Nearly forgotten but glorious art, envisionings and historical oddments from the back corners of the internet
All artwork in the public domain due to age. They can be found in many places but I found them all here: http://godsandfoolishgrandeur.blogspot.com/2018/11/triples-twelve-portraits-of-three.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+GodsAndFoolishGrand
Oh to be here.
Auntie’s in Bavaria. A long visit until school starts again.
House big enough to be a castle though Papa says it is not. Uncle’s grandpapa’s, it was, with six turrets, an elevator, and guard people who bow up and down like a bunch of jack-in-the-boxes when the oldest boy cousin runs up and down the stairs. Spoiled he is because he’ll get all the money, no doubt.
But the rest all right.
Grownups getting dressed downstairs in lederhosen and dirndls for the dinner and dance downstairs in the big hall. Better to be upstairs really. Nervous they must be. Not the Kaiser but someone else almost as important with both of his mistresses, one on each arm someone whispered at lunch when they thought no one short was listening.
All those deer heads mounted all around, too. Looking like they could come alive and in a scary way what with all their antlers bumping into each other all squished up.
But a hunting kind of place and five more being added every week in season. No more room and a second row soon so the antlers can duel with each other.
But upstairs nice and cozy. Nannies all gone off to gossip down the hall over tea. Nursemaids in the window seat. There all afternoon peeking out towards the carriage house behind. All of them with beaux who are grooms to wave back. Each one waving bigger and bigger as they open the doors.
Off with the girl cousins into the night nursery. Time to sit on the bed by the window and look through the old pictures that turned up behind the bookcase.
Dust all over and the pinafores wrecked but too much fun to stop. Children on ponies and children with kittens. Little boys in skeleton suits and small brothers in dresses. Girls in fluff and girls ready to go sledding.
But a prettier one at the bottom. A girl with her little brother in fluffy dresses with their dog. Funny. Giving him treats and no one to stop them. Must have had a nicer Mama.
But sweet looking . . . .Uncle’s grandmama, maybe . . . .slippers not boots and a while ago. . . . doesn’t matter really. . . happy they look . . . that’s all that matters . . . .
Oh to go back and be here.
Brightchester House and another of the grownups’ house parties . So much noise even the nursery rings with voices and shrieks.
Nurse nowhere to be seen. Down the stairs towards the drawing room instead where Mama must be. The flowers on the landing where they should be but the window seat not quite right. A favorite reading spot during the day but a strange white thing floating up. Like one of the sisters at the old convent where Grandmama liked to visit.
One of the haints in the old nurse’s stories it must be. An abbey the house having been before that mean king Henry got rid of them and gave it all away. Not happy the nuns and their abbess must have been.
But funny. Them one only heard about. Not unhappy enough to wander out of their grave places into the house. No. Spirit rapping they must be doing like the little boy in Sunday school says his auntie does. A spirit rapping lady brought in from London to speak to them and that all too well.
Continue reading “Silverworks by Charles Robert Ashbee (1863-1942). Arts and Crafts movement.”