George Somes Layard

WHEN the iconography of Edward FitzGerald’s Ruba’iyat of Omar Khayyam comes to be compiled, there will be one item which will be found to be well-nigh unattainable by the enthusiastic collector. That item is not unnaturally dismissed in a very few words by Colonel W. F. Prideaux in his “Notes for a Bibliography of Edward FitzGerald.” He is dealing with the third edition, published by Quaritch in the year 1872. “It may be added,” he writes, “that a weird frontispiece to this edition was designed and etched by Mr. Edwin Edwards, the artist friend to whom FitzGerald lent his house at the beginning of 1871, and whose death in 1879 was a source of sorrow to him. A few copies of the etching were struck off, but it did not meet with the {180} approval of FitzGerald, and was consequently never used.”

Now, I am inclined to think that this, as I believe, the only published reference to an interesting rarity, will hardly satisfy the craving of the FitzGerald enthusiast. I shall therefore give the fullest information on the subject, whereby the modern MÆcenas will be afforded full particulars of what only a few of the cult of Omar can ever hope to possess.

Those who know their Ruba’iyat as they should will remember that there are several allusions made by the philosopher to the amusements of his countrymen.

Take the FitzGerald quatrain:—

Here, in the last line, we have what is probably an allusion to the game of “Ducks and Drakes,” “which,” says Mr. Edward Heron-Allen in the notes to his admirable translation, “was known to the Egyptians and also to the Greeks under the {181} name of ?p?st?a??s??. It was played with oyster-shells. The curious are referred to Minutius Felix (A.D. 207), who describes the game in his preface.” This last is a gentleman with whose name I am free to confess I have hitherto been unfamiliar, and to whose writings I have no access. I must therefore leave the enthusiastic reader to follow up the clue for himself. However, with the aid of Liddell and Scott, I find myself able to go one better than Mr. Heron-Allen, and would refer the reader to ArchÆologus Pollux, the author of Onomastikon, whose date is prior to Felix by twenty-nine years!

Another game which we find Omar Khayyam alluding to is that of chequers, which is familiar to us in FitzGerald’s oft-quoted quatrain:—

altered in the later edition to:—

Again we have allusion to what is probably some form of the game of tennis in the following:—

Other passages might be quoted, but these are enough for our purpose, for the form of amusement with which we have immediately to concern ourselves is rather a toy than a game—a toy indeed which would seem to have been the forerunner of a somewhat elaborate apparatus which, being used at first for more frivolous purposes, has now been largely adapted to educational ends.

The Magic Lantern of modern times is generally referred back to Athanasius Kircher, who died in 1680, although, according to some, it was known four centuries earlier to Roger Bacon. This may be true enough so far as the “projecting lantern” is concerned, but it can hardly be doubted that it had in the line of its earlier ancestors the Persian Fanus i Khiyal or Lantern of Fancy, which is used with such effect by the Philosopher of NaishÁpur, and which instigated the design of the {183} rare suppressed etching of which I here propose to treat with some particularity.

As literally translated by Mr. Heron-Allen, the quatrain referring thereto runs as follows:—

As literally translated by Mr. John Payne it run:—“This sphere of the firmament, wherein we are amazed, The Chinese lantern I think a likeness of it; The sun the lamp-stand and the world the lantern; We like the figures are that in it revolve.”

As metrically translated by him into a throwback quatrain it runs:—

As rendered by FitzGerald more literally than is his wont it ran in its first state as follows:—

As altered later, it assumed the following more familiar form:—

All who have read the published letters of Edward FitzGerald will have been struck by the infinite pains which he took to make this highest effort of his genius, the translation of Omar, as perfect as possible. His correspondence with his friend Professor Cowell teems with allusions to, and innumerable discussions on, minute points of meaning in the Persian.

Therefore it will not surprise us to find that the figure of the Fanus i Khiyal (literally the lanthorn32 of fancy), here made use of in so masterly a manner, had its characteristics and peculiarities carefully considered.

By the kindness of Mrs. Edwin Edwards and the late Professor Cowell, I am enabled to give extracts from an unpublished letter written by the {185} latter to FitzGerald in the year 1868, dealing somewhat exhaustively with the matter. This letter appears to have been forwarded by FitzGerald to Edwin Edwards, the artist, by way of inspiration for an etched frontispiece to the edition of The Ruba’iyat which was to be published by Quaritch in 1871, not, I think, in 1872, as Colonel Prideaux has it.

From Professor Cowell to Edward FitzGerald.

MY DEAR E. F. G.—I have sent off one letter to you to-day, but I did not answer a question of yours in it, after all, which you remind me of in your letter just received by this evening’s post.

First as to the famous Fanus i Khiyal—you will find it explained in a note by the editor at the end of my Calcutta Review Paper. I have often seen them in Calcutta. The lantern is about a foot and a half high—and nearly a foot in diameter, and it moves round with a slow and slightly vibratory motion. The candle is placed inside, and the draught sends it round. The editor in his note explains how the draught is produced:—They are made of a talc33 cylinder with figures of men and animals cut out of paper and pasted on it. The cylinder, which is very light, is suspended on an axis, round which it easily turns. A hole {186} is cut near the bottom, and the part cut out is fixed at an angle to the cylinder so as to form a vane. When a small lamp or candle is placed inside, a current of air is produced which keeps the cylinder slowly revolving. (Here is a small drawing.)

