SECTION II. Memoir of Chantrey, the Sculptor. In the preceding section I have observed that the parish of Norton was the birth-place of two brothers who arrived at high honours in the church, one being the Bishop of Salisbury, and the other the Bishop of Coventry and Litchfield; the latter of whom built a chapel at Norton, erected an alabaster tomb within it to the memory of his parents, and appointed a chantry for them. This pleasant village has likewise the honour of being the birth-place of another distinguished individual, FRANCIS CHANTREY, Esq. R. A. Sculptor, F.R.S., Lon. & Ed., F.S. A., M. G. S., and Member of the Roman Academy of St. Luke; a man whose extraordinary talents have placed him at an early period of life at the summit of his profession. F. Chantrey was born on the 7th of April, 1782. His ancestors were in respectable but not opulent circumstances, and some heritable possessions still belong to the family. His father was involved in considerable pecuniary losses, chiefly by the conduct of a brother whom he endeavoured to serve beyond the extent of his means. He saw the property which his forefathers had accumulated, progressively departing from him, his spirits became depressed, and he died in the prime of life, when his only child, the subject of this memoir, was scarcely twelve years old. After his death, his widow remained in the occupation of a farm which had been in the family through a long series of years; and although Chantrey's mother, who is still living to enjoy the fame of her son, was left in narrow circumstances, she yet contrived to bestow upon him as liberal an education as her limited means would admit. Being an only child he was naturally the object of the tenderest care and most anxious solicitude of his surviving parent, who retained him about her person MEMOIR OF CHANTREY, THE SCULPTOR. 277 until he was nearly eighteen years old. He was intended for agricultural pursuits, but his employment in attending to the concerns of a farm was but little suited to his views and inclinations. At this period of life he is said to have had it in contemplation to study the law, under a respectable soli citor at Sheffield. This is an error into which his biographers have fallen, in consequence of the term factor being understood to have the same meaning in Sheffield as it has in Scotland, where the memoir of this distinguished artist was first published. To the business of a factor, or inland merchant, his views were first directed, but he soon discovered that his inclinations had a different tendency. The drudgery of a factor's warehouse, the calculation of per centages and discounts, the systematic arrangements and nice methodical management which such a pursuit requires, the mind of Chantrey was but ill fitted to encounter; he therefore relinquished this intention, and apprenticed himself to a Mr. Ramsay, a carver and gilder, in the town of Sheffield; yet even in this business he soon found that he had but few opportunities of indulging that feeling for the arts, which had now so taken possession of his mind, that it might be said to have become the animating principle of his being, and the sole impulse his heart obeyed. At this time Mr. J. R. Smith, mezzotint-engraver and portrait-painter, visited Sheffield, professionally as an artist, and being occasionally at the house of Mr. Ramsay, Chantrey's devotion to the study and practice of drawing and modelling did not escape his observation. He was the first to perceive and appreciate his genius; he took pleasure in giving him instruction, and, some years afterwards, the pupil having become a proficient in art, perpetuated the recollection of his master in one of the finest busts that ever came from his hands. He, however, experienced considerable difficulty in making an advantageous use of the lessons thus obtained. His master supposing, and perhaps with reason, that Chantrey's predilection for the arts would make him a less profitable servant, was but little inclined to promote his pursuits. The whole of his leisure hours, however, were devoted to his favourite studies, and chiefly passed in a lonely room in the neighbourhood of his master's house, which he hired at the rate of a few pence weekly. It may easily be supposed from the preceding detail, that 278 MEMOIR OF CHANTREY, THE SCULPTOR. the connexion between Chantrey and Ramsay was not of long continuance; they separated before the expiration of the term of his apprenticeship, a compensation being made by Chantrey for the remainder of his time. Being now left to prosecute his studies in his own way, he visited London, and attended the school of the Royal Academy at Somerset House, but was never regularly admitted a student. Painting and sculpture, the sister arts, to one of which he resolved to dedicate his talents, were now presented to his choice, but he was undetermined, and some weeks passed away before he attempted either. Painting had only a secondary place in his affections, but he regarded it as a surer source of profitable employment than sculpture; he therefore hesitated long before he made his election. Perplexed and embarrassed, he left the students' room at Somerset House, returned to his own apartments, "resolved and resolved," spread his canvas before him, prepared his pallet, took up his pencils, and began to paint: landscape, portrait, and history, by turns attracted his notice and mingled with his contemplations, but the sculpture of the Academy was continually before him, and the images it presented became associated with all his thoughts. This state of suspense prevented him from using the talents he then possessed, and so long as it continued he accomplished nothing. During this period of doubt and indecision he visited the Elgin marbles: