenge given by the Edinburgh Club, which was then only in its infancy. The terms agreed on were, that the match should consist of three won games; and that, in case of any game being drawn, a new one, begun by the same opener, should take its place. The match commenced on 23d April 1824. Two games were opened simultaneously. The first game was opened by the Edinburgh Club; and in sending their first answering move, the London Club also sent the first move of the second game. The first game, which consisted of 35 moves, was, on 14th December 1824, declared to be drawn. The second, which consisted of 52 moves, was resigned by the London Club on 23d February 1825. The third game – opened by the Edinburgh Club in place of the first game, which had been drawn – was begun on 20th December 1824; it consisted of 99 moves, and was drawn on 18th March 1828. The fourth game, begun by the Edinburgh Club, on 26th February 1825, was resigned by them on 15th September 1826, at the 55th move. The fifth game, begun by the Edinburgh Club, on 6th October 1826, was resigned by the London Club on 31st July 1828, at the 60th move – and this determined the match in favour of Edinburgh.

The simple statement of these details is sufficient altogether to exclude the idea that the result of the match was a mere accident, where manifestly inferior players profited by the unfortunate blunder of their superior antagonists. Though the Edinburgh Club had lost, instead of gaining, two out of the three games, it would still have been in vain to maintain that the play in the match showed them to be unquestionably inferior. The contest was a long and severe one. When the fifth and deciding game was proceeding, each party had gained one game, and there had been two drawn games, both of which were keenly disputed, without the least advantage in favour of London at any point of either; while, on the other hand, in the third game, Edinburgh had obtained an advantage, though not sufficient to enable them to checkmate their adversaries. It has never been pretended, by the most unscrupulous partisan of England, that the winning of the fifth game was ascribable to an oversight. On the contrary, their chess writers have, with most becoming fairness and candour, always referred to it as an instance of admirable play on the part of Edinburgh; and members of the London committee, who shortly after happened to visit Edinburgh, acknowledged that their committee were quite unable to discover the object of particular moves, the effect of which had been previously calculated, and reduced to demonstration by the Edinburgh players. Is there, in all this, such evidence of overwhelming superiority on the part of the English players, that their losing the match must have been an accident?

But it is time to inquire a little more minutely into the so-called blunder, which the Englishmen say was the cause of their defeat. And here it is but fair to give their statement in their own words. The Quarterly reviewer says —

"Perhaps the most remarkable instance on record of a strict enforcement of the tenor of chess law occurred in the celebrated match, by correspondence, between the London and Edinburgh Clubs. At the 27th move of the second game, the London Club threw a rook away. How they did so, Mr Lewis explains in the following words: – 'The 26th, 27th, and 28th moves were sent on the same day to the Edinburgh Club. This was done to save time. It so happened that the secretary, whose duty it was to write the letters, had an engagement which compelled him to leave the Club two hours earlier than usual – the letter was therefore posted at three instead of five o'clock. In the mean time, one of the members discovered that the 2d move (the 27th) had not been sufficiently examined.10 An application was immediately made at the Post-office for the letter, which was refused. In consequence, a second letter was transmitted by the same post to the Edinburgh Club, retracting the 2d and 3d moves, and abiding only by the first. The Edinburgh Club, in answer, gave it as their decided opinion that the London Club were bound by their letter, and that no move could be retracted: they therefore insisted on the moves being played. The London Club conceded the point, though they differed in opinion.'

"We cannot but think, under all the circumstances, the Edinburgh Club were to blame. What rendered the mishap more vexatious to the Londoners was, that whereas they had a won game before, they now barely lost it, and thereby the match, which the winning of this game would have decided in their favour. There can be little doubt that the London Club (then comprising Messrs Lewis, Fraser, and Cochrane) was the strongest of the two. On the part of Edinburgh, we believe the lion's share of the work fell to the late Mr Donaldson."

In the remarks on the London and Amsterdam match, in Mr Staunton's periodical, (the Chess-Player's Chronicle,) for February 1850, there is the following passage: —

"If the relative skill of the competitors engaged on each side were to be the gauge by which to estimate the probable result of a contest like this, it would have been easy to predict to which party victory would incline; and we should have wondered at the daring gallantry that prompted the little band of Hollanders to challenge the leviathans of London. Experience, however, has shown that, in a match of chess by correspondence, the battle is not always to the strong, and that foresight and profound calculation are of infinitely less account, when the men may be moved experimentally, than they are in ordinary chess, where conclusions must be tried by the head, and not by the hand. Of this, indeed, the archives of the London Club afford a memorable instance. In March 1824, a proposal was made to this Club by the Club at Edinburgh, to play a match at chess by correspondence for a silver cup; the match to consist of three games, (irrespective of drawn games;) two games to be played together, and the winner of the first game to have the move in the third. The London Club at this period was in the pride and plenitude of its strength, and the committee appointed to conduct the match comprised every name of note among the chess-players of the metropolis. The Edinburgh Chess-Club, on the other hand, was composed of amateurs comparatively unknown and inexperienced, and possessed one player only – the late Mr Donaldson – capable of making anything like a stand 'over the board' with any of the London chiefs. In an ordinary contest, indeed, over the board, it was the old odds of Lombard Street to a China orange! Maugre all the advantages of superior skill and practice, however, the Londoners lost the battle, and lost it by a blunder as ridiculous as it was vexatious, at the very moment, too, when the game was in their hands."

