THE MATIBO AFFAIR,

or, Your Cheating ’Art

by Sally Forth

It may not have been okay to talk about sex or body parts below the neck, or get a divorce, in the nineteenth century, but prudishness did not extend to other moral qualities. Lying and stealing were flourishing apace, however clothed and bound. The fine arts, including literature, were no exception.

Plagiarism and copyright violations thrived on both sides of the Atlantic, with American writers and publishers having the edge in this sort of thievery. They had good role-models in England, although I don’t think it was quite as common due to the smaller size of the country and better communication across Europe. Americans felt safer stealing popular British works, especially in “frontier cities” like Chicago.^a It was not easy to catch the thief, since reading material was scarcer and access to much of what was written in Europe, or even in other parts of the U. S., was limited or nonexistent.

When I tried to find out more about this wonderful tree-house, I discovered that it made for the perfect case history of this rampant practice, illustrating those ‘scam-artist artists’ quite well.

Remember, the article above was published in Paris, in 1841. Édouard Charton, the innovative founder, and editor-in-chief of Le Magasin Pittoresque, selected material with broad appeal for his great journal. He added excellent engravings as well. That appeal extended beyond Gallic borders.

After the appearance of the “L’Érable de Matibo” in this issue, here’s what happened next:

The first uncredited partial translation of the first two paragraphs of the article, with the same exact engraving, appeared in England, in The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, in 1842. Although, this series does state that it publishes “Select Extracts from New and Expensive Works; . . . The Spirit of the Public Journals; Discoveries in the Arts and Sciences,” the translation appears as “The Maple-Tree at Matibo” under the title of “Original Correspondence”! Here is what was written:

“The beautiful maple-tree, which our engraving represents, is one of the most curious ornaments of a charming estate, called Matibo, situated in the neighbourhood of Savigliano, in Piedmont. It was planted upwards of sixty years ago, but it is not more than twenty-five or thirty years since the idea was started of giving to it the form of a temple, which, after much time and perseverance, was completely realized.
     This elegant little edifice consists of two stories, each of which has eight windows, and is capable of containing twenty persons. The floors are formed of branches twined together with great skill; and by nature are furnished with leafy carpets. All round, the verdure has formed thick walls, where innumerable birds have taken up their sojourn. The proprietor of Matibo has never disturbed those joyous little songsters, but has rather encouraged them; and at all hours of the day they may be heard fearlessly sporting and warbling, by the delighted visitors, who, looking from the windows, admire the prospect that opens before them.”^b

Probably, because the Americans had easier access to British periodicals more than French ones and knew that what was successful in England would likely be successful on this side of the pond, the more popular British journals were mined for material. (There is also the possibility of recurring francophobia to consider here.) Thus, the same two paragraphs of this British translation appeared with the same picture, uncredited, two years later, in 1844, as the article “Maple Tree at Matibo, Italy,” in the American series of books called Robert Merry’s Museum, edited by S. G. Goodrich. In this the text is divided into three paragraphs with only one minor change, four words, from the previous translation, (plagiarism would not be too strong a word here). You can see for yourself from the first paragraph, the one with the only difference, which I show in italics:

“The proprietor of the island of Matibo has never disturbed those joyous little songsters, but has rather encouraged them; and at all hours of the day they may be heard fearlessly sporting and warbling, by the delighted visitors, who, looking from the windows, admire the prospect that opens before them.”^c

S. G. Goodrich, who was known under the sobriquet of “Peter Parley,” made this sort of practice a habit. In some of the literary miscellanies which I have, he stole unrepentantly from various and sundry authors, implying they were original pieces.^d He was hugely popular nevertheless, proving crime paid then, as it does now. (Tit for tat, multiple other publishers printed books by “Peter Parley,” and they borrowed that famous name illicitly to publish all manner of material.)

