The Cotman Letters 1834
Archive: SDK Sydney Decimus Kitson Archive
Reference Number: SDK/1/3/1/3
Page: 5
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Description
Copy of letter from John Sell Cotman to Dawson Turner, 6 January 1834
A visit to the Artists’ Graphic Society Conversazione. Praise for the preaching of Rev. James Bulwer. Cotman plans a visit with Gurney to a Conversazione at the Freemasons’ Tavern. His London pupils will outnumber his Norwich ones. He wishes to copy a painting by Giovanni Bellini owned by Turner [Madonna and Child with Saints Peter and Paul, now in Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery].
Date: 1834
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Transcription
To Dawson Turner Esq
Great Yarmouth,
Norfolk.[Note in pencil:]
[Posted at Charing X
9th Jan:
7 Old Burlington St.]Jan 6, ’34.
My dear Sir, and dear Friend,
I shall very soon boil over. I must now do so – or explode! George Cooke, his son Edward, & Starke took their wine with me at Mr Bulwer’s, and, after looking over drawings till 9 o’clock, they took me to the Artists’ [word added in pencil: grathin (?)] [i.e. Graphic] Conversazione at the Thatched House Tavern, St James’, when [we – crossed out] I saw above three hundred most splendid drawings by Lewis, from nature & copies of pictures & bits from the old Spanish masters. Words cannot convey to you this splendour. My poor Red, Blues & Yellows – for which I have in Norwich been so much abused and broken-hearted about – are faded fades, to what I saw there. Yes & aye, Faded fades & trash, nonsense & stuff. And yet with all this, and knowing my own weak powers, my reception by all the top Men & Artists was just such as to warm the heart of my best Friends and to make me a perfect furnace heated three hundred times beyond Red Hot!!! And yet with all this, my dear Sir, I keep my senses, and am as cool as you and all my best Friends can wish me to be. Doubt it not for one instant! I have to thank my dear & long-tried friend, Mrs Turner, for this state of mind. She kindly recommended me to put my trust in Him in whom no error can exist. And it is my determination, should I be placed once more in London, to become a constant attender on my Friend Mr Bulwer at St James’ Chapel, for he is a man I can listen to with love & admiration. Gurney was with me on Sunday, and can give you his opinion of his sermon. Bulwer must soon be a very popular preacher. I should like Sir Francis & Lady Palgrave to hear him exceedingly. His manner is quiet, easy, dignified, simple and more what I can fancy the Apostles to have been than anything I have ever heard. He is exactly the reverse of Dibdin. Not a word can be lost, his articulation is so perfect. At home, with his family, he is a perfect kitten. And fortunately for
