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dened by the stirring stroke of music, and passionate with love's outburst. Here are lavished the gayest of colours; here arrayed the most picturesque of costumes; here shine faces bright as flowers, sparkling with eyes brilliant as gems. In a scene such as this, which most travellers witness in Seville or Granada, Mr Phillip is triumphant. Mr Lewis may have portrayed Spain with minute detail, but no one has caught, like Mr Phillip, the very life of these children sporting in the passionate south.

The post of honour in the large room has, by an error in judgment, been assigned to 'The Courtyard of the Coptic Patriarch, Cairo,' by J. F. Lewis-a canvass which, as a mirror shattered in a thousand fragments, shows the too crowded life of Cairo in direst confusion. Mr Lewis, to our mind, has never been able to give to his oil-pictures the matchless qualities possessed by his drawings. Even the opacity of his water-colour pigments was redeemed by a brilliancy which in oilpaints is lost in dead density. We incline to the opinion, indeed, that for works within the limits of a cabinet size, no medium which the world has yet known attains excellencies which equal those now reached by the water-colour process, which is, in fact, tempera painted on paper in lieu of the ancient panel. Therefore in the interest of art, and with the remembrance of such drawings as the 'Encampment on Mount Sinai,' we have again to question the policy of the step taken by Mr Lewis, when he transferred his allegiance from the Old Water-Colour Gallery to the Academy in Trafalgar Square. Perhaps, however, the very best work which this artist has yet executed in oil, is to be met with in the present Exhibition, under the title "Caged Doves, Cairo;' doves of two species caged in a diverse sense-a winged dove, the pet of a houri, who is herself caged in a harem. The lattice-work of the window floods a sparkling light, and casts a dappled

shade upon the green and gold of the lady's robe-a dazzling effect, of which this artist has been long fond, here carried to consummate perfection. Several other painters, such as Webb, Herbert junior, Walton, Fisk, and Goodall, have either visited the East in person, or sent as their delegate a photographic apparatus. With one excерtion, we must pass these respective products by, and that exception we of course make in favour of F. Goodall's 'Messenger from Sinai at the Wells of Moses.' Mr Goodall may be quoted as the representative of that careful, well-balanced, and eclective style, towards which our English school is now tending; a style in which accurate drawing gives truth and attains expression, in which close and detailed study is directed to strict topographic accuracy, wherein colour is forced up to a pitch little short of decorative splendour; and lastly, where composition becomes an intricate calculation, whereby all these several elements may be set off to best advantage. It is notorious that in art the world has arrived at an age in which everything has been in generations past already attempted and done. The Roman school was pre-eminent in form, the Venetian resplendent in colour, the Bolognese skilful in composition, and perhaps in any one of these separate qualities it is hard for us now in these last days to make an advance on the attainments of former times. Yet a super-excellence which may be impossible in dissevered units becomes practicable in a balanced and collective whole. And this is just that eclecticism to which our English schools, whether of painting, of sculpture, or of architecture, are now tending-a proclivity, moreover, not limited to the domain of the arts, but extending into every realm of knowledge,-found in science, through her accumulative stores; in metaphysics, by the mass of chop-logic and seedy chaff; in political philosophy, by the heap of compiled maxims and tabulat

ed statistics; in prose literature, through the inveterate building-up of tombs to the prophets; in poetry, by the reiteration of approved metaphors, and the shooting down, or rather the re-serving up, of whole cartloads laden with old materials.

