-Vegetable-Seller-c1850-watercolor-on-paper-Metropolitan-Museum-of-Art-New-York.jpg) |
| Monogrammist M Vegetable Seller ca. 1850 watercolor on paper Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| Gabriel Max Portrait of the artist's wife Ernestine peeling Mushrooms 1896 oil on canvas Lenbachhaus, Munich |
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| Frank Dicksee P is for Parlourmaid 1878 drawing (print study for the Cornhill Magazine) British Museum |
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| Julius Bloch Monday Morning 1934 lithograph Delaware Art Museum, Wilmington |
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| Rebecca Davenport Lady at the Laundromat 1974 oil on canvas Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia |
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| Hubert von Herkomer Low Lodging House, St Giles's 1872 wood-engraving Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
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| Jean-François Millet Gleaners ca. 1853 drawing (study for painting) British Museum |
-after-Francesco-Primaticcio-Penelope-and-her-Women-Weaving-c1540-50-engraving-(School-of-Fontainebleau)-British-Museum.jpg) |
| Monogrammist FG after Francesco Primaticcio (School of Fontainebleau) Penelope and her Women Weaving ca. 1540-50 engraving British Museum |
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| Heinrich Reinhold after Friedrich Reinhold Loading a Boat with Hay 1817 etching British Museum |
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| James Havard Thomas Italian Woman threshing Rye ca. 1899-1906 drawing British Museum |
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| Edward Melcarth Litter 1948 oil on canvas Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC |
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| Agnes Miller Parker Sheep Dipping in Wales 1927 wood-engraving Art Institute of Chicago |
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| Léon-Augustin Lhermitte Making Hay 1887 oil on canvas Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam |
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| Arthur Herschel Lidov Railroading ca. 1941 tempera on board (study for Post Office mural) Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC |
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| Diego Rivera Cargado de Petate 1943 watercolor on paper Los Angeles County Museum of Art |
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| Edme Bouchardon Baker Boy ca. 1730-40 drawing British Museum |
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| Jean-Jacques de Boissieu Interior of Flour Mill 1767 drawing British Museum |
"One suffers so much," Denis went on, "from the fact that beautiful words don't always mean what they ought to mean. Recently, for example, I had a whole poem ruined, just because the word 'carminative' didn't mean what it ought to have meant. Carminative – it's admirable, isn't it?"
"Admirable," Mr. Scogan agreed. "And what does it mean?"
"It's a word I've treasured from my earliest infancy," said Denis, "treasured and loved. They used to give me cinnamon when I had a cold – quite useless, but not disagreeable. One poured it drop by drop out of narrow bottles, a golden liquor, fierce and fiery. On the label was a list of its virtues, and among other things it was described as being in the highest degree carminative. I adored the word. 'Isn't it carminative?' I used to say to myself when I'd taken my dose. It seemed so wonderfully to describe that sensation of internal warmth, that glow, that – what shall I call it? – physical self-satisfaction which followed the drinking of cinnamon. Later, when I discovered alcohol, 'carminative' described for me that similar, but nobler, more spiritual glow which wine evokes not only in the body but in the soul as well. The caminative virtues of burgundy, of rum, of old brandy, of Lacryma Christi, of Marsala, of Aleatico, of stout, of gin, of champagne, of claret, of the raw new wine of this year's Tuscan vintage – I compared them, I classified them. Marsala is rosily, downily carminative; gin pricks and refreshes while it warms. I had a whole table of carminative values. And now" – Denis spread out his hands, palm upwards, despairingly – "Now I know what carminative really means."
"Well, what does it mean?" asked Mr. Scogan, a little impatiently.
"Carminative," said Denis, lingering lovingly over the syllables, "carminative. I imagined vaguely that it had something to do with carmen-carminis, still more vaguely with caro-carnis, and its derivatives, like carnival and carnation. Carminative – there was the idea of singing and the idea of flesh, rose-coloured and warm, with a suggestion of the jollities of mi-Carême and the masked holidays of Venice. Carminative – the warmth, the glow, the interior ripeness were all in the word. Instead of which . . . "
"Do come to the point, my dear Denis," protested Mr. Scogan. "Do come to the point."
"Well, I wrote a poem the other day," said Denis; "I wrote a poem about the effects of love."
"Others have done the same before you," said Mr. Scogan. "There is no need to be ashamed."
"I was putting forward the notion," Denis went on, "that the effects of love were often similar to the effects of wine, that Eros would intoxicate as well as Bacchus. Love, for example, is essentially carminative. It gives one the sense of warmth, the glow.
"And passion carminative as wine . . ."
was what I wrote. Not only was the line elegantly sonorous; it was also, I flattered myself, very aptly and compendiously expressive. Everything was in the word carminative – a detailed, exact foreground, an immense, indefinite hinterland of suggestion.
"And passion carminative as wine . . ."
I was not ill-pleased. And then suddenly it occurred to me that I had never actually looked up the word in a dictionary. Carminative had grown up with me from the days of the cinnamon bottle. It had always been taken for granted. Carminative: for me the word was as rich in content as some tremendous, elaborate work of art; it was a complete landscape with figures.
"And passion carminative as wine . . ."
It was the first time I had ever committed the word to writing, and all at once I felt I would like lexicographical authority for it. A small English-German dictionary was all I had at hand. I turned up C, ca, car, carm. There it was: "Carminative: windtreibend." Windtreibend! he repeated. Mr. Scogan laughed. Denis shook his head. "Ah," he said, "for me, it was no laughing matter."
– Aldous Huxley, from Crome Yellow (1921)