Our pal Goodrich, added of the island in the above paragraph, because although he stole much of his content unaltered, he would sometimes add very minor personal touches, which in this case was based on shoddy research (no big surprise). The picture caption in French says that the maple in question was in the États Sardes, which he assumed was the island of Sardinia. In that period the Kingdom of Sardinia consisted not only of the island of Sardinia, but it included areas that are now part of present-day mainland Italy as well. The Piedmont region, part of Savoy, was one of its dependencies.^e

Such literary liberties, in no way compatible with fair use, extended to other languages with a truly international ethical flexibility. The first two paragraphs used in the English translation of the article were also translated into a Spanish magazine, published in London. The same picture was used, both again uncredited, under the title of “El Plátano de Matibo,” in La Colmena, 1842.^f

The French picture and story, being so unique and eminently romantic, its popularity persisted sporadically for the rest of the century and beyond. Twenty years later, a different English translation of the article, but the same picture, (I don’t know if the source was credited,) appeared in The Ladies’ Treasury, 1860. I don’t know how much was translated from the French or if it was re-written from the English translation, because the entire text is not online. But the description is alarmingly similar. Women writers in the Victorian period are likely no exception to the above vacillations of the moral compass, after all ‘a crook’s best friend is his mother.’

Now being relatively famous, the maple is briefly cited as an interesting example in a Portuguese article called “As Maiores Arvores do Mundo,” [“The World’s Greatest Trees”], in only one sentence:

“Que nos resta agora? O castanheiro de Prévarange . . .? A faia do Mont-Blanc? . . . O bordo de Matibo, que o que tem de notavel é a forma artistica que lhe deu um homem de mau gosto, chegando a fazer d’elle uma casa de dois andares, cercados de ninhos de passaros, e em cada um dos quaes ha um quarto com oito janellas para vinte pessoas? . . .”^g

[What do we have left now? The chestnut tree of Prévarange . . .? The beech of the Mont-Blanc . . .? The maple of Matibo, which is remarkable for the artful shape given to it by a man with bad taste, who managed to turn it into a two-story house surrounded by bird nests: each story has a room for twenty persons, with eight windows? . . . — B.T.]

Our maple, described in variations of the original text with no citations, also appeared again in France without the picture, in Wonders of Vegetation, translated and edited from the French of Marion, by Schele De Veke, in 1872. The pertinent section appears again under the anglicized subtitle of “The Maple of Matibo”:

“This plant, the type of the “Lower trees” with which the skilled horticulturist ornaments our gardens, is especially remarkable for its architectural form. This variety of the sycamore is not, in fact, a marvel of vegetation; and, strictly speaking, it is not on its own merits to be classed among the extraordinary plants which have already been described plants which owe to nature alone this distinguishing feature. It is to be seen in its perfection at Matibo, in the vicinity of Savigliano, near Coni, in Piedmont. The skill and perseverance of the horticultural architect has made an astonishing metamorphosis of it. In its cultivated state it appears like a structure of two stories. Each of these has eight windows naturally formed and can contain twenty people. The flooring is managed by a skilful arrangement of the branches, which are carefully interwoven, and the leaves form a natural carpet. The birds of the air sing amid the green leaves, and are not disturbed by the people that sit at the artificially formed windows. More elegant than the oak of Allouville which we have already described, this sycamore does not appear to belong to the same category. It is only mentioned here as a type of the trees manipulated by art, with which gardeners decorate country houses.”^h

Unpatriotically, Marion does not mention his earlier countrymen, or anybody else, as the source of the original information. He adds nothing new either, making this merely a re-writing of the original article. Neither Marion nor the English translator add any comments or credits in the notes on the tree itself.

Frustrated by the lack of any new discussion or picture of the tree, I enlisted the help of polyglot Bill Thayer. Since he likes tree-houses, and mysteries, he was happy to help, searching for any mention in Italian and French works.