Thus, as we have said, do we see on all sides, and in every direction, boundless stores wherewith to construct an elaborate eclecticism. And far be it from us to call in question the originality which may remain possible notwithstanding, and even, perhaps, through the aid of, this systematic copyism. We believe, for example, the picture already quoted, 'The Messenger at the Wells of Moses,' is just as original as works produced in any prior epoch. A scrutiny into the history and development of art discovers a slow, sure, and accumulative progression, step by step. The building which we worship as a wonder of the world was put together stone by stone; and even the original conception of the architect, if original it ever were, will be found to be but a conglomerate of scattered elementary ideas, which prior men had conceived and put into rudimentary form. We dwell with emphasis upon this line of thought, because it is this eclecticism, this compilation, and the growth that comes from concerted power, which can alone enable the critic and connoisseur to adjudicate on the merits, and to decide upon the coming prospects, of our English school. Scarcely more certain are the laws which guide the planets, than the dynamics which impel, and yet control, the cycloid movements of the arts. How genius repeats herself, and yet is never twice the same; how the arts retrace their former steps, and yet never tread precisely along the same path; how they gather strength in their orbit, and gain progressive velocity as they approach to central nature, which stands as the sun in the firmament; and then again, at seasons, how wildly they wander into darkness, only to return at the fit

ting moment back to their former and better selves;-why, all these problems, we say, find in the present aspect of English and Continental schools forcible and vivid illustration.

With the guidance of some such principles as those just enunciated, it were interesting to trace the pedigree and to pronounce upon the antecedents of the styles of high art, of domestic incident, and of landscape, which are now dominant in our Exhibitions. It were instructive to show how the grand school of Italy was carried to the shore of Britain, how it suffered shipwreck, and then, at a moment when all might be deemed lost, how up it rose once more into life, though in garb how changed, in the works of Mr Leighton and Mr Watts. In like manner, though with much more detail and precision, we should desire to set forth the causes which at this moment conspire towards the literal naturalism manifest on the walls of every gallery in the country. And then, coming to specific departments, it were a task, if not tempting, at least profitable, to trace the various styles of portrait-painting back to their historic originals- to point out how Vandyke and Titian formed our English Reynolds-how their manner, broad in handling and senatorial or plebeian in bearing just as the subject might suggest, descended upon Watson Gordon, Knight, and others of the school-and then how, when people grew perhaps a little tired of being painted after the good old fashion in which their grandfathers and grandmothers descended to posterity, suddenly set in a reaction; and so Sandys, with the detail of Van Eyck and Holman Hunt, in the severity of Albert Durer, rise to the zenith. The multiplication of small cabinet - pictures after the Dutch practice demands no elaborate analysis. A school so simply naturalistic springs indigenous to every soil; as a wayside flower it blooms in all hedgerows, and demands little culture save such as

nature in shower and sunshine bestows on her favoured children. Wilkie was, we all know, one of the first among us who gathered this plant growing a little rudely and coarsely on the flat lands of Holland, and gave to the foundling a dressing more decorous. A glance into the Academy, or indeed at any of our Exhibitions, will at once indicate what industry and aptitude painters, whose names are legion, have brought to the formation of this Anglo-Scottish or Dutch school. Webster, T. Faed, Hardy, Smith, Provis, and Nicol, not to enumerate others, form of themselves a phalanx sufficiently strong. As for our English landscape, the glory of ournative art, its pedigree is soon told. Salvator Rosa and Gasper Poussin, who were still towers of strength down to the commencement of the present century, are now wholly overthrown in their ancient dominion. Claude, however, is not yet quite forgotten. He still reigns in the elements of air and water; he yet, through the glories of Turner, who was more than a Claude for England, shines in the sunset sky and illumines the radiant sea; and even in the present year, when a Danby enthrones the sun in mid-heaven, can we not wholly forget the tribute due to placid and poetic Claude, whose soul never found its surfeit in serene sunsets. Yet in this our analysis of the present phasis of England's landscape-art, we were indeed remiss not to mention the master to whom every one of our painters is alike indebted. If we cast an eye to the works contributed by Creswick, Leader, the Linnells, Cole, Hulme, Knight, and Brett, we cannot fail to see that these several artists in their studies have thought little of Salvator, Poussin, or Claude, but in simple earnestness devote their best days and years to nature. The old masters have been, for these modern men, dead. No resuscitation or resurrection of a form or a life which has passed away, is by our present school of landscape-painters desired or attempted. But one thing

they do earnestly strive to get upon canvass-the truth and the beauty which dwell among the hills and the woods and the streams. This they seek after, and not in vain.

