MODERN PAINTING

By

GEORGE MOORE

TO SIR WILLIAM EDEN, BART. 

OF ALL MY BOOKS, THIS IS THE ONE YOU LIKE BEST; ITS SUBJECT HAS BEENTHE SUBJECT OF NEARLY ALL OUR CONVERSATIONS IN THE PAST, AND I SUPPOSEWILL BE THE SUBJECT OF MANY CONVERSATIONS IN THE FUTURE; SO, LOOKINGBACK AND FORWARD, I DEDICATE THIS BOOK TO YOU. 

G. M. 

_The Editor of "The Speaker" allowed me to publish from time to timechapters of a book on art. These chapters have been gathered from themass of art journalism which had grown about them, and I reprint themin the sequence originally intended_. 

_G. M. _

CONTENTS. 

WHISTLERCHAVANNES, MILLET, AND MANETTHE FAILURE OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURYARTISTIC EDUCATION IN FRANCE AND ENGLANDINGRES AND COROTMONET, SISLEY, PISSARO, AND THE DECADENCEOUR ACADEMICIANSTHE ORGANISATION OF ARTART AND SCIENCEROYALTY IN ARTART PATRONSPICTURE DEALERSMR. BURNE-JONES AND THE ACADEMYTHE ALDERMAN IN ARTRELIGIOSITY IN ARTTHE CAMERA IN ARTTHE NEW ENGLISH ART CLUBA GREAT ARTISTNATIONALITY IN ARTSEX IN ARTMR. STEER'S EXHIBITIONCLAUDE MONETNOTES-- MR. MARK FISHER A PORTRAIT BY MR. SARGENT AN ORCHID BY MR. JAMES THE WHISTLER ALBUM INGRESSOME JAPANESE PRINTSNEW ART CRITICISMLONG AGO IN ITALY

WHISTLER. 

I have studied Mr. Whistler and thought about him this many a year. His character was for a long time incomprehensible to me; it containedelements apparently so antagonistic, so mutually destructive, that Ihad to confess my inability to bring him within any imaginablepsychological laws, and classed him as one of the enigmas of life. ButNature is never illogical; she only seems so, because our sight is notsufficient to see into her intentions; and with study my psychologicaldifficulties dwindled, and now the man stands before me exquisitelyunderstood, a perfect piece of logic. All that seemed discordant anddiscrepant in his nature has now become harmonious and inevitable; thestrangest and most erratic actions of his life now seem natural andconsequential (I use the word in its grammatical sense) contradictionsare reconciled, and looking at the man I see the pictures, and lookingat the pictures I see the man. 

But at the outset the difficulties were enormous. It was like anewly-discovered Greek text, without punctuation or capital letters. Here was a man capable of painting portraits, perhaps not quite sofull of grip as the best work done by Velasquez and Hals, only justfalling short of these masters at the point where they were strongest, but plainly exceeding them in graciousness of intention, and subtlehappiness of design, who would lay down his palette and run to anewspaper office to polish the tail of an epigram which he waslaunching against an unfortunate critic who had failed to distinguishbetween an etching and a pen-and-ink drawing! Here was a man who, though he had spent the afternoon painting like the greatest, wouldspend his evenings in frantic disputes over dinner-tables about theultimate ownership of a mild joke, possibly good enough for _Punch_, something that any one might have said, and that most of us havingsaid it would have forgotten! It will be conceded that suchdivagations are difficult to reconcile with the possession of artisticfaculties of the highest order. 

The "Ten o'clock" contained a good deal of brilliant writing, sparkling and audacious epigram, but amid all its glitter and "go"there are statements which, coming from Mr. Whistler, are asastonishing as a denial of the rotundity of the earth would be in apamphlet bearing the name of Professor Huxley. Mr. Whistler is onlyserious in his art--a grave fault according to academicians, who areserious in everything except their "art". A very boyish utterance isthe statement that such a thing as an artistic period has never beenknown. 

One rubbed one's eyes; one said, Is this a joke, and, if so, where isthe point of it? And then, as if not content with so much mystification, Mr. Whistler assured his ten o'clock audience that there was no suchthing as nationality in art, and that you might as well speak ofEnglish mathematics as of English art. We do not stop to inquire ifsuch answers contain one grain of truth; we know they do not--we stopto consider them because we know that the criticism of a creative artistnever amounts to more than an ingenious defence of his own work--aningenious exaltation of a weakness (a weakness which perhaps nonesuspects but himself) into a conspicuous merit. 

Mr. Whistler has shared his life equally between America, France, andEngland. He is the one solitary example of cosmopolitanism in art, forthere is nothing in his pictures to show that they come from thenorth, the south, the east, or the west. They are compounds of allthat is great in Eastern and Western culture. Conscious of this, andfearing that it might be used as an argument against his art, Mr. Whistler threw over the entire history, not only of art, but of theworld; and declared boldly that art was, like science, not national, but essentially cosmopolitan; and then, becoming aware of the anomalyof his genius in his generation, Mr. Whistler undertook to explainaway the anomaly by ignoring the fifth century B. C. In Athens, thefifteenth century in Italy, and the seventeenth in Holland, and humblysubmitting that artists never appeared in numbers like swallows, butsingly like aerolites. Now our task is not to disprove thesestatements, but to work out the relationship between the author of the"Butterfly Letters" and the painter of the portrait of "The Mother", "Lady Archibald Campbell", "Miss Alexander", and the other forty-onemasterpieces that were on exhibition in the Goupil galleries. 

There is, however, an intermediate step, which is to point out theintimate relationship between the letter-writer and the physical man. Although there is no internal evidence to show that the pictures werenot painted by a Frenchman, an Italian, an Englishman, or aWesternised Japanese, it would be impossible to read any one of thebutterfly-signed letters without feeling that the author was a man ofnerves rather than a man of muscle, and, while reading, we shouldinvoluntarily picture him short and thin rather than tall andstalwart. But what has physical condition got to do with painting? Agreat deal. The greatest painters, I mean the very greatest--MichaelAngelo, Velasquez, and Rubens--were gifted by Nature with as full ameasure of health as of genius. Their physical constitutions resembledmore those of bulls than of men. Michael Angelo lay on his back forthree years painting the Sistine Chapel. Rubens painted a life-sizefigure in a morning of pleasant work, and went out to ride in theafternoon. But Nature has dowered Mr. Whistler with only genius. Hisartistic perceptions are moreexquisite than Velasquez's. He knows asmuch, possibly even a little more, and yet the result is never quiteequal. Why? A question of health. _C'est un tempérament de chatte_. Hecannot pass from masterpiece to masterpiece like Velasquez. Theexpenditure of nerve-force necessary to produce such a work as theportrait of Lady Archibald Campbell or Miss Alexander exhausts him, and he is obliged to wait till Nature recoups herself; and thesenecessary intervals he has employed in writing letters signed"Butterfly" to the papers, quarrelling with Oscar over a few mildjokes, explaining his artistic existence, at the expense of the entireartistic history of the world, collecting and classifying thestupidities of the daily and weekly press. 

But the lesser side of a man of genius is instructive to study--indeed, it is necessary that we should study it if we would thoroughlyunderstand his genius. "No man, " it has been very falsely said, "is ahero to his _valet de chambre_. " The very opposite is the truth. Manwill bow the knee only to his own image and likeness. The deeper thehumanity, the deeper the adoration; and from this law not even divinityis excepted. All we adore is human, and through knowledge of the fleshthat grovels we may catch sight of the soul ascending towards thedivine stars. 

And so the contemplation of Mr. Whistler, the author of the "ButterflyLetters", the defender of his little jokes against the plagiarisingtongue, should stimulate rather than interrupt our prostrations. Isaid that Nature had dowered Mr. Whistler with every gift except thatof physical strength. If Mr. Whistler had the bull-like health ofMichael Angelo, Rubens, and Hals, the Letters would never have beenwritten. They were the safety-valve by which his strained nerves foundrelief from the intolerable tension of the masterpiece. He has not thebodily strength to pass from masterpiece to masterpiece, as did thegreat ones of old time. In the completed picture slight traces of hisagony remain. But painting is the most indiscreet of all the arts, andhere and there an omission or a feeble indication reveal the painterto us in moments of exasperated impotence. To understand Mr. Whistler's art you must understand his body. I do not mean that Mr. Whistler has suffered from bad health--his health has always beenexcellent; all great artists have excellent health, but hisconstitution is more nervous than robust. He is even a strong man, buthe is lacking in weight. Were he six inches taller, and his bulkproportionately increased, his art would be different. Instead ofhaving painted a dozen portraits, every one--even the mother and MissAlexander, which I personally take to be the two best--a littlefebrile in its extreme beauty, whilst some, masterpieces though theybe, are clearly touched with weakness, and marked with hysteria--Mr. Whistler would have painted a hundred portraits, as strong, asvigorous, as decisive, and as easily accomplished as any by Velasquezor Hals. But if Nature had willed him so, I do not think we shouldhave had the Nocturnes, which are clearly the outcome of ahighly-strung, bloodless nature whetted on the whetstone of its ownweakness to an exasperated sense of volatile colour and evanescentlight. It is hardly possible to doubt that this is so when we look onthese canvases, where, in all the stages of her repose, the nightdozes and dreams upon our river--a creole in Nocturne 34, upon whosetrembling eyelids the lustral moon is shining; a quadroon in Nocturne17, who turns herself out of the light anhungered and set upon somefeast of dark slumber. And for the sake of these gem-like pictures, whose blue serenities are comparable to the white perfections ofAthenian marbles, we should have done well to yield a littlestrengthin portraiture, if the distribution of Mr. Whistler's genius had beenleft in our hands. So Nature has done her work well, and we have nocause to regret the few pounds of flesh that she withheld. A fewpounds more of flesh and muscle, and we should have had anotherVelasquez; but Nature shrinks from repetition, and at the last momentshe said, "The world has had Velasquez, another would be superfluous:let there be Jimmy Whistler. "

In the Nocturnes Mr. Whistler stands alone, withouta rival. Inportraits he is at his best when they are near to his Nocturnes inintention, when the theme lends itself to an imaginative anddecorative treatment; for instance, as in the mother or MissAlexander. Mr. Whistler is at his worst when he is frankly realistic. I have seen pictures by Mr. Henry Moore that I like better than "TheBlue Wave". Nor does Mr. Whistler seem to me to reach his highestlevel in any one of the three portraits--Lady Archibald Campbell, Miss Rose Corder, and "the lady in the fur jacket". I know that Mr. Walter Sickert considers the portrait of Lady Archibald Campbell to beMr. Whistler's finest portrait. I submit, however, that the attitudeis theatrical and not very explicit. It is a movement that has notbeen frankly observed, nor is it a movement that has been franklyimagined. It has none of the artless elegance of Nature; it is full ofstudio combinations; and yet it is not a frankly decorativearrangement, as the portrait of the mother or Miss Alexander. WhenHals painted his Burgomasters, he was careful to place them indefinite and comprehensible surroundings. He never left us in doubteither as to the time or the place; and the same obligations of timeand place, which Hals never shirked, seem to me to rest on thepainter, if he elects to paint his sitter in any attitude except oneof conventional repose. 

Lady Archibald Campbell is represented in violent movement, lookingbackwards over her shoulder as she walks up the picture; yet there isnothing to show that she is not standing on the low table on which themodel poses, and the few necessary indications are left out becausethey would interfere with the general harmony of his picture; because, if the table on which she is standing were indicated, the movement ofoutstretched arm would be incomprehensible. The hand, too, is somewhatuncertain, undetermined, and a gesture is meaningless that the handdoes not determine and complete. I do not speak of the fingers of theright hand, which are non-existent; after a dozen attempts to paintthe gloved hand, only an approximate result was obtained. Look at theear, and say that the painter's nerves did not give wayonce or twice. And the likeness is vague and shadowy; she is only fairlyrepresentative of her class. We see fairly well that she is a lady _dugrand monde_, who is, however, not without knowledge of _les environsdu monde_. But she is hardly English--she might be a French woman oran American. She is a sort of hybrid. Miss Rose Corder and "the ladyin the fur jacket" are equally cosmopolitan; so, too, is MissAlexander. Only once has Mr. Whistler expressed race, and that was inhis portrait of his mother. Then these three ladies--Miss Corder, LadyArchibald Campbell, and "the lady in the fur jacket"--wear the samecomplexion: a pale yellow complexion, burnt and dried. With thisconventional tint he obtains unison and a totality of effect; but heobtains this result at the expense of truth. Hals and Velasquezobtained the same result, without, however, resorting to suchmeretricious methods. 

The portrait of the mother is, as every one knows, in the Luxemburg;but the engraving reminds us of the honour which France has done, butwhich we failed to do, to the great painter of the nineteenth century;and after much hesitation and arguing with myself I feel sure that onthe whole this picture is the painter's greatest work in portraiture. We forget relations, friends, perhaps even our parents; but thatpicture we never forget; it is for ever with us, in sickness and inhealth; and in moments of extreme despair, when life seems hopeless, the strange magic of that picture springs into consciousness, and wewonder by what strange wizard craft was accomplished the marvellouspattern on the black curtain that drops past the engraving on thewall. We muse on the extraordinary beauty of that grey wall, on theblack silhouette sitting so tranquilly, on the large feet on afoot-stool, on the hands crossed, on the long black dress that fillsthe picture with such solemn harmony. Then mark the transition fromgrey to white, and how _le ton local_ is carried through the entirepicture, from the highest light to the deepest shadow. Note thetenderness of that white cap, the white lace cuffs, the certainty, thechoice, and think of anything if you can, even in the best Japanesework, more beautiful, more delicate, subtle, illusive, certain in itshandicraft; and if the lace cuffs are marvellous, the delicate handsof a beautiful old age lying in a small lace handkerchief are littleshort of miraculous. They are not drawn out in anatomical diagram, butappear and disappear, seen here on the black dress, lost there in thesmall white handkerchief. And when we study the faint, subtle outlineof the mother's face, we seem to feel that there the painter has toldthe story of his soul more fully than elsewhere. That soul, strangelyalive to all that is delicate and illusive in Nature, found perhapsits fullest expression in that grave old Puritan lady looking throughthe quiet refinement of her grey room, sitting in solemn profile inall the quiet habit of her long life. 

Compared with later work, the execution is "tighter", if I may bepermitted an expression which will be understood in studios; we arevery far indeed from the admirable looseness of handling which is thecharm of the portrait of Miss Rose Corder. There every object is bornunconsciously beneath the passing of the brush. If not less certain, the touch in the portrait of the mother is less prompt; but thepainter's vision is more sincere and more intense. And to those whoobject to the artificiality of the arrangement, I reply that if theold lady is sitting in a room artificially arranged, Lady ArchibaldCampbell may be said to be walking through incomprehensible space. Butwhat really decides me to place this portrait above the others is thefact that while painting his mother's portrait he was unquestionablyabsorbed in his model; and absorption in the model is perhaps thefirst quality in portrait-painting. 

Still, for my own personal pleasure, to satisfy the innermost cravingsof my own soul, I would choose to live with the portrait of MissAlexander. Truly, this picture seems to me the most beautiful in theworld. I know very well that it has not the profound beauty of theInfantes by Velasquez in the Louvre; but for pure magic of inspiration, is it not more delightful? Just as Shelley's "Sensitive Plant" thrillsthe innermost sense like no other poem in the language, the portraitof Miss Alexander enchants with the harmony of colour, with the melodyof composition. 

Strangely original, a rare and unique thing, is this picture, yet weknow whence it came, and may easily appreciate the influences thatbrought it into being. Exquisite and happy combination of the art ofan entire nation and the genius of one man-the soul of Japan incarnatein the body of the immortal Spaniard. It was Japan that counselled thestrange grace of the silhouette, and it was that country, too, thatinspired in a dim, far-off way those subtly sweet and magical passagesfrom grey to green, from green again to changing evanescent grey. Buta higher intelligence massed and impelled those chords of green andgrey than ever manifested itself in Japanese fan or screen; the meansare simpler, the effect is greater, and by the side of this picturethe best Japanese work seems only facile superficial improvisation. Inthe picture itself there is really little of Japan. The painter merelyunderstood all that Japan might teach. He went to the very root, appropriating only the innermost essence of its art. We Westerns hadthought it sufficient to copy Nature, but the Japanese knew it wasbetter to observe Nature. The whole art of Japan is selection, andJapan taught Mr. Whistler, or impressed upon Mr. Whistler, theimperative necessity of selection. No Western artist of the present orof past time--no, not Velasquez himself--ever selected from the modelso tenderly as Mr. Whistler; Japan taught him to consider Nature as astorehouse whence the artist may pick and choose, combining thefragments of his choice into an exquisite whole. Sir John Millais' artis the opposite; there we find no selection; the model is copied--andsometimes only with sufficient technical skill. 

But this picture is throughout a selection from the model; nowhere hasanything been copied brutally, yet the reality of the girl is notsacrificed. 

The picture represents a girl of ten or eleven. She is dressedaccording to the fashion of twenty years ago--a starched muslin frock, a small overskirt pale brown, white stockings, square-toed blackshoes. She stands, her left foot advanced, holding in her left hand agrey felt hat adorned with a long plume reaching nearly to the ground. The wall behind her is grey with a black wainscot. On the left, farback in the picture, on a low stool, some grey-green drapery strikesthe highest note of colour in the picture. On the right, in theforeground, some tall daisies come into the picture, and twobutterflies flutter over the girl's blonde head. This picture seems toexist principally in the seeing! I mean that the execution is sostrangely simple that the thought, "If I could only see the model likethat, I think Icould do it myself", comes spontaneously into the mind. And this spontaneous thought is excellent criticism, for three-partsof Mr. Whistler's art lies in the seeing; no one ever saw Nature soartistically. Notice on the left the sharp line of the white frockcutting against the black wainscoting. Were that line taken away, howmuch would the picture lose! Look at the leg that is advanced, andtell me if you can detect the modelling. There is modelling, I know, but there are no vulgar roundnesses. Apparently, only a flat tint; butthere is on the bone a light, hardly discernible; and this light issufficient. And the leg that is turned away, the thick, chubby ankleof the child, how admirable in drawing; and that touch of darkercolour, how it tells the exact form of the bone! To indicate is thefinal accomplishment of the painter's art, and I know no indicationlike that ankle bone. And now passing from the feet to the face, notice, I beg of you to notice--it is one of the points in thepicture--that jaw bone. The face is seen in three-quarter, and tofocus the interest in the face the painter has slightly insisted onthe line of the jaw bone, which, taken in conjunction with the line ofthe hair, brings into prominence the oval of the face. In Nature thatcharming oval only appeared at moments. The painter seized one ofthose moments, and called it into our consciousness as a musician withcertain finger will choose to give prominence to a certain note in achord. 

There must have been a day in Mr. Whistler's life when the artists ofJapan convinced him once and for ever of the primary importance ofselection. In Velasquez, too, there is selection, and very often it isin the same direction as Mr. Whistler's, but the selection is never, Ithink, so much insisted upon; and sometimes in Velasquez there is, asin the portrait of the Admiral in the National Gallery, hardly anyselection--I mean, of course, conscious selection. Velasquez sometimesbrutally accepted Nature for what she was worth; this Mr. Whistlernever does. But it was Velasquez that gave consistency and strength towhat in Mr. Whistler might have run into an art of trivial butexquisite decoration. Velasquez, too, had a voice in the compositionof the palette generally, so sober, so grave. The palette of Velasquezis the opposite of the palette of Rubens; the fantasy of Rubens'palette created the art of Watteau, Turner, Gainsborough; it obtainedthroughout the eighteenth century in England and in France. Chardinwas the one exception. Alone amid the eighteenth century painters hechose the palette of Velasquez in preference to that of Rubens, and inthe nineteenth century Whistler too has chosen it. It was Velasquezwho taught Mr. Whistler that flowing, limpid execution. In thepainting of that blonde hair there is something more than a souvenirof the blonde hair of the Infante in the _salle carrée_ in the Louvre. There is also something of Velasquez in the black notes of the shoes. Those blacks--are they not perfectly observed? How light and dry thecolour is! How heavy and shiny it would have become in other hands!Notice, too, that in the frock nowhere is there a single touch of purewhite, and yet it is all white--a rich, luminous white that makesevery other white in the gallery seem either chalky or dirty. What anenchantment and a delight the handling is! How flowing, how supple, infinitely and beautifully sure, the music of perfect accomplishment!In the portrait of the mother the execution seems slower, hardly sospontaneous. For this, no doubt, the subject is accountable. But thislittle girl is the very finest flower, and the culminating point ofMr. Whistler's art. The eye travels over the canvas seeking a fault. In vain; nothing has been omitted that might have been included, nothing has been included that might have been omitted. There is muchin Velasquez that is stronger, but nothing in this world ever seemedto me so perfect as this picture. 

The portrait of Carlyle has been painted about an arabesque similar, Imight almost say identical, to that of the portrait of the mother. Butas is usually the case, the attempt to repeat a success has resulted afailure. Mr. Whistler has sought to vary the arabesque in thedirection of greater naturalness. He has broken the severity of theline, which the lace handkerchief and the hands scarcely stayed in thefirst picture, by placing the philosopher's hat upon his knees, he hasattenuated the symmetry of the picture-frames on the walls, and hasomitted the black curtain which drops through the earlier picture. Andall these alterations seemed to me like so many leaks through whichthe eternal something of the first design has run out. A pattern likethat of the egg and dart cannot be disturbed, and Columbus himselfcannot rediscover America. And, turning from the arabesque to thepainting, we notice at once that the balance of colour, held with suchexquisite grace by the curtain on one side and the dress on the other, is absent in the later work; and if we examine the colours separatelywe cannot fail to apprehend the fact that the blacks in the later arenot nearly so beautiful as those in the earlier picture. The blacks ofthe philosopher's coat and rug are neither as rich, not as rare, noras deep as the blacks of the mother's gown. Never have the vitaldifferences and the beauty of this colour been brought out as in thatgown and that curtain, never even in Hals, who excels all otherpainters in this use of black. Mr. Whistler's failure with the firstcolour, when we compare the two pictures, is exceeded by his failurewith the second colour. We miss the beauty of those extraordinary andexquisite high notes--the cap and cuffs; and the place of the rich, palpitating greys, so tremulous in the background of the earlierpicture, is taken by an insignificant grey that hardly seems necessaryor helpful to the coat and rug, and is only just raised out of thecommonplace by the dim yellow of two picture-frames. It must beadmitted, however, that the yellow is perfectly successful; it may bealmost said to be what is most attractive in the picture. The greys inchin, beard, and hair must, however, be admitted to be beautiful, although they are not so full of charm as the greys in the portrait ofMiss Alexander. 

But if Mr. Whistler had only failed in these matters, he might havestill produced a masterpiece. But there is a graver criticism to beurged against the picture. A portrait is an exact reflection of thepainter's state of soul at the moment of sitting down to paint. Weread in the picture what he really desired; for what he really desiredis in the picture, and his hesitations tell us what he only desiredfeebly. Every passing distraction, every weariness, every loss ofinterest in the model, all is written upon the canvas. Above all, hetells us most plainly what he thought about his model--whether he wasmoved by love or contempt; whether his moods were critical orreverential. And what the canvas under consideration tells mostplainly is that Mr. Whistler never forgot his own personality in thatof the ancient philosopher. He came into the room as chirpy andanecdotal as usual, in no way discountenanced or put about by thepresence of his venerable and illustrious sitter. He had heard thatthe Chelsea sage wrote histories which were no doubt very learned, buthe felt no particular interest in the matter. Of reverence, respect, or intimate knowledge of Carlyle there is no trace on the canvas; andlooked at from this side the picture may be said to be the mostAmerican of all Mr. Whistler's works. "I am quite as big a man asyou", to put it bluntly, was Mr. Whistler's attitude of mind whilepainting Carlyle. I do not contest the truth of the opinion. I merelysubmit that that is not the frame of mind in which great portraitureis done. 

The drawing is large, ample, and vigorous, beautifully understood, butnot very profound or intimate: the picture seems to have beenaccomplished easily, and in excellent health and spirits. The paintingis in Mr. Whistler's later and most characteristic manner. For manyyears--for certainly twenty years--his manner has hardly varied atall. He uses his colour very thin, so thinly that it often hardlyamounts to more than a glaze, and painting is laid over painting, likeskin upon skin. Regarded merely as brushwork, the face of the sagecould hardly be surpassed; the modelling is that beautiful flatmodelling, of which none except Mr. Whistler possesses the secrets. What the painter saw he rendered with incomparable skill. The visionof the rugged pensiveness of the old philosophers is as beautiful andas shallow as a page of De Quincey. We are carried away in a flow ofexquisite eloquence, but the painter has not told us one significantfact about his model, his nationality, his temperament, his rank, hismanner of life. We learn in a general way that he was a thinker; butit would have been impossible to draw the head at all and conceal sosalient a characteristic. Mr. Whistler's portrait reveals certaingeneral observations of life; but has he given one single touchintimately characteristic of his model?

But if the portrait of Carlyle, when looked at from a certain side, must be admitted to be not wholly satisfactory, what shall be said ofthe portrait of Lady Meux? The dress is a luminous and harmoniouspiece of colouring, the material has its weight and its texture andits character of fold; but of the face it is difficult to say morethan that it keeps its place in the picture. Very often the faces inMr. Whistler's portraits are the least interesting part of thepicture; his sitter's face does not seem to interest him more than thecuffs, the carpet, the butterfly, which hovers about the screen. Afterthis admission, it will seem to many that it is waste of time toconsider further Mr. Whistler's claim to portraiture. This is not so. Mr. Whistler is a great portrait painter, though he cannot takemeasurements or follow an outline like Holbein. 

Like most great painters, he has known how to introduce harmoniousvariation into his style by taking from others just as much of theirsense of beauty as his own nature might successfully assimilate. Ihave spoken of his assimilation and combination of the art ofVelasquez, and the entire art of Japan, but a still more strikinginstance of the power of assimilation, which, strange as it may seem, only the most original natures possess, is to hand in the early butextremely beautiful picture, _La femme en blanc_. In the Chelseaperiod of his life Mr. Whistler saw a great deal of that singular man, Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Intensely Italian, though he had never seenItaly; and though writing no language but ours, still writing it witha strange hybrid grace, bringing into it the rich and voluptuouscolour and fragrance of the south, expressing in picture and poemnothing but an uneasy haunting sense of Italy--opulence of women, notof the south, nor yet of the north, Italian celebration, mystic altarlinen, and pomp of gold vestment and legendary pane. Of such hauntingsRossetti's life and art were made. 

His hold on poetic form was surer than his hold on pictorial form, wherein his art is hardly more than poetic reminiscence of Italianmissal and window pane. Yet even as a painter his attractivenesscannot be denied, nor yet the influence he has exercised on Englishart. Though he took nothing from his contemporaries, all took fromhim, poets and painters alike. Not even Mr. Whistler could refrain, and in _La femme en blanc_ he took from Rossetti his manner of feelingand seeing. The type of woman is the same--beauty of dreaming eyes andabundant hair. And in this picture we find a poetic interest, a moralsense, if I may so phrase it, nowhere else to be detected, though yousearch Mr. Whistler's work from end to end. The woman stands idlydreaming by her mirror. She is what is her image in the glass, anappearance that has come, and that will go leaving no more trace thanher reflection on the glass when she herself has moved away. She seesin her dream the world like passing shadows thrown on an illuminatedcloth. She thinks of her soft, white, and opulent beauty which fillsher white dress; her chin is lifted, and above her face shines thegolden tumult of her hair. 

The picture is one of the most perfect that Mr. Whistler has painted;it is as perfect as the mother or Miss Alexander, and though it hasnot the beautiful, flowing, supple execution of the "symphony inwhite", I prefer it for sake of its sheer perfection. It is moreperfect than the symphony in white, though there is nothing in itquite so extraordinary as the loving gaiety of the young girl's face. The execution of that face is as flowing, as spontaneous, and asbright as the most beautiful day of May. The white drapery clings likehaze about the edge of the woods, and the flesh tints are pearly andevanescent as dew, and soft as the colour of a flowering mead. But thekneeling figure is not so perfect, and that is why I reluctantly givemy preference to the woman by the mirror. Turning again to thispicture, I would fain call attention to the azalias, which, inirresponsible decorative fashion, come into the right-hand corner. Thedelicate flowers show bright and clear on the black-leaded fire-grate;and it is in the painting of such detail that Mr. Whistler exceeds allpainters. For purity of colour and the beauty of pattern, theseflowers are surely as beautiful as anything that man's hand has everaccomplished. 

