Another installment of dining with history. Today four silver second course dishes from the extravagant service commissioned by the richest commoner in England, William Thomas Beckford (1759-1844), kindred spirit.

by Dr. Jeffrey Lant

 Author's program note. The catalog entry for Lot 65 in Sotheby's 23 January, 2014  "Of Royal And Noble Descent" sale was arid and sharply descriptive in the usual  fashion:

 "Four Georgian second course dishes, one Smith & Sharp, one John Robins, two  Philip Rundell for Rundell, Bridge & Rundell, London, respectively 1781, 1809 and  1823.

 circular, engraved with a coat of arms below applied gadroon borders.

 10 1/4 in. diameter 2786 gr. 89 oz. 12 dwt."

 All standard, nothing to elevate your blood pressure. Then the facts that did the  trick for these were part of the lavish commission ordered by William Thomas  Beckford, the wonder, the envy of England, inheriting as he did, just 10 years old,  over one million pounds sterling, the equivalent of over 117 million pounds in today's  money. At once the greatest race of the 18th century began, between an  imaginative young man with money to burn and a colossal fortune that dwarfed  even his breathtaking ability to spend it... at least for a time.

 The music.

 William Beckford was many things... visionary, aesthete, connoisseur, with a  plethora of talents, skills, abilities and perfect, unrivalled taste. Taste that he shows  in the music I have selected to accompany this article, the "Arcadian Pastoral". Now  the fact that he was a composer of elegance and finesse is not the wonder.  Many cultivated gentlemen of this time of radiant enlightenment were that and produced  their share of limpid, even beguiling notes accordingly.

 What makes Beckford's composition still worth the listening is that he had both talent  and the instructor par excellence, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, a felicitous pairing  for even this scion of unrivalled Croesus. The result, of course, isn't Mozart. Nothing  but the inimitable original could be that... but the result is good, pleasing to the ear, a  work one calls nice, not bad, really not bad at all, (as you can see in any search engine).

 That description would have infuriated Beckford... and spurred him to work harder and  harder still to prove just how good he really was. But here he missed the point of  his astonishing life, for he was not destined to be known as a master of music... or of  painting... or architecture... or literature... or of any other of his broad range of achievements  and always workmanlike results. No, indeed. His genius was himself, a phenomenon  at once unique, unparalleled, without peer or equal. This was William Thomas Beckford,  and great England had never beheld such a creation as this... and never would again  to the general impoverishment of the people and their ability to dream and imagine.

 Born into the plutocracy.

 To understand  Beckford, you must understand his world, for he was a fortunate son  not of the upper gentry and titled nobility. No, indeed. His ancestors were the merchant  adventurers who made England the very byword of wealth, the object of every nimble  fingered thief and confidence man, including any number of marauders, dictators and  self-proclaimed generals with expensive tastes, high aspirations and an army readily  available with dreams of avarice and untrammeled plunder.

 Beckford was precisely the kind of fellow whose capacious pockets they meant to pick if  Rule Britannia's oceanic resources should ever waver for even a moment. Such people  lived at a level of stupendous excess, mind-blowing extravagance, lavish immoderation...  the way in which we'd all like to live, not to mention that their unending wealth went  untaxed, social nirvana indeed.

 How rich were they? Well, consider this comment from a visiting English aristocrat  when he first saw Thomas Jefferson's always-in-process, never-quite-finished mansion Monticello.

 "My horses live better than Mr. Jefferson," he sniffed. And he was right , for England's  countryside was littered with palaces not just grandiloquently named pretensions,  "Monticello", indeed. There was nothing "little" about the world into which the Beckford  heir was born. It was as solid as the Bank of England -- and slave labor -- could  make it.

 We don't have to wonder what this world was like; the insightful pen of Jane Austen's  genius makes it entirely apparent, particularly in her beloved favorite, "Mansfield Park",  published in 1814. In it the source of Sir Thomas Bertram's wealth is hinted at rather  than robustly disclosed.

 "Estates", it says. In the "West Indies", it says, with the veil of obscurity thrown over  all the often troubling details, for even by Beckford's early years slavery was already  a hot potato for England's governing class, the less said the better, excused by the  glib response that, after all, all the great civilizations were based on slavery, particularly  those of Ancient Greece and Rome which constituted the models and basis for learning  of every young English gentleman.

 Que voulez vous? What can one do about it?, and how is dear Lady Bertram and her  adorable pug?

 Daddy

 If there were any justice in this world (there isn't), the hero of this tale would be the  young heir's piously unlamented father, William Beckford, Senior.  He was the very  essence of John Bull's plutocracy, twice Lord Mayor of the City of London, a man of  turtle soup, the roast beef of Olde England, God Save the King, and the extensive  sugar plantations in Jamaica that coined money for a man who knew the value of  hard work and was of an entrepreneurial disposition... He did and he was.