Having launched into general dissertation, we must now, in a few supplementary notes, concentrate attention upon some leading works which still remain without comment. In portraiture we have distinguished between schools of breadth and of detail. The portrait by F. Sandys may be quoted as a favourable example of the high finish known to Denner. Two full-length figures, 'Mr James Hodgson' and 'Mrs Stewart Hodgson,' by H. T. Wells, are commendable for the happy combination of a detail loved by Van Eyck, with a colour in which a Titian might glory. When we possess native artists capable of painting pictures such as these, we scarcely understand wherefore Mr Jensen should have been called upon to perpetrate two parodies upon 'The Prince of Wales' and 'The Princess of Wales,' -pictures which, by the prominent positions which they usurp, disfigure the Exhibition. By far the most felicitous rendering of Royalty comes from the easel of H. Weigall. 'Alexandra, Princess of Wales,' painted by this artist, is certainly a work of much refinement and delicacy. Among the products which in balanced eclecticism happily blend varied excellencies, we must signalise Mr Beccani's full-length figure of Lady Mary Fox, which ranks as one of the best portraits in the Exhibition. Lastly, as examples of the broad generalisation which has descended in the English school from the time of Vandyke or of Rembrandt, we may enumerate the portraits of 'General Cabrera,' by J. P. Knight; 'The Earl of Dalhousie,' by J. Phillip; and 'John Gibson,' by W. Boxall. In the treatment of female heads, this manner, sometimes sturdy, is mitigated and softened, as in the heads of the Countess of Home, by G. Richmond, and of the Hon. Mrs J. Macdonald, by F. Grant. We have intentionally reserved the mention of several portraits, the closing works of Sir John Watson Gordon, in order to pay a tribute to the memory of this great and honoured painter. In style this artist possessed the charm of simplicity and the vigour of truth; few painters the world has known could model a head with a firmer or bolder pencil. His name will henceforth go down to posterity not only as President of the Royal Academy of Scotland, not only through the grateful remembrance of the many services he conferred on art in the city of his birth, but likewise, as was the lot of Reynolds, through the illustrious men whose portraits will to future generations testify to the rare pictorial powers of this master-hand. The annals of Scotland owe to John Watson Gordon the noble portraits of Wilson, De Quincey, Cockburn, Chalmers, and Scott- pictures which now more than ever will be prized for twofold reasons and accumulative associations. John Watson Gordon was, even to the last days of his long and active life, in the full possession of that vigour of hand and of intellect which have ever given to his works universal power and worth. Within a comparatively few hours of his death, he was able to devote to his profession his wonted zeal. The Academies of Scotland and of England, which his portraits have for many years adorned, will now mourn his loss - a loss which falls not only on the public at large, but a bereavement that cannot fail to be felt most acutely among private friends, to whom his simple, straightforward character made him very dear.

This seems a fitting place to record another loss which the Academy has sustained. William Mulready died in July last, full of years and crowned with honours. The present Exhibition is bereaved of those works which for half a century have been endeared to the public eye. To judge of the dili