Mr. Whistler has never tried to be original. He has never attempted toreproduce on canvas the discordant and discrepant extravagancies ofNature as M. Besnard and Mr. John Sargent have done. His style hasalways been marked by such extreme reserve that the critical must havesometimes inclined to reproach him with want of daring, and askthemselves where was the innovator in this calculated reduction oftones, in these formal harmonies, in this constant synthesis, soughtwith far more disregard for superfluous detail than Hals, forinstance, had ever dared to show. The still more critical, whileadmitting the beauty and the grace of this art, must have often askedthemselves what, after all, has this painter invented, what newsubject-matter has he introduced into art?

It was with the night that Mr. Whistler set his seal and sign-manualupon art; above all others he is surely the interpreter of the night. Until he came the night of the painter was as ugly and insignificantas any pitch barrel; it was he who first transferred to canvas theblue transparent darkness which folds the world from sunset tosunrise. The purple hollow, and all the illusive distances of thegas-lit river, are Mr. Whistler's own. It was not the unhabited nightof lonely plain and desolate tarn that he chose to interpret, but thedifficult populous city night--the night of tall bridges and vastwater rained through with lights red and grey, the shores lined withthe lamps of the watching city. Mr. Whistler's night is the vast blueand golden caravanry, where the jaded and the hungry and theheavy-hearted lay down their burdens, and the contemplative freed fromthe deceptive reality of the day understand humbly and patheticallythe casualness of our habitation, and the limitlessreality of a plan, the intention of which we shall never know. Mr. Whistler's nights arethe blue transparent darknesses which are half of the world's life. Sometimes he foregoes even the aid of earthly light, and his pictureis but luminous blue shadow, delicately graduated, as in the nocturnein M. Duret's collection--purple above and below, a shadow in themiddle of the picture--a little less and there would be nothing. 

There is the celebrated nocturne in the shape of a T--one pier of thebridge and part of the arch, the mystery of the barge, and the figureguiding the barge in the current, the strange luminosity of thefleeting river! lines of lights, vague purple and illusive distance, and all is so obviously beautiful that one pauses to consider howthere could have been stupidity enough to deny it. Of less dramaticsignificance, but of equal esthetic value, is the nocturne known as"the Cremorne lights". Here the night is strangely pale; one of thosesummer nights when a slight veil of darkness is drawn for an hour ormore across the heavens. Another of quite extraordinary beauty, evenin a series of extraordinarily beautiful things, is "Night on theSea". The waves curl white in the darkness, and figures are seen as indreams; lights burn low, ships rock in the offing, and beyond them, lost in the night, a vague sense of illimitable sea. 

Out of the night Mr. Whistler has gathered beauty as august as Phidiastook from Greek youths. Nocturne II is the picture which ProfessorRuskin declared to be equivalent to flinging a pot of paint in theface of the public. But that black night, filling the garden even tothe sky's obliteration, is not black paint but darkness. The whirl ofthe St. Catherine wheel in the midst of this darkness amounts to amiracle, and the exquisite drawing of the shower of falling fire wouldarouse envy in Rembrandt, and prompt imitation. The line of thewatching crowd is only just indicated, and yet the garden is crowded. There is another nocturne in which rockets are rising and falling, andthe drawing of these two showers of fire is so perfect, that when youturn quickly towards the picture, the sparks really do ascend anddescend. 

More than any other painter, Mr. Whistler's influence has made itselffelt on English art. More than any other man, Mr. Whistler has helpedto purge art of the vice of subject and belief that the mission of theartist is to copy nature. Mr. Whistler's method is more learned, moreco-ordinate than that of any other painter of our time; all ispreconceived from the first touch to the last, nor has there ever beenmuch change in the method, the painting has grown looser, but themethod was always the same; to have seen him paint at once is to haveseen him paint at every moment of his life. Never did a man seem moreadmirably destined to found a school which should worthily carry onthe tradition inherited from the old masters and represented only byhim. All the younger generation has accepted him as master, and thatmy generation has not profited more than it has, leads me to think, however elegant, refined, emotional, educated it may be, and anxiousto achieve, that it is lacking in creative force, that it is, in aword, slightly too slight. 

CHAVANNES, MILLET, AND MANET. 

Of the great painters born before 1840 only two now are living, Puvisde Chavannes and Degas. It is true to say of Chavannes that he is theonly man alive to whom a beautiful building might be given fordecoration without fear that its beauty would be disgraced. He is theone man alive who can cover twenty feet of wall or vaulted roof withdecoration that will neither deform the grandeur nor jar the greynessof the masonry. Mural decoration in his eyes is not merely a picturelet into a wall, nor is it necessarily mural decoration even if it bepainted on the wall itself: it is mural decoration if it form part ofthe wall, if it be, if I may so express myself, a variant of thestonework. No other painter ever kept this end so strictly before hiseyes. For this end Chavannes reduced his palette almost to amonochrome, for this end he models in two flat tints, for this end hedraws in huge undisciplined masses. 

Let us examine his palette: many various greys, some warmed withvermilion, some with umber, and many more that are mere mixtures ofblack and white, large quantities of white, for Chavannes paints in ahigh key, wishing to disturb the colour of the surrounding stone aslittle as may be. Grey and blue are the natural colours of buildingstone; when the subject will not admit of subterfuge, he willintroduce a shade of pale green, as in his great decoration entitled"Summer"; but grey is always the foundation of his palette, and itfills the middle of the picture. The blues are placed at the top andbottom, and he works between them in successive greys. The sky in theleft-hand top corner is an ultramarine slightly broken with white; theblue gown at the bottom of the picture, not quite in the middle of thepicture, a little on the right, is also ultramarine, and here thecolour is used nearly in its first intensity. And the colossal womanwho wears the blue gown leans against some grey forest tree trunk, anda great white primeval animal is what her forms and attitude suggest. There are some women about her, and they lie and sit in disconnectedgroups like fragments fallen from a pediment. Nor is any attempt madeto relate, by the aid of vague look or gesture, this group in theforeground to the human hordes engaged in building enclosures in themiddle distance. In Chavannes the composition is always as disparateas an early tapestry, and the drawing of the figures is almost asrude. If I may be permitted a French phrase, I will say _un peusommaire_ quite unlike the beautiful simplifications of Raphael orIngres, or indeed any of the great masters. They could simplifywithout becoming rudimentary; Chavannes cannot. 

And now a passing word about the handicraft, the manner of using thebrush. Chavannes shares the modern belief-and only in this is hemodern--that for the service of thought one instrument is as apt asanother, and that, so long as that man's back--he who is pulling atthe rope fastened at the tree's top branches--is filled in with twogrey tints, it matters not at all how the task is accomplished. Trulythe brush has plastered that back as a trowel might, and the resultreminds one of stone and mortar, as Millet's execution reminds one ofmud-pie making. The handicraft is as barbarous in Chavannes as it isin Millet, and we think of them more as great poets working in a notwholly sympathetic and, in their hands, somewhat rebellious material. Chavannes is as an epic poet whose theme is the rude grandeur of theprimeval world, and who sang his rough narrative to a few chordsstruck on a sparely-stringed harp that his own hands have fashioned. And is not Millet a sort of French Wordsworth who in a barbarousBreton dialect has told us in infinitely touching strains of the noblesubmission of the peasant's lot, his unending labours and themelancholy solitude of the country. 

As poet-painters, none admires these great artists more than I, butthe moment we consider them as painters we have to compare thehandicraft of the decoration entitled "Summer" with that of Francisthe First meeting Marie de Medicis; we have to compare the handicraftof the Sower and the Angelus with that of "Le Bon Bock" and "L'enfantà Pépée"; and the moment we institute such comparison does not theinferiority of Chavannes' and Millet's handicraft become visible evento the least initiated in the art of painting, and is not theconclusion forced upon us that however Manet may be judged inferior toMillet as a poet, as a painter he is easily his superior? And asMillet's and Chavannes' brush-work is deficient in beauty so is theirdrawing. Preferring decorative unity to completeness of drawing, Chavannes does not attempt more than some rudimentary indications. Millet seems even to have desired to omit technical beauty, so that hemight concentrate all thought on the poetic synthesis he was gatheringfrom the earth. Degas, on the contrary, draws for the sake of thedrawing-The Ballet Girl, The Washerwoman, The Fat Housewife bathingherself, is only a pretext for drawing; and Degas chose theseextraordinary themes because the drawing of the ballet girl and thefat housewife is less known than that of the nymph and the Spartanyouth. Painters will understand what I mean by the drawing being "lessknown", --that knowledge of form which sustains the artist like acrutch in his examination of the model, and which as it were dictatesto the eye what it must see. So the ballet girl was Degas' escapementfrom the thraldom of common knowledge. The ballet girl was virginsoil. In her meagre thwarted forms application could freely be made ofthe supple incisive drawing which bends to and flows with thecharacter--that drawing of which Ingres was the supreme patron, and ofwhich Degas is the sole inheritor. 

Until a few years ago Chavannes never sold a picture. Millet lived hislife in penury and obscurity, but thirty years of persistent ridiculehaving failed to destroy Degas' genius, some recognition has beenextended to it. The fate of all great artists in the nineteenthcentury is a score years of neglect and obloquy. They may hardly hopefor recognition before they are fifty; some few cases point the otherway, but very few--the rule is thirty years of neglect and obloquy. Then a flag of truce will be held out to the recalcitrant artist whocannot be prevented from painting beautiful pictures. "Come, let us befriends; let's kiss and make it up; send a picture to the academy;we'll hang it on the line, and make you an academician the firstvacancy that occurs. " To-day the academy would like to get Mr. Whistler, but Mr. Whistler replies to the academy as Degas replied tothe government official who wanted a picture for the Luxembourg. _Non, je ne veux pas être conduit au poste par les sargents de villed'aris_. 

To understand Manet's genius, the nineteenth century would haverequired ten years more than usual, for in Manet there is nothing butgood painting, and there is nothing that the nineteenth centurydislikes as much as good painting. In Whistler there is an exquisiteand inveigling sense of beauty; in Degas there is an extraordinaryacute criticism of life, and so the least brutal section of the publicended by pardoning Whistler his brush-work, and Degas his beautifuldrawing. But in Manet there is nothing but good painting, and it istherefore possible that he might have lived till he was eighty withoutobtaining recognition. Death alone could accomplish the miracle ofopening the public's eyes to his merits. During his life the excusegiven for the constant persecution waged against him by the"authorities" was his excessive originality. But this was meresubterfuge; what was really hated-what made him so unpopular-was theextraordinary beauty of his handling. Whatever he painted becamebeautiful--his hand was dowered with the gift of quality, and therehis art began and ended. His painting of still life never has beenexceeded, and never will be. I remember a pear that used to hang inhis studio. Hals would have taken his hat off to it. 

Twenty years ago Manet's name was a folly and a byword in the Parisianstudios. The students of the Beaux Arts used to stand before his salonpictures and sincerely wonder how any one could paint like that; thestudents were quite sure that it was done for a joke, to attractattention; and then, not quite sincerely, one would say, "But I'llundertake to paint you three pictures a week like that. " I say thatthe remark was never quite sincere, for I never heard it made withoutsome one answering, "I don't think you could; just come and look at itagain--there's more in it than you think. " No doubt we thought Manetvery absurd, but there was always something forced and artificial inour laughter and the ridicule we heaped upon him. 

But about that time my opinions were changing; and it was a greatevent in my life when Manet spoke to me in the cafe of the NouvelleAthene. I knew it was Manet, he had been pointed out to me, and I hadadmired the finely-cut face from whose prominent chin a closely-cutblonde beard came forward; and the aquiline nose, the clear grey eyes, the decisive voice, the remarkable comeliness of the well-knit figure, scrupulously but simply dressed, represented a personality curiouslysympathetic. On several occasions shyness had compelled me to abandonmy determination to speak to him. But once he had spoken I enteredeagerly into conversation, and next day I went to his studio. It wasquite a simple place. Manet expended his aestheticism on his canvases, and not upon tapestries and inlaid cabinets. There was very little inhis studio except his pictures: a sofa, a rocking-chair, a table forhis paints, and a marble table on iron supports, such as one sees incafés. Being a fresh-complexioned, fair-haired young man, the typemost suitable to Manet's palette, he at once asked me to sit. Hisfirst intention was to paint me in a café; he had met me in a café, and he thought he could realise his impression of me in the firstsurrounding he had seen me in. 

The portrait did not come right; ultimately it was destroyed; but itgave me every opportunity of studying Manet's method of painting. Strictly speaking, he had no method; painting with him was a pureinstinct. Painting was one of the ways his nature manifested itself. That frank, fearless, prompt nature manifested itself in everythingthat concerned him--in his large plain studio, full of light as aconservatory; in his simple, scrupulous clothes, and yet with a touchof the dandy about them; in decisive speech, quick, hearty, andinformed with a manly and sincere understanding of life. Never was anartist's inner nature in more direct conformity with his work. Therewere no circumlocutions in Manet's nature, there were none in his art. 

The colour of my hair never gave me a thought until Manet began topaint it. Then the blonde gold that came up under his brush filled mewith admiration, and I was astonished when, a few days after, I sawhim scrape off the rough paint and prepare to start afresh. 

"Are you going to get a new canvas?"

"No; this will do very well. "

"But you can't paint yellow ochre on yellow ochre without getting itdirty?"

"Yes, I think I can. You go and sit down. "

Half-an-hour after he had entirely repainted the hair, and withoutlosing anything of its brightness. He painted it again and again;every time it came out brighter and fresher, and the painting neverseemed to lose anything in quality. That this portrait cost himinfinite labour and was eventually destroyed matters nothing; my pointis merely that he could paint yellow over yellow without getting thecolour muddy. One day, seeing that I was in difficulties with a black, he took a brush from my hand, and it seemed to have hardly touched thecanvas when the ugly heaviness of my tiresome black began todisappear. There came into it grey and shimmering lights, the shadowsfilled up with air, and silk seemed to float and rustle. There was nomethod-there was no trick; he merely painted. My palette was the sameto him as his own; he did not prepare his palette; his colour did notexist on his palette before he put it on the canvas; but working underthe immediate dictation of his eye, he snatched the tintsinstinctively, without premeditation. Ah! that marvellous hand, thosethick fingers holding the brush so firmly-somewhat heavily; howmalleable, how obedient, that most rebellious material, oil-colour, was to his touch. He did with it what he liked. I believe he could ruba picture over with Prussian blue without experiencing anyinconvenience; half-an-hour after the colour would be fine andbeautiful. 

And never did this mysterious power which produces what artists knowas "quality" exist in greater abundance in any fingers than it did inthe slow, thick fingers of Edouard Manet: never since the world began;not in Velasquez, not in Hals, not in Rubens, not in Titian. As anartist Manet could not compare with the least among these illustriouspainters; but as a manipulator of oil-colour he never was and neverwill be excelled. Manet was born a painter as absolutely as any manthat ever lived, so absolutely that a very high and lucid intelligencenever for a moment came between him and the desire to put anythinginto his picture except good painting. I remember his saying to me, "Ialso tried to write, but I did not succeed; I never could do anythingbut paint. " And what a splendid thing for an artist to be able to say. The real meaning of his words did not reach me till years after;perhaps I even thought at the time that he was disappointed that hecould not write. I know now what was passing in his mind: _Je ne mesuis pas trompé de métier_. How many of us can say as much? Go round apicture gallery, and of how many pictures, ancient or modern, can youstand before and say, _Voila un homme qui ne s'est pas trompé demétier?_

Perhaps above all men of our generation Manet made the least mistakein his choice of a trade. Let those who doubt go and look at thebeautiful picture of Boulogne Pier, now on view in Mr. VanWesselingh's gallery, 26 Old Bond Street. The wooden pier goes rightacross the canvas; all the wood piers are drawn, there is no attemptto hide or attenuate their regularity. Why should Manet attenuate whenhe could fill the interspaces with the soft lapping of such exquisiteblue sea-water. Above the piers there is the ugly yellow-painted rail. But why alter the colour when he could keep it in such exquisitevalue? On the canvas it is beautiful. In the middle of the pier thereis a mast and a sail which does duty for an awning; perhaps it is onlya marine decoration. A few loungers are on the pier--men and women ingrey clothes. Why introduce reds and blues when he was sure of beingable to set the little figures in their places, to draw them sofirmly, and relieve the grey monotony with such beauty of execution?It would be vain to invent when so exquisite an execution is always athand to relieve and to transform. Mr. Whistler would have chosen tolook at the pier from a more fanciful point of view. Degas would havetaken an odd corner; he would have cut the composition strangely, andcommented on the humanity of the pier. But Manet just painted itwithout circumlocutions of any kind. The subject was void of pictorialrelief. There was not even a blue space in the sky, nor yet a darkcloud. He took it as it was--a white sky, full of an inner radiance, two sailing-boats floating in mist of heat, one in shadow, the otherin light. Vandervelde would seem trivial and precious beside paintingso firm, so manly, so free from trick, so beautifully logical, and sounerring. 

Manet did not often paint sea-pieces. He is best known and is mostadmired as a portrait-painter, but from time to time he ventured totrust his painting to every kind of subject-I know even a cattle-pieceby Manet--and his Christ watched over by angels in the tomb is one ofhis finest works. His Christ is merely a rather fat model sitting withhis back against a wall, and two women with wings on either side ofhim. There is no attempt to suggest a Divine death or to express theKingdom of Heaven on the angels' faces. But the legs of the man are asfine a piece of painting as has ever been accomplished. 

In an exhibition of portraits now open in Paris, entitled _CentChefs-d'Oeuvre_, Manet has been paid the highest honour; he himselfwould not demand a greater honour--his "Bon Bock" has been hung nextto a celebrated portrait by Hals.... 

Without seeing it, I know that the Hals is nobler, grander; I know, supposing the Hals to be a good one, that its flight is that of aneagle as compared with the flight of a hawk. The comparison isexaggerated; but, then, so are all comparisons. I also know that Halsdoes not tell us more about his old woman than Manet tells us aboutthe man who sits so gravely by his glass of foaming ale, so clearlyabsorbed by it, so oblivious to all other joys but those that itbrings him. Hals never placed any one more clearly in his favouritehour of the day, the well-desired hour, looked forward to perhapssince the beginning of the afternoon. In this marvellous portrait weread the age, the rank, the habits, the limitations, physical andmental, of the broad-faced man who sits so stolidly, his fat handclasping his glass of foaming ale. Nothing has been omitted. We lookat the picture, and the man and his environment become part of ourperception of life. That stout, middle-aged man of fifty, who worksall day in some small business, and goes every evening to his café todrink beer, will abide with us for ever. His appearance, and his modeof life, which his appearance so admirably expresses, can never becomecompletely dissociated from our understanding of life. For Manet's"Bon Bock" is one of the eternal types, a permanent nationalconception, as inherent in French life as Polichinelle, Pierrot, Monsieur Prud'homme, or the Baron Hulot. I have not seen the portraitfor fifteen or eighteen years, and yet I see it as well as if it werehung on the wall opposite the table on which I am writing this page. Ican see that round, flat face, a little swollen with beer, the smalleyes, the spare beard and moustaches. His feet are not in the picture, but I know how much he pays for his boots, and how they fit him. Nordid Hals ever paint better; I mean that nowhere in Hals will you findfiner handling, or a more direct luminous or simple expression of whatthe eye saw. It has all the qualities I have enumerated, and yet itfalls short of Hals. It has not the breadth and scope of the greatDutchman. There is a sense of effort, _on sent le souffle_, and inHals one never does. It is more bound together, it does not flow withthe mighty and luminous ease of the _chefs d'oeuvre_ at Haarlem. 

But is this Manet's final achievement, the last word he has to say? Ithink not. It was painted early in the sixties, probably about thesame period as the Luxembourg picture, when the effects of his Spanishtravel were wearing off, and Paris was beginning to command his art. Manet used to say, "When Degas was painting Semiramis I was paintingmodern Paris. " It would have been more true to have said modern Spain. For it was in Spain that Manet found his inspiration. He had not beento Holland when he painted his Spanish pictures. Velasquez clearlyinspired them; but there never was in his work any of the nobledelicacies of the Spaniard; it was always nearer to the plainer andmore--forgive the phrase--yokel-like eloquence of Hals. The art ofHals he seemed to have divined; it seems to have come instinctively tohim. 

Manet went to Spain after a few months spent in Couture's studio. Likeall the great artists of our time, he was self-educated--Whistler, Degas, Courbet, Corot, and Manet wasted little time in other men'sstudios. Soon after his return from Spain, by some piece of good luck, Manet was awarded _une mention honorable_ at the Salon for hisportrait of a toreador. Why this honour was conferred upon him it isdifficult to guess. It must have been the result of some specialinfluence exerted at a special moment, for ever after--down to theyear of his death--his pictures were considered as an excrescence onthe annual exhibitions at the _Salon_. Every year--down to the year ofhis death--the jury, M. Bouguereau et Cie. , lamented that they werepowerless to reject these ridiculous pictures. Manet had been placed_hors concours_, and they could do nothing. They could do nothingexcept stand before his pictures and laugh. Oh, I remember it all verywell. We were taught at the Beaux-Arts to consider Manet an absurdperson or else an _épateur_, who, not being able to paint like M. Gérôme, determined to astonish. I remember perfectly well the derisionwith which those _chefs d'oeuvre_, "Yachting at Argenteuil" and "LeLinge", were received. They were in his last style--that bright, clearpainting in which violet shadows were beginning to take the place ofthe conventional brown shadows, and the brush-work, too, was looserand more broken up; in a word, these pictures were the germ from whichhas sprung a dozen different schools, all the impressionism and otherisms of modern French art. Before these works, in which the real Manetappeared for the first time, no one had a good word to say. To killthem more effectually, certain merits were even conceded to the "BonBock" and the Luxembourg picture. 

The "Bon Bock", as we have seen, at once challenges comparison withHals. But in "Le Linge" no challenge is sent forth to any one; it isManet, all Manet, and nothing but Manet. In this picture he expresseshis love of the gaiety and pleasure of Parisian life. And thisbright-faced, simple-minded woman, who stands in a garden crowded withthe tallest sunflowers, the great flower-crowns drooping above her, her blue cotton dress rolled up to the elbows, her hands plunged in asmall wash-tub in which she is washing some small linen, habit-shirts, pocket-handkerchiefs, collars, expresses the joy of homely life in theFrench suburb. Her home is one of good wine, excellent omelettes, softbeds; and the sheets, if they are a little coarse, are spotless, andretain an odour of lavender-sweetened cupboards. Her little child, about four years old, is with his mother in the garden; he has strayedinto the foreground of the picture, just in front of the wash-tub, andhe holds a great sunflower in his tiny hand. Beside this picture ofsuch bright and happy aspect, the most perfect example of that _genre_known as _la peinture claire_, invented by Manet, and so infamouslyand absurdly practised by subsequent imitators--beside this picture solimpid, so fresh, so unaffected in its handling, a Courbet would seemheavy and dull, a sort of mock old master; a Corot would seemephemeral and cursive; a Whistler would seem thin; beside this pictureof such elegant and noble vision a Stevens would certainly seemodiously common. Why does not Liverpool or Manchester buy one of thesemasterpieces? If the blueness of the blouse frightens theadministrators of these galleries, I will ask them--and perhaps thiswould be the more practical project--to consider the purchase ofManet's first and last historical picture, the death of theunfortunate Maximilian in Mexico. Under a high wall, over which someMexicans are looking, Maximilian and two friends stand in front of therifles. The men have just fired, and death clouds the unfortunateface. On the right a man stands cocking his rifle. Look at themovement of the hand, how well it draws back the hammer. The face isnearly in profile--how intent it is on the mechanism. And is not thedrawing of the legs, the boots, the gaiters, the arms lifting theheavy rifle with slow deliberation, more massive, firm, and concisethan any modern drawing? How ample and how exempt from all trick, andhow well it says just what the painter wanted to say! This picture, too, used to hang in his studio. But the greater attractiveness of "LeLinge" prevented me from discerning its more solemn beauty. But lastMay I came across it unexpectedly, and after looking at it for sometime the thought that came was--no one painted better, no one willever paint better. 

The Luxembourg picture, although one of the most showy and thecompletest amongst Manet's masterpieces, is not, in my opinion, eitherthe most charming or the most interesting; and yet it would bedifficult to say that this of the many life-sized nudes that Francehas produced during the century is not the one we could least easilyspare. Ingres' Source compares not with things of this century, butwith the marbles of the fourth century B. C. Cabanel's Venus is abeautiful design, but its destruction would create no appreciable gapin the history of nineteenth century art. The destruction of "Olympe"would. 

The picture is remarkable not only for the excellence of theexecution, but for a symbolic intention nowhere else to be found inManet's works. The angels on either side of his dead Christnecessitated merely the addition of two pairs of wings--a conventionwhich troubled him no more than the convention of taking off his haton entering a church. But in "Olympe" we find Manet departing from theindividual to the universal. The red-headed woman who used to dine atthe _Ratmort_ does not lie on a modern bed but on the couch of alltime; and she raises herself from amongst her cushions, setting forthher somewhat meagre nudity as arrogantly and with the same calmcertitude of her sovereignty as the eternal Venus for whose prey isthe flesh of all men born. The introduction of a bouquet bound up inlarge white paper does not prejudice the symbolic intention, and thepicture would do well for an illustration to some poem to be found in_"Les fleurs du Mal"_. It may be worth while to note here thatBaudelaire printed in his volume a quatrain inspired by one of Manet'sSpanish pictures. 

But after this slight adventure into symbolism, Manet's eyes wereclosed to all but the visible world. The visible world of Paris he sawhenceforth--truly, frankly, and fearlessly, and more beautifully thanany of his contemporaries. Never before was a great man's mind sostrictly limited to the range of what his eyes saw. Nature wished itso, and, having discovered nature's wish, Manet joined his desire withNature's. I remember his saying as he showed me some illustrations hehad done for Mallarme's translation of Edgar Poe's poem, "You'll admitthat it doesn't give you much idea 'of a kingdom by the sea. '" Thedrawing represented the usual sea-side watering place--the beach witha nursemaid at full length; children building sand castles, and somesmall sails in the offing. 

So Manet was content to live by the sight, and by the sight alone; hewas a painter, and had neither time nor taste for such ideals as Poe'smagical Annabel Lee. Marvellous indeed must have been the eyes thatcould have persuaded such relinquishment. How marvellous they were weunderstand easily when we look at "Olympe". Eyes that saw truly, thatsaw beautifully and yet somewhat grossly. There is much vigour in theseeing, there is the exquisite handling of Hals, and there is theplacing, the setting forth of figures on the canvas, which was asinstinctively his as it was Titian's. Hals and Velasquez possessed allthose qualities, and something more. They would not have beensatisfied with that angular, presumptuous, and obvious drawing, harshin its exterior limits and hollow within--the head a sort ofconvulsive abridgment, the hand void, and the fingers too, if we seektheir articulations. An omission must not be mistaken for asimplification, and for all his omissions Manet strives to make amendby the tone. It would be difficult to imagine a more beautifulsyntheses than that pale yellow, a beautiful golden sensation, and theblack woman, the attendant of this light of love, who comes to thecouch with a large bouquet fresh from the boulevard, is certainly apiece of painting that Rubens and Titian would stop to admire. 

But when all has been said, I prefer Manet in the quieter and I thinkthe more original mood in the portrait of his sister-in-law, MadameMorisot. The portrait is in M. Duret's collection; it hangs in a nottoo well lighted passage, and if I did not spend six or ten minutes inadmiration before this picture, I should feel that some familiarpleasure had drifted out of my yearly visit to Paris. Never did awhite dress play so important or indeed so charming a part in apicture. The dress is the picture--this common white dress, with blackspots, _une robe a poix, une petite confection de soixante cinqfrancs_, as the French would say; and very far it is from allremembrance of the diaphanous, fairy-like skirts of our eighteenthcentury English school, but I swear to you no less charming. It is avery simple and yet a very beautiful reality. A lady, in white dresswith black spots, sitting on a red sofa, a dark chocolate red, in thesubdued light of her own quiet, prosaic French _appartment, ledeuxième au dessus l'entre-sol_. The drawing is less angular, lessconstipated than that of "Olympe". How well the woman's body is in thedress! there is the bosom, the waist, the hips, the knees, and thewhite stockinged foot in the low shoe, coming from out the dress. Thedrawing about the hips and bosom undulates and floats, vague and yetprecise, in a manner that recalls Harlem, and it is not until we turnto the face that we come upon ominous spaces unaccounted for, formsunexplained. The head is so charming that it seems a pity to press ourexamination further. But to understand Manet's deficiency is tounderstand the abyss that separates modern from ancient art, and theportrait of Madame Morisot explains them as well as another, for thedeficiency I wish to point out exists in Manet's best portraits aswell as in his worst. The face in this picture is like the face inevery picture by Manet. Three or four points are seized, and thespaces between are left unaccounted for. Whistler has not the strengthof Velasquez; Manet is not as complete as Hals. 