Bill found the original work by Marion, and said, “ ‘Fulgence Marion’ was the pseudonym of the famous French astronomer Camille Flammarion, and he did indeed write Les merveilles de la végétation in 1867.”ⁱ This book, he adds, was also translated into Italian: “Le meraviglie della vegetazione,” in 1877.^j There was no commentary by the Italian translator on the tree in his own backyard.

In my own quest, I discovered another person in our time, who became interested in this quaint tree-house. Henry, at the blog Arboarchitecture, found equal joy in the belvedere when he came across the picture two years ago. He also did some research on the subject. I was pole-axed when I saw the title under which he first came across it: “The Maple of Ratibor” !!!

Henry had found that The New York Public Library had the same engraved print, by F. Wiesener, under two titles. The earliest one is the one on this page, from Le Magasin Pittoresque, 1841, with the original French subtitle, “Un érable à Matibo, prés de Savigliano, dans le Piémont, Etats Sardes.” The typo is reproduced from the original, (prés should be près — which I corrected on the French page). The other print copy is from The Picture Magazine, printed in London, in 1893. It is entitled “The Maple of Ratibor.” The text under this copy of the print states:

“This tree, which is more than a century old, has been turned into a kind of temple of two stories, each of its compartments being lighted by eight windows, and capable of containing twenty people with ease. The floors are constructed of boughs skilfully woven together, of which the leaves make a sort of natural carpet. The walls are formed of thick leafage, in which innumerable birds build their nests.

Now, with more journals available on Google Books than Henry found back then, I found a copy of The Picture Magazine. This is the only text that accompanies the picture. It is part of an article called “Pictures of Places,” and includes pictures from all over the world.^k

Along with this re-write of the original description of our newly germanized tree, a Note appeared in Garden and Forest Magazine in 1894:

“One of the most curious trees in Germany stands on the left bank of the River Oder, in Ratibor, Silesia. It is a Maple, at least one hundred years old, which has been twisted and cut into a sort of circular two-storied house. A flight of steps leads up to the first level, where the branches have been gradually woven together so that they make a firm leafy floor; above this is a second floor of smaller diameter, formed in the same way; and the ends of the branches have been woven into solid walls, and cut so that eight windows light each of the apartments. Below the first floor, at the level of the second, and at the top of the tree the boughs have been allowed to grow out naturally, while the intermediate walls and the edges of the window-like openings are kept closely clipped.”^l

This Note was reprinted in arnoldia, The Magazine of the Arnold Arboretum, at Harvard, in 2000,^m but it gives credit to the above journal as the source. In this later publication, Ethan Carr adds that Garden and Forest Magazine was written by “all the leading practitioners of the day” in the “profession of landscape architecture.”ⁿ Sounds like they must have been a trustworthy bunch of people, right?

Au contraire, mon cher! There are Notes in several journals in 1894, about the Maple of Ratibor. All the text of which is identical. The only novelty is in the heading.

What is worse, the only one that mentions the source of their information is in an issue of The American Architect and Building News, in 1894.^o The pertinent portion of the magazine’s Notes section is called, “A German House Tree,” and states the source as the Philadelphia Press (no date of the issue is mentioned):

As I said, exact duplicates of this Note also appeared in several magazines that very year, 1894. Nobody is honest enough, to cite their source, other than the one to the Philadelphia Press. At best, we find that in The Journal of Horticulture and Practical Gardening, where the Note is called “A Curious Tree”, credit is given to a “A reliable contemporary,” but the rest of the paragraph is identical.^p

So who wrote the original Ratibor article? I don’t know. The monthly dates of the individual issues do not mean anything anyway, since the journals were planned so long in advance.

So where is that durn maple tree? Matibo or Ratibor? Italy or Germany? Henry could not find either city two years ago.

So now I looked for Matibo, Italy. Bill Thayer, with his strong penchant for most places and things Italian, and speaking the lingo, also searched diligently. There is no Matibo, Italy, either as a city, estate or family name, that we can find.