gence and the rare merit of this simple and truth - seeking artist, every student and lover of art should go to South Kensington, where the pictures, drawings, and sketches of William Mulready have been collected. The whole course of a long and laborious life is here illustrated, "from the first boyish fancy to the picture that stood unfinished on the easel" when the artist died, a collection which forms "a worthy memorial of the great painter, who from his youth to the evening before his death was a workman in the service of art." "I have," said Mulready, in the evidence given before the Royal Academy Commission, "from the first moment I became a visitor in the Life School, drawn there as if I were drawing for a prize." The evidence of this untiring devotion lies before us in the instructive series of paintings and studies wherein one of the greatest among our British artists has transcribed, as it were, a detailed autobiography. It is indeed most interesting to mark how the nascent thought, as it first dawned, was jotted down in the shorthand of the painter's art; how, at a subsequent stage of development, the embryo idea grew into a draughtsman's study or cartoon, till at length colour-and a colour how subtle and exquisite those who know these works most intimately will best appreciate-being added, the picture, thoroughly mature, became, after its kind, little short of perfect. Mulready assuredly, in all the technical qualities of his art, was not surpassed by the most dexterous of the Dutch masters. And then, in forming a just estimate of his concerted powers, it must not be forgotten that to the skill of his brush and the rich harmonies of his palette were superadded traits of sagacious wisdom, of thought serious and profound, and yet wont to sparkle in sportive wit and playful satire upon the surface. He is gone, this master who touched each note upon the gamut with a light yet pensive hand, who passed from grave to gay, claiming a tear for pity, and winning a smile from the face of joy.

Two Academicians we mourn over as dead: other Academicians, who shall be nameless, we lament over as living. Melancholy is it that men whose brains are out, should go on, year after year, painting pictures which proclaim little else than an enfeebled and incoherent intellect. Professions there are of mere mechanical routine, which, so long as the wheels of life manage to rotate, however slowly, can be carried on even to the very last without serious detriment to the public weal. But the practice of the artist's calling is not of this lower nature. A picture is the very life-blood of genius; and when the flood of manhood's prime stagnates, the image cast upon the canvass shows itself decrepid. We shall not, for reasons which good taste dictates, direct individual attention to works which it is mercy to pass unnoticed: but in general terms we may denounce one of the worst abuses known to creep into institutions that after a time, it may be feared, are sustained, not so much to promote the best interests of art, as for the protection of individual members unable to stand without adventitious support. The outcry raised against the Academy for its persistent maintenance of vested private rights, whatever public wrongs be thereby inflicted, grows every year louder as each succeeding Exhibition comes round. It is certainly a grievance past toleration, that hundreds and tens of hundreds of pictures should be rejected altogether for want of space, and that other paintings of first-rate merit, even when admitted, should be thrust out of sight, simply because Academicians and Associates have the privilege of inundating the rooms with works of boundless mediocrity. How greatly the quality of the present Exhibition is deteriorated by this flagrant injustice, inflicted upon the outsiders in the profession, a glance round the walls

will at once indicate. There are, in fact, pictures placed in positions of command, which, wholly beneath criticism, call aloud for the reform of an Academy which, strange to say, is not ashamed thus to proclaim its incapacity and corruption.

We must now, in rapid survey, again turn to individual works which ought not to escape commendation. The public has usually to thank Mr Millais for some startling pictorial prodigy. This year, however, he relies for his effects upon the force of literal facts, and, like some of the greatest painters, his predecessors of old, finds the means of making a simple portrait a consummate piece of art. Leaving several such works, we at once go to the charming little picture, in praise of which every tongue is loud. 'My Second Sermon' had been a homily, were it not a satire. A little girl, who last year listened, all attention, in this same place, to her "first sermon," has now, under the infliction of a "second," gone fast asleep; and never was slumber more profound in its depths, or more peacefulon its placid surface, unruffled by breath of conscious thought or care. For technical qualities of colour and handling, the picture can scarcely be surpassed. The works contributed by Mr Millais may be taken in illustration and in extension of the foregoing remarks upon schools of portraiture. Other and widely different productions, which we now proceed to mention, exemplify the various phases of that school which we have ventured to designate the Anglo or Scottish Dutch. One of the very choicest examples of this popular style is T. Webster's seriocomic little picture, 'A Penny Peepshow of the Battle of Waterloo.' Other works of a like class demand no stinted praise, such as 'Evening,' by G. Hardy; 'Try dese Pair,' by F. D. Hardy; 'The Banquet Scene, Macbeth,' by C. Hunt; 'Interior near Penmachno,' by A. Provis; and 'Among the Old Masters,' by E. Nicol. The two brothers, Mr Thomas Faed and Mr John Faed,

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