Pen and ink, approx. ? × ? cm (image only).
The editors of the
Library Edition
describe the image as “a sketch of the field of
Waterloo; soldiers with cannon in the foreground; a general on his horse”
(
Ruskin, Works, 2:347 n. 1).
While
Ruskin certainly intends the drawing to depict a scene from the
Battle of Waterloo,
which is mentioned in
“Brussels”—both in the prose section following
the drawing, and in the poem preceding it—he based his drawing on
J. M. W. Turnerʼs vignette,
Marengo,
depicting the
Battle of Marengo, which was engraved for
Samuel Rogers, Italy (1830) (p. 17; and
see no. 6 of catalog in
Piggott, Turnerʼs Vignettes, 98).
Ruskin omits the left side of
Turnerʼs original vignette,
copying only the general on his rearing horse and the group gathered around the cannon on the right.
In order to resituate the scene in
Waterloo,
Ruskin also omits
the
Alps that
Turner shows in the north above the
Piedmont plain;
instead, he indicates the outline of a town in the distance, intended as
Brussels, shown with its two large cathedral towers in silouette.
By adapting
Turnerʼs scene to
Waterloo,
Ruskin intensifies
Turnerʼs irony. The
Battle of Marengo
was a decisive victory for
Napoleon in his second Italian campaign against the Austrians,
allegedly causing the British prime minister,
William Pitt (
1759–1806),
to declare with resignation, “Fold up that map”, meaning that the French general had effectively conquered all of Europe
(
Piggott, Turnerʼs Vignettes, 38).
In
Italy, this victory is undermined by placing
Turnerʼs vignette above
Rogersʼs poem,
“The Descent”, referring literally to the descent from the mountains
into
Piedmont but figuratively to
Napoleonʼs eventual fall.
Ruskin completes
Turnerʼs ironic statement by bringing the image
forward in time to
Waterloo.