 One fact shines a bright light on his considerable popularity and political acumen.  It is reported that on one notable occasion six dukes, two marquises, twenty  three earls, four viscounts, and fourteen barons gathered to honor him, then fell to  demolishing a repast beyond Lucullan. It was gutling on a heroic scale, and upon its  belching conclusion the gentlemen of England uncinched their belts in honor of  Beckford, hip, hip, hurrah, God love 'im!

 Sadly, one senses the refined, sensitive heir didn't much venerate his sire for all that  his monument graced the Guildhall. This is a not uncommon phenomenon. The first  generation begins the dirty business of grubbing for money. Money is the goal, the  aspiration, the very god for this generation. Such people are tenacious and keep every  penny ever earned. Such people say "Do you think money grows on trees?" and other  pointed aphorisms for the feckless and so they become notorious for getting their  money's worth, and more.

 The second, helped by the substantial parental leg-up of the first, ascends further  faster. They are determined to erase any trace of where their comfortable capital  derives. This would be Beckford Senior.

 The third is thereby free to posture and preen as that most desirable of creatures, the  English gentleman, sustained by wealth that is called "old money" and used to gild  the already gilded lily. This most assuredly is William Thomas  Beckford, the very  acme of the genre, a many splendored thing, splendidly accoutered, perfectly turned  out, every solid gold crested button gleaming, a non-pareil of the first order... a man  who has everything but the knack for making money.

 However, what did that matter when there was so very much of it as for Beckford  there surely was? And so he set about the unutterably fascinating, all consuming task  of living as a grand seigneur should live, summoning the purveyors of the best of  everything to provide for him, to serve him, to cater to and perfect him, thereby  enabling him to become the apogee of his wonderful, dazzling, awesome self.

 And so he traveled to the best of places and met the best of people. People craved  the honor of his acquaintance especially if there was tangible benefit to be derived,  as there usually was. He was given a seat in Parliament, first at Wells (1784-1790),  then Hindon (1790-1795, then again from 1806-1820). Whether they got any  benefit from his election is doubtful, but they were no doubt proud and grateful  to add M.P. to his thinly lettered name and so enhance his worldly renown, the  most important thing in life, the only thing worth having, the thing beside which  all else paled, dull and profitless.

 "Vathek", "Beckford's Folly", renown written in perpetual ink and in transient stone.

 Once he had this insight he began to live it. And so, just 26 years old he sat down and,  in French, wrote ""Vathek", a Gothic novel. Like so many first books by young authors  this one was overwritten, too many words, too many characters, too many  misconceptions, and a plot line that went too many places all at once. Still, it offered  what only youth can offer... energy, unfettered imagination, boldness and a belief not  yet tarnished in love and miracles. Thus the reading public took this ungainly book to  its heart and has never forgotten it unlike so many better written books without a soul.  Thus Beckford gained his place in history... a place Fonthill Abbey secured forever.

 Today Fonthill is just a place on a map, a handful of rocks in Wiltshire's lovely  countryside. But in 1796 when construction began it was Beckford's exuberant vision  of what living could be if only one was bold enough to dream. The result was Fonthill  Abbey, "Beckford's Folly", a place into which Beckford poured not just his money but his  yearning soul.

 And because he was Beckford of England his pied a terre had to be the biggest, the  grandest, the most extravagantly appointed, the dernier cri in everything...  not  least a central tower that he insisted scrape the sky.

 This first attempt to achieve this goal reached 300 feet and collapsed; the second also  reached 300 feet and collapsed. His third vainglorious attempt spewed its stones across  the countryside... This was the end of everything...the money, of course, had been frittered  away as heirs in the third generation will do.

 He never did get his peerage and become Lord Beckford there was that unsavory  business with William Courtenay, later 9th Earl of Devon, just 10 years old when  Beckford met him and commenced the juiciest of scandals, so delightful for his many  envious detractors who saw the very hand of God in this comeuppance.    It all ate away at his patrimony... and his bright shining renown, now sadly tarnished.  And so it went until in 1844 he died in comparative obscurity... his fortune now just  80,000 pounds sterling; more than enough for most any man but not for this particular  man and the dreams which cost him so much.

 Envoi.

 Beckford's silver service, opulent indeed as you may imagine, was bequeathed along  with so much else to his daughter Susan Euphemia (1786-1859). She married  Alexander Hamilton,10th Duke of Hamilton through whom these handsome pieces  in excellent condition have descended. They are now resident here in Cambridge,  a place of clever youth and young savants with esoteric interests. He would have  loved being here... as I do who will keep these plates in good order for the next  generation. And, yes, I shall most surely use them and invite my special friends  to do so, including the shade of William Thomas Beckford, kindred spirit.



About the Author Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is an avid collector, as well as author of 18 best selling business and marketing books, several ebooks and over one thousand online articles. Republished with author's permission by Ruthsella Corasol http://WorkingAtHome101.com.