THE FAILURE OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY. 

In the seventeenth century were Poussin and Claude; in the eighteenthWatteau, Boucher, Chardin, and many lesser lights--Fragonard, Pater, and Lancret. But notwithstanding the austere grandeur of Poussin andthe beautiful, if somewhat too reasonable poetry of Claude, theinfinite perfection of Watteau, the charm of that small FrenchVelasquez Chardin, and the fascinations and essentially French geniusof all this group (Poussin and Claude were entirely Roman), I think wemust place France's artistic period in the nineteenth century. 

Nineteenth century art began in France in the last years of theeighteenth century. It began well, for it began with its greatestpainters--Ingres, Corot, and Delacroix. Ingres was born in 1780, Gericault in 1791, Corot in 1796, Delacroix in 1798, Diaz in 1809, Dupré in 1812, Rousseau in 1812, Jacques in 1813, Meissonier in 1815, Millet in 1815, Troyon in 1816, Daubigny in 1817, Courbet in 1819, Fromentin in 1820, Monticelli in 1824, Puvis de Chavannes in 1824, Cabanel in 1825, Hervier in 1827, Vollon in 1833, Manet in 1833, Degasin 1834. With a little indulgence the list might be considerablyenlarged. 

The circumstances in which this artistic manifestation took place wereidentical with the circumstances which brought about every one of thegreat artistic epochs. It came upon France as a consequence of hugenational aspiration, when nationhood was desired and disaster hadjoined men together in struggle, and sent them forth on recklessadventure. It has been said that art is decay, the pearl in theoyster; but such belief seems at variance with any reading of history. The Greek sculptors came after Salamis and Marathon; the Italianrenaissance came when Italy was distracted with revolution and wasdivided into opposing states. Great empires have not produced greatmen. Art came upon Holland after heroic wars in which the Dutchmenvehemently asserted their nationhood, defending their country againstthe Spaniard, even to the point of letting in the sea upon theinvaders. Art came upon England when England was most adventurous, after the victories of Marlborough. Art came upon France after thegreat revolution, after the victories of Marengo and Austerlitz, afterthe burning of Moscow. A unique moment of nationhood gave birth to along list of great artists, just as similar national enthusiasm gavebirth to groups of great artists in England, in Holland, in Florence, in Venice, in Athens. 

Having determined the century of France's artistic period we will askwhere we shall place it amongst the artist period of the past. Comparison with Greece, Italy, or Venice is manifestly impossible; thenames of Rembrandt, Hals, Ruysdael, Peter de Hoogh, Terburg, and Cuypgive us pause. We remember the names of Ingres, Delacroix, Corot, Millet, and Degas. Even the divine name of Ingres cannot save thebalance from sinking on the side of Holland. Then we think ofReynolds, Gainsborough, Romney, Wilson, and Morland, and wonder howthey compare with the Frenchmen. The best brains were on the Frenchside, they had more pictorial talent, and yet the school when taken asa whole is not so convincing as the English. Why, with better brains, and certainly more passion and desire of achievement, does the Frenchschool fall behind the English? Why, notwithstanding its extraordinarygenius, does it come last in merit as it comes last in time amongstthe world's artistic epochs? Has the nineteenth century brought anynew intention into art which did not exist before in England, Holland, or Italy? Yes, the nineteenth century has brought a new intention intoart, and I think that it is this very new intention that has causedthe failure of the nineteenth century. To explain myself, I will haveto go back to first principles. 

In the beginning the beauty of man was the artist's single theme. Science had not then relegated man to his exact place in creation: hereigned triumphant, Nature appearing, if at all, only as a kind ofaureole. The Egyptian, the Greek, and the Roman artists saw nothing, and cared for nothing, except man; the representation of his beauty, his power, and his grandeur was their whole desire, whether theycarved or painted their intention, and I may say the result was thesame. The painting of Apelles could not have differed from thesculpture of Phidias; painting was not then separated from her eldersister. In the early ages there was but one art; even in MichaelAngelo's time the difference between painting and sculpture was soslight as to be hardly worth considering. Is it possible to regard the"Last Judgment" as anything else but a coloured bas-relief, morecomplete and less perfect than the Greeks? Michael Angelo's artisticoutlook was the same as Phidias'. One chose the "Last Judgment" andthe other "Olympus", but both subjects were looked at from the samepoint of view. In each instance the question asked was--whatopportunity do they afford for the display of marvellous human form?And when Michael Angelo carved the "Moses" and painted the "St. Jerome" he was as deaf and blind as any Greek to all otherconsideration save the opulence and the magic of drapery, thevehemence and the splendour of muscle. Nearly two thousand years hadgone by and the artistic outlook had not changed at all; three hundredyears have passed since Michael Angelo, and inthose three hundredyears what revolution has not been effected? How different ourestheticism, our aims, our objects, our desires, our aspiration, andhow different our art!

After Michael Angelo painting and sculpture became separate arts:sculpture declined, and colour filled the whole artistic horizon. Butthis change was the only change; the necessities of the new medium hadto be considered; but the Italian and Venetian painters continued toview life and art from the same side. Michael Angelo chose hissubjects merely because of the opportunities they offered for thedelineation of form, Titian, Tintoretto, and Veronese chose theirsmerely for the opportunities they offered for the display of colour. Anew medium of expression had been discovered, that was all. The themesof their pictures were taken from the Bible, if you will, but thescenes they represented with so much pomp of colour were seen by themthrough the mystery of legend, and the vision was again sublimated bynaive belief and primitive aspiration. 

The stories of the Old and New Testaments were not anecdotes; faithand ignorance had raised them above the anecdote, and they had becomeepics, whether by intensity of religious belief--as in the case of themonk of Fiesole--or by being given sublime artistic form--for paganismwas not yet dead in the world to witness Leonardo, Raphael, and Andreadel Sarto. To these painters Biblical subjects were a mere pretext forrepresenting man in all his attributes; and when the same subjectswere treated by the Venetians, they were transformed in a pomp ofcolour, and by an absence of all _true_ colour and by contempt forhistory and chronology became epical and fantastical. It is onlynecessary to examine any one of the works of the great Venetians tosee that they bestowed hardly a thought on the subject of theirpictures. When Titian painted the "Entombment of Christ", what did hesee? A contrast--a white body, livid and dead, carried byfull-blooded, red-haired Italians, who wept, and whose sorrow onlyserved to make them more beautiful. That is how he understood asubject. The desire to be truthful was not very great, nor was thedesire to be new much more marked; to be beautiful was the first andlast letter of a creed of which we know very little to-day. 

Art died in Italy, and the subject had not yet appeared; and at theend of the sixteenth century the first painters of the great Dutchschool were born, and before 1650 a new school, entirely original, having nothing in common with anything that had gone before, hadformulated its aestheticism and produced masterpieces. In thesemasterpieces we find no suspicion of anything that might be called asubject; the absence of subject is even more conspicuous in theDutchmen than in the Italians. In the Italian painters the subjectpassed unperceived in a pomp of colour or a Pagan apotheosis ofhumanity; in the Dutchmen it is dispensed with altogether. No longerdo we read of miracles or martyrdoms, but of the most ordinaryincidents of everyday life. Turning over the first catalogue to handof Dutch pictures, I read: "View of a Plain, with shepherd, cows, andsheep in the foreground"; "The White Horse in the Riding School"; "ALady Playing the Virginal"; "Peasants Drinking Outside a Tavern";"Peasants Drinking in a Tavern"; "Peasants Gambling Outside a Tavern";"Brick-making in a Landscape"; "The Wind-mill"; "The Water-mill";"Peasants Bringing Home the Hay". And so on, and so on. If we meetwith a military skirmish, we are not told where the skirmish tookplace, nor what troops took part in the skirmish. "A Skirmish in aRocky Pass" is all the information that is vouchsafed to us. Italianart is invention from end to end, in Dutch art no slightest trace ofinvention is to be found; one art is purely imaginative, the other isplainly realistic; and yet, at an essential point, the two artscoincide; in neither does the subject prevail; and if Dutch art ismore truthful than Italian art, it is because they were unimaginative, stay-at-home folk, whose feet did not burn for foreign travel, andwhose only resource was, therefore, to reproduce the life around them, and into that no element of curiosity could come. For their wholecountry was known to them; even when they left their native town theystill continued to paint what they had seen since they were littlechildren. 

And, like Italian, Dutch art died before the subject had appeared. Itwas not until the end of the eighteenth century that the subjectreally began to make itself felt, and, like the potato blight orphylloxera, it soon became clear that it had come to stay. I thinkGreuze was the first to conceive a picture after the fashion of ascene in a play--I mean those domestic dramas which he invented, andin which the interest of the subject so clearly predominates--"TheProdigal Son", for instance. In this picture we have the domesticdrama exactly as a stage manager would set it forth. The indignantfather, rising from table, prepares to anathematise the repentant son, who stands on the threshold, the weeping mother begs forgiveness forher son, the elder girl advances shyly, the younger children play withtheir toys, and the serving-girl drops the plate of meat which she isbringing in. And ever since the subject has taken first place in theart of France, England, and Germany, and in like measure as thesubject made itself felt, so did art decline. 

For the last hundred years painters seem to have lived in librariesrather than in studios. All literatures and all the sciences have beenpressed into the service of painting, and an Academy catalogue is initself a liberal education. In it you can read choice extracts fromthe Bible, from Shakespeare, from Goethe, from Dante. You can dip intoGreek and Latin literature, history--ancient and modern--you can learnsomething of all mythologies-Pagan, Christian, and Hindoo; if yourtaste lies in the direction of Icelandic legends, you will not bedisappointed in your sixpennyworth. For the last hundred years thepainter seems to have neglected nothing except to learn how to paint. 

For more than a hundred years painting has been in service. She hasacted as a sort of handmaiden to literature, her mission being to makeclear to the casual and the unlettered what the lettered had alreadyunderstood and enjoyed in a more subtle and more erudite form. But topass from the abstract to the concrete, and, so far as regardssubject, to make my meaning quite clear to every one, I cannot dobetter than to ask my readers to recall Mr. Luke Fildes' picture of"The Doctor". No better example could be selected of a picture inwhich the subject is the supreme interest. True that Mr. Fildes hasnot taken his subject from novel or poem; in this picture he may havebeen said to have been his own librettist, and perhaps for that veryreason the subject is the one preponderating interest in the picture. He who doubts if this be so has only to ask himself if any criticthought of pointing to any special passage of colour in this picture, of calling attention to the quality of the modelling or the ability ofthe drawing. No; what attracted attention was the story. Would thechild live or die? Did that dear, good doctor entertain any hopes ofthe poor little thing's recovery? And the poor parents, how grievedthey seemed! Perhaps it is their only child. The picture is typical ofcontemporary art, which is nearly all conceived in the same spirit, and can therefore have no enduring value. And if by chance the Englishartist does occasionally escape from the vice of subject for subject'ssake, he almost invariably slips into what I may called the derivativevices--exactness of costume, truth of effect and local colour. Toexplain myself on this point, I will ask the reader to recall any oneof Mr. Alma Tadema's pictures; it matters not a jot which is chosen. That one, for instance, where, in a circular recess of white marble, Sappho reads to a Greek poet, or is it the young man who is reading toSappho and her maidens? The interest of the picture is purelyarchaeological. According to the very latest researches, the ornamentwhich Greek women wore in their hair was of such a shape, and Mr. Tadema has reproduced the shape in his picture. Further researches aremade, and it is discovered that that ornament was not worn until ahundred years later. The picture is therefore deprived of some of itsinterest, and the researches of the next ten years may make it appearas old-fashioned as the Greek pictures of the last two generationsappear in our eyes to-day. Until then it is as interesting as a pageof Smith's _Classical Dictionary_. We look at it and we say, "Howcurious! And that was how the Greeks washed and dressed themselves!"

When Mr. Holman Hunt conceived the idea of a picture of Christ earningHis livelihood by the sweat of His brow, it seemed to him to be quitenecessary to go to Jerusalem. There he copied a carpenter's shop fromnature, and he filled it with Arab tools and implements, feeling surethat, the manners and customs having changed but little in the East, it was to be surmised that such tools and implements must be nearlyidentical with those used eighteen centuries ago. To dress the Virginin sumptuous flowing robes, as Raphael did, was clearly incorrect; theVirgin was a poor woman, and could not have worn more than a singlegarment, and the garment she wore probably resembled the dress of theArab women of the present day, and so on and so on. Through the windowwe see the very landscape that Christ looked upon. From the point ofview of the art critic of the _Daily Telegraph_ nothing could bebetter; the various sites and prospects are explained and commentedupon, and the heart of middle-class England beats in sympatheticresponse. But the real picture-lover sees nothing save twogeometrically drawn figures placed in the canvas like diagrams in abook of Euclid. And the picture being barren of artistic interest, hisattention is caught by the Virgin's costume, and the catalogue informshim that Mr. Hunt's model was an Arab woman in Jerusalem, whose dressin all probability resembled the dress the Virgin wore two thousandyears ago. The carpenter's shop he is assured is most probably anexact counterpart of the carpenter's shop in which Christ worked. Howvery curious! how very curious!

Curiosity in art has always been a corruptive influence, and the artof our century is literally putrid with curiosity. Perhaps the desireof home was never so fixed and so real in any race as some would haveus believe. At all times there have been men whose feet itched fortravel; even in Holland, the country above all others which gavecurrency to the belief in the stay-at-home instinct, there were alwaysadventurous spirits who yearned for strange skies and lands. It wasthis desire of travel that destroyed the art of Holland in theseventeenth century. I can hardly imagine an article that would bemore instructive and valuable than one dealing precisely with thoseDutchmen who went to Italy in quest of romance, poetry, and generalartistic culture, for travel has often had an injurious effect on art. I do not say foreign travel, I say any travel. The length of thejourney counts for nothing, once the painter's inspiration springsfrom the novelty of the colour, or the character of the landscape, orthe interest that a strange costume suggests. There are painters whohave never been further than Maidenhead, and who bring back what Ishould call _notes de voyage_; there are others who have travelledround the world and have produced general aspects bearing neitherstamp nor certificate of mileage--in other words, pictures. There are, therefore, two men who must not be confused one with the other, thetraveller that paints and the painter that travels. 

Every day we hear of a painter who has been to Norway, or to Brittany, or to Wales, or to Algeria, and has come back with sixty-fivesketches, which are now on view, let us say, at Messrs. Dowdeswell'sGalleries, in New Bond Street, the home of all such exhibitions. Thepainter has been impressed by the savagery of fiords, by theprettiness of blouses and sabots, by the blue mountain in the distanceand the purple mountain in the foreground, by the narrow shade of thestreet, and the solemnity of a _burnous_ or the grace of a _haik_floating in the wind. The painter brings back these sights and scenesas a child brings back shells from the shore--they seemed very strangeand curious, and, therefore, like the child, he brought back, not thethings themselves, but the next best things, the most faithfulsketches he could make of them. To understand how impossible it is topaint _pictures_ in a foreign country, we have only to imagine a youngEnglish painter setting up his easel in, let us say, Algeria. There hefinds himself confrontedwith a new world; everything is different: thecostumes are strange, the rhythm of the lines is different, theeffects are harsh and unknown to him; at home the earth is dark andthe sky is light, in Algeria the everlasting blue must be darker thanthe white earth, and the key of colour widely different from anythinghe has seen before. Selection is impossible, he cannot distinguishbetween the important and the unimportant; everything strikes him withequal vividness. To change anything of this country, so clear, soprecise, so characteristic, is to soften; to alleviate what is toorude, is to weaken; to generalise, is to disfigure. So the artist isobliged to take Algiers in the lump; in spite of himself he will findhimself forced into a scrupulous exactitude, nothing must be passedover, and so his pictures are at best only the truth, photographictruth and the naturalness of a fac-simile. 

The sixty-five drawings which the painter will bring back and willexhibit in Messrs. Dowdeswell's will be documentary evidence of theexistence of Algeria--of all that makes a country itself, of exactlythe things by which those who have been there know it, of the thingswhich will make it known to those who have not been there, the exacttype of the inhabitants, their costume, their attitudes, their ways, and manner of living. Once the painter accepts truth for aim and end, it becomes impossible to set a limit upon his investigations. We shalllearn how this people dress, ride, and hunt; we shall learn what armsthey use--the painter will describe them as well as a pencil maydescribe--the harness of the horses he must know and understand;through dealing with so much novelty it becomes obligatory for thetravelling painter to become explanatory and categorical. And as theattraction of the unknown corresponds in most people to the immoralinstinct of curiosity, the painter will find himself forced to attemptto do with paint and canvas what he could do much better in a writtenaccount. His public will demand pictures composed after the manner ofan inventory, and the taste for ethnography will end by being confusedwith the sentiment of beauty. 

Amongst this collection of _documents_ which causes the Gallery toresound with foolish and vapid chatter there are two small pictures. Every one has passed by them, but now an artist is examining them, andthey are evidently the only two things in the exhibition that interesthim. One is entitled "Sunset on the Nile", an impression of themelancholy of evening; the other is entitled "Pilgrims", a band oftravellers passing up a sandy tract, an impression of hot desertsolitudes. 

And now I will conclude with an anecdote taken from one to whom I owemuch. Two painters were painting on the banks of the Seine. Suddenly ashepherd passed driving before him a long flock of sheep, silhouettingwith supple movement upon the water whitening under a grey sky at theend of April. The shepherd had his scrip on his back, he wore thegreat felt hat and the gaiters of the herdsman, two black dogs, picturesque in form, trotted at his heels, for the flock was going inexcellent order. "Do you know, " cried one painter to the other, "thatnothing is more interesting to paint than a shepherd on the banks of_a river_?" He did not say the Seine--he said a river. 

ARTISTIC EDUCATION IN FRANCE AND ENGLAND. 

Is the introduction of the subject into art the one and only cause forthe defeat of the brilliant genius which the Revolution and thevictories of Napoleoncalled into existence? Are there not other modernand special signs which distinguish the nineteenth century Frenchschools from all the schools that preceded it? I think there are. 

Throwing ourselves back in our chairs, let us think of this Frenchschool in its _ensemble_. What extraordinary variety! What an absenceof fixed principle! curiosity, fever, impatience, hurry, anxiety, desire touching on hysteria. An enormous expenditure of force, butspent in so many different and contrary directions, that the sum-totalof the result seems a little less than we had expected. Throwingourselves back in our chairs, and closing our eyes a second time, letus think of our eighteenth century English school. Is it not likepassing from the glare and vicarious holloaing of the street into aquiet, grave assembly of well-bred men, who are not afraid to let eachother speak, and know how to make themselves heard without shouting;men who choose their words so well that they afford to speak withoutemphasis, and in whose speech you find neither neologisms, norinversions, nor grammatical extravagances, nor calculated brutalities, nor affected ignorance, nor any faintest trace of pedantry? What thesemen have to say is more or less interesting, but they address us inthe same language, and however arbitrarily we may place them, thoughwe hang a pig-stye by Morland next to a duchess by Gainsborough, weare surprised by a pleasant air of family likeness in the execution. We feel, however differently these men see and think, that they arecontent to express themselves in the same language. Their work may becompared to various pieces of music played on an instrument which wascommon property; they were satisfied with the instrument, andpreferred to compose new music for it than to experiment with theinstrument itself. 

It may be argued that in the lapse of a hundred years the numerousdifferences of method which characterise modern painting willdisappear, and that it will seem as uniform to the eyes of thetwenty-first century as the painting of the eighteenth century seemsin our eyes to-day. I do not think this will be so. And in proof ofthis opinion I will refer again to the differences of opinionregarding the first principles of painting and drawing which dividedIngres and Géricault. Differences regarding first principles neverexisted between the leaders of any other artistic movement. Notbetween Michael Angelo and Raphael, not between Veronese, Tintoretto, Titian, and Rubens; not between Hals or any other Dutchman, exceptRembrandt, born between 1600 and 1640; or between Van Dyck andReynolds and Gainsborough. Nor must the difference between the methodsof Giotto and Titian cause any one to misunderstand my meaning. Thechange that two centuries brought into art was a gradual change, corresponding exactly to the ideas which the painter wished toexpress; each method was sufficient to explain the ideas current atthe time it was invented for that purpose; it served that purpose andno more. 

Facilities for foreign travel, international exhibitions, andcosmopolitanism have helped to keep artists of all countries in aferment of uncertainty regarding even the first principles of theirart. But this is not all; education has proved a vigorous and rapidsolvent, and has completed the disintegration of art. A young man goesto the Beaux Arts; he is taught how to measure the model with hispencil, and how to determine the movement of the model with hisplumb-line. He is taught how to draw by the masses rather than by thecharacter, and the advantages of this teaching permit him, if he is anintelligent fellow, to produce at the end of two years' hard labour ameasured, angular, constipated drawing, a sort of inferior photograph. He is then set to painting, and the instruction he receives amounts tothis--that he must not rub the paint about with his brush as he rubbedthe chalk with his paper stump. After a long methodical study of themodel, an attempt is made to prepare a corresponding tone; no mediummust be used; and when the, large square brush is filled full ofsticky, clogging pigment it is drawn half an inch down and then halfan inch across the canvas, and the painter must calculate how much hecan finish at a sitting, for this system does not admit ofretouchings. It is practised in all the French studios, where it isknown as _la peinture au premier coup_. 

A clever young man, a man of talent, labours at art in the manner Ihave described from eight to ten hours a day, and at the end of six orseven years his education is completed. During the long while of hispupilage he has heard, "first learn your trade, and then do what youlike". The time has arrived for him to do what he likes. He alreadysuspects that the mere imitation of MM. Bouguereau and Lefebvre willbring him neither fame nor money; he soon finds that is so, and itbecomes clear to him he must do something different. Enticing vistasof possibilities open out before him, but he is like a man whose limbshave been kept too long in splints--they are frozen; and he at lengthunderstands the old and terrible truth: as the twig is bent so will itgrow. The skin he would slough will not be sloughed; he tries all themethods--robust executions, lymphatic executions, sentimental andinsipid executions, painstaking executions, cursive and impertinentexecutions. Through all these the Beaux Arts student, if he isintelligent enough to perceive the falseness and worthlessness of hisprimary education, slowly works his way. He is like a vessel withoutballast; he is like a blindfolded man who has missed his pavement; heis blown from wave to wave; he is confused with contradictory cries. Last year he was robust, this year he is lymphatic; he affectslearning which he does not possess, and then he assumes airs ofignorance, equally unreal--a mild, sophisticated ignorance, which hecalls _naïveté_. And these various execution she is never more thansuperficially acquainted with; he does not practise any one longenough to extract what good there may be in it. 

To set before the reader the full story of the French decadence, Ishould have to relate the story of the great schism of some few yearsago, when the pedants remained at the _Salon_ under the headship ofMr. Bouguereau, and the experimentalists followed Meissonier to theChamps de Mars. [Footnote: See "Impressions and Opinions. "]Theauthoritative name of Meissonier, the genius of Puvis de Chavannes, and the interest of the exhibition of Stevens' early work, sufficedfor some years to disguise the progress and the tendency of thedeclension of French art; and it was not until last year (1892) thatit was impossible to doubt any longer that the great Frenchrenaissance of the beginning of the century had worn itself out, thatthe last leaves were falling, and that probably a long period ofwinter rest was preparing. French art has resolved itself into pedantsand experimentalists! The _Salon_ is now like to a library of Latinverses composed by the Eton and Harrow masters and their pupils; theChamps de Mars like a costume ball at Elyseé Montmartre. 

In England it is customary for art to enter by a side door, and theenormous subvention to the Kensington Schools would never have beenvoted by Parliament if the bill had not been gilt with the usualutility gilding. It was represented that the schools were intended forsomething much more serious than the mere painting of pictures, whichonly rich people could buy: the schools were primarily intended asschools of design, wherein the sons and daughters of the people wouldbe taught how to design wall-papers, patterns for lace, curtains, damask table-cloths, etc. The intention, like many another, wasexcellent; but the fact remains that, except for examination purposes, the work done by Kensington students is useless. A design for a pieceof wall-paper, for which a Kensington student is awarded a medal, isalmost sure to prove abortive when put to a practical test. Theisolated pattern looks pretty enough on the two feet of white paper onwhich it is drawn; but when the pattern is manifolded, it is usuallyfound that the designer has not taken into account the effect of therepetition. That is the pitfall into which the Kensington studentusually falls; he cannot make practical application of his knowledge, and at Minton's factory all the designs drawn by Kensington studentshave to be redrawn by those who understand the practical working outof the processes of reproduction and the quality of the materialemployed. So complete is the failure of the Kensington student, thatto plead a Kensington education is considered to be an almost fatalobjection against any one applying for work in any of our industrialcentres. 

Five-and-twenty years ago the schools of art at South Kensington werethe most comical in the world; they were the most complete parody onthe Continental school of art possible to imagine. They are no doubtthe same to-day as they were five-and-twenty years ago--any way, theeducational result is the same. The schools as I remember them werefaultless in everything except the instruction dispensed there. Therewere noble staircases, the floors were covered with cocoa-nut matting, the rooms admirably heated with hot-water pipes, there were plastercasts and officials. In the first room the students practised drawingfrom the flat. Engraved outlines of elaborate ornamentation were giventhem, and these they drew with lead pencil, measuring the spacescarefully with compasses. In about six months or a year the studenthad learned to use his compass correctly, and to produce a fine hardblack-lead outline; the harder and finer the outline, the more thedrawing looked like a problem in a book of Euclid, the better theexaminer was pleased, and the more willing was he to send the studentto the room upstairs, where drawing was practised from the antique. 

This was the room in which the wisdom of South Kensington attained acomplete efflorescence. I shall never forget the scenes I witnessedthere. Having made choice of a cast, the student proceeded to measurethe number of heads; he then measured the cast in every direction, andascertained by means of a plumb-line exactly where the lines fell. Itwasmore like land-surveying than drawing, and to accomplish thisportion of his task took generally a fortnight, working six hours aweek. He then placed a sheet of tissue paper upon his drawing, leavingonly one small part uncovered, and, having reduced his chalk pencil tothe finest possible point, he proceeded to lay in a set of extremelyfine lines. These were crossed by a second set of lines, and the twosets of lines were elaborately stippled, every black spot beingcarefully picked out with bread. With a patience truly sublime in itsfolly, he continued the process all the way down the figure, accomplishing, if he were truly industrious, about an inch square inthe course of an evening. Our admiration was generally directed tothose who had spent the longest time on their drawings. After threemonths' work a student began to be noticed; at the end of four hebecame an important personage. I remember one who had contrived tospend six months on his drawing. He was a sort of demigod, and we usedto watch him anxious and alarmed lest he might not have the genius todevote still another month to it, and our enthusiasm knew no boundswhen we learned that, a week before the drawings had to be sent in, hehad taken his drawing home and spent three whole days stippling it andpicking out the black spots with bread. 

The poor drawing had neither character nor consistency; it looked likenothing under the sun, except a drawing done at Kensington--a flat, foolish thing, but very soft and smooth. But this was enough; it waspassed by the examiners, and the student went into the Life Room tocopy an Italian model as he had copied the Apollo Belvedere. Once ortwice a week a gentleman who painted tenth-rate pictures, which werenot always hung in the Academy, came round and passed casual remarkson the quality of the stippling. There was a head-master who paintedtenth-rate historical pictures, after the manner of a tenth-rateGerman painter in a provincial town, in a vast studio upstairs, whichthe State was good enough to provide him with, and he occasionallywalked through the studios; on an average, I should say, once a month. 

The desire to organise art proceeded in France from a love of system, and in England from a love of respectability. To the ordinary mindthere is something especially reassuring in medals, crowns, examinations, professors, and titles; and since the founding of theKensington Schools we unfortunately hear no more of parents opposingtheir children's wishes to become artists. The result of all thesefacilities for art study has been to swamp natural genius and toproduce enormous quantities of vacuous little water colours and slimylittle oil colours. Young men have been prevented from going toAustralia and Canada and becoming rough farmers, and young ladies fromfollowing them and becoming rough wives and themothers of healthychildren. Instead of such natural emigration and extension of therace, febrile little pilgrimages have been organised to Paris andGrey, whence astonishing methods and theories regarding theconditions, under which painting alone can be accomplished, have beenbrought back. Original Kensington stipple has been crossed with squarebrush-work, and the mule has been bred in and in with open brush-work, and fresh strains have been sought in the execution at the angle offorty-five; art has become infinitely hybrid and definitely sterile. 

