The Strand Magazine/Volume 3/Issue 18/Portraits of Celebrities
Portraits of Celebrities at Different Times of their Lives.
SIR GEORGE TREVELYAN, BART., M.P.
Born 1838.
 Age 27. |
 Age 37. |
Present Day.
From a Photo. by Alex. Bassano.
he Right Hon. Sir George Orro Trevelyan, Bart., M.P., was born at Rothley Temple, in Leicestershire, and is the only son of the late Sir Charles Edward Trevelyan, Bart., K.C.B., and of Hannah More Macaulay, the sister of Lord Macaulay. He was educated at Harrow and at Trinity, Cambridge, where he took the fine degree of second classic. In 1865, at the age at which our first portrait represents him, he was elected to Parliament as member for Tynemouth in the Liberal interest. In the same year appeared his well-known book descriptive of the Indian Mutiny, "Cawnpore." His "Letters of a Competition Wallah" had been reprinted from Macmillan's Magazine the year before. In 1875, at the age depicted in our second portrait, he was engaged in preparing his admirable "Life and Letters of his celebrated uncle, which appeared in the following year. In 1880 he succeeded Lord Frederick Cavendish as Chief Secretary for Ireland, a post which he retained through two most trying years. In 1886 he disagreed with the Prime Minister's proposed scheme for Ireland, and lost his seat, but was elected in the year following at Bridgeton as a Gladstonian Liberal.
W. P. FRITH, R.A.
Born 1819.
 Age 12. |
 Age 36. |
 From a Painting by W. P. Frith. |
 From a Photo. by Window & Grove. |
r. William Powell Frith was born at Studley, near Ripon, and at sixteen entered Sass's academy. At nineteen he painted, among other pictures, a very fine portrait of himself, which we have here the pleasure of reproducing. At the very early age of twenty-seven he was elected an A.R.A., becoming an R.A. at thirty-three, by which time his realistic and dramatic power had made him perhaps the most widely popular of all English artists. His "Coming of Age," "Ramsgate Sands," "The Railway Station," and "The Derby Day," are known by engravings from castle to cottage throughout the land. When "The Derby Day" was exhibited at the Royal Academy it had to be protected from the pressure of the crowd by a barrier—the first occasion in which such a precaution was required. Mr. Frith's admirable "Reminiscences" have placed him at the head of living writers of autobiographies.
B. W. LEADER, A.R.A.
Born 1831.
R. BENJAMIN WILLIAMS LEADER, son of the late Mr. E. Leader Williams, C.E., was born at Worcester, and received his earliest instruction in art at the School of Design in that city. At twenty-three he was admitted as a student in the Royal Academy, and in the same year exhibited his first picture, "Cottage Children Blowing Bubbles," which was bought by an American connoisseur for £80. Two years later he visited Scotland for the first time, since which he has become one of the most popular delineators of mountain scenery, Wales and Switzerland, as well as the Highlands, being his favourite sketching-grounds. His pictures, of which the subjects are most frequently the wild mountain pass, the common, and the lake, are often darkened with the shadows of evening or of the thunder cloud, or are dyed with all the colours of the setting sun. He was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1883, and has been an annual exhibitor ever since 1856. Among his most important works may be mentioned "A Moated Grange," 1868; "The Streams through the Birch Wood," 1871; "Wild Waters," 1875; "The Last Gleam," 1879; "February Fill-dyke," 1881; "With Verdure Clad," 1886, his largest picture. In the present Royal Academy, "A Surrey Sand-pit" and "Conway Bay" are excellent examples of his powers.
MISS LILY HANBURY.
 From a Photo. by Debenham, Regent-street, W. |
 From a Photograph. |
 Photographed at the Princess's Studio, Oxford-street, W. |
 From a Photo. by W. & D. Downey. |
ISS LILY HANBURY, with whose appearance as Lady Windermere most playgoers are by this time familiar, and to whom we are here indebted for a charming page of portraits, was born in London, and made her first appearance when she was fifteen years old in Mr. W. S. Gilbert's "Pygmalion and Galatea," in which she played Myrine. Her next engagement was with Mr. Thomas Thorne, in 1889, with whom she stayed until the autumn of 1890, playing in all his productions at the Vaudeville. She then went on tour with him for six weeks, after which she joined Mr. Wilson Barrett for his season at the Olympic, during which period she played eight or nine parts. She then went to Terry's Theatre for a summer season, and played in the triple bill Mrs. Hemmersley in Mr. Weedon Grossmith's comedietta "A Commission." Then she went for a short tour with Mr. George Alexander, returning with him to the St. James's Theatre last autumn,
SIR HENRY PARKES.
Born 1815.
 Age 30. |
 Age 65. |
Age 77.
From a Photo. by Charlemont & Co, Sydney.
ir Henry Parkes, Prime Minister of New South Wales, was the son of a Warwickshire farmer, and was born at Stoneleigh. At twenty-four he emigrated to Australia, and for some time worked as an ordinary farm labourer, but when about thirty-five he started The Empire, a daily newspaper, and a few years later was elected to the Legislative Council. His political life was brilliant, and in 1872 he became Premier for the first time. He has now been at the head of a Government more times, and longer, than any man alive, except Mr. Gladstone. But it is not only as the most conspicuous figure in Australian politics that Sir Henry Parkes is remarkable. His seventy-seven years weigh lightly upon him—this old political general, with his long white beard and white hair crowning his forehead and falling down upon his shoulders. His house in Balmain, Sydney, Hampton Villa, is an old stone building, surrounded by trees, on a neck of land jutting into Johnston's Bay. As a conversationalist he is deeply interesting—full of literary reminiscences; at one time time he is walking with Tennyson, at another chatting with Browning in his lodgings in London, at breakfast with Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone, dining with the President of the American Republic or with the King and Queen of the Belgians, or chatting at a blazing fire with Thomas and Jane Carlyle. To Sir Henry, Carlyle wrote: "I am greatly pleased with your calm, quiet, lucid, and honest speeches, and with all the useful and manful labour you have so successfully gone through for one of the most sacred interests of human affairs." This remark refers to Sir Henry's efforts in the cause of education in Australia. His talk bristles with "wise saws and instances," and the fiery element that breathes in his speeches has been kindled by Lowell, Browning, and Tennyson. He is now writing a book which, when published, will, it is predicted, make him for many years the most discussed man in Australia, and perhaps one of the most notable in the British Empire. His two Russian cats, which purr about his legs, and his large and varied collection of pet animals, are his sole recreation.
JACQUES BLUMENTHAL.
Born 1829.
 Age 21. |
 Age 39. |
 Age 30. |
 Present Day. |
r. Jacques Blumenthal, whose charming songs have been or many years so popular in every drawing-room and concert-hall in the kingdom, was born at Hamburg on October 4, 1829; and, having shown precocious signs of musical talents, was trained at first under Grund in his native city, and then under Von Bocklet and Sechter at Vienna. At seventeen he removed to Paris, in order to study under Hertz at the Conservatoire, where he attained his extraordinary proficiency in pianoforte playing. Two years later he took up his permanent residence in London, where he has ever since resided, with occasional visits to a house which he possessed at Montreux. He early had the honour of being selected as pianist to the Queen, and soon became known as a very fashionable teacher; while his fame as a composer was continually increasing. Of all his songs, perhaps "The Message " has been the most widely and justly popular; though, indeed, he is a composer whose work can never be anything but brilliant and effective. We are happy to be able to place before our readers, in the following pages, a song—"Wilt Thou Understand?"—written by Mr. Blumenthal especially for this magazine, and which, we hope, will prove as popular as any of the beautiful melodies which have made his name a household word.