'A boy! A boy! My kingdom for a boy!' On Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI,his dilemma, and an over-the-top picture of eye-popping grandeur and allegory.

by  Dr. Jeffrey Lant.

Author's Program Note. No royal court in Europe was more musically inclined than the imperial Habsburgs who ruled their vast real estate from the most melodious of capitals, Wien. Or as you would say, Vienna. To be a prince of this dynasty (called archdukes) was an honorable thing of course, a matter of dignity and respect.

But to be an emperor or even an archduke who was an accomplished musician was marvelous... and when this valued being composed, too, why this was very heaven and deserving of every paean and veneration. For the Habsburgs were the most fortunate of princes; to rule over a people as cosmopolitan and sophisticated as they were, with taste refined, pure, cultivated to the highest degree.

Their subjects realized such accomplished and refined princes were rare, and so gave them a fidelity less humane sovereigns could only envy but never emulate. As it turned out the last male ruler in his line was the Emperor Charles VI (1685-1740). Today I tell his story... and unveil one of the most magnificent pictures of his reign... the great day he, God's vicegerant on Earth, was crowned King of Bohemia, September 5, 1723.

For such an occasion, for such a man music, great music is required and what better than a brave little piece written by Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, two of whose musically inclined sons (Joseph I and Charles VI) became emperors, too. This piece is called "Lasset Ihr Stemen", and you'll find it in any search engine. Go now. You'll need to practice your courtly leaps and gambols; the music will provide the necessary clues about just when to jump and with what elasticity and exquisite precision...

The problem, the tragedy of Charles VI's life.

Charles VI was a man of taste, an aesthete, a connoisseur. He was also a prince of the first magnitude; a necessary cog in the complicated wheel of European statecraft.  At the time his childless cousin of Spain, Charles II, lay a long time dying Archduke Charles was not the next heir to Austria's empire. That was his older brother Joseph I.

But to the inconvenience of all, Joseph died, thus making his archducal brother Holy Roman Emperor and, due to the carefully contrived marriages of his canny predecessors, plausible heir to even greater lands, specifically those of Spain where his sickly cousin Charles II still lingered, a man whose only remaining importance was his much desired death... and who would get the glittering inheritance, about one sixth of the globe.

Two princes claimed the riches of the dons; Philip of Anjou, the French candidate; and the man now called Emperor Charles VI. Should Spanish King Charles select his imperial cousin, the great empire of Charles V would be revived, to the unmitigated detriment of both England and France. That, the disadvantaged all agreed, would never do.

And so King Louis XIV of France reluctantly allowed Philip of Anjou to accept the throne of Spain (as Philip III) and so began the draining, interminable War of the Spanish Succession. From Austria's standpoint it was not a "good" war. Along the way, their shrewd ally England, recreating their immemorial role as "Perfidious Albion", deserted the imperial cause thus allowing Philip III to stay on the Spanish throne. The condition was that the crowns of Spain and France must never be linked.

The bone tossed to Charles VI was a goodly part of the Netherlands. For all that he didn't triumph, France, victor, came out worse; desolate, bankrupt, exhausted. Such was the price of victory and the monarchical structure of Europe.  Things got better for Imperial Charles, and worse.

The real estate agents called Habsburg did what they always did: added properties, traded properties, bargained properties, married properties, ventured properties, lost properties. They were Europe's realtors, and they consistently got more than they gave up; garnering the crown of Bohemia in 1711; that of restless Hungary in 1712; trading Spain in 1738 Sicily and Naples for the gracious duchies of Parma and Piacenza.

This is what being a Habsburg meant and Charles VI played the great game as well as any of his imperial brethren. But he had to finesse his one glaring problem, the succession; the first task of a dynast. Charles produced two daughters but a brigade of such princesses was not the equal of a single prince. He needed that prince and a spare, and his need was urgent.

Thus the head of House Habsburg, the very model of monarchical tradition, canvassed a radical solution to the matter; a solution that would keep the succession to his own kin, never mind they were female, and so avoid another of Europe's debilitating wars of succession. It was called the Pragmatic Sanction and, bribe by bribe, concession by lucrative concession, the princes of Europe came on board with pledges of adherence hardly one had any intention of actually keeping. It was all part of the scheming that was sovereignty. Duplicity was the true droit de seigneur.

Revolutionary, unprecedented solution; ultra traditional presentation.

The Pragmatic Sanction was finalized in 1713. It was crucial to disguise just how unprecedented it was. And that's where Johann George Bohm (1673-1746) and his exuberant, signed and imperially commissioned "Allegory of the Coronation of Emperor Charles VI as King of Bohemia in Prague on 5th September 1723" comes in.