Must we then conclude that all education is an evil? Why exaggerate;why outstrip the plain telling of the facts? For those who arethinking of adopting art as a profession it is sufficient to know thatthe one irreparable evil is a bad primary education. Be sure thatafter five years of the Beaux Arts you cannot become a great painter. Be sure that after five years of Kensington you can never become apainter at all. "If not at Kensington nor at the Beaux Arts, where amI to obtain the education I stand in need of?" cries the embarrassedstudent. I do not propose to answer that question directly. How themasters of Holland and Flanders obtained their marvellous education isnot known. We neither know how they learned nor how they painted. Didthe early masters paint first in monochrome, adding the colouringmatter afterwards? Much vain conjecturing has been expended inattempting to solve this question. Did Ruysdale paint direct fromnature or from drawings? Unfortunately on this question history has nosingle word to say. We know that Potter learned his trade in thefields in lonely communication with nature. We know too that Crome wasa house-painter, and practised painting from nature when his dailywork was done. Nevertheless he attained as perfect a technique as anypainter that ever lived. Morland, too, was self-taught: he practisedpainting in the fields and farmyards and the country inns where helived, oftentimes paying for board and lodging with a picture. Did hisart suffer from want of education? Is there any one who believes thatMorland would have done better work if he had spent three or fouryears stippling drawings from the antique at South Kensington?

I will conclude these remarks, far too cursive and incomplete, with ananecdote which, I think, will cause the thoughtful to ponder. Someseven or eight years ago, Renoir, a painter of rare talent andoriginality, after twenty years of struggle with himself and poverty, succeeded in attaining a very distinct and personal expression of hisindividuality. Out of a hundred influences he had succeeded inextracting an art as beautiful as it was new. His work was beginningto attract buyers. For the first time in his life he had a littlemoney in hand, and he thought he would like a holiday. Long reading ofnovels leads the reader to suppose that he found his ruin in a periodof riotous living, the reaction induced by anxiety and over-work. Notat all. He did what every wise friend would have advised him to dounder the circumstances: he went to Venice to study Tintoretto. Themagnificences of this master struck him through with the sense of hisown insignificance; he became aware of the fact that he could not drawlike Tintoretto; and when he returned to Paris he resolved to subjecthimself to two years of hard study in an art school. For two years helaboured in the life class, working on an average from seven to tenhours a day, and in two years he had utterly destroyed every trace ofthe charming and delightful art which had taken him twenty years tobuild up. I know of no more tragic story--do you?

INGRES AND COROT. 

Of the thirty or more great artists who made the artistic movement atthe beginning of the century in France, five will, I think, exercise aprolonged influence on the art of the future--Ingres, Corot, Millet, Manet, and Degas. 

The omission of the name of Delacroix will surprise many; but thoughDelacroix will engage the attention of artists as they walk throughthe Louvre, I do not think that they will turn to him for counsel intheir difficulty, or that they will learn from him any secrets oftheir craft. In the great masters of pictorial composition--MichaelAngelo, Veronese, Tintoretto, and Rubens--the passion and tumult ofthe work resides solely in the conception; the execution is alwayscalculated, and the result is perfectly predetermined and accuratelyforeseen. To explain myself I will tell an anecdote which is alwaystold whenever Delacroix's name is mentioned, without, however, thetrue significance of the anecdote being perceived. After seeingConstable's pictures, Delacroix repainted one of his most importantworks from end to end. 

Of Degas [Footnote: See essay on Degas In "Impressions and Opinions". ]and Manet I have spoken elsewhere. Millet seems to me to be a sort ofnineteenth century Greuze. The subject-matter is different, but atbottom the art of these two painters is more alike than is generallysupposed. Neither was a painter in any true sense of the word, and ifthe future learns anything from Millet, it will be how to separate thescene from the environment which absorbs it, how to sacrifice thebackground, how to suggest rather than to point out, and how by aseries of ellipses to lead the spectator to imagine what is not there. The student may learn from Millet that it was by sometimes servilelycopying nature, sometimes by neglecting nature, that the old masterssucceeded in conveying not an illusion but an impression of life. 

But of all nineteenth century painters Ingres and Corot seem most sureof future life; their claim upon the attention and the admiration offuture artists seems the most securely founded. Looked at from acertain side Ingres seems for sheer perfection to challenge antiquity. Of Michael Angelo there can never be any question; he stands alone ina solitude of greatness. Phidias himself is not so much alone. For theart of Apelles could not have differed from that of Phidias; and theintention of many a drawing by Apelles must have been identical withthat of "La Source". It is difficult to imagine what further beauty hemay have introduced into a face, or what further word he might havehad to say on the beauty of a virgin body. 

The legs alone suggest the possibility of censure. Ingres repaintedthe legs when the picture was finished and the model was not beforehim, so the idea obtains among artists that the legs are what areleast perfect in the picture. In repainting the legs his object wasomission of detail with a view to concentration of attention on theupper part of the figure. It must not however be supposed that thelegs are what is known among painters as empty; they have beensimplified; their synthetic expression has been found; and if theteaching at the Beaux Arts forbids the present generation tounderstand such drawing, the fault lies with the state that permitsthe Beaux Arts, and not with Ingres, whose genius was not crushed byit. The suggestion that Ingres spoilt the legs of "La Source" byrepainting them when the model was not before him could come fromnowhere but the Beaux Arts. 

That Ingres was not so great an artist as Raphael I am aware. ThatIngres' drawings show none of the dramatic inventiveness of Raphael'sdrawings is so obvious that I must apologise for such a commonplace. Raphael's drawings were done with a different intention from Ingres';Raphael's drawings were no more than rough memoranda, and in noinstance did he attempt to carry a drawing to the extreme limit thatIngres did. Ingres' drawing is one thing, Raphael's is another; stillI would ask if any one thinks that Raphael could have carried adrawing as far as Ingres? I would ask if any of Raphael's drawings areas beautiful, as perfect, or as instructive as Ingres'. Take, forexample, the pencil drawing in the Louvre, the study for theodalisque: who except a Greek could have produced so perfect adrawing? I can imagine Apelles doing something like it, but no oneelse. 

When you go to the Louvre examine that line of back, return the nextday and the next, and consider its infinite perfection before youconclude that my appreciation is exaggerated. Think of the learningand the love that were necessary for the accomplishment of suchexquisite simplifications. Never did pencil follow an outline withsuch penetrating and unwearying passion, or clasp and enfold it withsuch simple and sufficient modelling. Nowhere can you detect astarting-point or a measurement taken; it seems to have grown as abeautiful tendril grows, and every curve sways as mysteriously, andthe perfection seems as divine. Beside it Dürer would seem crabbed andpuzzle-headed; Holbein would seem angular and geometrical; Da Vinciwould seem vague: and I hope that no critic by partial quotation willendeavour to prove me guilty of having said that Ingres was a greaterartist than Da Vinci. I have not said any such thing; I have merelystriven by aid of comparison to bring before the reader some sense ofthe miraculous beauty of one of Ingres' finest pencil drawings. 

Or let us choose the well-known drawing of the Italian lady sitting inthe Louis XV. Arm-chair, her long curved and jewelled hand lying inher lap and a coiffure of laces pinned down with a long jewelledhair-pin. How her head-dress of large laces decorates the paper, andthe elaborate working out of the pattern, is it not a miracle ofhandicraft? How exquisite the black curls on the forehead, and howthey balance the dark eyes which are the depth and centre of thecomposition! The necklace, how well the stones are heaped, how wellthey lie together! How well their weight and beauty are expressed! Andthe earrings, how enticing in their intricate workmanship. Then themovement of the face, how full it is of the indolent south, and theoval of the face is composed to harmonise and enhance the lacehead-dress; and its outline, though full of classical simplifications, tells the character with Holbein-like fidelity; it falls away into asoft, weak chin in which resides a soft sensual lassitude. The blackeyes are set like languid stars in the face, and the flesh rounds offsoftly, like a sky, modelled with a little shadow, part of theoutline, and expressing its beauty. And then there are the marvels ofthe dress to consider: the perfect and spontaneous creation of theglitter of the long silk arms, and the muslin of the wrists, soft asfoliage, and then the hardness of the bodice stitched with jewelleryand set so romantically on the almost epicene bosom. 

It is the essentially Greek quality of perfection that brings Corotand Ingres together. They are perfect, as none other since the Greeksculptors has been perfect. Other painters have desired beauty atintervals as passionately as they, none save the Greeks socontinuously; and the desire to be merely beautiful seemed, ifpossible, to absorb the art of Corot even more completely than it didthat of Ingres. Among the numerous pictures, sketches, and drawingswhich he left you will find weakness, repetitions, even commonplace, but ugliness never. An ugly set of lines is not to be found in Corot;the rhythm may sometimes be weak, but his lines never run out ofmetre. For the rhythm of line as well as of sound the artist must seekin his own soul; he will never find it in the inchoate and discordantjumble which we call nature. 

And, after all, what is art but rhythm? Corot knew that art is naturemade rhythmical, and so he was never known to take out a six-footcanvas to copy nature on. Being an artist, he preferred to observenature, and he lay down and dreamed his fields and trees, and hewalked about in his landscape, selecting his point of view, determining the rhythm of his lines. That sense of rhythm which I havedefined as art was remarkable in him even from his first pictures. Inthe "Castle of St. Angelo, Rome", for instance, the placing of thebuildings, one low down, the other high up in the picture, the bridgebetween, and behind the bridge the dome of St. Peter's, is asfaultless a composition as his maturest work. As faultless, and yetnot so exquisite. For it took many long and pensive years to attainthe more subtle and delicate rhythms of "The Lake" in the collectionof J. S. Forbes, Esq. , or the landscape in the collection of G. N. Stevens, Esq. , or the "Ravine" in the collection of Sir John Day. 

Corot's style changed; but it changed gradually, as nature changes, waxing like the moon from a thin, pure crescent to a full circle oflight. Guided by a perfect instinct, he progressed, fulfilling thecourse of his artistic destiny. We notice change, but each changebrings fuller beauty. And through the long and beautiful year ofCorot's genius--full as the year itself of months and seasons--wenotice that the change that comes over his art is always in thedirection of purer and more spiritual beauty. We find him more andmore absorbed in the emotion that the landscape conveys, more willingto sacrifice the superfluous and circumstantial for the sake of theimmortal beauty of things. 

Look at the "Lac de Garde" and say if you can that the old Greekmelody is not audible in the line which bends and floats to the lake'sedge, in the massing and the placing of those trees, in the fragilegrace of the broken birch which sweeps the "pale complexioned sky". Are we not looking into the heart of nature, and do we not hear thesilence that is the soul of evening? In this, his perfect period, heis content to leave his foreground rubbed over with some expressivegrey, knowing well that the eye rests not there, and upon his middledistance he will lavish his entire art, concentrating his picture onsome one thing in which for him resides the true reality of the place;be this the evening ripples on the lake or the shimmering of thewillow leaves as the last light dies out of the sky. 

I only saw Corot once. It was in some woods near Paris, where I hadgone to paint, and I came across the old gentleman unexpectedly, seated in front of his easel in a pleasant glade. After admiring hiswork I ventured to say: "Master, what you are doing is lovely, but Icannot find your composition in the landscape before us. " He said: "Myforeground is a long way ahead, " and sure enough, nearly two hundredyards away, his picture rose out of the dimness of the dell, stretching a little beyond the vista into the meadow. 

The anecdote seems to me to be a real lesson in the art of painting, for it shows us the painter in his very employment of nature, and wedivine easily the transposition in the tones and in the aspect ofthings that he was engaged in bringing into that picture. And to speakof transpositions leads us inevitably into consideration of the greatsecret of Corot's art, his employment of what is known in studios asvalues. 

By values is meant the amount of light and shadow contained in a tone. The relation of a half-tint to the highest light, which is representedby the white paper, the relation of a shadow to the deepest black, which is represented by the chalk pencil, is easy enough to perceivein a drawing; but when the work is in colour the values, although notless real, are more difficult to estimate. For a colour can beconsidered from two points of view: either as so much colouringmatter, or as so much light and shade. Violet, for instance, containsnot only red and blue in proportions which may be indefinitely varied, but also certain proportions of light and shade; the former tendingtowards the highest light, represented on the palette by flake white;the latter tending towards the deepest dark, represented on thepalette by ivory black. 

Similar to a note in music, no colour can be said to be in itselfeither false or true, ugly or beautiful. A note and a colour acquirebeauty and ugliness according to their associations; therefore tocolour well depends, in the first instance, on the painter's knowledgeand intimate sense of the laws of contrast and similitude. But thereis still another factor in the art of colouring well; for, just as themusician obtains richness and novelty of expression by means of adistribution of sound through the instruments of the orchestra, sodoes the painter obtain depth and richness through a judiciousdistribution of values. If we were to disturb the distribution ofvalues in the pictures of Titian, Rubens, Veronese, their colour wouldat once seem crude, superficial, without cohesion or rarity. But somewill aver that if the colour is right the values must be right too. However plausible this theory may seem, the practice of those who holdit amply demonstrates its untruth. It is interesting and instructiveto notice how those who seek the colour without regard for the valuesinherent in the colouring matter never succeed in producing more thana certain shallow superficial brilliancy; the colour of such paintersis never rich or profound, and although it may be beautiful, it isalways wanting in the element of romantic charm and mystery. 

The colour is the melody, the values are the orchestration of themelody; and as the orchestration serves to enrich the melody, so dothe values enrich the colour. And as melody may--nay, must--exist, ifthe orchestration be really beautiful, so colour must inhere whereverthe values have been finely observed. In Rembrandt, the colour isbrown and a white faintly tinted with bitumen; in Claude, the colouris blue, faintly flushed with yellow in the middle sky, and yet nonehas denied the right of these painters to be considered colourists. They painted with the values--that is to say, with what remains on thepalette when abstraction has been made of the colouring matter--adelicate neutral tint of infinite subtlety and charm; and it is withthis, the evanescent and impalpable soul of the vanished colours, thatthe most beautiful pictures are painted. Corot, too, is a conspicuousexample of this mode of painting. His right to stand among the world'scolourists has never, so far as I know, been seriously contested, hispictures are almost void of colouring matter--a blending of grey andgreen, and yet the result is of a richly coloured evening. 

Corot and Rembrandt, as Dutilleux pointed out, arrived at the samegoal by absolutely different ends. He saw clearly, although he couldnot express himself quite clearly, that, above all painters, Rembrandtand Corot excelled in that mode of pictorial expression known asvalues, or shall I say chiaroscuro, for in truth he who has saidvalues has hinted chiaroscuro. Rembrandt told all that a golden rayfalling through a darkened room awakens in a visionary brain; Corottold all that the grey light of morning and evening whispers in thepensive mind of the elegiac poet. The story told was widely different, but the manner of telling was the same: one attenuated in the light, the other attenuated in the shadow: both sacrificed the corners with aview to fixing the attention on the one spot in which the soul of thepicture lives. 

All schools have not set great store on values, although all schoolshave set great store on drawing and colour. Values seem to have comeand gone in and out of painting like a fashion. One generation hardlygives the matter a thought, the succeeding generation finds the wholecharm of its art in values. It would be difficult to imagine a moreinteresting and instructive history than the history of values inpainting. It is far from my scheme to write such a history, but I wishthat such a history were written, for then we should see clearly howunwise were they who neglected the principle, and how much they lost. I would only call attention to how the principle came to bereintroduced into French art in the beginning of this century. It camefrom Holland _viâ_, England through the pictures of Turner andConstable. It was an Anglo-Dutch influence that roused French art, then slumbering in the pseudo-classicisms of the First Empire; and, half-awakened, French art turned its eyes to Holland for inspiration;and values, the foundation and corner-stone of Dutch art, becamealmost at a bound a first article of faith in the artistic creed. In1830 values came upon France like a religion. Rembrandt was the newMessiah, Holland was the Holy Land, and disciples were busy dispensingthe propaganda in every studio. 

Since the bad example of Greuze, literature had wound round everybranch of painting until painting seemed to disappear in the parasitelike an oak under a cloud of ivy. The excess had been great--areaction was inevitable--and Rembrandt, with his Biblical legends, furnished the necessary transition. But when a taste for painting hadbeen reacquired, one after the other the Dutch painters became thefashion. It is almost unnecessary to point out the influence ofHobbema on the art of Rousseau. Corot was less affected by theDutchmen, or, to speak more exactly, he assimilated more completelywhat he had learnt from them than his rival was able to do. Moreover, what he took from Holland came to him through Ruysdael rather thanthrough Hobbema. 

The great morose dreamer, contemplative and grave as Wordsworth, musthave made more direct and intimate appeal to Corot's soul than thecharm and the gaiety of Hobbema's water-mills. Be this as it may, itwas Holland that revived the long-forgotten science of values in theBarbizon painters. They sought their art in the direction of values, and very easily Corot took the lead as chief exponent of the newprinciple; and he succeeded in applying the principle of values tolandscape painting as fully as Rembrandt had to figure painting. 

But at the moment when the new means of expression seemed mostdistinctly established and understood, it was put aside and lost sightof by a new generation of painters, and, curiously enough, by the menwho had most vigorously proclaimed the beauty and perfection of theart which was to be henceforth, at least in practice, their mission torepudiate. For I take it that the art of the impressionists hasnothing whatever in common with the art of Corot. True, that Corot'saim was to render his impression of his subject, no matter whether itwas a landscape or a figure; in this aim he differed in no wise fromGiotto and Van Eyck; but we are not considering Corot's aims but hismeans of expression, and his means of expression were the veryopposite to those employed by Monet and the school of Monet. Not withhalf-tints in which colour disappears are Monet and his schoolconcerned, but with the brilliant vibration of colour in the fulllight, with open spaces where the light is reflected back and forward, and nature is but a prism filled with dazzling and iridescent tints. 

I remember once writing about one of Monet's innumerable snow effects:"This picture is in his most radiant manner. A line of snow-enchantedarchitecture passes through the picture--only poor houses with asingle square church tower, but they are beautiful as Greek temples inthe supernatural whiteness of the great immaculate snow. Below thevillage, but not quite in the foreground, a few yellow bushes, bareand crippled by the frost, and around and above a marvellous glitterin pale blue and pale rose tints. " I asked if the touch was not moreprecious than intimate; and I spoke, too, of a shallow and brilliantappearance. But if I had asked why the picture, notwithstanding itsincontestable merits, was so much on the surface, why it soirresistibly suggested _un décor de théâtre_, why one did not enterinto it as one does into a picture by Wilson or Corot, my criticismwould have gone to the root of the evil. And the reason of this isbecause Monet has never known how to organise and control his values. The relation of a wall to the sky which he observes so finely seem asif deliberately contrived for the suppression of all atmosphere; andwe miss in Monet the delicacy and the mystery which are the charm ofCorot. The bath of air being withdrawn, a landscape becomes a mosaic, flat surface takes the place of round: the next step is some form orother of pre-Raphaelitism. 

MONET, SISLEY, PISSARO, AND THE DECADENCE. 

Nature demands that children should devour their parents, and Corotwas hardly cold in his grave when his teaching came to be neglectedand even denied. Values were abandoned and colour became the uniquethought of the new school. 

My first acquaintance with Monet's painting was made in '75 or'76--the year he exhibited his first steam-engine and his celebratedtroop of life-size turkeys gobbling the tall grass in a meadow, at theend of which stood, high up in the picture, a French château. Impressionism is a word that has lent itself to every kind ofmisinterpretation, for in its exact sense all true painting ispenetrated with impressionism, but, to use the word in its most modernsense--that is to say, to signify the rapid noting of illusiveappearance--Monet is the only painter to whom it may be reasonablyapplied. I remember very well that sunlit meadow and the long colourednecks of the turkeys. Truly it may be said that, for the space of onerapid glance, the canvas radiates; it throws its light in the face ofthe spectator as, perhaps, no canvas did before. But if the eyes arenot immediately averted the illusion passes, and its place is taken bya somewhat incoherent and crude coloration. Then the merits of thepicture strike you as having been obtained by excessive accomplishmentin one-third of the handicraft and something like a formalprotestation of the non-existence of the other two-thirds. Since thatyear I have seen Monets by the score, and have hardly observed anychange or alteration in his manner of seeing or executing, or anydevelopment soever in his art. At the end of the season he comes upfrom the country with thirty or forty landscapes, all equally perfect, all painted in precisely the same way, and no one shows the slightestsign of hesitation, and no one suggests the unattainable, the beyond;one and all reveal to us a man who is always sure of his effect, andwho is always in a hurry. Any corner of nature will do equally wellfor his purpose, nor is he disposed to change the disposition of anyline of tree or river or hill; so long as a certain reverberation ofcolour is obtained all is well. An unceasing production, and an almostunvarying degree of excellence, has placed Monet at the head of theschool; his pictures command high prices, and nothing goes now withthe erudite American but Monet's landscapes. But does Monet merit thisexcessive patronage, and if so, what are the qualities in his workthat make it superior to Sisley's and Pissaro's?

Sisley is less decorative, less on the surface, and though he followsMonet in his pursuit of colour, nature is, perhaps, on account of hisEnglish origin, something more to him than a brilliant appearance. Ithas of course happened to Monet to set his easel before the suburbanaspect that Sisley loves, but he has always treated it rather in thedecorative than in the meditative spirit. He has never been touched bythe humility of a lane's end, and the sentiment of the humble lifethat collects there has never appeared on his canvas. Yet Sisley, being more in sympathy with such nature, has often been able toproduce a superior though much less pretentious picture than theordinary stereotyped Monet. But if Sisley is more meditative thanMonet, Pissaro is more meditative than either. 

Monet had arrived at his style before I saw anything of his work; ofhis earlier canvases I know nothing. Possibly he once painted in theCorot manner; it is hardly possible that he should not have done so. However this may be, Pissaro did not rid himself for many years of theinfluence of Corot. His earliest pictures were all composed in pensivegreys and violets, and exhaled the weary sadnessof tilth and grangeand scant orchard trees. The pale road winds through meagre uplands, and through the blown and gnarled and shiftless fruit-trees thesaddening silhouette of the town drifts across the land. The violetspaces between the houses are the very saddest, and the spare furrowsare patiently drawn, and so the execution is in harmony with andaccentuates the unutterable monotony of the peasant's lot. The sky, too, is vague and empty, and out of its deathlike, creamy hollow thefirst shadows are blown into the pallid face of a void evening. Thepicture tells of the melancholy of ordinary life, of our poortransitory tenements, our miserable scrapings among the little mildewthat has gathered on the surface of an insignificant planet. I willnot attempt to explain why the grey-toned and meditative Pissaroshould have consented to countenance--I cannot say to lead (for, unlike every other _chef d'école_, Pissaro imitated the disciplesinstead of the disciples imitating Pissaro)--the many fantasticrevolutions in pictorial art which have agitated Montmartre during thelast dozen years. The Pissaro psychology I must leave to take care ofitself, confining myself strictly to the narrative of theserevolutions. 

Authority for the broken brushwork of Monet is to be found in Manet'slast pictures, and I remember Manet's reply when I questioned himabout the pure violet shadows which, just before his death, he wasbeginning to introduce into his pictures. "One year one paints violetand people scream, and the following year every one paints a greatdeal more violet. " If Manet's answer throws no light whatever on thenew principle, it shows very clearly the direction, if not the goal, towards which his last style was moving. But perhaps I am speaking toocautiously, for surely broken brushwork and violet shadows lead onlyto one possible goal--the prismatic colours. 

Manet died, and this side--and this side only--of his art was taken upby Monet, Sisley, and Renoir. Or was it that Manet had begun to yieldto an influence--that of Monet, Sisley, and Renoir--which was justbeginning to make itself felt? Be this as it may, browns and blacksdisappeared from the palettes of those who did not wish to beconsidered _l'école des beaux-arts, et en plein_. Venetian reds, siennas, and ochres were in process of abandonment, and the palettecame to be composed very much in the following fashion: violet, white, blue, white, green, white, red, white, yellow, white, orange, white--the three primary and the three secondary colours, with whiteplaced between each, so as to keep everything as distinct as possible, and avoid in the mixing all soiling of the tones. Monet, Sisley, andRenoir contented themselves with the abolition of all blacks andbrowns, for they were but half-hearted reformers, and it was clearlythe duty of those who came after to rid the palette of all ochres, siennas, Venetian, Indian, and light reds. The only red and yellowthat any one who was not, according to the expression of the newgeneration, _presque du Louvre_, could think of permitting on hispalette were vermilion and cadmium. The first of this new generationwas Seurat, Seurat begot Signac, Signac begot Anquetin, and Anquetinhas begotten quite a galaxy of lesser lights, of whom I shall notspeak in this article--of whom it is not probable that I shall everspeak. 

It was in an exhibition held in Rue Lafitte in '81 or '82 that the newmethod, which comprised two most radical reforms--an executionachieved entirely with the point of the brush and the division of thetones--was proclaimed. Or should I say reformation, for the executionby a series of dots is implicit in the theory of the division of thetones? How well I remember being attracted towards an end of the room, which was filled with a series of most singular pictures. There musthave been at least ten pictures of yachts in full sail. They were alldrawn in profile, they were all painted in the very clearest tints, white skies and white sails hardly relieved or explained with shadow, and executed in a series of minute touches, like mosaic. Ten picturesof yachts all in profile, all in full sail, all unrelieved by anyattempt at atmospheric effect, all painted in a series of little dots!

Great as was my wonderment, it was tenfold increased on discoveringthat only five of these pictures were painted by the new man, Seurat, whose name was unknown to me; the other five were painted by my oldfriend Pissaro. My first thought went for the printer; my second forsome _fumisterie_ on the part of the hanging committee, the intentionof which escaped me. The pictures were hung low, so I went down on myknees and examined the dotting in the pictures signed Seurat, and thedotting in those that were signed Pissaro. After a strict examinationI was able to detect some differences, and I began to recognise thewell-known touch even through this most wild and most wonderfultransformation. Yes, owing to a long and intimate acquaintancewith Pissaro and his work, I could distinguish between him and Seurat, but to the ordinary visitor their pictures were identical. 

Many claims are put forward, but the best founded is that of Seurat;and, so far as my testimony may serve his greater honour and glory, Ido solemnly declare that I believe him to have been the originaldiscoverer of the division of the tones. 

A tone is a combination of colours. In Nature colours are separate;they act and react one on the other, and so create in the eye theillusion of a mixture of various colours-in other words, of a tone. But if the human eye can perform this prodigy when looking on colouras evolved through the spectacle of the world, why should not the eyebe able to perform the same prodigy when looking on colour asdisplayed over the surface of a canvas? Nature does not mix hercolours to produce a tone; and the reason of the marked discrepancyexisting between Nature and the Louvre is owing to the fact thatpainters have hitherto deemed it a necessity to prepare a tone on thepalette before placing it on the canvas; whereas it is quite clearthat the only logical and reasonable method is to first complete theanalysis of the tone, and then to place the colours which compose thetone in dots over the canvas, varying the size of the dots and thedistance between the dots according to the depth of colour desired bythe painter. 

If this be done truly--that is to say, if the first analysis of thetones be a correct analysis--and if the spectator places himself atthe right distance from the picture, there will happen in his eyesexactly the same blending of colour as happens in them when they arelooking upon Nature. An example will, I think, make my meaning clear. We are in a club smoking-room. The walls are a rich ochre. Three orfour men sit between us and the wall, and the blue smoke of theircigars fills the middle air. In painting this scene it would be usualto prepare the tone on the palette, and the preparation would besomewhat after this fashion: ochre warmed with a little red--a paleviolet tinted with lake for the smoke of the cigars. 

But such a method of painting would seem to Seurat and Signac to beartless, primitive, unscientific, childish, _presque du Louvre_--aboveall, unscientific. They would say, "Decompose the tone. That tone iscomposed of yellow, white, and violet turning towards lake"; and, having satisfied themselves in what proportions, they would dot theircanvases over with pure yellow and pure white, the interspaces beingfilled in with touches of lake and violet, numerous where the smoke isthickest, diminishing in number where the wreaths vanish into air. Orlet us suppose that it is a blue slated roof that the dottist wishesto paint. He first looks behind him, to see what is the colour of thesky. It is an orange sky. He therefore represents the slates by meansof blue dots intermixed with orange and white dots, and--ah! I amforgetting an important principle in the new method--the complementarycolour which the eye imagines, but does not see. What is thecomplementary colour of blue, grey, and orange? Green. Therefore greenmust be introduced into the roof; otherwise the harmony would beincomplete, and therefore in a measure discordant. 

