Lightning Man_ The Accursed Life of Samuel F. B. Morse - Kenneth Silverman [17]
Late in December 1814, Londoners learned that representatives of their battle-weary country had met with an American delegation in Ghent and worked out an agreement ending the War of 1812. Finley no sooner heard the welcome news than, with shipping lanes less risky, he packed up and sent home his eight-by-six-foot painting of The Dying Hercules. The picture was admired, “highly approved by all who examine it,” Jedediah informed him, including for once even Elizabeth, who had a handsome frame made for the large canvas, at the substantial cost of $100. She and Jedediah said they would try to get the painting publicly exhibited in Boston, Philadelphia, and perhaps Charleston—a step toward making Finley financially independent by gaining him a reputation.
Finley’s pleasure at the return of peace was dampened by the unexpected death in February of Allston’s wife, a woman refined and angelically sweet. Particularly because of the political situation, he had viewed her, Leslie, Allston, and himself as a domestic circle, a family: “we became in a manner necessary to each others happiness … we could meet, and talk of our beloved country, mutually rejoice in her successes, or lament at her reverses.” He felt “overwhelmed” by the loss, but Allston seemed broken, “almost bereft of his reason.” Finley and Leslie tried to relieve their mentor’s distraught state. But despite their support Allston fell into a year-long depression that brought on something like a religious crisis, in which there was “revealed” to him the divinity of Christ.
Finley still fretted over the lost chance to study in Paris, “letting an opportunity slip,” he said, “which is irrecoverable.” Astoundingly, however, by springtime France was once more under the control of Napoleon. Arising once more from defeat, he had escaped from the island of Elba, raised an army, and put King Louis XVIII to flight. He seemed determined to “again set the world by the ears,” Finley said; “I fear we are apt yet to see a darker and more dreadful storm than any we have yet seen.” That did not happen. In June, now a wheezing forty-five-year-old with a paunch, Bonaparte engaged the Duke of Wellington’s army in the savage battle at Waterloo that left some 25,000 French troops dead or wounded. This time, Finley exulted in British victory. “I wish the British success against everything but my country.” In July he saw and heard the flash-boom of the Hyde Park guns, confirming news that the allies had again entered Paris and that Napoleon had been captured, ending twenty years of European warfare.
During the year, Finley worked on an ambitious picture he planned to submit for the history-painting prize at the Royal Academy’s 1815 exhibition. He chose a subject from mythology, the judgment of Jupiter in the case of Apollo, Marpessa, and Idas. He depicted the shamefaced Marpessa throwing herself into the arms of her husband, Idas, while her spurned lover, Apollo, looks on in surprise and chagrin. The three-by-four-foot canvas required much study, but the Academy rejected his petition to enter it for the prize. The exhibition rules required his presence in London during the show, held in December; he was scheduled to depart for America in August. Allston denounced the Academy’s decision as based on a mere formality that could have been waived: “they resist all kinds of improvement from too great a dread of innovation.” West liked the picture enough to encourage Finley to stay on in England. Instead, Finley packed The Judgment of Jupiter to take home with him.
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