It may well be the most significant and is certainly the most glorious representation of monarchical legitimacy ever painted, bold in its objective, audacious in its purpose, a picture offering the strongest possible support to the legitimist principle and its current representative and champion, Charles VI by the Grace of God...

An allegory, a declaration, an assertion, a conviction, a proof.

Every picture contains a message, but in few pictures is that message as abundantly clear, striking, fierce and even bombastic as this one, which seeks, indeed demands, nothing less than your total belief in and submission to the unquestioned doctrine that this man and his dynasty are the favored and elect of God. It goes about elucidating this fact in the following way: by picturing the Coronation in Prague as grand theater, operatic, uplifting, inspiring, an event of grace and apotheosis.

Thus, the work offers a plethora of signs, symbols, and images, each with its individual task of supporting and hammering home the essential message: that the Emperor specifically and the entire dynasty generally are of God, ordained by God, sustained by God, forever and ever and that submission to these God-sanctified Habsburgs is mandatory, unalterable, eternal. Amen.

Let us take a closer look at the symbolic richness of this picture where each item and every representation is there to carry the overriding message and in as many ways remind the viewer that here is perpetual truth, no cavil or reservation of any kind permitted.

And so we see the sovereigns, Charles VI and his consort Elisabeth Christine of Braunschweig-Wolfenbuttel under a soaring cloth of state, the double headed eagle picked out in gold and their imperial monograms. The imperial couple are surrounded by personifications of the virtues intended to characterize the reign of the new Bohemian king. Amongst them Charity, represented with the arms of the city of Prague, their new kingdom's capital. Pheme floats above this group with the trumpet of fame. In the right foreground Chronos, father of Zeus, God of time, pulls back the curtain of history which cannot but bless this king, his dynasty, his reign which can only be happy ordained as it is by God Himself and His (Roman Catholic) church.

Now the question must be answered: who painted this magnificent declaration, this encyclical of color and splendor? Bohm. Johann George Bohm, Master, a man who knew his craft; the art of presenting royalty exactly as it wished to be seen by itself and all lesser folk. As such Bohm was welcomed wherever fastidious royalty needed his essential talent, amongst them the Courts of Saxony and Poland.

Lot 620, "Alte Meister", Dorotheum, 18 April, 2012.

It would be wrong to say it was love at first sight; rather it was lust, desire, and anxiety. It was something so perfect for my collection it might have been commissioned by me. As such it threw all my good resolutions about thrift, planning and self-control right out the window. I could only hope my valued conservator of over 3 dozen pictures would find flaws so grave even his genius would not suffice. But this is the magic of Simon Gillespie, Cleveland Street, London. If the picture can be restored to its pristine allure, then his triumph and the picture's future are assured even for objects as badly off as this daunting masterpiece, a skein of thousands of cracks, damages, imperfections, and assorted troubles on an imperial scale.

Surely this time even Simon might quail. But he did not quail. And so the master who painted this demanding masterpiece came to be admirably served by the master who saved the work from its pitiful downward spiral of distress, desolation, and despair.

Thus Gillespie and team went to work with a will, investing over 600 hours of their practised expertise, bringing the picture back one fraction of an inch after another, patience and a hand made sable hair brush the crucial tools. By such pains the picture and its splendid original frame with the Crown of Bohemia above all were restored, resplendent, a thing as proud as the sovereign who commissioned the work, and far more successful than he.

For you see, the great work of his reign, ensuring that the empire complete and indivisible was successfully passed to his daughter Archduchess Maria Theresa, crashed before his mortal remains were even cool; royal marauders, all sworn to support the Pragmatic Sanction, broke their solemn vows and grabbed what they could as fast as they could.

Now this picture, 117 x 89 cm, saved for the future, has come to its new home here in Cambridge, where I, the son of Puritans, carefully protect not just this imperial work... but a room full of Habsburgs, all in radiant condition. And so the present, in the persons of Simon Gillespie and me, has kept faith with a past we value, particularly in its artful manifestations. We have here worked to preserve; worked to maintain; and worked to secure... all tasks worth doing... all tasks done well.

About the Author

Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Services include home business training, affiliate marketing training, earn-at-home programs, traffic tools, advertising, webcasting, hosting, design, WordPress Blogs and more. Find out why Worldprofit is considered the # 1 online Home Business Training program by getting a free Associate Membership today. Republished with author's permission by Ruthsella Corasol http://WorkingAtHome101.com

'I may know nothing about art...

by  Dr. Jeffrey Lant.

Author's program note. One day in 1901 at the beginning of his long-deferred reign, the new and enthusiastic 60-year-old sovereign Edward VII by the Grace of God king, emperor, ruler of plum properties everywhere on Earth, was surveying his picture collection at Buckingham Palace (itself worth a king's ransom) along with Frederick "Fritz" Ponsonby, later Lord Sysonby (1867-1935).

