Various - Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, No. 359, September 1845

" November 2d. – The weather has been bad; but I do not at all regret being confined to this house. The mail did not arrive yesterday till many hours after the time, owing to some trees being blown down, and the waters out. * * * I am now going to breakfast before the Narcissus of Claude. How enchanting and lovely it is! far, very far, surpassing any other landscape I ever beheld. Write to me. Kiss and love my darlings. I hope my stay will not exceed this week."

In one of his letters from Cole-Orton to his wife, Constables says: —

"Sir George rises at seven, walks in the garden before breakfast, and rides out about two – fair or foul. We have had breakfast at half-past eight; but to-day we began at the winter hour – nine. We do not quit the breakfast-table directly, but chat a little about the pictures in the room. We then go to the painting-room, and Sir George most manfully sets to work, and I by his side. At two, the horses are brought to the door. I have had an opportunity of seeing the ruins of Ashby, the mountain stream and rocks (such Everdingens!) at Grace-Dieu, and an old convent there – Lord Ferrers' – a grand but melancholy spot. At dinner we do not sit long; Lady Beaumont reads the newspaper (the Herald ) to us; and then to the drawing-room to tea; and after that comes a great treat. I am furnished with some portfolios, full of beautiful drawings or prints, and Sir George reads a play in a manner the most delightful. On Saturday evening it was, 'As You Like It;' and I never heard the 'seven ages' so admirably read before. Last evening, Sunday, he read a sermon, and a good deal of Wordsworth's 'Excursion.' Some of the landscape descriptions in it are very beautiful. About nine, the servant comes in with a little fruit and a decanter of water; and at eleven we go to bed. I always find a fire in my room, and make out about an hour longer, as I have every thing there – writing-desk, &c. – and I grudge a moment's unnecessary sleep in this place. You would laugh to see my bed-room, I have dragged so many things into it – books, portfolios, prints, canvasses, pictures, &c."

" November 9. – How glad I was, my dear love, to receive your last kind letter, giving a good account of yourself and our dear babies. * * * Nothing shall, I hope, prevent my seeing you this week; indeed I am quite nervous about my absence, and shall soon begin to feel alarmed about the Exhibition. * * * I do not wonder at your being jealous of Claude. If any thing could come between our love, it is him. I am fast advancing a beautiful little copy of his study from nature of a little grove scene. If you, my dearest love, will be so good as to make yourself happy without me for this week, it will, I hope, be long before we part again. But, believe me, I shall be the better for this visit as long as I live. Sir George is never angry, or pettish, or peevish, and though he loves painting so much, it does not harass him. You will like me a great deal better than you did. To-morrow Southey is coming with his wife and daughter. I know you would be sorry if I were not to stay and meet him, he is such a friend of Gooch's; but the Claudes, the Claudes, are all, all, I can think of here. * * * The weather is so bad that I can scarcely see out of the window, but Friday was lovely. I shall hardly be able to make you a sketch of the house, but I shall bring you much, though in little compass, to show you. * * * Thursday was Sir George's birth-day. Sixty-nine, and married almost half a century. The servants had a ball, and I was lulled to sleep by a fiddle."

" November 18. – My dearest love, * * * I was very glad to hear a very nice account of you and my dear babies. * * * I shall finish my little Claude on Thursday; and then I shall have something to do to some of Sir George's pictures, that will take a day or two more, and then home. * * * I sent you a hasty shabby line by Southey, but all that morning I had been engaged on a little sketch in Miss Southey's album of this house, which pleased all parties here very much. Sir George is loath to part with me. He would have me pass Christmas with him, and has named a small commission which he wished me to execute here; but I have declined it, as I am desirous to return. Sir George is very kind, and I have no doubt meant this little picture to pay my expenses. I have worked so hard in the house, that I never went out of the door last week, so that I am getting quite nervous. But I am sure my visit here will be ultimately of the greatest advantage to me, and I could not be better employed to the advantage of all of us, by its making me so much more of an artist. * * * The breakfast bell rings. I now hasten to finish, as the boy waits. I really think seeing the habits of this house will be of service to me as long as I live. Every thing so punctual. Sir George never looks into his painting-room on a Sunday, nor trusts himself with a portfolio. Never is impatient. Always rides or walks for an hour or two, at two o'clock; so will I with you, if it is only into the square. I amuse myself, every evening, making sketches from Sir George's drawings about Dedham, &c. I could not carry all his sketch-books. * * * I wish I had not cut myself out so much to do here; but I was greedy with the Claudes."

In his next letter to his wife, Constable deplores the facility with which he allowed his time to be consumed by loungers in his painting-room – an evil his good-nature to the last entailed on him. Mrs Constable in one of her letters had said: – "Mr **** was here nearly an hour on Saturday, reading the paper and talking to himself. I hope you will not admit him so often. Mr ****, another lounger, has been here once or twice."

" Cole-Orton Hall, November. 21st. – My dearest love, I am as heartsick as ever you can be at my long absence from you, and all our dear darlings, but which is now fast drawing to a close. In fact, my greediness for pictures made me cut out for myself much more work than I ought to have undertaken at this time. One of the Claudes would have been all that I wanted, but I could not get at that first, and I had been here a fortnight before I began it. To-day it will be done, with perhaps a little touch on Saturday morning. I have then an old picture to fill up some holes in. But I fear I shall not be able to get away on Saturday, though I hope nothing shall prevent me on Monday. I can hardly believe I have not seen you, or my Isabel, or my Charley, for five weeks. Yesterday there was another very high wind and such a splendid evening as I never before beheld at this time of the year Was it so with you? But in London nothing is to be seen, worth seeing, in the NATURAL way.

"I certainly will not allow of such serious interruptions as I used to do from people who devour my time, brains and every thing else. Sir George says it is quite serious and alarming. Let me have a letter on Sunday, my last day here, as I want to be made comfortable on my journey, which will be long and tiresome, and I shall be very nervous as I get near home; therefore, pray let me have a good account of you all. I believe some great folks are coming here in December, which Sir George dreads, as they so much interfere with his painting habits; for no artist can be fonder of the art."

" November 25th. – My very dearest love, I hope nothing will prevent my leaving this place to-morrow afternoon and that I shall have you in my arms on Thursday morning, and my babies; Oh, dear! how glad I shall be. I feel that I have been AT SCHOOL, and can only hope that my long absence from you may ultimately be to my great and lasting improvement as an artist, and indeed in every thing. If you have any friends staying with you, I beg you will dismiss them before my arrival."

We have already said we have no intention of going through the meagre incidents in the life of Constable. He was elected an Academician in 1829 after the death of his wife, which took place the year before. Much as he was pleased at the attainment of the honour, he could not help saying, "It has been delayed till I am solitary and cannot impart it." He could not add with Johnson, "until I am known and do not want it ;" for probably no painter of equal genius was at that time less generally known in his own country. Two days before, he writes, "I have just received a commission to paint a mermaid for a sign to an inn in Warwickshire! This is encouraging, and affords no small solace after my previous labours on landscape for twenty years."