Lavengro · Chapter
XXXVII explained
The narrator's brother visits him in London, explaining that he has come not to see him but to commission a painter for the mayor's portrait.
What happens
The narrator's brother visits him in London, explaining that he has come not to see him but to commission a painter for the mayor's portrait. The brother recounts how the town's committee initially offered him the commission, but he recommended his own teacher, the painter of Lazarus, as a greater master of the heroic. After some debate, the committee agreed to let him bring the painter to town.
Themes in this chapter
Honor and Morality
The brother's decision to recommend a more skilled painter rather than accept the commission himself reflects a sense of artistic integrity and honor.
Social Class and Gentility
The mayor's portrait commission and the committee's concern with the painter's loyalty to Church and State highlight themes of social status and respectability.
Characters to notice
Key passages
“I never talked so well in my life, and said so many flattering things to the hunchback and his friends, that at last they said that I should have my own way; and that if I pleased to go up to London, and bring down the painter of Lazarus to paint the mayor, I might; so they then bade me farewell, and I have come up to London.”
The brother's persuasive speech convinced the committee to let him travel to London to hire the painter of Lazarus for the mayor's portrait.
The brother's eloquence secures the committee's approval.
“The dog, said my brother, is, I am afraid, in a very poor way; ever since the death he has done nothing but pine and take on.”
The dog has been grieving and losing weight since the death of a family member.
The dog's decline mirrors the family's mourning.