Fritz was one of those most useful of beings; a man who had grown up in a courtly family; his father was Sir Henry Ponsonby, Queen Victoria's long-time private secretary. He was a courtier to his finger tips, knowing all the ins and outs and where all the bodies were buried. Such a man was expected to be available at the monarch's slightest command, know everything, say nothing... and do it all for a pittance. Oh, yes, such people were useful indeed.

On this particular day, the new king and young Fritz were surveying the picture galleries which still had the dour mark of Queen Victoria on them. This meant the greatest masterpieces of the greatest European masters cheek by jowl, higgledy-piggledy with daubs in water color by minor princesses of minor German states. ("Dear Maria had no talent, poor thing.")

There was no order to it, just one thing on top of another. Edward VII, a man who understood his craft, his metier of kingship, was appalled but not dismayed. He had waited a lifetime for this moment, and he told Ponsonby, standing by with notebook in hand, "I may know nothing about arrrrrrrt," he intoned in his idiosyncratic mixture of English and guttural German. "But I think I know something about arrrrrrangement."

And so he did... in art, in music, in life. Thus, to accompany this article I have selected the "Enigma Variations" by Sir Edward Elgar (1857-1934). Find them now in any search engine. They were composed in 1898-1899, just in time for the lush richness of England and her empire at their peak in the reign of a man who knew every nuance of being a king, including which artists should be allowed to paint him and so provide the desired look for all time.

One of the most favored of these artists was Heinrich (later Baron) von Angeli, persona gratissima at all the Courts of Europe, not merely talented, but arguably the best connected painter of his day. How had this happened?

Favored by an unhappy princess.

Prince Albert, Queen Victoria's beautiful and obsessively loved husband, fathered 9 children, of whom two were of major political significance: Princess Victoria, Princess Royal (1840-1901) and Prince Edward, Prince of Wales (1841- 1910). She was married far too young (just 17 years old) to Prince Frederick of Prussia, Crown Prince (1831-1888). It was a love match fervently desired by her parents, who saw thereby a means to expedite German unification and hence create a liberal, progressive nation under a constitutional monarchy, a highly desirable solution to the thorny "German problem" to the benefit of all Europe.

It was, on paper, a brilliant plan... except for one thing: neither Fritz's father, King (later Emperor) William of Prussia (1797-1888) or his chief henchman Otto (later Prince) von Bismarck (1815-1898) wanted what those meddling Englanders wanted... quite the reverse, "blood and iron" being more their cup of tea. And so young, idealistic, home-sick Princess Victoria, now Crown Princess of Prussia, went to her fate... to be ridiculed, derided, humiliated and isolated by Bismarck, past master in the art of exquisite torments.

She became the most unhappy princess on Earth, for all that she had the man of her dreams as her wedded husband. She needed a friend and here at least the fates were kind, for she got as her painting tutor just the right man, Heinrich von Angeli. His visits lessoned the burdens of her royal life. He made her smile and this skill, linked to undeniable talent, made von Angeli and his meteoric career. 

Mirror, not just painter.

He saw the princes of Europe as they wanted to be seen, picturing them as larger than life, bold, audacious, people of vision and destiny. And on this basis he networked his way through the interconnected dynasties which constituted the acme of Europe in this last, greatest age of monarchy.

Paint box in hand, he trod the corridors of undeniable power, great pictures always the result of his visits... pictures of his loyal patron the Crown Princess of Prussia, her husband the Crown Prince.... Queen Victoria (to whom in 1877 he presented his own most attractive self portrait)... Austrian Emperor Franz Josef... and, of course, Prince Edward, The Prince of Wales. It is the study for this magnificent portrait of 1890 that you see above, the dirty, distressed, undistinguished "before" image... and then, as if painted today, the splendid "after", a prince indeed.

For if von Angeli had been fortunate in his patron, so, too, both he and his image of the man who became Edward VII were equally fortunate in the conservator who brought this woebegone picture back from the brink, saving it for grateful generations yet to come. This gifted conservator is Simon Gillespie of Cleveland Street, London, an expert adept at saving portraits of royalty... and every other kind of person or scene. I know. He has worked his undeniable magic on over three dozen such pictures for me, this being the latest.

"Kaiserhaus und Historika" sale, Dorotheum, Lot 260, 8 May, 2012.

This picture was placed for auction at the very end of a long day when I had had almost no luck, until I acquired Lot 256, a superb signed photograph of the Prince of Wales' brother-in-law, Emperor Frederick III photographed as Crown Prince of Germany. I owed its "steal" price to the fact that the auction was nearly over, most folks already gone. My spirits upbeat from this pip of an acquisition, I awaited the signed and 1890 dated portrait of Edward of Wales with equanimity. In the event, its unappealing condition linked to a much diminished audience carried the day. It was mine, and at a very attractive price. All it needed now was Simon Gillespie.

Simon's review.