Needless to say that a sky painted in this way does not bear lookinginto. Close to the spectator it presents the appearance of a pard; butwhen he reaches the proper distance there is no denying that thecolours do in a measure unite and assume a tone more or lessequivalent to the tone that would have been obtained by blending thecolours on the palette. "But, " cry Seurat and Signac, "an infinitelypurer and more beautiful tone than could have been obtained by anyartificial blending of the colours on the palette--a tone that is theexact equivalent of one of Nature's tones, for it has been obtained inexactly the same way. "

Truly a subject difficult to write about in English. Perhaps it is onethat should not be attempted anywhere except in a studio with closeddoors. But if I did not make some attempt to explain this matter, Ishould leave my tale of the decline and fall of French art in thenineteenth century incomplete. 

Roughly speaking, these new schools--the symbolists, the decadents, the dividers of tones, the professors of the rhythm of gesture--dateback about ten years. For ten years the division of the tones has beenthe subject of discussion in the aesthetic circles of Montmartre. Andwhen we penetrate further into the matter--or, to be more exact, as weascend into the higher regions of _La Butte_--we find the elect, whoform so stout a phalanx against the Philistinism of the Louvre, themselves subdivided into numerous sections, and distraught withinternecine feuds concerning the principle of the art which theypursue with all the vehemence that Veronese green and cadmium yelloware capable of. From ten at night till two in the morning the_brasseries_ of the Butte are in session. Ah! the interminable bocksand the reek of the cigars, until at last a hesitating exodus begins. An exhausted proprietor at the head of his waiters, crazed withsleepiness, eventually succeeds in driving these noctambulist apostlesinto the streets. 

Then the nervous lingering at the corner! The disputants, anxious andyet loth to part, say goodbye, each regretting that he had not urgedsome fresh argument--an argument which had just occurred to him, andwhich, he feels sure, would have reduced his opponent to impotentsilence. Sometimes the partings are stormy. The question of theintroduction of the complementary colours into the frames of thepictures is always a matter of strife, and results in muchnonconformity. Several are strongly in favour of carrying thecomplementary colours into the picture-frames. "If you admit, " saysone, "that to paint a blue roof with an orange sky shining on it youmust introduce the complementary colour green--which the spectatordoes not see, but imagines--there is excellent reason why you shoulddot the frame all over with green, for the picture and its frame arenot two things, but one thing. " "But, " cries his opponent, "there is afinality in all things; if you carry your principle out to the bitterend, the walls as well as the frame should be dotted with thecomplementary colours, the staircases too, the streets likewise; andif we pursue the complementaries into the street, who shall say wherewe are to stop? Why stop at all, unless the neighbours protest that weare interfering with their complementaries?"

The schools headed by Signac and Anquetin comprise numerous disciplesand adherents. They do not exhibit in the Salon or in the Champ deMars; but that is because they disdain to do so. They hold exhibitionsof their own, and their picture-dealers trade only in their works andin those belonging to or legitimately connected with the new schools. 

If I have succeeded in explaining the principle of coloration employedby these painters, I must have excited some curiosity in the reader tosee these scientifically-painted pictures. To say that they arestrange, absurd, ridiculous, conveys no sensation of theirextravagances; and I think that even an elaborate description wouldmiss its mark. For, in truth, the pictures merit no such attention. Itis only needful to tell the reader that they fail most conspicuouslyat the very point where it was their mission to succeed. Instead ofexcelling in brilliancy of colour the pictures painted in the ordinaryway, they present the most complete spectacle of discolorationpossible to imagine. 

Yet Signac is a man of talent, and in an exhibition of pictures whichI visited last May I saw a wide bay, two rocky headlands extending farinto the sea, and this offing was filled with a multitude of gull-likesails. There was in it a vibration of light, such an effect as amosaic composed of dim-coloured but highly polished stones mightproduce. I can say no good word, however, for his portrait of agentleman holding his hat in one hand and a flower in the other. Thispicture formulated a still newer aestheticism--the rhythm of gesture. For, according to Signac, the raising of the face and hands expressesjoy, the depression of the face and hands denotes sadness. Therefore, to denote the melancholy temperament of his sitter, Signac representedhim as being hardly able to lift his hat to his head or the flower tohis button-hole. The figure was painted, as usual, in dots of purecolour lifted from the palette with the point of the brush; thecomplementary colours in duplicate bands curled up the background. This was considered by the disciples to be an important innovation;and the effect, it is needless to say, was gaudy, if not neat. 

A theory of Anquetin's is that wherever the painter is painting, hisretina must still hold some sensation of the place he has left;therefore there is in every scene not only the scene itself, butremembrance of the scene that preceded it. This is not quite clear, isit? No. But I think I can make it clear. He who walks out of abrilliantly lighted saloon--that is to say, he who walks out ofyellow--sees the other two primary colours, red and blue; in otherwords, he sees violet. Therefore Anquetin paints the street, andeverything in it, violet--boots, trousers, hats, coats, lamp-posts, paving-stones, and the tail of the cat disappearing under the _portecochère_. 

But if in my description of these schools I have conveyed the idea ofstupidity or ignorance I have failed egregiously. These young men areall highly intelligent and keenly alive to art, and their doings arenot more vain than the hundred and one artistic notions which havebeen undermining the art-sense of the French and English nations forthe last twenty years. What I have described is not more foolish thanthe stippling at South Kensington or the drawing by the masses atJulien's. The theory of the division of the tones is no more foolishthan the theory of _plein air_ or the theory of the square brushwork;it is as foolish, but not a jot more foolish. 

Great art dreams, imagines, sees, feels, expresses--reasons never. Itis only in times of woful decadence, like the present, that thebleating of the schools begins to be heard; and although, to theignorant, one method may seem less ridiculous than another, allmethods--I mean, all methods that are not part and parcel of thepictorial intuition--are equally puerile and ridiculous. Theseparation of the method of expression from the idea to be expressedis the sure sign of decadence. France is now all decadence. In theChamp de Mars, as in the Salon, the man of the hour is he who hasinvented the last trick in subject or treatment. 

France has produced great artists in quick succession. Think of allthe great names, beginning with Ingres and ending with Degas, andwonder if you can that France has at last entered on a period ofartistic decadence. For the last sixty years the work done in literaryand pictorial art has been immense; the soil has been worked along andacross, in every direction; and for many a year nothing will come tous from France but the bleat of the scholiast. 

OUR ACADEMICIANS. 

That nearly all artists dislike and despise the Royal Academy is amatter of common knowledge. Whether with reason or without is a matterof opinion, but the existence of an immense fund of hate and contemptof the Academy is not denied. From Glasgow to Cornwall, wherever agroup of artists collects, there hangs a gathering and a darkening skyof hate. True, the position of the Academy seems to be impregnable;and even if these clouds should break into storm the Academy would beas little affected as the rock of Gibraltar by squall or tempest. TheAcademy has successfully resisted a Royal Commission, and a crusadeled by Mr. Holman Hunt in the columns of the _Times_ did not succeedin obtaining the slightest measure of reform.... Here I might consultBlue-books and official documents, and tell the history of theAcademy; but for the purpose of this article the elementary facts inevery one's possession are all that are necessary. We know that we owethe Academy to the artistic instincts of George III. It was he whosheltered it in Somerset House, and when Somerset House was turnedinto public offices, the Academy was bidden to Trafalgar Square; andwhen circumstances again compelled the authorities to ask the Academyto move on, the Academy, posing as a public body, demanded a site, andthe Academy was given one worth three hundred thousand pounds. Thereonthe Academy erected its present buildings, and when they werecompleted the Academy declared itself on the first opportunity to beno public body at all, but a private enterprise. Then why the site, and why the Royal charter? Mr. Colman, Mr. Pears, Mr. Reckitt are notgiven sites worth three hundred thousand pounds. These questions haveoften been asked, and to them the Academy has always an excellentanswer. "The site has been granted, and we have erected buildings uponit worth a hundred thousand pounds; get rid of us you cannot. "

The position of the Academy is as impregnable as the rock ofGibraltar; it is as well advertised as the throne itself, and theincome derived from the sale of the catalogues alone is enormous. Thenthe Academy has the handling of the Chantrey Bequest Funds, which itdoes not fail to turn to its own advantage by buying pictures ofAcademicians, which do not sell in the open market, at extravagantprices, or purchasing pictures by future Academicians, and sofostering, strengthening, and imposing on the public the standard ofart which obtains in Academic circles. Such, in a few brief words, isthe institution which controls and in a large measure directs the artof this country. But though I come with no project to obtain itsdissolution, it seems to me interesting to consider the causes of thehatred of the Academy with which artistic England is saturated, oftentimes convulsed; and it may be well to ask if any institution, however impregnable, can continue to defy public opinion, if anysovereignty, however fortified by wealth and buttressed byprescription, can continue to ignore and outrage the opinions of itssubjects?

The hatred of artistic England for the Academy proceeds from theknowledge that the Academy is no true centre of art, but a merecommercial enterprise protected and subventioned by Government. Inrecent years every shred of disguise has been cast off, and it hasbecome patent to every one that the Academy is conducted on as purelycommercial principles as any shop in the Tottenham Court Road. For itis impossible to suppose that Mr. Orchardson and Mr. Watts do not knowthat Mr. Leader's landscapes are like tea-trays, that Mr. Dicksee'sfigures are like bon-bon boxes, and that Mr. Herkomer's portraits arelike German cigars. But apparently the R. A. 's are merely concerned tofollow the market, and they elect the men whose pictures sell best inthe City. City men buy the productions of Mr. Herkomer, Mr. Dicksee, Mr. Leader, and Mr. Goodall. Little harm would be done to art if themoney thus expended meant no more than filling stockbrokers'drawing-rooms with bad pictures, but the uncontrolled exercise of thestockbroker's taste in art means the election of a vast number ofpainters to the Academy, and election to the Academy means certainaffixes, R. A. And A. , and these signs are meant to direct opinion. 

For when the ordinary visitor thinks a picture very bad, and findsR. A. Or A. After the painter's name, he concludes that he must bemistaken, and so a false standard of art is created in the publicmind. But though Mr. Orchardson, Sir John Millais, Sir FrederickLeighton, and Mr. Watts have voted for the City merchants' nominees, it would be a mistake to suppose that they did not know for whom theyshould have voted. It is to be questioned if there be an R. A. Nowalive who would dare to deny that Mr. Whistler is a very greatpainter. It was easy to say he was not in the old days when, under theprotection of Mr. Ruskin, the R. A. S went in a body and gave evidenceagainst him. But now even Mr. Jones, R. A. , would not venture to repeatthe opinion he expressed about one of the most beautiful of thenocturnes. Time, it is true, has silenced the foolish mouth of theR. A. , but time has not otherwise altered him; and there is as littlechance to-day as there was twenty years ago of Mr. Whistler beingelected an Academician. 

No difference exists even in Academic circles as to the merits of Mr. Albert Moore's work. Many Academicians will freely acknowledge thathis non-election is a very grave scandal; they will tell you that theyhave done everything to get him elected, and have given up the task indespair. Mr. Whistler and Mr. Albert Moore, the two greatest artistsliving in England, will never be elected Academicians; and artisticEngland is asked to acquiesce in this grave scandal, and also in manyminor scandals: the election of Mr. Dicksee in place of Mr. HenryMoore, and Mr. Stanhope Forbes in place of Mr. Swan or Mr. JohnSargent! No one thinks Mr. Dicksee as capable an artist as Mr. HenryMoore, and no one thinks Mr. Stanhope Forbes as great an artist as Mr. Swan or Mr. Sargent. Then why were they elected? Because the men whorepresent most emphatically the taste of the City have become sonumerous of late years in the Academy that they are able to keep outany one whose genius would throw a doubt on the commonplace idealwhich they are interested in upholding. Mr. Alma Tadema would not careto confer such a mark of esteem as the affix R. A. On any painterpractising an art which, when understood, would involve hatred of thecopyplate antiquity which he supplies to the public. 

This explanation seems incredible, I admit, but no other explanationis possible, for I repeat that the Academicians do not themselves denythe genius of the men they have chosen to ignore. So we find theAcademy as a body working on exactly the same lines as the individualR. A. , whose one ambition is to extend his connection, please hiscustomers, and frustrate competition; and just as the capacity of theindividual R. A. Declines when the incentive is money, so does thecorporate body lose its strength, and its hold on the art instincts ofthe nation relaxes when its aim becomes merely mercenary enterprise. 

If Sir John Millais, Sir Frederick Leighton, Mr. Orchardson, Mr. Hook, and Mr. Watts were to die tomorrow, their places could be filled bymen who are not and never will be in the Academy; but among theAssociates there is no name that does not suggest a long decline: Mr. Macbeth, Mr. Leader, Mr. David Murray, Mr. Stanhope Forbes, Mr. J. MacWhirter. And are the coming Associates Mr. Hacker, Mr. Shannon, Mr. Solomon, Mr. Alfred East, Mr. Bramley? Mr. Swan has been passed overso many times that his election is beginning to seem doubtful. Forvery shame's sake the elder Academicians may bring their influence andinsist on his election; but the City merchants' nominees are verystrong, and will not have him if they can help it. They may yield toMr. Swan, but no single inch further will it be possible to get themto go. Mr. Mouat Loudan, Mr. Lavery, Mr. Mark Fisher, and Mr. Peppercorn have no chance soever. Mr. Mouat Loudan, was rejected thisyear. Mr. Lavery's charming portrait of Lord McLaren's daughters wasstill more shamefully treated; it was "skied". Mr. Mark Fisher, mostcertainly our greatest living landscape-painter, had his picturerefused; and Mr. Reid, a man who has received medals in every capitalin Europe, has had his principal picture hung just under the ceiling. 

On varnishing-day Mr. Reid challenged Mr. Dicksee to give a reason forthis disgraceful hanging; he defied him to say that he thought thepictures underneath were better pictures; and it is as impossible forme as it was for Mr. Dicksee to deny that Mr. Reid's picture is thebest picture in Room 6. Mr. Peppercorn, another well-known artist, hadhis picture rejected. It is now hanging in the Goupil Galleries. I donot put it forward as a masterpiece, but I do say that it deserved aplace in any exhibition, and if I had a friend on the HangingCommittee I would ask him to point to the landscapes on the Academywalls which he considers better than Mr. Peppercorn's. 

Often a reactionary says, "Name the good pictures that have beenrejected; where can I see them? I want to see these masterpieces, "etc. The reactionary has generally the best of the argument. It isdifficult to name the pictures that have been refused; they are theunknown quantity. Moreover, the pictures that are usually refused aretentative efforts, and not mature work. But this year the opponents ofthe Academy are able to cite some very substantial facts in support oftheir position, a portrait by our most promising portrait-painter anda landscape by the best landscape-painter alive in England having beenrejected. The picture of the farm-yard which Mr. Fisher exhibited atthe New English Art Club last autumn would not be out of place in theNational Gallery. I do not say that the rejected picture is as good--Ihave not seen the rejected picture--but I do say that Mr. Fisher couldnot paint as badly as nine-tenths of the landscapes hanging in theAcademy if he tried. 

The Academy is sinking steadily; never was it lower than this year;next year a few fine works may crop up, but they will be accidents, and will not affect the general tendency of the exhibitions nor thedirection in which the Academy is striving to lead English art. Underthe guidanceship of the Academy English art has lost all that charmingnaïveté and simplicity which was so long its distinguishing mark. Atan Academy banquet, anything but the most genial optimism would be outof place, and yet Sir Frederick Leighton could not but allude to thedisintegrating influence of French art. True, in the second part ofthe sentence he assured his listeners that the danger was moreimaginary than real, and he hoped that with wider knowledge, etc. Butif no danger need be apprehended, why did Sir Frederick trouble toraise the question? And if he apprehended danger and would save usfrom it, why did he choose to ask his friend M. Bouguereau to exhibitat the Academy?

The allusion in Sir Frederick's speech to French methods, and theexhibition of a picture by M. Bouguereau in the Academy, is strangelysignificant. For is not M. Bouguereau the chief exponent of the artwhich Sir Frederick ventures to suggest may prove a disintegratinginfluence in our art?--has proven would be a more correct phrase. Lethim who doubts compare the work of almost any of the elderAcademicians with the work of those who practise the square brushworkof the French school. Compare, for instance, Sir Frederick's "Gardenof the Hesperides" with Mr. Solomon's "Orpheus", and then you willappreciate the gulf that separates the elder Academicians from the menalready chosen and marked out for future Academicians. And him whomthis illustration does not convince I will ask to compare Mr. Hacker's"Annunciation" with any picture by Mr. Frith, or Mr. Faed, I will evengo so far as to say with any work by Mr. Sidney Cooper, anoctogenarian, now nearer his ninetieth than his eightieth year. 

It would have been better if Sir Frederick had told the truth boldlyat the Academy banquet. He knows that a hundred years will hardlysuffice to repair the mischief done by this detestable Frenchpainting, this mechanical drawing and modelling, built upsystematically, and into which nothing of the artist's sensibility mayenter. Sir Frederick hinted the truth, and I do not think it willdisplease him that I should say boldly what he was minded but did notdare to say. The high position he occupies did not allow him to gofurther than he did; the society of which he is president is nowirreparably committed to Anglo-French art, and has, by every recentelection, bound itself to uphold and impose this false and foreign artupon the nation. 

Out of the vast array of portraits and subject-pictures painted invarious styles and illustrating every degree of ignorance, stupidity, and false education, one thing really comes home to the carefulobserver, and that is, the steady obliteration of all English feelingand mode of thought. The younger men practise an art purged of allnationality. England lingers in the elder painters, and though therepresentation is often inadequate, the English pictures arepleasanter than the mechanical art which has spread from Paris allover Europe, blotting out in its progress all artistic expression ofracial instincts and mental characteristics. Nothing, for instance, can be more primitive, more infantile in execution, than Mr. Leslie's"Rose Queen". But it seems to me superficial criticism to pull it topieces, for after all it suggests a pleasant scene, a stairway full ofgirls in white muslin; and who does not like pretty girls dressed inwhite muslin? And Mr. Leslie spares us the boredom of odious andsterile French pedantry. 

Mr. Waterhouse's picture of "Circe Poisoning the Sea" is an excellentexample of professional French painting. The drawing is planned outgeometrically, the modelling is built up mechanically. The brush, filled with thick paint, works like a trowel. In the hands of theDutch and Flemish artists the brush was in direct communication withthe brain, and moved slowly or rapidly, changing from the broadest andmost emphatic stroke to the most delicate and fluent touch accordingto the nature of the work. But here all is square and heavy. Thecolour scheme, the blue dress and the green water--how theatrical, howits richness reeks of the French studio! How cosmopolitan and pedanticis this would-be romantic work!

But can we credit Mr. Dicksee with any artistic intention in thepicture he calls "Leila", hanging in the next room? I think not. Mr. Dicksee probably thought that having painted what the critics wouldcall "somewhat sad subjects" last year, it would be well if he paintedsomething distinctly gay this year. A girl in a harem struck him as asubject that would please every one, especially if he gave her apretty face, a pretty dress, and posed her in a graceful attitude. Anice bright crimson was just the colour for the dress, the feet hemight leave bare, and it would be well to draw them from the plastercast--a pair of pretty feet would be sure to find favour with thepopulace. It is impossible to believe that Mr. Dicksee was moved byany deeper thought or impression when he painted this picture. Theexecution is not quite so childlike and bland as Mr. Leslie's; it isheavier and more stodgy. One is a cane chair from the Tottenham CourtRoad, the other is a dining-room chair from the Tottenham Court Road. In neither does any trace of French influence appear, and bothpainters are City-elected Academicians. 

A sudden thought.... Leader, Fildes, David Murray, Peter Graham, Herkomer.... Then it is not the City that favours the French school, but the Academy itself! And this shows how widely tastes may differ, yet remain equally sundered from good taste. I believe the north andthe south poles are equidistant from the equator. Looking at SirFrederick Leighton's picture, entitled "At the Fountain", I am forcedto admit that, regarded as mere execution, it is quite as intolerablybad as Mr. Dicksee's "Leila". And yet it is not so bad a picture, because Sir Frederick's mind is a higher and better-educated mind thanMr. Dicksee's; and therefore, however his hand may fail him, thereremains a certain habit of thought which always, even when worn andfrayed, preserves something of its original aristocracy. "The Seagiving up its Dead" is an unpleasant memory of Michael Angelo. But in"The Garden of the Hesperides" Sir Frederick is himself, and nothingbut himself. And the picture is so incontestably the work of an artistthat I cannot bring myself to inquire too closely into itsshortcomings. The merit of the picture is in the arabesque, which ischarming and original. The maidens are not dancing, but sitting roundtheir tree. On the right there is an olive, in the middle the usualstrawberry-cream, and on the left a purple drapery. The brown water inthe foreground balances the white sky most happily, and the faces ofthe women recall our best recollections of Sir Frederick's work. Inthe next room--Room 3--Mr. Watts exhibits a very incoherent workentitled "She shall be called Woman". 

The subject on which all of us are most nearly agreed--painters'critics and the general public--is the very great talent of Mr. G. F. Watts. Even the Chelsea studios unite in praising him. But were weever sincere in our praise of him as we are sincere in our praise ofDegas, Whistler, and Manet? And lately have we not begun to suspectour praise to-day is a mere clinging to youthful admirations whichhave no root in our present knowledge and aestheticisms? Perhaps thetime has come to say what we do really think of Mr. Watts. We thinkthat his very earliest pictures show, occasionally, the hand of apainter; but for the last thirty years Mr. Watts seems to have beenundergoing transformation, and we see him now as a sort of crossbetween an alchemist of old time and a book collector--his left handfumbling among the reds and blues of the old masters, his rightturning the pages of a dusty folio in search of texts forillustration; a sort of a modern Veronese in treacle and gingerbread. To judge him by what he exhibits this year would not be just. We willselect for criticism the celebrated portrait of Mrs. Percy Wyndham--inwhich he has obviously tried to realise all his artistic ideals. 

The first thing that strikes me on looking on this picture is the tooobvious intention of the painter to invent something that could not goout of fashion. On sitting down to paint this picture the painter'smind seems to have been disturbed with all sorts of undeterminednotions concerning the eternal Beautiful, and the formula discoveredby the Venetian for its complete presentation. "The Venetians gave usthe eternal Beautiful as civilisation presents it. Why not select inmodern life all that corresponds to the Venetian formulae; why notprofit by their experience in the selection I am called upon to make?"

So do I imagine the painter's desire, and certainly the picture isfrom end to end its manifestation. Laurel leaves form a background forthe head, and a large flower-vase is in the right-hand corner, and abalustrade is on the right; and this Anglo-Venetian lady is attired ina rich robe, brown, with green shades, and heavily embroidered; herelbow is leaned on a pedestal in a manner that shows off theplenitudes of the forearm, and for pensive dignity the hand is raisedto the face. It is a noble portrait, and tells the story of a lifelongdevotion to art, and yet it is difficult to escape from the suspicionthat we are not very much interested, and that we find its compoundbeauty a little insipid. In avoiding the fashion of his day Mr. Wattsseems to me to have slipped into an abstraction. The mere leaving outevery accent that marks a dress as belonging to a particular epochdoes not save it from going out of fashion. It is in the executionthat the great artists annihilated the whim of temporary taste, andmade the hoops of old time beautiful, however slim the season'sfashions. To be of all time the artist must begin by being of his owntime; and if he would find the eternal type he must seek it in his ownparish. 

The painters of old Venice were entirely concerned with _l'ideeplastique_, but on this point the art of Mr. Watts is a repudiation ofthe art of his masters. Abstract conceptions have been this long whilea constant source of pollution in his work. Here, even in histreatment of the complexion, he seems to have been impelled by someabstract conception rather than by a pictorial sense of harmony andcontrast, and partly for this reason his synthesis is not beautiful, like the conventional silver-grey which Velasquez used so often, orthe gold-brown skins of Titian's women. The hand tells what waspassing in the mind, and seeing that ugly shadow which marks the noseI know that the painter was not then engaged with the joy of purelymaterial creation; had he been he could not have rested satisfied withso ugly a statement of a beautiful fact. And the forehead, too, whereit comes into light, where it turns into shadow; the cheek, too, withits jawbone, and the evasive modelling under and below the eyes, aresummarily rendered, and we think perforce of the supple, flowingmodelling, so illusive, apparent only in the result, with which Titianwould have achieved that face. Manet, an incomplete Hals, might havefailed to join the planes, and in his frankness left out what he hadnot sufficiently observed; but he would have compensated us with abeautiful tone. 

For an illustration of Mr. Watts' drawing we will take the picture of"Love and Death", perhaps the most pictorially significant of all Mr. Watts' designs. The enormous figure of Death advances impressivelywith right arm raised to force the door which a terrified Love wouldkeep closed against him. The figure of Death is draped in grey, thecolour that Mr. Watts is most in sympathy with and manages best. Butthe upper portion of the figure is vast, and the construction beneaththe robe too little understood for it not to lack interest; and in theraised arm and hand laid against the door, where power and delicacy ofline were indispensable for the pictorial beauty of the picture, weare vouchsafed no more than a rough statement of rudimentary fact. Love is thrown back against the door, his right arm raised, his rightleg advanced in action of resistance to the intruder. The movement iswell conceived, and we regret that so summary a line should have beenthought sufficient expression. Any one who has ever held a pencil in aschool of art knows how a young body, from armpit to ankle-bone, flowswith lovely line. Any one who has been to the Louvre knows the passionwith which Ingres would follow this line, simplifying it and drawingit closer until it surpassed all melody. But in Mr. Watts' picture theboy's natural beauty is lost in a coarse and rough planing out thattells of an eye that saw vaguely and that wearied, and in an executionfull of uncertain touch and painful effort. Unless the painter isespecially endowed with the instinct of anatomies, the sentiment ofproportion, and a passion for form, the nude is a will-o'-the-wisp, whose way leads where he may not follow. No one suspects Mr. Watts ofone of these qualifications; he appears even to think them of butslight value, and his quest of the allegorical seems to be merelymotived by an unfortunate desire to philosophise. 

As a colourist Mr. Watts is held in high esteem, and it is as acolourist that his admirers consider his claim to the future to bebest founded. Beautiful passages of colour are frequently to be metwith in his work, and yet it would be difficult to say what colourexcept grey he has shown any mastery over. A painter may paint with anexceedingly reduced palette, like Chardin, and yet be an exquisitecolourist. To colour well does not consist in the employment of brightcolours, but in the power of carrying the dominant note of colourthrough the entire picture, through the shadows as well as thehalf-tints, and Chardin's grey we find everywhere, in the bloom of apeach as well as in a decanter of rich wine; and how tender andpersuasive it is! Mr. Watts' grey would seem coarse, common, uninteresting beside it. Reds and blues and yellows do not disappearfrom Mr. Watts' palette as they do from Rembrandt's; they are there, but they are usually so dirtied that they appear like a monochrome. Can we point to any such fresh, beautiful red as the scarf that the"Princesse des Pays de la Porcelaine" wears about that grey whichwould have broken Chardin's heart with envy? Can we point to any bluein Mr. Watts' as fresh and as beautiful as the blue carpet under thePrincess's feet?

With what Mr. Watts paints it is impossible to say. On one side anunpleasant reddish brown, scrubbed till it looks like a mud-washedrock; on the other a crumbling grey, like the rind of a Stiltoncheese. The nude figure in the reeds--the picture purchased for theChantrey Fund collection--will serve for illustration. It is clearlythe work of a man with something incontestably great in his soul, butwhy should so beautiful a material as oil paint be transformed into acrumbly substance like--I can think of nothing else but the rind of aStilton cheese. Mr. Watts and Mr. Burne-Jones seem to have convincedthemselves that imaginative work can only be expressed in wool-workand gum. A strange theory, for which I find no authority, even if Iextend my inquiry as far back as Mantegna and Botticelli. True, thatthe method of these painters is archaic, the lights are narrowed, andthe shadows broadened; nevertheless, their handling of oil colour isnearer to Titian's than either Mr. Watts' or Mr. Burne-Jones'. 