Our French article on the Maple Tree of Matibo, then, is the first written description of the tree-house of all of the ones he or I found. Nobody afterwards adds any new information to the original piece of 1841, other than the change in locale. I wondered, at first, if Ratibor was a typo and Matibo was completely misread in these later articles describing the original tree-house. But once I found out that there is no Matibo, then Bill and I assume that the later writers were also stymied. They might have thought it was a typo, too, when they could not find that town on the map and then went hunting until they found some town with a similar name, thus finding Ratibor, which they could at least localize to “the banks of the Oder.”

There is actually an area called the Maple Mountains in Czechoslovakia, and Upper Silesia is also known as the Ratibor region, according to Oskar Krejčí in online snippets from his monograph Czechoslovak national interests, etc., written in 1996.^q Both of these facts, and no Italian Matibo, must have helped these later authors decide that Matibo must have really been a mistake for Ratibor. There are 5 common letters, and there were a lot of drunken typesetters back then, as well as proofreaders with my sort of skill-set (sub-par!), so this was not an unreasonable guess. The implication of the honesty and credibility of the “experts,” by transferring the tree, without comment, to another land leaves an unpleasant taste in my mouth, not to mention the uncredited new re-write (or re-translation) of the much older original article and picture with the implication of a “new discovery.”

Where did the author and the engraver of the original article get their information, if it was not created by them on the spot? That seems like a clue to the location of the storied tree.

Although the words of the French writer were thought worth adopting for their own by so many, he or she is anonymous.

The engraver, F. Wiesener, was acknowledged in the references devoted to the art of engraving (including the New York Public Library above), but only because he had the good sense to sign the plate, and his signature is there for all the world to see. Since illustrators and engravers were only sporadically acknowledged in the 19th century, it is not surprising that in the earlier thefts, he was not mentioned, nor was he mentioned in the original French journal. Later in the 19th century, better journals, like Pall Mall Magazine, credited these artists. However, in none of the articles with the picture of the tree-house is Wiesener acknowledged.

But was Wiesener the original illustrator, or did he just do the engraving from some other artist’s work? This was standard practice before photography and xerocopying was known.

As noticed above, multiple copies of his print appeared in various magazines. The same print engraved by F. Wiesener, is shown on a webpage, where it appears on a page from another compilation, Album de gravures et de dessins, called: “un érable à Matibo, près de Savigliano, Piémont.”^r The online picture (or book), is stated as being at the Gustave Moreau Museum in Paris, but searching the museum’s website was not a success and yielded no information about Wiesener, or this book, at all.

There is no stand-alone print by Wiesener to be found, nor is there an original picture from which the engraving was taken.^s

Henry also looked for other mention of the engraving. He found a webpage, “Fab Tree Hab” that states the “Maple of Ratibor,” by J. F. Wiesener, circa 1815, as a source in the bibliography. Then he did some more searching and only found a watercolor called, “Nocturnal Landscape with Thunderstorm,” by J. F. Wiesener, painted circa 1815. It is part of the collection of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. While this is a great picture of a lightning bolt over a tree-shaded river, there is certainly no tree-house in it. This Wiesener, they report, was a German and painted the picture in Germany.

I don’t think that this artist, J. F. Wiesener, is the F. Wiesener who did the engraving of the tree-house. Our F. Wiesener seems to be Pierre-Félix Wiesener, an engraver in France. Pierre-Félix was from Metz (Lorraine), and graduated from the l’École de Châlons, in 1827.^t J. F. and P.-F. could be related, of course.

It seems that Pierre-Félix is often listed only as F. Wiesener. He invented a new engraving method, which is in Mémoires sur un nouveau procédé de gravure, par Wiesener, graveur et imprimeur, in 1855.^u

I base this assumption on the entry in Les Graveurs de 19e siècle : un guide de l’amateur d’estampes moderne, by Henri Béraldi, it lists:

WIESENER, (Pierre-Félix), graveur, a exposé de 1841 à 1850 des gravures en relief sur cuivre, à l’eau-forte.

