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[Illustration: THE SISTINE MADONNA.--RAPHAEL.]




  CHILD-LIFE IN ART
  BY
  ESTELLE M. HURLL, M.A.


  Illustrated


    Children are God's apostles, day by day
    Sent forth to preach of love and hope and peace.
                                          LOWELL.


  BOSTON
  JOSEPH KNIGHT COMPANY
  1895




  _Copyright, 1894,_
  BY JOSEPH KNIGHT COMPANY.


  University Press:
  JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.




PREFACE.


The subject of this little book is its best claim upon public favor.
Child-life in every form appeals with singular force to the sympathies
of all. In palace and in cottage, in the city and in the country,
childhood reigns supreme by the divine right of love. No monarch rules
more mightily than the infant sovereign in the Kingdom of Home, and none
more beneficently. His advent brings a bit of heaven into our midst, and
we become more gentle and tender for the sacred influence. Every phase
of the growing young life is beautiful and interesting to us. Every new
mood awakens in us a sense of awe before unfolding possibilities for
good or evil.

The poetry of childhood is full of attractiveness to the artist,
and many and varied are the forms in which he interprets it. The
Christ-child has been his highest ideal. All that human imagination
could conceive of innocence and purity and divine loveliness has been
shown forth in the delineation of the Babe of Bethlehem. The influence
of such art has made itself felt upon all child pictures. It matters not
whether the subject be a prince or a street-waif; the true artist sees
in him something which is lovable and winning, and transfers it to his
canvas for our lasting pleasure.

Art has produced so many representations of children that it would be a
hopeless task to attempt a complete enumeration of them, and the book
makes no pretensions to exhaustiveness. The aim has been merely to
suggest a convenient outline of classification, and to describe a few
characteristic examples in each group. The nature of the undertaking
has, of course, necessitated consulting the works of many standard
authorities, to whom I gratefully acknowledge my indebtedness. The names
of the most prominent are included in the bibliographical list. While
faithfully studying their opinions, I have always reserved the right of
forming an independent estimate of any painting considered, especially
when, as in many cases, I have myself seen the original. I am under
great obligations to my friend Professor Anne Eugenia Morgan of
Wellesley for first showing me, through her philosophical
art-interpretations, the true meaning and value of the works of
the masters. From these interpretations I have drawn many of the
suggestions which are embodied in the descriptions of the following
pages.

While addressing lovers of children primarily, I have also hoped to
interest students in the history of art. I have therefore added a few
notes containing further details in regard to some of the subjects.

                                                        E. M. H.

NEW BEDFORD, MASS., June 1, 1894.




  CONTENTS.


  CHAPTER                                                  PAGE
    I. CHILDHOOD IN IDEAL TYPES                               3
   II. CHILDREN BORN TO THE PURPLE                           29
  III. THE CHILDREN OF FIELD AND VILLAGE                     57
   IV. THE CHILD-LIFE OF THE STREETS                         87
    V. CHILD-ANGELS                                         115
   VI. THE CHRIST-CHILD                                     141




  LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.


                                                                   PAGE

  SISTINE MADONNA                           Raphael       _Frontispiece_

  THE STRAWBERRY GIRL                       Reynolds                  7

  PENELOPE BOOTHBY                          Reynolds                 15

  ANGEL HEADS                               Reynolds                 19
      _From the original painting in the National Gallery, London._

  NATURE                                    Lawrence                 23

  PORTRAIT OF PRINCE JAMES, DUKE OF YORK    Van Dyck                 33
      _From a painting in San Luca, Rome, after the Turin portrait
      by Van Dyck._

  PORTRAIT OF PRINCESS MARY STUART AND
    PRINCE WILLIAM II. OF ORANGE            Van Dyck                 39
      _From the original painting in Amsterdam._

  PORTRAIT OF THE INFANTA MARIA THERESA     Velasquez                45
      _From the original painting in the Prado, Madrid._

  PORTRAIT OF THE INFANTA MARGUERITE        Velasquez                49
      _From the original painting in the Louvre, Paris._

  RUSTIC CHILDREN                           Gainsborough             59

  LA CRUCHE CASSEE (The Broken Pitcher)     Greuze                   71
      _From the original painting in the Louvre, Paris._

  CHILD'S HEAD                              Bouguereau               77

  THE LITTLE RABBIT SELLER                  Meyer von Bremen         81

  BEGGAR BOYS                               Murillo                  89
      _From the original painting in the Pinacothek, Munich._

  STREET ARABS                              Dorothy Tennant Stanley  98

  THE MEETING                               Marie Bashkirtseff      103
      _From the original painting in the Luxembourg, Paris._

  CASTLES IN SPAIN                          J. G. Brown             107

  GROUP OF ANGELS. From the Assumption      Titian                  119
      _From the original painting in the Academy, Venice._

  PIPING ANGEL. Detail of Frari Madonna     Bellini                 127
      _From the original painting in Venice._

  ANGEL. From Madonna and Child             Luigi Vivarini          131
      _From the original painting in the Church of Redentore, Venice._

  ANGEL. From the Vision of Saint Bernard   Filippino Lippi         135
      _From the original painting in the Badia, Florence._

  MADONNA OF THE CASA TEMPI                 Raphael                 147

  INFANT JESUS AND SAINT JOHN               Boucher                 155
      _From the original painting in the Uffizi, Florence._

  THE CHRIST-CHILD                          Deger                   159

  HEAD OF BOY CHRIST                        Hofmann                 163
      _Detail of Christ Disputing with the Doctors._


       *       *       *       *       *




I.