It is one of the platitudes of art criticism to call attention to thelength of the necks of Rossetti's women, and thereby to infer that thepainter could not draw. True, Rossetti was not a skilful draughtsman, but not because the necks of his women are too long. The relationbetween good drawing and measurement is slight. The first quality indrawing, without which drawing does not exist, is an individual seeingof the object. This Rossetti most certainly had; there hisdraughtsmanship began and ended. But the question lies rather withhandling than with drawing, and Rossetti sometimes handled paint veryskilfully. The face and hair of the half-length Venus surrounded withroses is excellent in quality; the roses and the honeysuckle are quitebeautiful in quality; they are fresh and bright, pure in colour, as ifthey had just come from the garden. The "Annunciation" in the NationalGallery is a little sandy, but it cannot be said to be bad in quality, as Mr. Watts' and Mr. Jones' pictures are bad. Every Rossetti is atleast clearly recognisable as an oil painting. 

In the same room there is Mr. Orchardson's picture of "Napoleondictating the Account of his Campaigns". I gather from my notes thetrace of the disappointment that this picture caused me. "Two smallfigures in a large canvas. The secretary sits on the right at a smalltable. He looks up, his face turned towards Napoleon, who stands onthe left in the middle of the picture, looking down, studying the mapswith which the floor is strewn. A great simplicity in thesurroundings, and all the points of character insisted on, with theview of awakening the spectator's curiosity. From first to last avicious desire to narrate an anecdote. It is strange that a man of Mr. Orchardson's talent should participate so fully in the supreme vice ofmodern art which believes a picture to be the same thing as a scene ina play. The whole picture conceived and executed in that pale yellowtint which seems to be the habitual colour of Mr. Orchardson's mind. "A pity, indeed it is that Mr. Orchardson should waste very real talentin narratives, for he is a great portrait painter. I remember verywell that beautiful portrait of his wife and child, and will take thisopportunity to recall it. It is the finest thing he has done; finerthan the portrait of Mr. Gilbey. Here, in a few words, is the subjectof the picture. An old-fashioned cane sofa stretches right across thecanvas. A lady in black is seated on the right; she bends forward, herleft arm leaning over the back of the sofa; she holds in her hand aJapanese hand-screen. The fine and graceful English profile ismodelled without vulgar roundness, _un beau modèle à plat_; and theblack hair is heavy and loose, one lock slipping over the forehead. The painter has told the exact character of the hair as he has toldthe character of the hand, and the age of the hand and hair isevident. She is a woman of five-and-thirty, she is interested in herbaby, her first baby, as a woman of that age would be. The baby lieson a woollen rug and cushion, just beneath the mother's eyes; thecolour of both is a reddish yellow. He holds up his hands for thehand-screen that the mother waves about him. The strip of backgroundabout the yellow cane-work is grey-green; there is a vase of driedferns and grasses on the left, and the whole picture is filled andpenetrated with the affection and charm of English home-life, andwithout being disfigured with any touch of vulgar or commonplacesentimentality. The baby's face is somewhat hard; it is, perhaps, theleast satisfactory thing in the picture. The picture is wanting inthat totality which we find in the greatest masters--for instance, inthat exquisite portrait of a mother and child by Sir Joshua Reynolds, exhibited this year in the Guildhall--that beautiful portrait of themother holding out her babe at arms'-length above her knee. 

Room 4 is remarkable for Stanhope Forbes' picture of "Forging theAnchor". Mr. Stanhope Forbes is the last-elected Academician, and themost prominent exponent of the art of Bastien-Lepage. Perhaps the mostinstructive article that could be written on the Academy would be onein which the writer would confine his examination to this and Mr. Clausen's picture of "Mowers", comparing and contrasting the twopictures at every point, showing where they diverge, and tracing theirartistic history back to its ultimate source. But to do thisthoroughly would be to write the history of the artistic movement inFrance and England for the last thirty years; and I must limit myselfto pointing out that Mr. Clausen has gone back to first principles, whereas Mr. Stanhope Forbes still continues at the point whereBastien-Lepage began to curtail, deform, and degrade the originalinspiration. Mr. Clausen, I said, overcame the difficulty of thetrousers by generalisation. Mr. Stanhope Forbes copied the trousersseam by seam, patch by patch; and the ugliness of the garment boresyou in the picture, exactly as it would in nature. And the samecriticism applies equally well to the faces, the hands, the leatheraprons, the loose iron, the hammers, the pincers, the smoked walls. Ishould not be surprised to learn that Mr. Stanhope Forbes had had aforge built up in his studio, and had copied it all as it stood. Ahandful of dry facts instead of a passionate impression of life in itsenvelope of mystery and suggestion. 

Realism, that is to say the desire to compete with nature, to benature, is the disease from which art has suffered most in the lasttwenty years. The disease is now at wane, and when we happen upon acanvas of the period like "Labourers after Dinner", we cry out, "Whatmadness! were we ever as mad as that?" The impressionists have beenoften accused of a desire to dispense with the element of beauty, butthe accusation has always seemed to me to be quite groundless, andeven memory of a certain portrait by Mr. Walter Sickert does not causeme to falter in this opinion. Until I saw Mr. Clausen's "Labourers" Idid not fully realise how terrible a thing art becomes when divorcedfrom beauty, grace, mystery, and suggestion. It would be difficult tosay where and how this picture differs from a photograph; it seems tome to be little more than the vices of photography magnified. Havingspoken so plainly, it is necessary that I should explain myself. 

The subject of this picture is a group of field labourers finishingtheir mid-day dinner in the shade of some trees. They are portrayed ina still even light, exactly as they were; the picture is one longexplanation; it is as clear as a newspaper, and it reads like one. Wecan tell how many months that man in the foreground has worn thosedreadful hobnailed boots; we can count the nails, and we notice thattwo or three are missing. Those disgusting corduroy trousers have hungabout his legs for so many months; all the ugliness of theselabourers' faces and the solid earthiness of their lives are there;nothing has been omitted, curtailed, or exaggerated. There is somepsychology. We see that the years have brought the old man cunningrather than wisdom. The middle-aged man and the middle-aged woman livein mute stupidity--they have known nothing but the daily hardship ofliving, and the vacuous face of their son tells how completely thelife of his forefathers has descended upon him. Here there is neitherthe foolish gaiety of Teniers' peasants nor the vicious animality ofBrouwers'; and it is hardly necessary to say that the painter has seennothing of the legendary patriarchal beauty and solemnity which lendsso holy a charm to Millet's Breton folk. Mr. Clausen has seen nothingbut the sordid and the mean, and his execution in this picture is assordid and as mean as his vision. There is not a noble gestureexpressive of weariness nor an attitude expressive of resignation. Mr. Clausen seems to have said, "I will go lower than the others; I willseek my art in the mean and the meaningless. " But notwithstanding hisvery real talent, Mr. Clausen has not found art where art is not, where art never has been found, where art never will be found. 

Looking at this picture, the ordinary man will say, "If such uglinessas that exists, I don't want to see it. Why paint such subjects?" Andat least the first part of this criticism seems to me to be quiteincontrovertible. I can imagine no valid reason for the portrayal ofso much ugliness; and, what is more important, I can find among theunquestioned masters no slightest precedent for the blank realism ofthis picture. The ordinary man's aversion to such ugliness seems to meto be entirely right, and I only join issue with him when he says, "Why paint such subjects?" Why not? For all subjects contain elementsof beauty; ugliness does not exist for the eye that sees beautifully, and meanness vanishes if the sensation is a noble one. Have not thevery subjects which Mr. Clausen sees so meanly, and which he degradesbelow the level even of the photograph, been seen nobly, and have theynot been rendered incomparably touching, even august, by----Well, thewhole world knows by whom. But it will be said that Mr, Clausenpainted these people as he saw them. I dare say he did; but if hecould not see these field-folk differently, he should have abstainedfrom painting them. 

The mission of art is not truth, but beauty; and I know of no greatwork--I will go even further, I know no even tolerable work--inliterature or in painting in which the element of beauty does notinform the intention. Art is surely but a series of conventions whichenable us to express our special sense of beauty--for beauty iseverywhere, and abounds in subtle manifestations. Things ugly inthemselves become beautiful by association; or perhaps I should saythat they become picturesque. The slightest insistance in a line willredeem and make artistically interesting the ugliest face. Look atDegas' ballet-girls, and say if, artistically, they are not beautiful. I defy you to say that they are mean. Again, an alteration in thelight and shade will create beautiful pictures among the meanest brickbuildings that ever were run up by the jerry-builder. See the violetsuburb stretching into the golden sunset. How exquisite it has become!how full of suggestion and fairy tale! A picturesque shadow willredeem the squalor of the meanest garret, and the subdued light of thelittle kitchen where the red-petticoated housewife is sweeping mustcontrast so delicately with the white glare of the brick yard wherethe neighbour stands in parley, leaning against the doorpost, that thehumble life of the place is transformed and poetised. This was the ABCof Dutch art; it was the Dutchmen who first found out that with thepoetising aid of light and shade the meanest and most commonplaceincidents of every-day life could be made the subjects of pictures. 

There are no merits in painting except technical merits; and though mycriticism of Mr. Clausen's picture may at first sight seem to be aliterary criticism, it is in truth a strictly technical criticism. ForMr. Clausen has neglected the admirable lessons which our Dutchcousins taught us two hundred years ago; he has neglected to availhimself of those principles of chiaroscuro which they perfected, andwhich would have enabled him to redeem the grossness, the ugliness, the meanness inherent in his subject. I said that he had gone further, in abject realism, than a photograph. I do not think I haveexaggerated. It is not probable that those peasants would look so uglyin a photograph as they do in his picture. For had they beenphotographed, the chances are that some shadow would have clothed, would have hid, something, and a chance gleam might have concentratedthe attention on some particular spot. Nine times out of ten theexposure of the plate would not have taken place in a moment of flatgrey light. 

But it is the theory of Mr. Clausen and his school that it is rightand proper to take a six-foot canvas into the open, and paint theentire picture from Nature. But when the sun is shining, it is notpossible to paint for more than an hour--an hour and a half at most. At the end of that time the shadows have moved so much that the effectis wholly different. But on a grey day it is possible to paint on thesame picture for four or five hours. Hence the preference shown bythis school for grey days. Then the whole subject is seen clearly, like a newspaper; and the artist, if he is a realist, copies everypatch on the trousers, and does not omit to tell us how many nailshave fallen from the great clay-stained boots. Pre-Raphaelitism isonly possible among august and beautiful things, when the subjects ofthe pictures are Virgins and angels, and the accessories are marbles, agate columns, Persian carpets, gold enwoven robes and vestments, ivories, engraven metals, pearls, velvets and silks, and when theobject of the painter is to convey a sensation of the beauty of thesematerials by the luxury and beauty of the workmanship. The commonworkaday world, with accessories of tin pots and pans, corduroybreeches and clay-pipes, can be only depicted by a series of ellipsesthrough a mystery of light and shade. 

Beauty of some sort there must be in a work of art, and the veryconditions under which Mr. Clausen painted precluded any beauty fromentering into his picture. But this year Mr. Clausen seems to haveshaken himself free from his early education, and he exhibits apicture, conceived in an entirely different spirit, in this Academy. Turning to my notes I find it thus described: "A small canvascontaining three mowers in a flowering meadow. Two are mowing; thethird, a little to the left, sharpens his scythe. The sky is deep andlowering--a sultry summer day, a little unpleasant in colour, buttrue. At the end of the meadow the trees gleam. The earth is wrappedin a hot mist, the result of the heat, and through it the sun sheds asomewhat diffused and oven-like heat. There are heavy clouds overhead, for the gleam that passes over the three white shirts is transitoryand uncertain. The handling is woolly and unpleasant, but handling canbe overlooked when a canvas exhales a deep sensation of life. Themovement of mowing--I should have said movements, for the men mowdifferently; one is older than the other--is admirably expressed. Andthe principal figure, though placed in the immediate foreground, is inand not out of the atmosphere. The difficulty of the trousers has beenovercome by generalisation; the garment has not been copied patch bypatch. The distribution of light is admirable; nowhere does it escapefrom the frame. J. F. Millet has painted many a worse picture. "

Mr. Solomon and Mr. Hacker have both turned to mythology for thesubjects of their pictures. And the beautiful and touching legends ofOrpheus, and the Annunciation, have been treated by them with theindifference of "our special artist", who places the firemen on theright, the pump on the left, and the blazing house in the middle ofthe picture. These pictures are therefore typical of a great deal ofhistorical painting of our time; and I speak of them because they giveme an opportunity of pointing out that before deciding to treat a pageof history or legend, the painter should come to conclusions withhimself regarding the goal which he desires to obtain. There are buttwo. 

Either the legend passes unperceived in pomp of colour and wealth ofdesign, or the picture is a visible interpretation of the legend. TheVenetians were able to disregard the legend, but in centuries lessrichly endowed with pictorial genius painters are inclined to supporttheir failing art with the psychological interest their imaginationsdraw from it. But imaginative interpretation should not be confusedwith bald illustration. The Academicians cannot understand why, if wepraise "Dante seeing Beatrice in a Dream", we should vilify Mr. Fildes' "Doctor". In both cases a story is told, in neither case isthe execution excellent. Why then should one be a picture and theother no more than a bald illustration? The question is a vexed one, and the only conclusion that we can draw seems to be thatsentimentality pollutes, the anecdote degrades, wit altogether ruins;only great thought may enter into art. Rossetti is a painter weadmire, and we place him above Mr. Fildes, because his interpretationsare more imaginative. We condone his lack of pictorial power, becausehe could think, and we appreciate his Annunciation--the "Ecce AncillaDomini!" in the National Gallery, principally because he has lookeddeep into the legend, and revealed its true and human significance. 

It is a small picture, about three feet by two, and is destitute ofall technical accomplishment, or even habit. It is painted in whiteand blue, and the streak of red in the foreground, the red of a screenon which is embroidered the lily--emblem of purity--adds to the chilland coldness. Drawn up upon her white bed the Virgin crouches, silentwith expectation, listening to the mystic dream that has come upon herin the dim hush of dawn. The large blue eyes gleam with some strangejoy that is quickening in her. The mouth and chin tell no tale, butthe eyes are deep pools of light, and mirror the soul that is on firewithin. The red hair falls about her, a symbol of the soul. In thedrawn-up knees, faintly outlined beneath the white sheet, the painterhints at her body's beauty. One arm is cast forward, the hand notclenched but stricken. Behind her a blue curtain hangs straight fromiron rods set on either side of the bed. Above the curtain a lamp isburning dimly, blighted by the pallor of the dawn. A dead, faintsky--the faint ashen sky which precedes the first rose tint; thecircular window is filled with it, and the paling blue of the sky'scolour contrasts with the deep blue of the bed's curtain, on which theVirgin's red hair is painted. 

The angel stands by the side of the white bed--I should say floats, his fair feet hanging out of a few pale flames. White raiment clotheshim, falling in long folds, leaving the arms and feet bare; in theright hand he holds a lily all in blossom; the left hand is extendedin rigid gesture of warning. Brown-gold hair grows thick about theangel's neck; the shadowed profile is outlined against the hard, sadsky; the expression of the face is deep and sphinx-like; he has come, it is clear, from vast realms of light, where uncertainty and doubtare unknown. The Dove passes by him towards the Virgin. Look upon heragain, crouching in her white bed, her knees drawn to her bosom, herdeep blue eyes--her dawn-tinted eyes--filled with ache, dream, andexpectation. The shadows of dawn are on wall and floor--strange, blueshadows!--the Virgin's shadow lies on the wall, the angel's shadowfalls across the coverlet. 

Here, at least, there is drama, and the highest form ofdrama--spiritual drama; here, at least, there is story, and thehighest form of story--symbol and suggestion. Rossetti has revealedthe essence of this intensely human story--a story that, whenever welook below the surface, which is mediaeval and religious, we recogniseas a story of to-day, of yesterday, of all time. A girl thralled bythe mystery of conception awakes at morn in palpitations, seeingvisions. 

Mr. Hacker's telling of the legend is to Rossetti's what a story inthe _London Journal_ is to a story by Balzac. The Virgin hasapparently wandered outside the town. She is dressed in a long whitegarment neither beautiful nor explicit: is it a nightdress, or a pieceof conventional drapery? On the right there is a long, silly tree, which looks as if it had been evolved out of a ball of green wool withknitting-needles, and above her floats an angel attired in a wisp ofblue gauze. Rossetti, we know, was, in the strict sense of the word, hardly a painter at all, but he had something to say; and we can bearin painting, as we can in literature, with faulty expression, if thereis something behind it. What is most intolerable in art is scholasticrodomontade. And what else is Mr. Hacker's execution? In everytransmission the method seems to degenerate, and in this picture itseems to have touched bottom. It has become loose, all its originalcrispness is lost, and, complicated with _la peinture claire_, itseems incapable of expressing anything whatsoever. There is no varietyof tone in that white sheet, there is nobody inside it, and the angelis as insincere and frivolous as any sketch in a young lady's album. The building at the back seems to have been painted with the scrapingsof a dirty palette, and the sky in the left-hand corner comes out ofthe picture. I have only to add that the picture has been purchasedout of the Chantry Bequest Fund, and the purchase is considered to beequivalent to a formal declaration that Mr. Hacker will be elected anAssociate of the Royal Academy at the next election. 

Mr. Hacker's election to the Academy--I speak of this election as aforegone conclusion--following as it does the election of Mr. StanhopeForbes, makes it plain that the intention of the Academy is to supportto the full extent of its great power a method of painting which isforeign and unnatural to English art, which, in the opinion of a largebody of artists--and it is valuable to know that their opinion isshared by the best and most original of the French artists--isdisintegrating and destroying our English artistic tradition. Mr. Hacker's election, and the three elections that will follow it, thoseof Mr. Shannon, Mr. Alfred East, and Mr. Bromley, will be equivalentto an official declaration that those who desire to be EnglishAcademicians must adopt the French methods. Independent of thenational disaster that these elections will inflict on art, they willbe moreover flagrant acts of injustice. For I repeat, among the fortyAcademicians there is not one who considers these future Academiciansto be comparable to Mr. Whistler, Mr. Albert Moore, Mr. Swan, or Mr. Sargent. No one holds such an opinion, and yet there is no doubt whichway the elections in the Academy will go. 

The explanation of this incredible anomaly I have given, theexplanation is not a noble one, but that is not a matter for which Ican be held responsible; suffice it to say, that my explanation is theonly possible explanation. The Academy is a private commercialenterprise, and conducts its business on the lines which it considersthe most advantageous; its commercialism has become flagrant andundeniable. If this is so--how the facts can otherwise be explained Icannot see--it is to be regretted that the Academy got its beautifulsite for nothing. But regrets are vain. The only thing to do now is tosee that the Academy is no longer allowed to sail under false colours. This article may awaken in the Academy a sense that it is not well topersist in open and flagrant defiance of public opinion, or it mayserve to render the Academicians even more stiff-necked than before. In either case it will have accomplished its purpose. 

THE ORGANISATION OF ART. 

No fact is more painful to the modern mind than that men are not bornwith equal brains; and every day we grow more and more determined tothwart Nature's desire of inequality by public education. Whethereverybody should be taught to read and write I leave topoliticians--the matter is not important; but that the nation shouldnot be instructed in drawing, music, painting, and English literatureI will never cease to maintain. Everything that has happened inEngland for the last thirty years goes to prove that systematisededucation in art means artistic decadence. 

To the ordinary mind there is something very reassuring in the wordsinstitutions, professors, examinations, medals, and titles of allkinds. All these things have been given of late years to art, andparents and guardians need no longer have any fear for those confidedto their charge: the art of painting has been recognised as aprofession! The principal institution where this profession ispractised is called the Royal Academy. It owes its existence to thetaste of a gentleman known as George the Third, and it has beendowered by the State to the extent of at least three hundred thousandpounds. Professors from Oxford, even bishops, dine there. The membersof this institution put R. A. After their names; the president has beenmade a baronet; there was even a rumour that he was going to be made alord, and that he was not we must consider as another blow dealtagainst the dignity of art. 

Literature does not offer so much scope for organisation as painting;but strenuous efforts are being made to organise it, and, by the aidof academies, examinations, and crowns, hopes are entertained that, before long, it will be brought into line with the other professions. And the journalists too are anxious to "erect their craft to thedignity of a profession which shall confer upon its members _certainsocial status_ like that of the barrister and lawyer". Entrance is tobe strictly conditional; no one is to have a right to practice withouta diploma, and members are to be entitled to certain letters aftertheir names. A movement is on foot to Churton-Collinise Englishliterature at the universities, and every month Mr. Walter Besantraises a wail in the _Author_ that the peerage is not as open tothree-volume novelists as it is to brewers. He bewails the fact thatno eminent man of letters, with the exception of Lord Tennyson, hasbeen made the enforced associate of brewers and politicians. Mr. Besant does not think that titles in these democratic days are foolishand absurd, pitiful in the personality of those who own them byinheritance, grotesque in the personality of those on whom they havebeen conferred. Mr. Besant does not see that the desire of the baker, the brewer, the butcher, and I may add the three-volume novelist, tobe addressed by small tradesmen and lackeys as "yer lordship", raisesa smile on the lips even of the most _blasé_. 

I am advocating an unpopular _régime_ I know, for the majority believethat art is in Queer Street if new buildings are not being raised, ifofficial recognition of merits is not proclaimed, and if thenewspapers do not teem with paragraphs concerning the homes of theAcademicians. The wailing and gnashing of teeth that were heard whenan intelligent portion of the Press induced Mr. Tate to withdraw hisoffer to build a gallery and furnish it with pictures by Messrs. Herkomer, Fildes, Leader, Long, are not forgotten. It was not urgedthat the pictures were valuable pictures; the merit or demerit of thepictures was not what interested, but the fact that a great deal ofmoney was going to be spent, and that titles, badges, medals, crowns, would be given to those whose pictures were enshrined in the newtemple of art. The Tate Gallery touched these folk as would animposing review of troops, a procession of judges, or a coronation inWestminster Abbey. Their senses were tickled by the prospect of ashow, their minds were stirred by some idea of organisation--somethingwas about to be organised, and nothing appeals so much to the vulgarmind as organisation. 

An epoch is represented by a word, and to organise represents thedominant idea of our civilisation. To organise is to be respectable, and as every one wants to be respectable, every one dreams of newschemes of organisation. Soldiers, sailors, policemen, members ofparliament, independent voters, clerks in the post office, busdrivers, dockers, every imaginable variety of worker, domesticservants--it is difficult to think of any class that has not beenorganised of late years. 

There is a gentleman in parliament who is anxious to do something inthe way of social organisation for the gipsies. The gipsies have notappealed to him; they have professed no desire to have their socialstatus raised; they have, I believe, disclaimed through their king, whoever he may be, all participation in the scheme of this benevolentgentleman. Nor does any sense of the absurdity of his endeavour blightthe worthy gentleman's ardour. How should it? He, like the otherorganisers, is an unreasoning instrument in a great tendency ofthings. To organise something--or, put it differently, to educatesome one--is to day every man's ambition. So long as it is nothimself, it matters no jot to him whom he educates. The gipsy underthe hedge, the artist painting under a hill, it matters not. Atechnical school of instruction would enable the gipsy to harness hishorse better than he does at present; and the artist would paint muchbetter if he were taught to stipple, and examined by salariedprofessors in stipple, and given prizes for stippling. The generalmind of our century is with education and organisation of every kind, and from this terrible general mind art seems unable to escape. Art, that poor little gipsy whose very condition of existence is freedom, who owns no code of laws, who evades all regulations, who groupshimself under no standard, who can live only in disastrous times, whenthe world's attention is drawn to other things, and allows him life inshelter of the hedges, and dreams in sight of the stars, finds himselfforced into a uniform--poor little fellow, how melancholy he looks onhis high stool in the South Kensington Museum, and notwithstanding theprofessors his hand drops from the drawing-board, unable to accomplishthe admired stipple. 

But solemn members of parliament are certain that official recognitionmust be extended to art. Art is an educational influence, and theKensington galleries are something more than agreeable places, wheresweethearts can murmur soft nothings under divine masterpieces. Theutilitarian M. P. Must find some justification for art; he is notsensible enough to understand that art justifies its own existence, that it is its own honour and glory; and he nourishes a flimsy lie, and votes that large sums of money shall be spent in endowing schoolsof art and founding picture galleries. Then there is anotherclass--those who have fish to fry, and to whom art seems a convenientfrying-pan. Mr. Tate craves for a museum to be called Tate's; or, ifhis princely gift gained him a title, which it may, the museum wouldbe called--What would be an appropriate name? There are men too whohave trifles to sell, and they talk loudly of the glories of modernart, and the necessity of a British Luxembourg. 

That France should have a Luxembourg is natural enough; that we shouldhave one would be anomalous. We are a free-trading country. I passover the failure of the Luxembourg to recognise genius, to save theartist of genius a struggle with insolent ignorance. What did theLuxembourg do for Corot, Millet, Manet, Degas, Monet, Renoir, Sisley, Pissaro? The Luxembourg chose rather to honour such pretentiousmediocrities as Bouguereau, Jules Lefebvre, Jules Breton, and theirlike. What has our Academy done to rescue struggling genius frompoverty and obscurity? Did it save Alfred Stevens, the great sculptorof his generation, from the task of designing fire-irons? How oftendid the Academy refuse Cecil Lawson's pictures? When they did accepthim, was it not because he had become popular in spite of the Academy?Did not the Academy refuse Mr. Whistler's portrait of his mother, andwas it not hung at the last moment owing to a threat of one of theAcademicians to resign if a place was not found for it? Place wasfound for it seven feet above the line. Has not the Academy for thelast five-and-twenty years lent the whole stress and authority of itsname to crush Mr. Whistler? Happily his genius was sufficient for thefight, and it was not until he had conquered past all question that heleft this country. The record of the Academy is a significant one. Butif it has exercised a vicious influence in art, its history is noworse than that of other academies. Here, as elsewhere, the Academyhas tolerated genius when it was popular, and when it was not popularit has trampled upon it. 

We have Free Trade in literature, why should we not have Free Trade inart? Why should not every artist go into the market without title ormasquerade that blinds the public to the value of what he has to sell?I would turn art adrift, titleless, R. A. -less, out into the street andfield, where, under the light of his original stars, the impassionedvagrant might dream once more, and for the mere sake of his dreams. 

ART AND SCIENCE. 

"Mr. Goschen, " said a writer in a number of the _Speaker_, "deservescredit for having successfully resisted the attempt to induce him tosacrifice the interests of science at South Kensington to those ofart. " An excellent theme it seemed to me for an article; but theobject of the writer being praise of Mr. Tate for his good intention, the opportunity was missed of distinguishing between the false claimsof art and the real claims of science to public patronage andprotection. True it is that to differentiate between art and scienceis like drawing distinctions between black and white; and in excuse Imust plead the ordinary vagueness and weakness of the public mind, itsinability very often to differentiate between things the most opposed, and a very general tendency to attempt to justify the existence of arton the grounds of utility--that is to say, educational influences andthe counter attraction that a picture gallery offers to thepublic-house on Bank Holidays. Such reasoning is well enough atpolitical meetings, but it does not find acceptance among thinkers. Itis merely the flower of foolish belief that nineteenth century wisdomis greater than the collective instinct of the ages; that we are farin advance of our forefathers in religion, in morals, and in art. Weare only in advance of our forefathers in science. In art we have donelittle more than to spoil good canvas and marble, and not content withsuch misdeeds, we must needs insult art by attributing to herutilitarian ends and moral purposes. 

Modern puritanism dares not say abolish art; so in thinly disguisedspeech it is pleaded that art is not nearly so useless as might easilybe supposed; and it is often seriously urged that art may bereconciled after all with the most approved principles ofhumanitarianism, progress, and religious belief. Such is still theattitude of many Englishmen towards art. But art needs none of theseapologists, even if we have to admit that the domestic utility of aTerburg is not so easily defined as that of mixed pickles orumbrellas. Another serious indictment is that art appeals rather tothe few than to the many. True, indeed; and yet art is the very spiritand sense of the many. Yes; and all that is most national in us, allthat is most sublime, and all that is most imperishable. The art of anation is an epitome of the nation's intelligence and prosperity. There is no such thing as cosmopolitanism in art? alas! there is, andwhat a pitiful thing that thing is. 

