Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 9.djvu/360

624 The chief difficulty was with the living models, a few native Indian soldiers, who happened to be in London, and were engaged for the task; but no sooner were they grouped, and placed in proper attitudes, than they were seized with a fit of horror, at the thought of personating the death-scene of the mighty Sultan, so that they would "play out the play" no longer. In spite of all difficulties, however, the painting was successfully finished at the close of 1838. Of this choice production of Sir David Wilkie, we would only notice one of the several striking incidents which the talent of the artist has brought out on this occasion. It is, that while Sir David Baird is contemplating with emotion the body of the tyrant who had so cruelly treated him when a captive, the feet of the dead man are lying beside the iron-grated door of the dungeon in which his conqueror had been unjustly immured.

Before this picture was finished, important political events had furnished Sir David with a new national subject. This was the death of William IV., and the accession of our present gracious sovereign, Queen Victoria. As Wilkie's appointment of Painter in Ordinary was once more renewed, it was fitting that his talents should be exercised for the occasion, and accordingly he was commissioned to paint "The Queen Holding her First Council." He boldly commenced the subject, though with a full anticipation of the difficulty, where every member was unwilling to be placed in the back-ground, or be overshadowed by his neighbour. Notwithstanding the number of portraits it contained, it was finished in little more than six months, and introduced into the exhibition of 1838, along with five other paintings, four of which were portraits ; and not the least remarkable of these was one of Daniel O'Connell. But the most congenial of all his occupations for a considerable period had been a picture of "John Knox Administering the Sacrament in Calder House," which Wilkie designed as a companion to that of the Reformer preaching before the Lords of the Congregation. Here he was again upon his own Scottish ground, and among congenial characters; so that from this, as well as the ardour with which he prosecuted the subject, and the maturity into which his artistic experience had ripened, it was hoped that it would prove the most successful of all his efforts. Nor was the hope unfounded, although he did not live to complete the picture; for in the two advanced sketches of it, which appeared in the auction of his paintings after his death, the promise was already more than half fulfilled.

We have thus brought Wilkie to the year 1840, at the exhibition of which he had eight paintings—and to the age of fifty-five, at which either a rapid decay of life commences, or such an invigoration as holds out the promise that the full threescore and ten of a healthy old age will be attained. The autumn of this year found him in the full bustle of preparation for a long and adventurous journey, in which the Continent, Turkey, Egypt, and the Holy Land, were to be successively traversed. At the intelligence, not only his brother artists but the public were astounded. Was it as a painter or a pilgrim that he meant to travel? Was the search of health or the Holy Sepulchre the ultimatum of his wishes? In the midst of all this wonder and inquiry Sir David Wilkie departed—and his country saw him no more !

As this was the last, it was also the most important of his journeys, and therefore cannot be briefly dismissed. He left England on the 15th of August, 1840, and was accompanied by Mr. William Woodburn, an attached friend, as well as a lover of the Fine Arts. Their place of landing was the Hague, after