[WIESENER, (Pierre-Félix), engraver, who, from 1841 to 1850, has exposed engravings in relief over copper, to aqua fortis (nitric acid). (This is the first state of the etched plate, according to Harrap’s Standard French-English Dictionary, London, 1980).]^v

This is as far as Bill and I can go, in five languages, with the current material available online. This was a bit odd to both of us, since the rest of the world was so fascinated by it. Why didn't more people brag about, or disparage, this unique bit of garden art? Surely it would be a tourist attraction or locally famous, especially after all this ongoing publicity. But there is no more to discover. Vast as the online resources now are, there is more to discover in libraries and museums not yet made available. But it seems pretty clear that the article and engraving from Paris are the originals. What also seems highly likely is that a Frenchman or two has had the last laugh.

With no other mention of this tree-house in any other form, and not a single solitary illustration of it by anybody but Wiesener: somebody made it up!

Bill was pretty sure of this before I was, although I was getting that idea, my natural hope in the existence of anybody who could make such a thing died a bit harder. But I believe this is the case, as well.

For crying out loud, I am going to start a webpage called “This Old Hoax”!!!

Bill thinks Wiesener was might be the culprit, although his engravings were used several times in the long course of Le Magasin Pittoresque, and one would think he would not have been able to get repeat business if this sort of practice was his norm.

The fault might lie in the writer of a made-up text, instead, who asked P.-F. to illustrate it. Bill adds that “Ma ti’ bo” in pidgin French means “Mais tu es beaux“ (But you are beautiful!), making the whole thing a play on words. The writer is anonymous, and whether on the regular staff of the paper or only an occasional contributor to it, is impossible to say at this point.

There is another possibility that occurs to me: the piece was miscategorized as factual, and was really fiction: a pretty little tale, with a pretty little picture. Le Magasin Pittoresque included all sorts of subjects, including fiction and fashion. So who’s to say that this was not a piece that the writer and illustrator did with that intent, but it was treated by some hopeful editor in the gardening department as true.

I like this one best, and it would be nice if the only people in this Victorian myth who are not crooks or poor scholars, in varying degrees, were the original authors!

If, though, it was Wiesener’s sleight of hand, instead of a castle in Spain, or a romantic folly, he created a jewel of a tree-house out of thin air that enraptured us all.

And once he had such a charming picture to sell, there was no trouble finding a writer to come up with a story for it. Making word pictures is what authors do, after all.

Footnotes.

N. B. I am not placing a lot of links, to spare your internet privacy, or because the sites were nightmares to navigate, or they appeared iffy. If you are curious and properly sceptical, you can find these pages for yourself, with the information provided. The ones not on Google Books are on Henry”s blog, Arboarchitecture. If you insist, write me, and I”ll send you the links. Or if you find out anything new about the fabled tree, do tell me, please!

^a  When I first started looking for old books to put online, I was tickled pink to find (for free, in a giveaway cauldron at an old book store!), an old copy of Joe Miller’s Jest Book, no author stated, apparently an anonymous work. It was the perfect antidote to the gloom that typing up Froissart engenders in me, at our inability to read and/or learn how very bad war is from history. I put it online over time. It took forever because after I had done the first part of it, I happened to find the same book under its real name! Every bit of it but the title page was the same. This was published as an Arlington Edition: a series of books put out by Hurst & Co., Publishers, in New York, in the 1800’s. The original book was done by Mark Lemon about 40 years earlier. That I didn’t buy, because it cost 30 dollars. I have a couple of more American examples on my bookshelf, including The Teachings of Epictetus, translated by Rolleson, (which only americanized some British spelling). Tales of Humour, online onsite, also contains great stories, all but one translated from the French without acknowledging the original authors. It also is merely a re-packaging of two previous books by the same publishing house fifty years before, which they never mentioned to innocent book buyers.