CHILDHOOD IN IDEAL TYPES.




    O child! O new-born denizen
    Of life's great city! on thy head
    The glory of the morn is shed,
    Like a celestial benison!
    Here at the portal thou dost stand,
    And with thy little hand
    Thou openest the mysterious gate
    Into the future's undiscovered land.
                            LONGFELLOW.




CHILD-LIFE IN ART.

CHAPTER I.

CHILDHOOD IN IDEAL TYPES.


If we could gather into one great gallery all the paintings of
child-life which the world has ever produced, there would be scattered
here and there some few works of a distinctly unique character, before
which we should rest so completely satisfied that we should quite forget
to look at any others. These choice gems are the work of those rare men
of genius who, looking beyond all trivial circumstances and individual
peculiarities, discovered the essential secrets of child-life, and
embodied them in ideal types. They are pictures of _childhood_, rather
than of _children_, representing those phases of thought and emotion
which are peculiar to the child as such, and which all children possess
in common. In their presence every mother spontaneously exclaims, "How
like my own little one!" because the artist has interpreted the real
child nature. Such pictures may justly take rank among the highest
productions of creative art, having proven their claim to greatness by
their unquestioned appeal to universal admiration.

In work of this kind one name alone is prominent, a name which England
is proud to claim as hers, but to which all the world pays honor,--the
name of Sir Joshua Reynolds, Prince of Child-painters. A simple-hearted
man, of sweet, kindly disposition, the great portrait-painter, bachelor
though he was, possessed in rare measure the mysterious gift of winning
the confidence of children. The great octagonal studio in Leicester
Square must have often resounded to the laughter of childish voices, as
he entertained his little patrons with the pet dogs and birds he used in
their portraits, and coaxed them into good nature with a thousand merry
tricks. Although the greater number of these little people belonged to
the most wealthy and aristocratic families in England, their pictures
do not in any way indicate their rank. Still less do they show any
distinguishing marks of the artificial age in which they lived. Dressed
in the simplest of costumes, of the sort which is never out of fashion
and always in the best taste, and posed in the natural attitudes of
unconscious grace, they are representatives of childhood, pure and
simple, rather than of any particular social class or historical period.

A list of Sir Joshua's child pictures may suitably begin with one
which, in his own opinion, is among the best and most original of all
his works. This is the Strawberry Girl, exhibited in 1773, and repeated
many times by the painter,--"not so much for the sake of profit," as
Northcote explains, "as for improvement." The model was the artist's
pretty niece, Miss Theophila ("Offy") Palmer, who was named for his
mother, and whom he loved as an own daughter.

The little girl stands with head slightly drooping, in the sweet, shy
way so natural to a timid child. The big eyes are lifted to ours half
confidingly, half timidly, while a smile hovers bewitchingly over the
mouth. A long, pointed basket hangs on one arm, and the plump hands are
folded together in front like a little woman's. The child wears a
curious round cap on her head, under which, presumably, her hair is
gathered up in womanly fashion, for there are no stray locks to be
seen except the two soft curves on the forehead. Altogether, the figure
presents just that odd commingling of dignity with childish timidity
which we so often notice in our own little maids, and which makes them
at once so lovable and so womanly.

[Illustration: THE STRAWBERRY GIRL.--REYNOLDS.]

Some fifteen years after Sir Joshua's niece posed as the Strawberry
Girl, her own little daughter, another "Offy," served the artist uncle
as the model for Simplicity. The great-niece was as lovely a child as
her mother had been, and critics agree in placing Simplicity among the
best works of the painter. The setting is a landscape, in the foreground
of which the child is seated, with her lap full of flowers. The sweet
face is turned aside in a somewhat pensive poise, and the exquisite
purity of its expression is exactly represented by the title. Of a
similar character is the Age of Innocence, which portrays a little girl
looking out into the world with wide eyes and parted lips, a complete
embodiment of the innocence of childhood on the threshold of life. The
face, which is presented in profile, is finely cut, and charmingly
framed in short, clustering curls.

In looking for ideal types among the child-pictures of Sir Joshua
Reynolds, we need by no means be confined to those which bear fancy
titles. His portraits are as truly interpretative as his imaginative
subjects, and each typifies a distinct element of child-life. The little
Miss Bowles sitting on the ground hugging her dog, and Master Bunbury
looking out of the canvas with breathless eagerness, arouse a universal
interest, which is entirely independent of their individuality. Miss
Frances Harris, the serene,