Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 9.djvu/355

Rh ever incident of the great drama might be best fitted for his purpose. The choice was made by the king himself, and the subject was his admission into the palace of Hulyrood. This painting, like the rest of Wilkie's productions, was admirably executed; but there were difficulties in the way which no genius could surmount. One was the taste of the king himself, who suggested alterations which the artist found himself obliged to follow; the other was the bizarre costume that predominated on the occasion, by which Edinburgh itself was converted into a huge bale of tartan. At this period, also, he was appointed limner to the king for Scotland, in consequence of the death of Sir Henry Raeburn. While fully occupied with the two great paintings above-mentioned, Wilkie, during the intervals, painted the portrait of Lord Kellie for the townhall of Cupar, drew an old Greenwich pensioner under the character of Smollett's Commodore Trunnion, and executed a scene from Ramsay's "Gentle Shepherd," which he called "The Cottage Toilet." He also painted "Smugglers Offering Run Goods for Sale," for Sir Robert Peel, and "The Highland Family," for Sir George Beaumont, his affectionate friend and munificent patron.

The pressure of severe work, aggravated by the death of his mother and brother, made travelling once more necessary; and accordingly, in the middle of 1825, Wilkie set off to Paris, and afterwards proceeded to Italy. Milan, Genoa, and Florence were successively visited, and their galleries of paintings studied and admired. He then went to Rome, but the paintings in the Vatican failed to excite in him that supreme rapture which it was so much the fashion of our travelling artists to express. He seems to have been more highly gratified with the Sistine Chapel, from the ceiling of which Michael Angelo's "Last Judgment" looked down upon him in all its richness, and with all its terrors. It was here that he especially loved to muse and study, while his journal of this period is filled with criticisms of this sublime production and its matchless author. Naples, Bologna, Padua, Parma, and Venice, were also visited by the earnest contemplative tourist, and the remarks of his journal evince the profound attention he bestowed upon the paintings of the ancient masters, that constitute the richest inheritance of these once illustrious cities. After a stay of eight months in Italy, Wilkie found his health no better than when he arrived, and resolved, for change of air, to make a visit to Germany. But, indeed, there were painful causes to retard his recovery, against which his heart could not easily rally. A company had become bankrupt in which the most part of his pecuniary savings for years had been invested; and in addition to this, a bond by which he had engaged to be security for his brother, who became insolvent, was forfeited. He had thus, while languidly moving from place to place in quest of health, the prospect of ruin meeting him wherever he turned. Finding no remedy from the climate of Germany, or the use of the baths of Toplitz and Carlsbad, he again returned to Italy, by advice of his physicians, to winter there in 1826-7.

If anything could lighten the weight of such an amount of suffering, Wilkie must have found it in the universal respect with which he was treated abroad, both by countrymen and strangers. His fame as an artist had been wafted over Europe by the admirable engravings of Raimbach and Burnet, in which his best productions had been faithfully copied; and in Rome, where he now took up his abode, the "Eternal City" was moved through all its ranks to welcome him, and do him honour. Alluding to a high festival made there by the British artists on his account, at which the Duke of Hamilton presided, he