^b  The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, New Series, Volume I, London: Hugh Cunningham, 1842; p. 66.

^c  Robert Merry’s Museum, edited by S. G. Goodrich, Volume V., Boston: Bradbury, Soden and Co., 1844; pp. 5-6.

^d  Being the proud owner of Peter Parley’s Merry Stories, or Fact, Fancy and Fiction, by Peter Parley, Broadway: James Miller; 1869, I can tell you that he has included what was felt by many to be Fredric S. Cozzens funniest story, Chapter IX, from The Sparrowgrass Papers, by Frederic S. Cozzens, Derby & Jackson, New York; 1860. Naturally, merry Peter did not bother to tell anybody who really wrote it. It was written well within the 14 years copyright law granted to creators of original material, but alas, my dear Frederic was dead. (In case you want to know, I think Chapter III, by the delightful man, is howlingly funny, although the horse story is good too.)

^e   See the Wikipedia entry on Piedmont-Sardinia.

^f  La Colmena, periódico redactado por A. de Villalobos, Tomo I, London: Ackerman & Co., 1842; p. 217.

^g  Archivo Pittoresco, semanario illustrado, Volume III, Lisbon: Typographia de Castro & Irmão, 1860; p. 78.

^h  Wonders of Vegetation, translated from the French of Marion, edited, with Numerous Additions, by Schele De Veke, D.D., LL.D., of the University of Virginia, New York: Charles Scribner & Co., 1872; pp. 181-182.

ⁱ  Les merveilles de la végétation, par F. Marion, illustrées par E. Lancelot, Paris: Librairie de Hachette et C^ie, 1867.

^j  Le meraviglie della vegetazione, di F. Marion, opera illustrata da 44 incisioni di E. Lancelot, Seconda Edizione, Milano: Fratelli Treves, Editori, 1877.

^k  The Picture Magazine, George Newnes Ltd., Volume II, July-December, London: George Newnes, Limited, 1893; p. 162,

^l  Garden and Forest Magazine Issue 332, Volume 7; New York: Tribune Publishing Company: 1894; p. 270.

^m  arnoldia, The Magazine of the Arnold Arboretum, 2000; p. 28.

ⁿ  Ibid., p. 5.

^o  The American Architect and Building News, Volume 45, July-September, Boston: The American Architect and Building News Co., 1894; p. 48.

^p  The Journal of Horticulture, Cottage Gardener, and Home Farmer, conducted by Robert Hogg, Volume XIX., Third Series, July-December, London: Journal of the Horticultural Office; 1894; p. 199.

^q  Oskar Krejčí in online snippets from his monograph Czechoslovak national interests: a historical survey of Czechoslovak national interests and reflections on the demise of Czechoslovak communism, Volume 446, Boulder, Colorado: East European Monographs, 1996.

^r  Album de gravures et de dessins (plantes et animaux), p. 15.

^s  All the copies of the engraving are so exact, that I wonder if the original plate was copied and sold, or just print copies were, by Wiesener himself or by Charton’s magazine. I don’t understand enough about the printing process, or about the engraving business, to be able to do anything more than ponder idly.

^t  Liste générale alphabétique & par promotions des ancien élèves des écoles nationales d’arts & métiers depuis leurs fondations, by the Société des anciens élèves des écoles nationales d’arts et métiers, Paris, 1900; p. 734.

^u  Mémoires sur un nouveau procédé de gravure, par Wiesener, graveur et imprimeur typographe, 12, rue Delaborde à Paris, déposés au secrétariat de l’Académie des sciences, les 20 août 1849 et 12 mars 1852, impr. at Wiesener, 1855.

^v  Les Graveurs de 19^e siècle : un guide de l’amateur d’estampes moderne, by Henri Béraldi, Tome XII, SAINT-MARCEL - ZWINGER, Paris: Librarie L. Conquet, 1892; pp. 290-291.