I cannot recollect how it was suspended, the reviewer says, “on an axis.” I think it was hung by a string from the top over a candle. I remember seeing it go round one evening in our dining-room—the KhÁnsamah brought one to show me....

Nicolas’s Fanus34 is more elaborate than our Calcutta one, but on the same principle. He says the figures move round from right to left or vice versa—as may be. His fanal35 is like mine, only it has a metal top and bottom—the cylindrical sides being of waxed cloth and painted; it has a handle fixed on the top which the man holds; the candle is placed inside on the metal floor....

(Here is another small drawing.)...

Yours affectionately,

EDW. B. COWELL.

CAMBRIDGE,

January 16, 1868.

The letter was il­lus­trat­ed with two rough drawings of the Fanus for FitzGerald’s guidance. The last of them represented the toy held out by a truncated arm. Edwin Edwards, to whom the letter was forwarded, at once with true artistic instinct caught at the suggestion unintentionally conveyed, and, as will be seen from the etching here reproduced, accentuated the hidden presence of the “Master of the Show,” by making the arm which holds suspended this “Sun-illumined Lantern” of a world issue from the impenetrable darkness which hides its mysterious lord. Unfortunately, the Fanus is not etched with great success, although the artist made a special visit to the old India Museum, now dispersed, to study an example there on exhibition. Had the etching equalled the conception, the design could hardly have failed to satisfy even FitzGerald’s fastidious requirements. As it was, only a limited number36 of proofs (from twenty to twenty-five) were printed by that cleverest printer of etchings, Mrs. Edwin Edwards, and the plate destroyed. Hence their rarity.

The conception is a really fine one, and might well have proved an illus­tra­tion of the text in the best sense of that much-abused term, being, as it is, a very different thing from a mere translation of the words into pictorial form. It is far more than this. It is an illuminator of the meaning, and accentuates its spiritual significance. This is what illus­tra­tion should do, but rarely does do, in these days of rapid and perfunctory production.

Of Edwin Edwards the artist I should like to take this opportunity of saying a word. His name is little known outside artistic circles, and it would be somewhat unfair to advertise it in connection with an etched plate which failed to give satisfaction without at the same time making allusion to pictorial work which was successful and meritorious. That he did produce work of real value is evident from the fact that one of his oil pictures of the Thames hangs at the Luxembourg in the Salle des Étrangers (for he was always more appreciated in France than in England), and that two years ago another canvas, and that hardly one of the best examples of his {189} work, was chosen by Sir Edward Poynter to be well hung in the Tate Gallery.

It may also be mentioned that high appreciation of his talents has been shown across the Channel by eulogistic articles in the Gazette des Beaux Arts, Les Beaux Arts IllustrÉs, La Vie Moderne, L’Art, etc., etc.

It is, however, on his work as an etcher that his reputation must chiefly rest, and it would be more than unjust to allow the artist who produced such a tour de force as the great etching of “London from the Greenwich Observatory,” to mention only one of his three hundred and seventy-one works in this medium, to be advertised by an etching, finely conceived it is true, but unsatisfactorily carried to an issue.

Not that these facts will in any way affect the thoroughgoing rarity-hunter in his estimate of the suppressed plate here described. It will be enough for him to know that not more than a quarter of a hundred of his rivals can own a proof of the etching to make him ready to sell his last shirt for its acquisition. He will continue to value a print for its rarity rather than for its beauty, {190} a book for its height in millimetres rather than for its depth in thought.

No doubt these be hard words. Then why, it will be asked, pander to so foolish a passion? Shall I confess? Yes, indeed, and glory in the confession that I, too, am of the gentle brotherhood, that I, too, am a subscriber to The Connoisseur (or “The Connoyzer,” as one of my friends at Mr. W. H. Smith’s bookstall used to call that delightful pub­li­ca­tion), that I, too,—in fine, that I am, by the favour of Fortune, the happy possessor of two proofs of the suppressed etching to the Omar of 1872!

And now just one word with that gentle hunter, Mr. Thomas B. Mosher of Portland, Maine, U.S.A., who did me the honour of transferring a large portion of the above, originally written for The Bookman, to the pages of his beautiful 1902 edition of The Ruba’iyat. Of that I make no complaint, for I think it very probable that he asked and obtained my permission. What I do complain of is that, in a footnote, he falls foul of me for being “ungracious” to Colonel Prideaux in suggesting the date 1871 as the year of pub­li­ca­tion of the {191} third edition, instead of the year 1872, as Colonel Prideaux has it in his most valuable little “Notes for a Bibliography of Edward FitzGerald” 1901. Mr. Mosher says “no manner of doubt exists as to the date.” Let me tell him that I have it on the authority of one who was on intimate terms both with FitzGerald and Edwin Edwards at the time when this third edition was published that, though the book bore the date 1872 on the title, as a matter of fact it was published in the autumn of 1871 and post-dated. If it be “ungracious” to give Colonel Prideaux a piece of information which he had not the opportunity of obtaining for himself, then I sincerely hope that all who read this volume, and find themselves better informed, as well they may, than I am, will be equally “ungracious” to me. La plupart des hommes n’ont pas le courage de corriger les autres, parcequ’ils n’ont pas le courage de souffrir qu’on les corrige.