Good, honest, cackling Mrs. Quickly herself
was not more disposed to make the best of every thing and every body
than were we. Mr. S., in particular, was so joyous that I was afraid
he would break out into song, after the fashion of Sir Hugh Evans, -
"Melodious birds sung madrigals:
Whenas I sat in Babylon," &c.
By the by, the fishing ground of Izaak Walton is one of the localities
connected with Windsor.
The ride was done all too soon. One should not whirl through such a
choice bit of England in the cars; one should rather wish to amble
over the way after a sleepy, contemplative old horse, as we used to
make rural excursions in New England ere yet railroads were. However,
all that's bright must fade, and this among the rest.
About eleven o'clock we found ourselves going up the old stone steps
to the castle. It was the last day of a fair which had been holden in
this part of the country, and crowds of the common people were
flocking to the castle, men, women, and children pattering up the
stairs before and after us.
We went first through the state apartments. The principal thing that
interested me was the ball room, which was a perfect gallery of
Vandyke's paintings. Here was certainly an opportunity to know what
Vandyke is. I should call him a true court painter - a master of
splendid conventionalities, whose portraits of kings are the most
powerful arguments for the divine right I know of. Nevertheless,
beyond conventionality and outward magnificence, his ideas have no
range. He suggests nothing to the moral and ideal part of us. Here
again was the picture of King Charles on horseback, which had
interested me at Warwick. It had, however, a peculiar and romantic
charm from its position at the end of that long, dim corridor,
vis-a-vis with the masque of Cromwell, which did not accompany it
here, where it was but one among a set of pictures.
There was another, presenting the front side and three quarters face
of the same sovereign, painted by Vandyke for Benini to make a bust
from. There were no less than five portraits of his wife, Henrietta
Maria, in different dresses and attitudes, and two pictures of their
children. No sovereign is so profusely and perseveringly represented.
The queen's audience chamber is hung with tapestry representing scenes
from the book of Esther. This tapestry made a very great impression
upon me. A knowledge of the difficulties to be overcome in the
material part of painting is undoubtedly an unsuspected element of
much of the pleasure we derive from it; and for this reason, probably,
this tapestry appeared to us better than paintings executed with equal
spirit in oils. We admired it exceedingly, entirely careless what
critics might think of us if they knew it.
