Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol I (1901).djvu/409

Burton conclusion may be drawn from the considerably higher price paid for it at the time, was a still finer work, but was unfortunately burnt with a number of other pictures at an exhibition in London. A scene from ‘The Two Foscari,’ produced in 1842, seems to have been Burton’s only genre picture for several years. The demand upon his skill in portraiture kept him fully occupied down to the end of 1857. His portraits were marked by so much subtlety of expression, as well as beauty of execution, that the best people in Dublin thronged his studio, and his portraits became precious heirlooms in their families. Every year showed an advance in the mastery of this branch of art. It reached its highest point in two large drawings of Helen Faucit—onestanding as Antigone, the other seated in private dress. These were exhibited in the Royal Academy in 1839, and placed him among the leading water-colour painters of the day. For the next two years he remained in Dublin, fully occupied in painting portraits, true as likenesses, but with the added charm only to be given by the artist gifted with the power of showing the soul behind the face.

Burton’s handsome features, his peculiar distinction of manner, and great intelligence gave him at this time a distinguished place in Dublin society. He numbered among his intimate friends Dr. Stokes, Dr. Graves, Bishop Graves, Dr. James Todd, Lord Dunraven, Samuel Ferguson, Thomas Davies, Anster, Sir Thomas Larcom—in short, every man in Dublin who was eminent in science, archæology, law, literature, or art. With some of these he was actively associated in the council of the Royal Irish Academy and in the foundation of the Archæological Society of Ireland. During this period he occasionally visited Germany, where he began his studies of the old masters, which he afterwards prosecuted in all the galleries of Europe. While in Munich in 1844 he was engaged by the king of Bavaria to make copies of pictures, and also to restore some of the pictures in the royal collection.

At the end of 1851 Burton left Dublin for Germany, and settled in Munich, which formed his headquarters for the next seven years. During this period he made himself thoroughly familiar with all the German galleries, went deeply into the study of German art work in all its branches, and made innumerable studies for future use in flowers, landscape, figures, and costume. He also completed several elaborate drawings, which he brought over with him on his annual visits to London, the results of his wanderings in the forests of Franconia, in Nuremberg, Bamberg, and the villages of Muggendorf and Wöhlm. Of these the most distinguished were: ‘Peasantry of Franconia waiting for Confession,’ the ‘Procession in Bamberg Cathedral,’ and ‘The Widow of Wöhlm.’ Of the last of these the ‘Times’ wrote (7 May 1859): ‘No early master, not Hemling or Van Eyck, not Martin Schon, Cranach, or Holbein, ever painted an individual physiognomy more conscientiously than Mr. Burton has painted this widow. And with all the old master’s care, the modern draughtsman has immeasurably more refinement than any of them.’ This criticism well expresses the quality of Burton’s work. In luminous strength and harmony of colour, in truth to nature, in depth and sincerity of feeling, he recalled Mabuse, Van Eyck, and other great early masters, but he added to these qualities an accuracy of line, a refinement and suggestiveness of expression, with a pervading sense of beauty, which marked the hand and heart of an original as well as a highly accomplished artist. These qualities were quickly recognised, his drawings were eagerly sought for, and now, whenever they come into the market, fetch very high prices. They led to his admission, in 1855, as an associate of the ‘Old’ (now Royal) Water Colour Society, and to his promotion to full membership in 1856. Year by year until 1870 his drawings formed a conspicuous feature in the exhibitions of the society. They were few in number, for he worked slowly, sparing no pains to bring them up to the highest point of completeness, and retarded by a serious affection of his eyes which made continuous labour dangerous. Among the most conspicuous of these drawings were his ‘Iostephane,’ ‘Cassandra Fidele, the Muse of Venice,’ ‘Faust’s First Sight of Margaret,’ ‘The Meeting on the Turret Stairs’ (now in the National Gallery, Dublin), a life-size half-length portrait of Mrs. George Murray Smith (as powerful in effect as though painted in oil), and the portrait (in chalk) of ‘George Eliot’ (now in the National Portrait Gallery). During these years and on to 1874 Burton was unremitting in his studies of the history of art from its earliest epochs down to modern times. The lives as well as the works of all the great artists were made the subject of wide research. To his knowledge of the best literature of Italy, Germany, France, and England he was always making additions, and in all that concerned the antiquities of Ireland and its music he kept pace with those who had made them their special study. In 1863 he was elected a fellow of the London Society of