Page:Constable by C. J. Holmes.djvu/48

 Bonington were welcomed, as the writings of Scott and Byron had been welcomed, not so much for their actual merit, though this was generally admitted and sometimes exaggerated, but as indicating the lines on which the desired departure was possible.

In the course of a century and a half the logical side of the French character had stiffened the stern canons of Poussin till they had lost all relation either to nature or to art. The revolt from this academic severity was of necessity violent. Its leaders met with bitter opposition, while even those who tried to effect some kind of compromise could not escape scot-free. The life of Theodore Rousseau, who bore the brunt of the attack, is one long series of struggles and rebuffs, with but brief intervals of rest and success. To some extent, undoubtedly, the painter himself was to blame. An eternal striving for nature and for novelty too often overstrained a technical accomplishment that was far from complete, so that he is frequently unworthy of his reputation. He lacked the stores of experience that Constable had accumulated by unceasing study of the old masters, and in their place had little more than the intention of being sincere at all costs.

To catch the broken shifting forms of clouds and trees in motion, Constable had discarded the shapely brush-strokes which had characterized all fine painting before his time, and, towards the end of his life, indulged in pats and dots and scrapings of pigment applied with the palette-knife. Nevertheless, he retained much of the traditional breadth and simplicity in the shadows and other quiet portions of his work. Courbet, in the effort to get away from academic methods, did all he could to prevent his touch from being shapely. His pictures, in consequence, are sometimes little more than expanses of rough, worried, clumsy paint. Constable based his work upon a chiaroscuro sketch in monochrome which united the colours and tones and masses into a connected whole. Courbet trusted to chance for unity, and therefore did not always get it. Constable glazed with great care, delicacy, and skill. Courbet, where he did not leave his paint raw just as it came from his brush, was content with a general rubbing of thin colour.

In the work of Corot and Millet the effects of the Revolution were less marked, for both, like Constable, never forgot the main points of the traditional technique. In Corot we get the modern raw pigment, the modern spottiness, the modern shapeless 28