One day John Flaxman heard the great artist Sir Joshua Reynolds say, in a lecture, that no man could hope to become a great artist, either as a painter or a sculptor, who did not visit Italy and so study at first hand the great masterpieces that are to be found there. Flaxman left that lecture very much depressed. Just a short time before that he had married and he told his young wife what Sir Joshua Reynolds had said. She was not discouraged in the least. She said: “You earn what you can, and leave the saving to me, and perhaps before many years are over, we shall have enough to take us both to Italy.” So, for five years John Flaxman worked as hard as his health would permit. Even for fine designs he received at first only fifteen shillings each and, later on, one guinea. But his careful wife kept putting away a little whenever she could, and at the end of five years, they had sufficient to take them to Italy. It was in 1787 that John Flaxman went to Italy and he stayed there seven years, studying, and at the same time working to earn money. What he saw in Italy greatly astonished and delighted him. The marvellous workmanship of Michael Angelo and other great masters thrilled him so that he longed to greatly improve upon his own work. When he returned from Rome in 1794 he soon had more work than he could do. He executed a monument to Lord Mansfield which was placed in Westminster Abbey and when a noted sculptor of that time saw it, he said: “This little man, Flaxman, cuts us all out.” From that time until he died in 1826, John Flaxman easily took the leading place among English sculptors. He had studied carefully the works of other men, but he was constantly carrying out some new ideas of his own. When he went out for a walk he often saw scenes which gave him ideas and he would return to his study and commence the work of making models of what he had seen. He found his subjects in the parks, the streets, and often even in the nursery, for he dearly loved children. As he walked along the streets he did not look as though he were a great man. He seemed very feeble, and his head appeared to be too large for his body. He hurried along with a peculiar sidelong gait and he gave passers-by the impression that he was more or less deformed. Still, in spite of all this John Flaxman became one of the greatest men of his day. His works may be seen at a great many places in Great Britain and even in India. He helped in the decorations for Buckingham Palace and many of the noblest monuments in St. Paul’s Cathedral and Westminster Abbey are the works of his hands. Others are to be found in such places as the British Museum, South Kensington Museum and the Flaxman Hall at University College. He was made Professor of Sculpture at the Royal Academy and when he died in 1826 no one disputed what was said of him: “He was the most gifted genius in sculpture that England ever produced.” CHAPTER IV