Unhappy is he who forgets the morals, the manners, the customs, thematerial and spiritual life of his country! England can do without anyone of us, but not one of us can do without England. Study thequestion in the present, study it in the past, and you will find butone answer to your question--art is nationhood. All the great artisticepochs have followed on times of national enthusiasm, power, energy, spiritual and corporal adventure. When Greece was divided intohalf-a-dozen States she produced her greatest art. The same withItaly; and Holland, after having rivalled Greece in heroic effort, gave birth in the space of a single generation to between twenty andthirty great painters. And did not our Elizabethan drama follow closeupon the defeat of the Armada, the discovery of America, and theReformation? And did not Reynolds, Gainsborough, and Romney begin topaint almost immediately after the victories of Marlborough? To-dayour empire is vast, and as our empire grows so does our art lessen. Literature still survives, though even there symptoms of decadence arevisible. The Roman, the Chinese, and the Mahometan Empires are notdistinguished for their art. But outside of the great Chinese Empirethere lies a little State called Japan, which, without knowledge ofEgypt or Greece, purely out of its own consciousness, evolved an artstrangely beautiful and wholly original. 

And as we continue to examine the question we become aware that nofurther progress in art is possible; that art reached its apogee twothousand five hundred years ago. True that Michael Angelo in thefigures of "Day" and "Night", in the "Slave", in the "Moses", and inthe "Last Judgment"--which last should be classed as sculpture--standsvery, very close indeed to Phidias; his art is more complete and lessperfect. But three hundred years have gone since the death of MichaelAngelo, and to get another like him the world would have to be steepedin the darkness of another Middle Age. And, passing on in our inquiry, we notice that painting reached its height immediately after MichaelAngelo's death. Who shall rival the splendours, the profusion ofVeronese, the opulence of Tintoretto, the richness of Titian, the pompof Rubens? Or who shall challenge the technical beauty of Velasquez orof Hals, or the technical dexterity of Terburg, or Metzu, or Dow, orAdrian van Ostade? Passing on once again, we notice that art appearsand disappears mysteriously like a ghost. It comes unexpectedly upon apeople, and it goes in spite of artistic education, State help, picturedealers, and annual exhibitions. We notice, too, that art is whollyuntransmissible; nay, more, the fact that art is with us to-day is proofthat art will not be with us to-morrow. Art cannot be acquired, nor canthose who have art in their souls tell how it came there, or how theypractise it. Art cannot be repressed, encouraged, or explained; it issomething that transcends our knowledge, even as the principle of life. 

Now I take it that science differs from art on all these points. Science is not national, it is essentially cosmopolitan. The scienceof one country is the same as that of another country. It isimpossible to tell by looking at it whether the phonograph wasinvented in England or America. Unlike art, again, science isessentially transmissible; every discovery leads of necessity toanother discovery, and the fact that science is with us to-day provesthat science will be still more with us to-morrow. Nothing canextinguish science except an invasion of barbarians, and thebarbarians that science has left alive would hardly suffice. Art hasits limitations, science has none. It would, however, be vain topursue our differentiation any further. It must be clear that what aremost opposed in this world are art and science; therefore--I think Ican say therefore--all the arguments I used to show that a BritishLuxembourg would be prejudicial to the true interests of art may beused in favour of the endowment of a college of science at SouthKensington. Why should not the humanitarianism of Mr. Tate induce himto give his money to science instead of to art? As well build ahothouse for swallows to winter in as a British Luxembourg; butscience is a good old barn-door fowl; build her a hen-roost, and shewill lay you eggs, and golden eggs. Give your money to science, forthere is an evil side to every other kind of almsgiving. It is well tosave life, but the world is already overstocked with life; and insaving life one may be making the struggle for existence still moreunendurable for those who come after. But in giving your money toscience you are accomplishing a definite good; the results of sciencehave always been beneficent. Science will alleviate the wants of theworld more wisely than the kindest heart that ever beat under the robeof a Sister of Mercy; the hands of science are the mercifulest in theend, and it is science that will redeem man's hope of Paradise. 

ROYALTY IN ART. 

The subject is full of suggestion, and though any adequate examinationof it would lead me beyond the limits of this paper, I think I mayventure to lift its fringe. To do so, we must glance at its historicside. We know the interest that Julius the Second took in the art ofMichael Angelo and Raphael: had it not been for the Popes, St. Peter'swould not have been built, nor would "The Last Judgment" have beenpainted. We know, too, of Philip the Fourth's great love of the art ofVelasquez. The Court of Frederick the Great was a republic of art andletters; and is it not indirectly to a Bavarian monarch that we oweWagner's immortal _chefs-d'oeuvre_, and hence the musical evolution ofthe century? With these facts before us it would be puerile to denythat in the past Royalty has lent invaluable assistance in theprotection and development of art. Even if we turn to our own countrywe find at least one monarch who could distinguish a painter when hemet one. Charles the Second did not hesitate in the patronage heextended to Vandyke, and it is--as I have frequently pointed out--tothe influence of Vandyke that we owe all that is worthiest andvaluable in English art. Bearing these facts in mind--and it isimpossible not to bear them in mind--it is difficult to go to theVictorian Exhibition and not ask: Does the present Royal Familyexercise any influence on English art? This is the question that theVictorian Exhibition puts to us. After fifty years of reign, the Queenthrows down the gauntlet; and speaking through the medium of theVictorian Exhibition, she says: "This is how I have understood art;this is what I have done for art; I countenance, I court, I challengeinquiry. "

Yes, truly the Victorian Exhibition is an object-lesson in Royalty. Ifall other records were destroyed, the historian, five hundred yearshence, could reconstitute the psychological characteristics, thementality, of the present reigning family from the pictures onexhibition there. For in the art that it has chosen to patronise (amore united family on the subject of art it would be hard toimagine--nowhere can we detect the slightest difference of opinion), the Queen, her spouse, and her children appear to be singularly_bourgeois_: a staid German family congenially and stupidlycommonplace, accepting a little too seriously its mission of crownsand sceptres, and accomplishing its duties, grown out of date, somewhat witlessly, but with heavy dignity and forbearance. Waivingall racial characteristics, the German _bourgeois_ family mind appearsplainly enough in all these family groups; no other mind could havepermitted the perpetration of so much stolid family placidity, of somuch "_frauism_". "Exhibit us in our family circle, in our coronationrobes, in our wedding dresses, let the likeness be correct and thecolours bright--we leave the rest to you. " Such seems to have been theRoyal artistic edict issued in the beginning of the present reign. Inno instance has the choice fallen on a painter of talent; but themiddling from every country in Europe seems to have found a readywelcome at the Court of Queen Victoria. We find there middlingGermans, middling Italians, middling Frenchmen--and all receivingmoney and honour from our Queen. 

The Queen and the Prince Consort do not seem to have been indifferentto art, but to have deliberately, and with rare instinct, alwayspicked out what was most worthless; and regarded in the light ofdocuments, these pictures are valuable; for they tell plainly the realmind of the Royal Family. We see at once that the family mind iswholly devoid of humour; the very faintest sense of humour would havesaved them from exhibiting themselves in so ridiculous a light. Thelarge picture of the Queen and the Prince Consort surrounded withtheir children, the Prince Consort in knee-breeches, showing afinely-turned calf, is sufficient to occasion the overthrow of adynasty if humour were the prerogative of the many instead of beingthat of the few. This masterpiece is signed, "By G. Belli, after F. Winterhalter"; and in this picture we get the mediocrity of Italy andGermany in quintessential strength. These pictures also help us torealise the private life of our Royal Family. It must have spent agreat deal of time in being painted. The family pictures arenumberless, and the family taste is visible upon them all. And theremust be some strange magnetism in the family to be able to transfuseso much of itself into the minds of so many painters. So like is onepicture to another, that the Exhibition seems to reveal the secretthat for the last fifty years the family has done nothing but paintitself. And in these days, when every one does a little painting, itis easy to imagine the family at work from morn to eve. Immediatelyafter breakfast the easels are set up, the Queen paints the PrincessLouise, the Duke of Edinburgh paints Princess Beatrice, the PrincessAlice paints the Prince of Wales, etc. The easels are removed forlunch, and the moment the meal is over work is resumed. 

After having seen the Victorian Exhibition, I cannot imagine the RoyalFamily in any other way; I am convinced that is how they must havepassed their lives for the last quarter of a century. The names of G. Belli and F. Winterhalter are no more than flimsy make-believes. Andare there not excellent reasons for holding to this opinion? Has notthe Queen published, or rather surreptitiously issued, certain littlecollections of drawings? Has not the Princess Louise, the artist ofthe family, publicly exhibited sculpture? The Princess Beatrice, hasshe not done something in the way of designing? The Duke of Edinburgh, he is a musician. And it is in these little excursions into art thatthe family most truly manifests its _bourgeois_ nature. The sincerest_bourgeois_ are those who scribble little poems and smudge littlecanvases in the intervals between an afternoon reception and adinner-party. The amateur artist is always the most inaccessible toideas; he is always the most fervid admirer of the commonplace. Astaid German family dabbling in art in its leisure hours--the mostinartistic, the most Philistine of all Royal families--this is thelesson that the Victorian Exhibition impresses upon us. 

But why should not the Royal Family decorate its palaces with bad art?Why should it not choose the most worthless portrait-painters of allcountries? Dynasties have never been overthrown for failure inartistic taste. I am aware how insignificant the matter must seem tothe majority of readers, and should not have raised the question, butsince the question has been raised, and by her Majesty, I am wellwithin my right in attempting a reply. The Victorian Exhibition is aflagrant representation of a _bourgeois_, though a royal, family. Fromthe beginning to the end the Exhibition is this and nothing but this. In the Entrance Hall, at the doorway, we are confronted with theQueen's chief artistic sin--Sir Edgar Boehm. 

Thirty years ago this mediocre German sculptor came to England. TheQueen discovered him at once, as if by instinct, and she employed himon work that an artist would have shrunk from--namely, statuettes inHighland costume. The German sculptor turned out this odious andridiculous costume as fast as any Scotch tailor. He was then employedon busts, and he did the entire Royal Family in marble. Again, itwould be hard to give a reason why Royalty should not be allowed topossess bad sculpture. The pity is that the private taste of Royaltycreates the public taste of the nation, and the public result of thegracious interest that the Queen was pleased to take in Mr. EdgarBoehm, is the disfigurement of London by several of the worst statuesit is possible to conceive. It is bad enough that we should haveGerman princes foisted upon us, but German statues are worse. Theancient site of Temple Bar has been disfigured by Boehm with statuesof the Queen and the Prince of Wales, so stupidly conceived and sostupidly modelled that they look like figures out of a Noah's Ark. Thefinest site in London, Hyde Park Corner, has been disfigured by Boehmwith a statue of the Duke of Wellington so bad, so paltry, socharacteristically the work of a German mechanic, that it isimpossible to drive down the beautiful road without experiencing asensation of discomfort and annoyance. The original statue that waspulled down in the interests of Boehm was, it is true, bad English, but bad English suits the landscape better than cheap German. And thisdisgraceful thing will remain, disfiguring the finest site in London, until, perhaps, some dynamiter blows the thing up, ostensibly to servethe cause of Ireland, but really in the interests of art. At the otherend of the park we have the Albert Memorial. We sympathise with theQueen in her grief for the Prince Consort, but we cannot help wishingthat her grief were expressed more artistically. 

A city so naturally beautiful as London can do without statues; thequestion is not so much how to get good statues, but how to protectLondon against bad statues. If for the next twenty-five years we mightcelebrate the memory of each great man by the destruction of a statuewe might undo a great part of the mischief for which Royalty is mainlyresponsible. I do not speak of Boehm's Jubilee coinage--themelting-pot will put that right one of these days--but his statues, beyond some slight hope from the dynamiters, will be always with us. Had he lived, London would have disappeared under his statues; at thetime of his death they were popping up by twos and threes all over thetown. Our lovely city is our inheritance; London should be to theLondoner what Athens is to the Athenian. What would the Athenians havethought of Pericles if he had proposed the ornamentation of the citywith Persian sculpture? Boehm is dead, but another German will be withus before long, and, under Royal patronage, will continue the odiousdisfigurement of our city. If our Royal Family possessed any slightaesthetic sense its influence might be turned to the service of art;but as it has none, it would be well for Royalty to refrain. Art cantake care of itself if left to the genius of the nation, and freedfrom foreign control. The Prince of Wales has never affected anyartistic sympathies. For this we are thankful: we have nothing toreproach him with except the unfortunate "Roll-call" incident. Royaltyis to-day but a social figment--it has long ago ceased to control ourpolitics. Would that Royalty would take another step and abandon itsinfluence in art. 

ART PATRONS. 

The general art patron in England is a brewer or distiller. Five-and-forty is the age at which he begins to make his taste felt inthe art world, and the cause of his collection is the following, or ananalogous reason. After a heavy dinner, when the smoke-cloud isblowing lustily, Brown says to Smith: "I know you don't care forpictures, so you wouldn't think that Leader was worth fifteen hundredpounds; well, I paid all that, and something more too, at the lastAcademy for it. " Smith, who has never heard of Leader, turns slowlyround on his chair, and his brain, stupefied with strong wine andtobacco, gradually becomes aware of a village by a river bank seen inblack silhouette upon a sunset sky. Wine and food have made himhappily sentimental, and he remembers having seen a village lookingvery like that village when he was paying his attentions to the eldestMiss Jones. Yes, it was looking like that, all quite sharp and clearon a yellow sky, and the trees were black and still just like thosetrees. Smith determines that he too shall possess a Leader. He may notbe quite as big a man as Brown, but he has been doing pretty welllately.... There's no reason why he shouldn't have a Leader. Soirredeemable mischief has been done at Brown's dinner-party: anotherfive or six thousand a year will henceforth exert its mighty influencein the service of bad art. 

Poor Smith, who never looked attentively at a picture before, does notsee that what inspires such unutterable memories of Ethel Jones is buta magnified Christmas card; the dark trees do not suggest treacle tohim, nor the sunset sky the rich cream which he is beginning to feelhe partook of too freely; he does not see the thin drawing, looking asif it had been laboriously scratched out with a nail, nor yet thefeeble handling which suggests a child and a pot of gum. But oftechnical achievement how should Mr. Smith know anything?--thatmysterious something, different in every artist, taking a thousandforms, and yet always recognisable to the educated eye. How shouldpoor Smith see anything in the picture except what Mr. Whistlerwittily calls "rather a foolish sunset"? To perceive Mr. Leader'sdeficiency in technical accomplishment may seem easy to the young girlwho has studied drawing for six months at South Kensington; but Smithis a stupid man who has money-grubbed for five-and-twenty years in theCity; and through the fumes of wine and tobacco he resolves to have aLeader. He does not hesitate, he consults no one--and why should he?Mr. Leader put R. A. After his name--he charges fifteen hundred. Besides, the village on the river bank with a sunset behind isobviously a beautiful thing.... The mischief has been done, theirredeemable mischief has been achieved. Smith buys a Leader, and theLeader begets a Long, the Long begets a Fildes, the Fildes begets aDicksee, the Dicksee begets a Herkomer. 

Such is the genesis of Mr. Smith's collection, and it is typical of ahundred now being formed in London. In ten years Mr. Smith has laidout forty or fifty thousand pounds. He asks his friends if they don'tlike his collection quite as well as Brown's: he urges that he can'tsee much difference himself. Nor is there much difference. The samearticles--that is to say, identically similar articles--vulgarlypainted sunsets, vulgarly painted doctors, vulgarly painted babies, vulgarly painted manor-houses with saddle-horses and a young ladyhesitating on the steps, have been acquired at or about the sameprices. The popular R. A. S have appealed to popular sentiment, andpopular sentiment has responded; and the City has paid the price. ButTime is not at all a sentimental person: he is quite unaffected by theAdelphi reality of the doctor's face or the mawkish treacle of thevillage church; and when the collection is sold at auction twentyyears hence, it will fetch about a fourth of the price that was paid. 

Mr. Smith's artistic taste knows no change; it was formed on Mr. Brown's Leader, and developing logically from it, passing throughLong, Fildes, and Dicksee, it touches high-water mark at Hook. Thepretty blue sea and the brown fisher-folk call for popular admirationalmost as imperatively as the sunset in the village churchyard; andwhen an artist--for in his adventures among dealers Mr. Smith met oneor two--points out how much less like treacle Mr. Hook is than Mr. Leader, and how much more flowing and supple the drawing of thesea-shore is than the village seen against the sunset, Mr. Smiththinks he understands what is meant. But remembering the fifteenhundred pounds he paid for the cream sky and the treacle trees, he isquite sure that nothing could be better. 

The ordinary perception of the artistic value of a picture does notarise above Mr. Smith's. I have studied the artistic capacity of theordinary mind long and diligently, and I know my analysis of it isexact; and if I do not exaggerate the artistic incapabilities of Mr. Smith, it must be admitted that the influence which his money permitshim to exercise in the art world is an evil influence, and isexercised persistently to the very great detriment of the real artist. But it will be said that the moneyed man cannot be forbidden to buythe pictures that please him. No, but men should not be electedAcademicians merely because their pictures are bought by City men, andthis is just what is done. Do not think that Sir John Millais isunaware that Mr. Long's pictures, artistically considered, are quiteworthless. Do not think that Mr. Orchardson does not turn in contemptfrom Mr. Leader's tea-trays. Do not think that every artist, howeverhumble, however ignorant, does not know that Mr. Goodall's portrait ofMrs. Kettlewell stands quite beyond the range of criticism. Mr. Long, Mr. Leader, and Mr. Goodall were not elected Academicians because theAcademicians who voted for them approved of their pictures, butbecause Mr. Smith and his like purchased their pictures; and byelecting these painters to Academic honours the taste of Mr. Smithreceives official confirmation. 

The public can distinguish very readily--far better than it getscredit for--between bad literature and good; nor is the public deaf togood music, but the public seems quite powerless to distinguishbetween good painting and bad. No, I am wrong; it distinguishes verywell between bad painting and good, only it invariably prefers thebad. The language of speech we are always in progress of learning; andthe language of music being similar to that of speech, it becomeseasier to hear that Wagner is superior to Rossini than to see thatWhistler is better than Leader. Of all languages none is so difficult, so varying, so complex, so evanescent, as that of paint; and yet it isprecisely the works written in this language that every one believeshimself able to understand, and ready to purchase at the expense of alarge part of his fortune. If I could make such folk understand howillusory is their belief, what a service I should render to art--if Icould only make them understand that the original taste of man isalways for the obvious and the commonplace, and that it is only bygreat labour and care that man learns to understand as beautiful thatwhich the uneducated eye considers ugly. 

Why will the art patron never take advice? I should seek it if Ibought pictures. If Degas were to tell me that a picture I hadintended to buy was not a good one I should not buy it, and if Degaswere to praise a picture in which I could see no merit I should buy itand look at it until I did. Such confession will make me appearweak-minded to many; but this is so, because much instruction isnecessary even to understand how infinitely more Degas knows than anyone else can possibly know. The art patron never can understand asmuch about art as the artist, but he can learn a good deal. It isfifteen years since I went to Degas's studio for the first time. Ilooked at his portraits, at his marvellous ballet-girls, at thewasherwomen, and understood nothing of what I saw. My blindness toDegas's merit alarmed me not a little, and I said to Manet--to whom Ipaid a visit in the course of the afternoon--"It is very odd, Manet, Iunderstand your work, but for the life of me I cannot see the greatmerit you attribute to Degas. " To hear that some one has notunderstood your rival's work as well as he understands your own issweet flattery, and Manet only murmured under his breath that it wasvery odd, since there were astonishing things in Degas. 

Since those days I have learnt to understand Degas; but unfortunatelyI have not been able to transmit my knowledge to any one. Whenimportant pictures by Degas could be bought for a hundred and ahundred and fifty pounds apiece, I tried hard to persuade some Citymerchants to buy them. They only laughed and told me they liked Longbetter. Degas has gone up fifty per cent, Long has declined fifty percent. Whistler's can be bought to-day for comparatively small prices;[Footnote: This was written before the Whistler boom. ] in twenty yearsthey will cost three times as much; in twenty years Mr. Leader'spictures will probably not be worth half as much as they are to-day. What I am saying is the merest commonplace, what every artist knows;but go to an art patron--a City merchant--and ask him to pay fivehundred for a Degas, and he will laugh at you; he will say, "Why, I could get a Dicksee or a Leader for a thousand or two. "

PICTURE DEALERS. 

In the eighteenth century, and the centuries that preceded it, artistswere visited by their patrons, who bought what the artist had to sell, and commissioned him to paint what he was pleased to paint. But in ourtime the artist is visited by a showily-dressed man, who comes intothe studio whistling, his hat on the back of his head. This is theWest-End dealer: he throws himself into an arm-chair, and if there isnothing on the easels that appeals to the uneducated eye, the dealerlectures the artist on his folly in not considering the exigencies ofpublic taste. On public taste--that is to say, on the uneducatedeye--the dealer is a very fine authority. His father was a dealerbefore him, and the son was brought up on prices, he lisped in prices, and was taught to reverence prices. He cannot see the pictures forprices, and he lies back, looking round distractedly, not listening tothe timid, struggling artist who is foolishly venturing anexplanation. Perhaps the public might come to his style of painting ifhe were to persevere. The dealer stares at the ceiling, and his lipsrecall his last evening at the music-hall. If the public don't likeit--why, they don't like it, and the sooner the artist comes round thebetter. That is what he has to say on the subject, and, if sneers andsarcasm succeed in bringing the artist round to popular painting, thedealer buys; and when he begins to feel sure that the uneducated eyereally hungers for the new man, he speaks about getting up a boom inthe newspapers. 

The Press is in truth the great dupe; the unpaid jackal that goes intothe highways and byways for the dealer! The stockbroker gets theBouguereau, the Herkomer, the Alfred East, and the Dagnan-Bouveretthat his soul sighs for; but the Press gets nothing except unreadablecopy, and yet season after season the Press falls into the snare. Itseems only necessary for a dealer to order an artist to frame thecontents of his sketch-book, and to design an invitation card--"Sceneson the Coast of Denmark", sketches made by Mr. So-and-so during themonths of June, July, and August--to secure half a column of a goodlynumber of London and provincial papers--to put it plainly, anadvertisement that Reckitts or Pears or Beecham could not get forhundreds of pounds. One side of the invitation card is filled up witha specimen design, usually such a futile little thing as we mightexpect to find in a young lady's sketch-book: "Copenhagen at LowTide", "Copenhagen at High Tide", "View of the Cathedral from theMouth of the River", "The Hills of----as seen from off the Coast". Andthis topography every art critic will chronicle, and his chroniclingwill be printed free of charge amongst the leading columns of thepaper. Nor is this the worst case. The request to notice a collectionof paintings and drawings made by the late Mr. So-and-so seems evenmore flagrant, for then there is no question of benefiting a youngartist who stands in need of encouragement or recognition; the show issimply a dealer's exhibition of his ware. True, that the ware may beso rare and excellent that it becomes a matter of public interest; ifso, the critic is bound to notice the show. But the ordinary show--acollection of works by a tenth-rate French artist--why should thePress advertise such wares gratis? The public goes to theatres and toflower-shows and to race-courses, but it does not go to these dealers'shows--the dealer's friends and acquaintances go on private view day, and for the rest of the season the shop is quieter than thetobacconist's next door. 

For the last month every paper I took up contained glowing accounts ofMessrs. Tooth & MacLean's galleries (picture dealers do not keepshops--they keep galleries), glowing accounts of a large and extensiveassortment of Dagnan-Bouveret, Bouguereau, Rosa Bonheur: very nicethings in their way, just such things as I would take AldermanSamuelson to see. 

These notices, taken out in the form of legitimate advertisement, would run into hundreds of pounds; and I am quite at a loss tounderstand why the Press abandons so large a part of its revenue. Forif the Press did not notice these exhibitions, the dealers would beforced into the advertising columns, and when a little notice waspublished of the ware, it would be done as a little return--as alittle encouragement for advertising, on the same principle as ladies'papers publish visits to dressmakers. The present system of noticingMessrs Tooth's and not noticing Messrs. Pears' is to me whollyillogical; and, to use the word which makes every British heart beatquicker--unbusinesslike. But with business I have nothing to do--myconcern is with art; and if the noticing of dealers' shows were notinimical to art, I should not have a word to say against the practice. Messrs. Tooth & MacLean trade in Salon and Academy pictures, so thenotices the Press prints are the equivalent of a subvention granted bythe Press for the protection of this form of art. If I were astatistician, it would interest me to turn over the files of thenewspapers for the last fifty years and calculate how much Messrs. Agnew have had out of the Press in the shape of free advertisement. And when we think what sort of art this vast sum of money went tosupport, we cease to wonder at the decline of public taste. 

My quarrel is no more with Messrs. Agnew than it is with Messrs. Tooth& MacLean; my quarrel--I should say, my reprimand--is addressed to thePress--to the Press that foolishly, unwittingly, not knowing what itwas doing, threw such power into the hands of the dealers that ourexhibitions are now little more than the tributaries of the BondStreet shop? This statement will shock many; but let them think, andthey will see it could not be otherwise. Messrs. Agnew have thousandsand thousands of pounds invested in the Academy--that is to say, inthe works of Academicians. When they buy the work of any one outsideof the Academy, they talk very naturally of their new man to theirfriends the Academicians, and the Academicians are anxious to pleasetheir best customer. It was in some such way that Mr. Burne-Jones'selection was decided. For Mr. Burne-Jones was held in no Academicesteem. His early pictures had been refused at Burlington House, andhe resolved never to send there again. For many years he remained firmin his determination. In the meantime the public showed unmistakablesigns of accepting Mr. Jones, whereupon Messrs. Agnew also acceptedMr. Jones. Mr. Jones was popular; he was better than popular, he stoodon the verge of popularity; but there was nothing like making thingssafe--Jones's election to the Academy would do that. Jones's scrupleswould have to be overcome; he must exhibit once in the Academy. TheAcademicians would be satisfied with that. Mr. Jones did exhibit inthe Academy; he was elected on the strength of this one exhibit. Hehas never exhibited since. These are the facts: confute them who may, explain them who can. 

It is true that the dealer cannot be got rid of--he is a vice inherentin our civilisation; but if the Press withdrew its subvention, hismonopoly would be curtailed, and art would be recruited by new talent, at present submerged. Art would gradually withdraw from the blusterand boom of an arrogant commercialism, and would attain her oldendignity--that of a quiet handicraft. And in this great reformationonly two classes would suffer--the art critics and the dealers. Thenewspaper proprietors would profit largely, and the readers ofnewspapers would profit still more largely, for they would no longerbe bored by the publication of dealers' catalogues expanded withinsignificant comment. 

MR. BURNE-JONES AND THE ACADEMY. 

 _To the Editor of "The Speaker". _

 SIR, --Your art critic "G. M. " is in error on a matter of fact, and as everybody knows the relationship between fact and theory, I am afraid his little error vitiates the argument he propounds with so much vigour. It was _after_, and not before, his election as an Associate that Mr. Burne-Jones made his solitary appearance as an exhibitor at the Royal Academy. --Yours truly, etc. , R. I. 

 Sir, -It has always been my rule not to enter into argument with my critics, but in the instance of "R. I. " I find myself obliged to break my rule. "R. I. " thinks that the mistake I slipped into regarding Mr. Burne-Jones's election as an Associate vitiates the argument which he says I propound with vigour. I, on the contrary, think that the fact that Mr. Burne-Jones was elected as an Associate before he had exhibited in the Royal Academy advances my argument. Being in doubt as to the particular fact, I unconsciously imagined the general fact, and when man's imagination intervenes it is always to soften, to attenuate crudities which only nature is capable of. 

 For twenty years, possibly for more, Mr. Burne-Jones was a resolute opponent of the Royal Academy, as resolute, though not so truculent, an opponent as Mr. Whistler. When he became a popular painter Mr. Agnew gave him a commission of fifteen thousand pounds--the largest, I believe, ever given--to paint four pictures, the "Briar Rose" series. Some time after--before he has exhibited in the Academy--Mr. Jones is elected as an Associate. The Academicians cannot plead that their eyes were suddenly opened to his genius. If this miracle had happened they would not have left him an Associate, but would have on the first vacancy elected him a full Academician. How often have they passed him over? Is Mr. Jones the only instance of a man being elected to the Academy who had never exhibited there? Perhaps "R. I. " will tell us. I do not know, and have not time to hunt up records. 

 G. M. 

THE ALDERMAN IN ART. 

Manchester and Liverpool are rival cities. They have matchedthemselves one against the other, and the prize they are striving foris--Which shall be the great art-centre of the North of England. Theartistic rivalry of the two cities has become obvious of late years. Manchester bids against Liverpool, Liverpool bids against Manchester;the results of the bidding are discussed, and so an interest in art iscreated. It was Manchester that first threw her strength into thisartistic rivalry. It began with the decorations which Manchestercommissioned Mr. Madox Brown to paint for the town hall. Manchester'schoice of an artist was an excellent and an original one. Mr. MadoxBrown was not an Academician; he was not known to the general public;he merely commanded the respect of his brother-artists. 