Simon's work demands utter and complete honesty and integrity. This is essential, and here with this distressed artifact he gave full measure. Upon delivery from Vienna, he emailed a full report of its disfigurements and discolorations. Most of the background, which is now a light gray and for its time a modern conceit, had been glazed over with a brown paint. Further to this, the last treatment it had received had included painting out broad brush strokes around the head in an attempt to "tidy up" and make presentable the regal image.

Gillespie never commits such solecisms... for his credo is to return venerable objects to their pristine state... conserving, not inventing. He is the painter's latter-day incarnation, as true to the painter's original intention as possible... and his intentions in this work were clear: to make an energetic sketch, to render the bravura techniques and prowess of his middle age, to capture the good personality of the sitter. The artist succeeded in his objective because Simon Gillespie, master, succeeded in his.

There is only one question left. Did this splendid study lead to one of Angeli's royal masterpieces? It constitutes the perfect query for my older age. Therefore I am not chagrined to have found no answer yet. For now it is enough that this engaging sketch has survived and faces its future with a mixture of royal pride and affability, the attributes of the sitter, captured by von Angeli, saved by Gillespie and now, chez moi, an object of grandeur and appeal, truly fit for a king, perfectly positioned for maximum effect... for I know something about arrrrrrangement, too.

 About the Author

Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Services include home business training, affiliate marketing training, earn-at-home programs, traffic tools, advertising, webcasting, hosting, design, WordPress Blogs and more. Find out why Worldprofit is considered the # 1 online Home Business Training program by getting a free Associate Membership today. Republished with author's permission by Ruthsella Corasol http://WorkingAtHome101.com

What a collector lives for... a steal... and of an emperor whoinsisted upon apricot dumplings in season and out... a tale.

by  Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author's program note. Quick! What do you know about the great Magyar nation of Hungary, a key element in the European equation for two thousand years? Exactly. Unless you are Hungarian yourself, you know little, if anything, about the matter... and that's why you, if you had the chance, would have walked past this gem... and missed a rare occasion to add its splendor and verve, radiating the e'clat that is so very Hungarian, to your collection.

For make no mistake about it, this is a picture of consequence... not least because it is, in microcosm, an apt representation of its nation, being bold, supercilious, absolutely sure of itself with an arrogance and hauteur that is quintessentially Hungarian (and got the nation into such a lot of trouble and grief, even unto its complete suppression and subjugation).

Look carefully and consider what you see, for this is how a king should look ... and be.

Now add the musical accompaniment of the Rakoczi march. It's the very thing to go along with and amplify this article. Find it in any search engine. Listen to the sound of this blood stirring music (composer unknown). You can see the crack troops of the kingdom on parade; the petted darlings, dazzling in their designed-to-impress uniforms and valorous decorations.

We look! We admire! We fall victim to a charm that defines the nation! This is the Hungary of September 28, 1830, the very day the young man portrayed, His Imperial Majesty Ferdinand I, already an emperor, was crowned King of Hungary as King Ferdinand V, and thus one of the key factors influencing every European nation and their millions of inhabitants. In short, this was History!

And, since History is the supreme ironist, you may be sure that what  you see is most assuredly not what you get. See for yourself...

The facts.

People who enjoy the undeniable delights of condescending to others can never afford to forget that to condescend with credibility you must win, constantly, consistently, completely. To condescend without victory is to open yourself to ridicule... snide remarks... and condescension by others more successful  than you. Thus, while Hungary had been a great nation in the days of Attila the Hun (434 A.D.) since then Victory had been fickle, elusive... and so it found itself in 1830 one of a vast number of dukedoms, principalities and other kingdoms in unhappy and restless thrall to God's good servant, the emperor of Austria, reigning supreme and condescending to all from Vienna.

This galling fact roiled every loyal Hungarian, for bending the knee to anyone was bitter indeed to the schemers of Budapest. But to bend the knee to the man who called himself Ferdinand V was the most bitter of all.

For these are the attributes and features that distinguished this imperial majesty... epilepsy, hydrocephalus, neurological problems, speech impediment, and more. Such was the fruit of the union between his consanguineous parents the Emperor Francis II and his double first cousin Maria Theresa, princess of Naples and Sicily.

His ability to produce an heir, non existent. His ability to reign, impossible. His ability to make the crucial decisions inherent in his weighty and powerful position... episodic, unpredictable. The only adamant decision he ever made related to... dumplings. Told by his chef that he could not have an apricot dumpling because apricots were not in season, he responded with uncharacteristic decisiveness, "I'm the Emperor, and I want dumplings!" And so in this matter at least he was gratified.

Otherwise for the 13 long years of his reign he was a negative factor, a void at the center of a turbulent Europe, marching to the Revolutions of 1848, when at last His Imperial and Apostolic Majesty was gently deposed, to be succeeded by his nephew Franz Joseph, who allowed his uncle to live in suitable splendor in Prague's Hradcany Castle, where perhaps he found dumplings a plenty and entirely to his taste. The record does not say.