these perfect resemblances of nature and simplicity made a strong impression on his mind; the more he examined them the more he became convinced of their truth and their beauty; they confirmed him in his own notions of excellence, and he revisited them daily with increased delight. In the intervals that filled up the space between his successive visits to these exquisite productions of art, he repeatedly attempted to paint, but the works of Greece, simple in design, beautiful in execution,-imposing and grand in effect, were still present to him: they influenced his choice, and determined him to become a sculptor. Chantrey's first work in marble was a bust of the Rev. James Wilkinson, which he executed for the parish church at Sheffield. He entered on this undertaking with all the confidence of conscious talent, and the assurance of success, even though previously he had never been employed on marble, and never used either a hammer or chisel on any material of more difficult workmanship than a picture frame. Mont MEMOIR OF CHANTREY, THE SCULPTOR. 279 gomery the poet, the author of the Wanderer of Switzerland, &c. beautifully alludes to this early production in a speech de livered in the town of Sheffield, in December 1822, on the establishment of a Philosophical and Literary Society there. Having briefly noticed several individuals, natives of the place, whose talents and acquirements in science and literature were an honour to the town, he adds – "Mr. Chantrey was not indeed a native of the town, but having been born at Norton in Derbyshire, four miles hence, within the limits of this corporation, he belongs to us, and is one of us. Whatever previous circumstances, very early in life, may have taught his eye to look at forms as subjects for his thoughts, his pencil, or his hand, it was in Sheffield, after he had been called hither from the honourable occupation of husbandry, which kings and the awful fathers of mankind of old did not disdain to follow; it was in Sheffield that his genius first began to exercise its plastic powers, both in painting and sculpture;-it was in Sheffield that the glorious alternative was presented to him, either to be amongst the greatest painters of the age, or to be alone as the greatest of its sculptors;-it was in Sheffield, likewise, after he had made the wiser choice, that he produced his first work in marble; -and Sheffield possesses that work, and, I trust, will pos sess it, till the hand of time, atom by atom, shall have crumbled it into dust. "This assuredly was the most interesting crisis of the artist's life, the turning period that should decide the bias of his future course. Having employed a marble-mason to rough-hew the whole, he commenced his task, with a hand trembling but determined, an eye keenly looking after the effect of every stroke, and a mind flushed with anticipation, yet fluctuating often between hope and fear, doubt, agony, and rapture; perplexities that always accompany conscious but untried powers in the effort to do some great thing: he pursued his solitary toil day by day, and night by night, till the form being slowly developed, at length the countenance came out of the stone, and looked its parent in the face. To know his joy a man must have been such a parent. The throes and anguish, however, of that first birth of his genius in marblẹ enabled that genius thenceforward, with comparative ease, to give being and body to its mightiest conceptions. "Were I a rich man, who could purchase the costly labours of such a master, I almost think that I could forego 280 MEMOIR OF CHANTREY, THE SCULPTOR. the pride of possessing the most successful effort of his later hand, for the noble pleasure of calling my own, the precious búst in yonder church. Works of genius and of taste are not to be valued solely according to their abstract excellence as such, but they may become inestimably more dear to the heart, as well as interesting to the eye, in proportion as they awaken thought, feeling, recollection, sympathy. Whether in alliance with the subject itself, the circumstances under which it was undertaken, or the conflict and triumph of the artist in achieving his design, in all these points the plain but adınirable monument before us transcends every other that has come, or can come, from the same hand; since the experienced and renowned proficient can never again be placed in a trial so severe, with an issue so momentous, as the youthful aspirant, unknown and unpractised, had to endure in this first essay of his skill on the block that might eternise his name or crush his hopes for ever. This, I believe, is the true history of the outset of Chantrey, a native of this neighbourhood, who was destined thenceforward, at his pleasure, to give to marble all but life; for "What fine chisel Could ever yet—cut breath.” SHAKSPEARE's Winter's Tale." In recurring to the earlier productions of Chantrey, his colossal bust of Satan, the first important work which he exhibited at the Royal Academy, deserves particular notice. That sublime passage in Paradise Lost, where Milton's "not less than archangel fallen," lifting his malignant brow to heaven, pours forth his impious address to the sun, "To thee I call, but with no friendly voice And add thy name, O Sun! to tell thee how afforded our young sculptor a noble opportunity for the display of his talents. Defiance, hatred, and despair, are personified with great force and sublimity in this magnificent head, the whole is finely imagined, and the point of time selected by the artist is admirably adapted both for picturesque effect and grandeur of expression. There is character in the very hair that crowns the head of this bust, and the serpent writhing his folds amongst it, forms an appropriate emblematic |