The general remarks on playing by correspondence in this last passage are evidently made to furnish a pretence for introducing the notice of the London and Edinburgh match; and they share the fate of all such forced work. They are absolute nonsense. The probability that a decidedly superior will overcome an inferior player, is not at all diminished by the circumstance that the match is played by correspondence. On the contrary, we should rather be inclined to say that the chance of an inferior player's escape in a single game or so is almost extinguished where the match is played by correspondence; because the time given for deliberation increases the improbability of his antagonist's erring from carelessness, or not taking in the whole position of the game, which sometimes occurs in playing over the board. But there is an inconsequence in the whole argument which surprises us to find in anything sanctioned by a person of Mr Staunton's unquestionable powers of mind. The loss of the match by London is not to be wondered at, it is said, because it was a match by correspondence; and the immediate cause of their losing it was the commission of a ridiculous and vexatious blunder! To make this anything like logic, it would be necessary to hold that ridiculous and vexatious blunders are more likely to be committed when the player has time and opportunity to consider his moves, and to make experiments upon their effect, than where he is under the necessity of moving at once in presence of an adversary, and possibly of spectators, apt to get impatient at long delay. It is plain that the game's being played by correspondence was the very circumstance calculated to render the London Club's particular excuse for losing all the more untenable.

It is quite true, however, that at a particular stage of the game opened by the London Club, (being one of the two games with which the match commenced,) the London Club might have won the game, by playing other moves than they did. This may be said of every game; but it is as unusual as it is unhandsome for the unsuccessful party, merely because he has missed such an opportunity of winning, to refuse all credit to his adversary for afterwards defeating him. In the third game, which was drawn, the Edinburgh Club would have won if they had played a different 51st move from that which they did. But this did not lead them to make depreciatory remarks about their antagonists: all that their report bears on this point is, that the London Club "conducted a difficult defence with great skill and dexterity, and finally succeeded in drawing the game."

Further, the remarks above quoted are calculated to produce an erroneous idea respecting the situation and conduct of the two clubs in the second game. The sophistry consists in mixing up two entirely separate and unconnected things. In this same game in which the London Club failed to observe that they had a winning position, they applied to have two of their moves recalled after they were despatched, and the Edinburgh committee refused their request. Now the obvious tendency of all that the English writers say upon the subject is to create the impression that if the London Club had been allowed to recall these two moves, they would have retained their winning position. This is plainly the only construction that the passage in the Quarterly Review is capable of bearing. It is the only construction which would justify his remarks, or make them at all intelligible. But it is quite incorrect. The only moves which the London committee wished to recall were the 27th and 28th; but they have never attempted to show that if they had been allowed to do so, they could have won the game. It has been demonstrated, over and over again, that they could not. In fact, the moves they wished to recall were as good as any others then in their power. They might have drawn the game if these moves had been played; and they could have done no more had they been allowed to recall them. This matter was set at rest while the match was still pending, by a proposal which emanated from the Edinburgh Club. When the Londoners lost the game, Mr Lewis insinuated, though he did not expressly state, that if they had not been held to the 27th and 28th moves, they would have won the game. A member of the Edinburgh Club then offered to play a back-game with any one or more of the London Club, in which the London players were to be allowed a new 27th move instead of the one they had made, and wished to recall; and also another back-game in which the Edinburgh player was to take the London side at an earlier stage of the game, with the view of showing that, by playing differently, the London Club might have won it. This proposal was under consideration of the London Club for several weeks, during which they satisfied themselves that the recall of the 27th and 28th moves would be of no use, and, accordingly, it was declined. It is surely not very uncharitable to surmise that it was during this period, and on the suggestion of their opponents, that they discovered that the error was not in the 27th move which they had proposed to recall, but in the 26th, which they had examined and adhered to. In his first publication of the games, Mr Lewis gives no back-game on this 26th move; and it is believed that no member of the London Club was aware, till the game was finished, that by playing differently at the 26th move they might have won it. But Mr Lewis admits that the game could not be won by a mere alteration of the 27th or 28th move; and any one who says that it could, is either speaking in ignorance of the subject, or is making a wilful misrepresentation. The likelihood of the remarks of the English writers producing an erroneous impression arises from their mixing up these two separate and distinct things: 1st, that at a previous stage of the game, the London Club had a winning position which they did not discover, and failed to avail themselves of; and, 2d, that the Edinburgh Club would not allow them to retract the 27th and 28th moves. These two facts have no longer any possible connection with each other when it is known that, at the 27th move, the London Club had ceased to have a winning position, and that the recall of that move would have been of no use to them. The failure, at a previous stage of the game, to maintain the winning position which they had, is simply one among several illustrations which occurred in the match, of the truth that the London Club, "in the pride and plenitude of its strength," did not always play as well as it was possible to have done. How such things show that superiority on the part of London, which they are brought forward to establish, we confess ourselves unable to understand, unless we were to adopt the principle of the Chess-Players' Chronicle, that it is the best players who are most likely to commit errors in conducting a match by correspondence!!