His portrait as King of Hungary, 1830.

The picture you see above, so grand, so designedly inaccurate was left behind... only to turn up as Lot 125 at Dorotheum's Austrian auction 3 April, 2012. You can see its deplorable "before" state, the state in which I first saw this picture and knew I had to have it. You see, a true collector relies upon a practiced mixture of fact, hunch, visual impact and affection to evaluate a picture and make decisions which may well cost a small fortune, or more. It is a process in which the skills of sleuths, specialists, historians and lovers are uniquely mixed and which, luck willing, produces connoisseurs with bravado and nerves of steel. I am such a person, and I have been liberally helped along the way by conservator par excellence, Simon Gillespie of Cleveland Street, London. He is the man who has helped me acquire and return to their pristine perfection over three dozen such pictures. I honor and trust him accordingly.

What Simon saw.

When the image was first put in front of him it seemed destined to be rejected as dull and flatly painted. Close inspection revealed that the unknown artist had applied a thick oil paint  which over time had left deep interstices that collected considerable dirt and old varnish which had itself discolored. The resulting effect was dismal, a dull surface, dirty, disfigured. 

Here is where experience and a trained eye become absolutely essential. Connoisseurs and their conservators must learn to see that which is below the surface, to see the dazzling promise in the seemingly hopeless. Here Simon Gillespie excels.

After extensive analysis, he concluded the work was worth acquiring, though there was still risk involved; there always is. Still, Simon concluded that at the end of the day the picture would be magnificent as the Elect of God should always be. On this basis I acquired the work at auction, though other discerning eyes did succeed in increasing the price. Still, I did not overpay, always a danger when one's heart is involved.

In short order, Simon had the picture, shipped with their usual speed and careful packing by Dorotheum. As the crate was opened, always a moment of concern and nervous anticipation about what one would find within, the picture emerged, forlorn, dirty, distressed, but not disheartened. For this fortunate image had had the good fortune to become distressed in ways that could be dealt with... so long as it had an empathetic purchaser... and that I most assuredly was.

In Cambridge, in sympathetic hands.

Now this object of royal grandeur, with its uniquely opulent frame, has come to its new home where it will be properly handled, regarded, and maintained. I see it before me now, touched by the divinity that must hedge a real  monarch. Yet it would scarcely be a true Hungarian tale without its mysteries still to be revealed. Who painted his majesty and why did he leave no clue? Who composed the Rakoczi march? And why, too, did its composer demur and remain incognito despite composing a work so excellent the fastidious Abbe Lizst would honor it at his piano? Again, we do not know. And, finally, did  Ferdinand I and V get the apricots he coveted for his dumplings? All these are left to discover.

However, one thing is clear. The  work is imperial indeed, made perfect again by the scrupulous care of Simon Gillespie. And so Ferdinand, sore troubled and afflicted in life, goes confidently into the ages to come, looking every inch as he should, a king, and a King of Hungary at that.

 About the Author

Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Services include home business training, affiliate marketing training, earn-at-home programs, traffic tools, advertising, webcasting, hosting, design, WordPress Blogs and more. Find out why Worldprofit is considered the # 1 online Home Business Training program by getting a free Associate Membership today.

 Republished with author's permission by Ruthsella Corasol http://WorkingAtHome101.com

The angel in my house, the alluring Catherine Stephens, countess of Essex,painted by Sir Martin Archer Shee, PRA.

by  Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author's program note. Do you believe in fate? Do you believe that there are people on this planet we are meant to meet? That we will meet... no matter how unlikely that seems at this moment? When I contemplate the matter objectively as my training as a social scientist demands, I come to the obvious, the expected, the empirical conclusion that the idea of fate is superstitious hokus-pokus... then a chance encounter with Catherine Stephens occurs and challenges my logic, for surely this is kismet indeed.

Some background.

I am that most uncomfortable and difficult of beings, a connoisseur; that is a person who is engaged in the strenuous, never-ending search for rapture; a state which occurs whenever I see a thing and know that thing must be mine, cannot go anywhere but to me... for my well-being, the very completion of myself depends on my acquiring it.

Every connoisseur knows this unsettled state for each of us goes through it, especially (it seems) when money is in short supply, possibly due to having only recently been so touched and agitated... by something else.

But there's the rub. Whenever one enters this condition, it is as if for the very first time, so intense, so unsettling are the pangs. And this can happen anywhere at anytime. Be warned.

In the matter of Catherine Stephens they occurred as I perused the pages of the Dorotheum auction catalog for The Prince Kinski Sale, February 28, 2012. Lot 96. Given my interest in the nobility and royal families of Europe, it was inevitable I should consult this catalog... and perhaps find something; but by no means inevitable that thing would be a portrait of a lovely actress and singer elevated into the highest echelon of the English aristocracy. Yet just as Catherine Stephens captivated and in 1838 married the octogenarian fifth earl of the ninth creation of Essex, the Right Honorable George Capell-Coningsby (1757-1839) ... so she captivated me... and so (I warn you) she will captivate you, too. 

Some facts about Miss Stephens.

Catherine Stephens (1794-1882) was the daughter of Edward Stephens, a carver and gilder in Park Street, Grosvenor Square, London. Theirs was a musical family... and her musical talent was encouraged. Thus, on 23 September 1813 she appeared at Covent Garden as Mandane in the opera "Artaxerxes" by Thomas Arne (1710-1778) . He was the celebrated composer who wrote "Rule, Britannia!" and even a version of "God Save The King", which became the British national anthem. She was in very good company indeed...

... and (I warned you) she enchanted them all. The aria that launched her career was  "The soldier tir'd of war's alarms", and it was theater magic.

You'll want to hear it. And you can. Go to any search engine where you can hear Joan Sutherland's 1960 performance. Now imagine the lovely very young Catherine's candlelit debut and the dulcet tones which made each member of the restive audience believe -- no, not just believe but know -- she was singing just for them. That was always to be her secret...

That quality was instantly apparent in this circa 1838 portrait by Sir Martin Archer Shee (1769-1850). This was the most sympathetic face I had ever seen. And it was instantly clear that he, too, for all that he was consummate master of his craft, knight of the realm and President of the Royal Academy (PRA) had felt the power of her serene radiance.  Thus perforce did I stop to regard.

Most pictures of grand ladies, particularly titled ladies, say, "Look at me and be honored to do so. For I am worth the viewing." Such pictures may awe and dazzle... but they do not warm or beckon us. They are about the subject, not the viewer. But Shee's inviting portrait makes you feel certain about your reception, certain she wants to meet you and will be good to you. Above all that she will be good to you.... for that is what we all need.  And if that quality is immediately apparent in the sitter it is not just because Shee is a master, supremely confident in his skill, but because it was there for all the world to see in the lady herself.

Hard times for the Kinskis. Hard times for the painting.

To understand the fate of this picture you must understand something of the noble families of Mitteleuropa, families which were the foundation of the Austro- Hungarian empire. When it fell in 1918 families like the Kinskis lost the fruits of their hundreds of years of advancement. Their lives ceased to be glamorous but rather one lawsuit after another, largely futile attempts to regain property -- and self-esteem. Throughout the declension of their lives and fortunes, the princes Kinski kept this picture. And it was in the old prince's drawing room when he died. It was, remember, always comforting.... even when its condition was dire... as it was when I saw it and asked Simon Gillespie to give me his opinion.

Miss Stephens charms Mr. Gillespie of Cleveland Street.

London England-based Simon is my chosen conservator, the man who has restored over 30 of my pictures and upon whose informed opinion I rely, picture after superbly restored picture. As much a master of his craft as Arne and Shee in theirs, he, like them, felt the enduring charm of Catherine Stephens and wanted to restore the picture as much for her sake as for mine.

Thus he and his talented staff set to their important work, removing the dirt of time and poor maintenance, old varnishes and over paint applied by less careful and discerning hands. When this was finished, the now pristine canvass yielded a considerable secret using radiology, namely that Shee had originally positioned the sitter quite differently, for a full frontal pose with both shoulders visible. But as Shee painted he came to see his subject better and divine the source of her undeniable allure. And so he started again, his flamboyant technique very apparent in the repositioned result that captivates ... and makes such an entrancing vision and desirable painting.

This is the image not just of one particular woman but of what the Victorians wanted from Woman in general, kindness, courtesy, sweetness of face and of manner, a willing ear, sympathetic at all times, generous of spirit -- in short the celestial ideal advanced by Coventry Patmore (1823-1896) in his important poem "The Angel in the House" written in stages from 1854-1862.  It was an image that swept the world..

"Now she was there! Within her face/Humility and dignity/ Were met in a most sweet embrace/She seem'd expressly sent below/ To teach our erring minds to see/ The rhythmic change of life's swift flow/ As part of still eternity."

This is why this portrait of a lady and exalted countess is so important. You see, it makes clear what Woman may choose to be and of her profound significance in our often sore afflicted and troubled lives. I know, for when in my own life such troubles emerge, as troubles can do, I look up at this soothing, welcoming image now here before me in Cambridge and find comfort, peace and the kindness we all need.

 About the Author

Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Services include home business training, affiliate marketing training, earn-at-home programs, traffic tools, advertising, webcasting, hosting, design, WordPress Blogs and more. Find out why Worldprofit is considered the # 1 online Home Business Training program by getting a free Associate Membership today. Republished with author's permission by Ruthsella Corasol http://WorkingAtHome101.com