The painting of these pictures was the work of years; the placing ofevery one was duly chronicled in the press, and it was understood inLondon that Manchester was entirely satisfied. But lo! on the placingin position of the last picture but one of the series an unseemlydispute was raised by some members of the Corporation, and it wasseriously debated in committee whether the best course to pursue wouldnot be to pass a coat of whitewash over the offending picture. It isimpossible to comment adequately on such barbarous conduct; perhaps atno distant date it will be proposed to burn some part of Mrs. Ryland'sperfect gift--the Althorp Library. There may be some books in thatlibrary which do not meet with some councillor's entire approval. Barbarism on one side, and princely generosity on the other, combinedto fix attention upon Manchester, and, in common with a hundredothers, I found myself thinking on the relation of Manchester andLiverpool to art, and speculating on the direction that these newinfluences were taking. 

There are two exhibitions now open in Manchester and Liverpool--thepermanent and the annual. The permanent collections must first occupyour attention, for it is through them that we shall learn what sortand kind of artistic taste obtains in the North. At first sight thesecollections present no trace of any distinct influence. They seem tobe simply miscellaneous purchases, made from every artist whose namehappens to be the fashion; and considered as permanent illustrationsof the various fashions that have prevailed in Bond Street during thelast ten years, these collections are curious and perhaps valuabledocuments in the history of art. But is there any real analogy betweena dressmaker's shop and a picture gallery? Plumes are bought becausethey are "very much worn just now", but then plumes are not soexpensive as pictures, and it seems to be hardly worth while to buypictures for the sake of the momentary fashion in painting which theyrepresent. 

Manchester and Liverpool have not, however, grasped the essential factthat it is impossible to form an art gallery by sending to London forthe latest fashions. Now and then the advice of some gentleman knowingmore about art than his colleagues has found expression in thepurchase of a work of art; but the picture that hangs next to thefortuitous purchase tells how the taste of the cultured individual wasoverruled by the taste of the uncultured mass at the next meeting. Icould give many, but two instances must suffice to explain and toprove my point. Two years ago Mr. Albert Moore exhibited a verybeautiful picture in the Academy--three women, one sleeping and twositting on a yellow couch, in front of a starlit and moonlit sea. Inthe same Academy there was exhibited a picture by Mr. Bartlett--apicture of some gondoliers rowing or punting or sculling (I amignorant of the aquatic habits of the Venetians) for a prize. TheLiverpool Gallery has bought and hung these pictures side by side. Such divagations of taste make the visitor smile, and he thinksperforce of the accounts of the stormy meetings of councillors thatfind their way into the papers. Artistic appreciation of these twopictures in the same individual is not possible. What should we thinkof a man who said that he did not know which he preferred-a poem byTennyson, or a story out of the _London Journal_? Catholicity of tastedoes not mean an absolute abandonment of all discrimination; and somethread of intellectual kinship must run through the many variousmanifestations of artistic temperament which go to form a collectionof pictures. Things may be various without being discrepant. 

The Manchester Gallery has purchased Lawson's beautiful picture, "TheDeserted Garden"; likewise Mr. Fildes' picture of a group of Venetiangirls sitting on steps, the principal figure in a blue dress with anorange handkerchief round her neck, the simple--I may saychild-like--scheme of colour beyond which Mr. Fildes never seems tostray. The Lawson and the Fildes agree no better than do the Moore andthe Bartlett; and the only thing that occurs to me is that the citiesshould toss up which should go for Fildes and Bartlett, and which forLawson and Moore. By such division harmony would be attained, and onecity would be going the wrong road, the other the right road; atpresent both are going zigzag. 

But notwithstanding the multifarious tastes displayed in thesecollections, and the artistic chaos they represent, we can, when weexamine them closely, detect an influence which abides though itfluctuates, and this influence is that of our discredited Academy. TheManchester and Liverpool collection are merely weak reflections of theChantrey Fund collection. Now, if the object of these cities be toadopt the standard of taste that obtains in Burlington House, toabdicate their own taste--if they have any--and to fortify themselvesagainst all chance of acquiring a taste in art, it would clearly bebetter for the two corporations to hand over the task of acquiringpictures to the Academicians. The responsibility will be gladlyaccepted, and the trust will be administered with the same honesty andstraightforwardness as has been displayed in the administration of themoneys which the unfortunate Chantrey entrusted to the care of theAcademicians. 

The sowing of evil seed is an irreparable evil; none can tell wherethe wind will carry it, and unexpected crops are found far and wide. Ihad thought that the harm occasioned to art by the Academy and itscorollary, the Chantrey Fund, began and ended in London. But inManchester and Liverpool I was speedily convinced of my mistake. Artin the provinces is little more than a reflection of the Academy. Themajority of the pictures represent the taste of men who have noknowledge of art, and who, to disguise their ignorance, follow theadvice which the Academy gives to provincial England in the picturesit purchases under the terms--or, rather, under its own reading of theterms--of the Chantrey Bequest Fund. One of the first things I heardin Manchester was that the committee had been fortunate enough tosecure the nude figure which Mr. Hacker exhibited this year in theAcademy. And on my failing to express unbounded admiration for thepurchase, I was asked if I was aware that the Academy had purchased"The Annunciation" for the Chantrey Bequest Fund. "Surely, " said amember of the committee, "you agree that our picture is the better ofthe two. " I answered: "Poor Mr. Chantrey's money always goes to buythe worst, or as nearly as possible the worst, picture the artist everpainted--the picture for which the artist would never be likely tofind a purchaser. "

Last month the Liverpool County Council assembled to discuss thepurchase of two pictures recommended by the art committee--"Summer", by Mr. Hornel; and "The Higher Alps", by Mr. Stott, of Oldham. Thediscussion that ensued is described by the _Liverpool Daily Post_ as"amusing". It was ludicrous, and those who do not care a snap of thefingers about art might think it amusing. The joke was started by Mr. Lynskey, who declared that the two pictures in question were meredaubs. Mr. Lynskey did not think that the Glasgow school of paintinghad yet been recognised by the public, and until it had he did not seewhy the corporation should pay £500 for these two productions, merelyfor the sake of experimenting. Thereby we are to understand that informing a collection of pictures it is the taste of the public thatmust be considered. "Of course, " cry the aldermen; "we are here tosupply the public with what it wants. " I repeat, the corporations ofManchester and Liverpool do not seem to have yet grasped the fact thatthere is no real analogy between a picture gallery and a dressmaker'sshop. 

The next speaker was Mr. Burgess. He could not imagine how any onecould recommend the purchase of such pictures. The Mr. Burgesses oftwenty-five years ago could not understand how any one could buyCorots. Mr. Smith asked if it were really a fact that the committeehad bought the pictures. He was assured that they would be bought onlyif the council approved of them; whereupon Alderman Samuelson declaredthat if that were so they would not be bought. Dr. Cummins comparedthe pictures to cattle in the parish pound, and it is reported thatthe remark caused much laughter. Then some one said--I think it wasMr. Smith--that the pictures had horrified him; whereupon there wasmore laughter. Then a member proposed that they should have thepictures brought in, to which proposition a member objected, amid muchlaughter. Then Mr. Daughan suggested that the chairman andvice-chairman should explain the meaning of the pictures to thecouncil. More laughter and more County Council humour. The meeting wasa typical meeting, and it furnishes us with the typical councillor. 

In the report of the meeting before me a certain alderman seems tohave been as garrulous as he was irrepressible. He not only spoke atgreater length than the rest of the councillors put together, but didnot hesitate to frequently interrupt the members of the committee withremarks. Speaking of pictures by Millais, Holman Hunt, and Rossetti, he said:--"We have had exhibitions, and the works of these greatartists were at various times closely scrutinised, and they had bornethe most careful scrutiny that could be directed to them. Now I defyyou to take a number of pictures such as those in dispute, and do thesame with them. " No one could have spoken the words I have quoted whowas not absolutely ignorant of the art of painting. Imagine the pooralderman going round, magnifying-glass in hand, subjecting Millais andHolman Hunt to the closest scrutiny. And how easy it is to determinewhat was passing in his mind during the examination of the Glasgowschool! "I can't see where this foot finishes; the painter was notable to draw it, so he covered it up with a shadow. In the pictures ofthat fellow Guthrie the grass is merely a tint of green, whereas inthe 'Shadow of the Cross' I can count all the shavings. "

But we will not seek to penetrate further into this very alderman-likemind. He declared that the Glasgow school of painting was "no more incomparison to what they recognised as a school of painting than acharity school was to the University of Oxford. " I am sorry ouralderman did not say what was the school of painting that he and hisfellow-aldermen admired. In the absence of any precise information onthe point I will venture to suggest that the school they recognise isthe school of Bartlett and Solomon. The gallery possesses two largeworks by these masters--the Gondoliers, and the great picture ofSamson, which fills an entire end of one room. But what would be ofstill greater interest would be to hear our alderman explain what hemeant by this astonishing sentence:--"The only motive of Mr. Hornel'spicture is a mode of art or rather artifice, in introducing a numberof colours with the idea of making them harmonise; and this could bedone, and had been done, by means of the palette-knife. "

I have not the least idea what this means, but I am none the lessinterested. For, although void of sense, the alderman's words allow meto look down a long line of illustrious ancestry--Prud'homme, Chadband, Stiggins, Phillion, the apothecary Homais in "MadameBovary". After passing through numerous transformations, an eternalidea at last incarnates itself in a final form. How splendid ouralderman is! Never did a corporation produce so fine a flower. He issententious, he is artistic. And how he lets fall from his thick lipsthose scraps of art-jargon which he picked up in the studio where hesat for his portrait! He is moral; he thinks that nude figures shouldnot be sanctioned by the corporation; he believes in the Bank, andproposes the Queen's health as if he were fulfilling an importantduty; he goes to the Academy, and dictates the aestheticism of hisnative town. There he is, his hand in his white waistcoat, in the posechosen for the presentation portrait, at the moment when he deliveredhimself of his famous apophthegm, "When the nude comes into art, artflies out of the window. "

The alderman is the reef which for the last five-and-twenty years hasdone so much to ruin and to wreck every artistic movement which theenthusiasm and intelligence of individuals have set on foot. The merechecking of the obstruction of the individual will not suffice; otheraldermen will arise--equally ignorant, equally talkative, equallyobstructive. And until the race is relegated to its proper function, bimetallism and sewage, the incidents I have described will happenagain and again. 

 * * * * *

A marvellous accident that it should have come to be believed that acorporation could edit a picture gallery! Whence did the belieforiginate? whence did it spring? and in what fancied substance of factdid it catch root? A tapeworm-like notion--come we know not whence, nor how. And it has thriven unobserved, though signs of its presencestare plainly enough in the pallid face of the wretched gallery. Curious it is that it should have remained undetected so long;curious, indeed, it is that straying thought should have led no one toremember that every great art collection of the world has grown out ofan individual intelligence. Collections have been worthily continued, but each successive growth has risen in obedience to the will of onesupreme authority; and that it should have ever come to be believedthat twenty aldermen, whose lives are mainly spent in consideringbank-rates, bimetallism, and sewage, could collect pictures ofpermanent value is on the face of it as wild a folly as ever tried thestrength of the strait waistcoats of Hanwell or Bedlam. But asManchester and Liverpool enjoy as fair a measure of sanity as the restof the kingdom, we perforce must admit the theory of unconsciousacceptation of a chance idea. 

But I take it that what is essential in my argument is not to provethat aldermen know little about art, but that twenty men, wise orfoolish, ignorant or learned, cannot edit a picture gallery. Provingthe obvious is not an amusing task, but it is sometimes a necessarytask. It may be thought, too, that I might be more brief; the elderlymaxim about brevity being the soul of wit may be flung in my teeth. But lengthy discourse gives time for reflection, and I am seriouslyanxious that my readers should consider the question which thesearticles introduce. I believe it to be one of vital interest, reachingdown a long range of consequences; and should these articles induceManchester and Liverpool to place their galleries in the care ofcompetent art-directors, I shall have rendered an incalculable serviceto English art. I say "competent art-directors", and I mean by"competent art-directors" men who will deem their mission to be arepudiation of the Anglo-French art fostered by the Academy--a returnto a truer English tradition, and the giving to Manchester andLiverpool individual artistic aspiration and tendency. 

Is the ambition of Manchester and Liverpool limited to paltryimitations of the Chantrey Fund collection? If they desire no more, itwould serve no purpose to disturb the corporations in their managementof the galleries. The corporations can do this better than anydirector. But if Manchester and Liverpool desire individual artisticlife, if they wish to collect art that will attract visitors andcontribute to their renown, they can only do this by the appointmentof competent directors. For assurance on this point we have only tothink what Sir Frederick Burton has done for the National Gallery, orwhat the late Mr. Doyle did for Dublin on the meagre grant of onethousand a year. It is the man and not the amount of money spent thatcounts. A born collector like the late Mr. Doyle can do more with athousand a year than a corporation could do with a hundred thousand ayear. 

Nothing is of worth except individual passion; it is the one thingthat achieves. And I know of no more intense passion--and, I will add, no more beautiful passion--than the passion for collecting works ofart. Of all passions it is the purest. It matters little to the manpossessed of it whether he collects for the State or for himself. Thegallery is his child, and all his time and energy are given to theenrichment and service of _his_ gallery. The gallery is his onethought. He will lie awake at night to better think out his plans forthe capture of some treasure on which he has set his heart. He willget up in the middle of the night, and walk about the gallery, considering some project for improved arrangements. To realise themeaning of the passion for collecting, it is necessary to have known areal collector, and intimately, for collectors do not wear theirhearts on their sleeve. With the indifferent they are indifferent; butthey are quick to detect the one man or woman who sympathises, whounderstands; and they select with eagerness this one from the crowd. But perhaps the collector never really reveals himself except to afellow-collector, and to appreciate the strength and humanity of thepassion it is necessary to have seen Duret and Goncourt explaining anew Japanesery which one of them has just acquired. 

The partial love which a corporation may feel for its collection isvery different from the undivided strength of the collector's love ofhis gallery. And even if we were to admit the possibility of an idealcorporation consisting of men perfectly conversant with art, andanimated with passion equal to the collector's passion, the history ofits labour would still be written in the words "vexatious discussionand lost chances". The rule that no picture is to be purchased untilit has been seen and approved of by the corporation forbids allextraordinary chances, and the unique and only moment is lost infoolish formulae. The machinery is too cumbersome; and chances ofsale-rooms cannot be seized; it is instinct and not reason thatdecides the collector, and no dozen or twenty men can ever be got toimmediately agree. 

Not long after my article on Manet was published in the columns of the_Speaker_, a member of the Manchester art committee wrote asking wherecould the pictures be seen, and if the owners would lend them forexhibition in the annual exhibition soon to open. If they did, perhapsthe corporation might be induced to buy them for the permanentcollection. Now I will ask my readers to imagine my bringing thepictures "Le Linge" and "L'Enfant à l'Êpée" over from France, andsubmitting them to the judgment of the Manchester Corporation. As wellmight I submit to them a Velasquez or a Gainsborough signed Smith andJones! It is the authority of the signature that induces acquiescencein the beauty of a portrait by Gainsborough or Velasquez; without thesignature the ordinary or drawing-room lady would prefer a portrait byMr. Shannon. Mr. Shannon is the fashion, and the fashion, being theessence and soul of the crowd, is naturally popular with the crowd. 

In my article on Manet I referred to a beautiful picture ofhis--"Boulogne Pier". It was then on exhibition in Bond Street. Iasked a friend to buy it. "You will not like the picture now, " I said;"but if you have any latent aesthetic feeling in you it will bring itout, and you will like it in six months' time. " My friend would notbuy the picture, and the reason he gave was that he did not like it. It did not seem to occur to him that his taste might advance, and thatthe picture he was ignorant enough to like to-day he might be wiseenough to loathe six years hence. 

An early customer of Sir John Millais said, "Millais, I'll give youfive hundred pounds to paint me a picture, and you shall paint me thepicture you are minded to paint. " Sir John painted him one of the mostbeautiful pictures of modern times, "St. Agnes' Eve". But the wisdomof the purchaser was only temporary. When the picture came home he didnot like it, his wife did not like it; there was no colour in it; itwas all blue and green. Briefly, it was not a pleasant picture to livewith; and after trying the experiment for a few months this excellentgentleman decided to exchange the picture for a picture by--bywhom?--by Mr. Sidney Cooper. I wonder what he thinks of himselfto-day. And his fate is the fate of the aldermen who buy picturesbecause they like them. 

The administration of art, as it was pointed out in the _ManchesterGuardian_, is one of extreme difficulty, and it is not easy to find acompetent director; but it seems to me to be easy to name many men whowould do better in art-management than a corporation, andembarrassingly difficult to name one who would do worse. Any one mancan thread a needle better than twenty men. Should the needle provebrittle and the thread rotten, the threader must resign. Though a taskmay be accomplished only by one man, and though all differ as to howit should be accomplished, yet, when the task is well accomplished, anappreciative unanimity seems to prevail regarding the result. We allagree in praising Sir Frederick Burton's administration; and yet howeasy it would be to cavil! Why has he not bought an Ingres, a Corot, aCourbet, a Troyon? Why has he showed such excessive partiality forsquint-eyed Italian saints? Sir Frederick Burton would answer: "Incollecting, like in everything else, you must choose a line. I choseto consider the National Gallery as a museum. The question is whetherI have collected well or badly from this point of view. " But acorporation cannot choose a line on which to collect; it can do nomore than indulge in miscellaneous purchases. 

RELIGIOSITY IN ART. 

One Sunday morning, more than twenty years ago, I breakfasted with agreat painter, who was likewise a wit, and the account he gave of arecent visit to the Doré Gallery amused me very much. On entering, henoticed that next to the door there was a high desk, so cunninglyconstructed both as regards height and inclination that all thediscomforts of writing were removed; and the brightness of the silverinkpot, the arrangement of the numerous pens and the order-book on thedesk, all was so perfect that the fingers of the lettered andunlettered itched alike with desire of the caligraphic art. By thisdesk loitered a large man of bland and commanding presence. He wore awhite waistcoat, and a massive gold chain, with which he toyed whilewatching the guileless spectators or sought with soothing voice toentice one to display his handwriting in the order-book. My friend, who was small and thin, almost succeeded in defeating the vigilance ofthe white-waistcoated and honey-voiced Cerberus; but at the lastmoment, as he was about to slip out, he was stopped, and the followingdialogue ensued:--

"Sir, that is a very great picture. "

"Yes, it is indeed, it is an immense picture. "

"Sir, I mean great in every sense of the word. "

"So do I; it is nearly as broad as it is long. "

"I was alluding, sir, to the superior excellence of the picture, andnot to its dimensions. "

"Oh!"

"May I ask, sir, if you know what that picture represents?"

"I'm sorry, but I can't tell you. "

"Then, sir, I'll tell you. That picture represents the point ofculmination in the life of Christ. "

"Really; may I ask who says so?"

"The dignitaries of the Church say so. "

Pause, during which my friend made an ineffectual attempt to get past. The waistcoat, however, barred the way, and then the bland and dulcetvoice spoke again. 

"Do you see that man copying the right-hand corner of the picture?That gentleman says that the man who could paint that corner couldpaint anything. "

"Oh! and who is that gentleman?"

"That gentleman is employed to copy in the National Gallery. "

"Oh! by the State?"

"No, sir, not by the State, but he has permission to copy in theNational Gallery. "

"A special permission granted to him by the State?"

"No, sir, but he has permission to copy in the National Gallery. " "Infact, just as every one else has. I am really very much obliged, but Imust be getting along. "

"Sir, won't you put down your name for a ten-guinea proof signed bythe artist?"

"I'm very sorry, but I really do not see my way to taking a ten-guineasubscription. "

"Then, perhaps, you will take one at five--the same without thesignature?"

"I really cannot. "

"You can have a numbered proof for £2, 10s. "

"No, thank you; you must excuse me. "

"You can have an ordinary proof for a guinea. "

"No, thank you; you must really allow me to pass. "

Then in the last moment the white waistcoat, assuming a tone in whichthere was both despair and disdain, said--"But you will have a yearand a half before you need pay your guinea. "

Who does not know this man? Who has not suffered from hisimportunities? Twenty years ago he extolled the beauties of "Christleaving the Praetorium"; ten years later he lauded the merits of"Christ and Diana"; to-day he is busy advising the shilling publicthronging the Dowdeswell galleries to view Mr. Herbert Schmalz's_impressive_ picture of "The Return from Calvary". I do not mean thatthe same gentleman who presided at the desk in the Doré Gallery nowpresides at the desk at 160 New Bond Street. The individual differs, but the type remains unaltered. The waistcoat, the desk, the pens andthe silver inkstand, such paraphernalia are as inseparable from him asthe hammer is from the auctioneer. All this I have on the authority ofMessrs. Dowdeswell themselves. When engaging their canvasser, theyoffered him a small table at the end of the room. Their ignorance ofhis art caused him to smile. "A table, " he said, "would necessitatesitting down to write, and the great point in this business is to savethe customer from all unnecessary trouble. Any other place in the roomexcept next the door is out of the question. I must have a nice deskthere, at which you can write standing up, a lamp shedding a brightglow upon the paper, a handsome silver inkstand, and a long, evenly-balanced pen. Give me these things, and leave the rest to me. "

Messrs. Dowdeswell hastened to comply with these requests. I was inthe gallery on Monday, and can testify to the pleasantness of thelittle installation, to the dexterity with which customers were ledthere, and to the grace with which the canvasser dipped the pen in thehandsome silver inkstand. The county squire, the owner of racehorses, the undergraduate, and the Brixton spinster, are easily led by him tothe commodious desk. Go and see the man, and you will be led thitherlikewise. 

It is a matter for wonder that more artists do not devote themselvesto painting religious subjects. There seems to be an almost limitlessdemand for work of this kind, and almost any amount of praise for it, no matter how badly it is executed. The critic dares not turn thepicture into ridicule however bad it may be, for to do so would seemlike turning a sacred subject into ridicule--so few distinguishbetween the subject and the picture. He may hardly venture todepreciate the work, for it would not seem quite right to depreciatethe work of a man who had endeavoured to depict, however inadequately, a sacred subject. Everything is in favour of the painter of religioussubjects, provided certain formalities are observed. The canvasser andthe arrangements of the desk are of course the first consideration, but there are a number of minor observances, not one of which may beneglected. The gallery must be thrown into deep twilight with a vividlight from above falling full on the picture. There must be lines ofchairs, arranged as if for a devout congregation; and if, in excess ofthese, the primary conditions of success, one of the dignitaries ofthe Church can be induced to accept a little excursion into theperilous fields of art criticism, all will go well with the show. 

It would be unseemly for a critic to argue with a bishop concerningthe merits of a religious picture--it would be irreverent, anomalous, and in execrable taste. For it must be clear to every one that thebest and truest critic of a religious picture is a bishop; and it isstill more clear that if the picture contains a view of Jerusalem, theone person who can speak authoritatively on the matter is the Bishopof Jerusalem. And it were indeed impossible to realise the essentialnature of these truths better than Messrs. Dowdeswell have done; theyhave even ventured to extend the ordinary programme, and have decreeda special _matinée_ in the interests of country parsons--truly an ideaof genius. If a fault may be found or forged with the arrangements, itis that they did not enter into some contract with the railwayauthorities. But this is hypercriticism; they have done their workwell, and the _matinée_, as the order-book will testify, was asplendid success. The parsons came up from every part of the country, and as "The Return from Calvary" is the latest thing in religious art, they think themselves bound to put their names down for proofs. Howcould they refuse? The canvasser dipped the pen in the ink for them, and he has a knack of making a refusal seem so mean. 

About Mr. Schmalz's picture I have really no particular opinion. I donot think it worse than any picture of the same kind by the late Mr. Long. Nor do I think that it can be said to be very much inferior tothe religious works with which Mr. Goodall has achieved so wide areputation. On the whole I think I prefer Mr. Goodall, though I am notcertain. Here is the picture:--At the top of a flight of steps andabout two-thirds of the way across the picture, to the left, so as notto interfere with the view of Jerusalem, are three figures--as SirAugustus Harris might have set them were he attempting a theatricalrepresentation of the scene. There is a dark man, this is St. John, and over him a woman draped in white is weeping, and behind her awoman with golden hair--the Magdalen--is likewise weeping. Two otherfigures are ascending the steps, but as they are low down in thepicture they interfere hardly at all with the splendid view. The darksky is streaked with Naples yellow, and the pale colour serves torender distinct the three crosses planted upon Calvary in the extremedistance. 

In this world all is a question of temperament. To the aesthetictemperament Mr. Schmalz's picture will seem hardly more beautiful orattractive than a Salvationist hymn-book; the unaesthetic temperamentwill, on the other hand, be profoundly moved, the subject stands outclear and distinct, and that class of mind, overlooking all artisticshortcomings, will lose itself in emotional consideration of thegrandest of all the world's tragedies. That Mr. Schmalz's picture iscapable of exercising a profound effect on the uneducated mind therecan be no doubt. While I was there a lady walked with stately treadinto the next room, and seeing there nothing more exciting than ruralscenes drawn in water-colour, exclaimed, "Trees, mere trees! what aretrees after having had one's soul elevated?"

That great artist Henri Monnier devoted a long life to the study andthe collection of the finest examples of human stupidity, andmarvellous as are some of the specimens preserved by him in hisdialogues, I hardly think that he succeeded in discovering a finer gemthan the phrase overheard by me in the Dowdeswell Galleries. Toappreciate the sublime height, must we not know something of themiserable depth? And the study of human stupidity is refreshing andsalutary; it helps us to understand ourselves, to estimate ourselves, and to force ourselves to look below the surface, and so raise ourideas out of that mire of casual thought in which we are all too proneto lie. For perfect culture, the lady I met at the DowdeswellGalleries is as necessary as Shakespeare. Is she not equally anexhortation to be wise?

THE CAMERA IN ART. 

It is certain that the introduction of Japaneseries into this countryhas permanently increased our sense of colour; is it thereforeimprobable that the invention of photography has modified, if it hasnot occasioned any very definite alteration in our general perceptionof the external world? It would be interesting to inquire into suchrecondite and illusive phenomena; and I am surprised that no paper onso interesting a question has appeared in any of our art journals. True, so many papers are printed in our weekly and monthly press thatit is impossible for any one to know all that has been written on anyone subject; but, so far as I am aware, no such paper has appeared, and the absence of such a paper is, I think, a serious deficiency inour critical literature. 

It is, however, no part of my present purpose to attempt to supplythis want. I pass on to consider rapidly a matter less abstruse and ofmore practical interest, a growing habit among artists to availthemselves of the assistance of photographs in their work. It will notbe questioned that many artists of repute do use photographs to--well, to put it briefly, to save themselves trouble, expense, and, in somecases, to supplant defective education. But the influence ofphotography on art is so vast a subject, so multiple, so intricate, that I may do no more here than lift the very outer fringe. 

It is, however, clear to almost everybody who has thought about art atall, that the ever-changing colour and form of clouds, the complexvariety (definite in its very indefiniteness) of every populousstreet, the evanescent delicacy of line and aërial effect that themost common and prosaic suburb presents in certain lights, are thevery enchantment and despair of the artist; and likewise every one whohas for any short while reflected seriously on the problem of artisticwork must know that the success of every evocative rendering of theexquisite externality of crowded or empty street, of tumult or calm incloud-land, is the fruit of daily and hourly observation--observationfiltered through years of thought, and then fortified again inobservation of Nature. 

But such observation is the labour of a life; and he who undertakes itmust be prepared to see his skin brown and blister in the shine, andfeel his flesh pain him with icy chills in the biting north wind. Thegreat landscape painters suffered for the intolerable desire of Art;they were content to forego the life of drawing-rooms and clubs, andlive solitary lives in unceasing communion with Art and Nature. Butartists in these days are afraid of catching cold, and impatient oflong and protracted studentship. Everything must be made easy, comfortable, and expeditious; and so it comes to pass that many anartist seeks assistance from the camera. A moment, and it is done: nowet feet; no tiresome sojourn in the country when town is full ofmerry festivities; and, above all, hardly any failure--that is to say, no failure that the ordinary public can detect, nor, indeed, anyfailure that the artist's conscience will not get used to in time. 

Mr. Gregory is the most celebrated artist who is said to make habitualuse of photography. Mr. Gregory has no warmer admirer than myself. Hispicture of "Dawn" is the most fairly famous picture of our time. Butsince that picture his art has declined. It has lost all the noblesynthetical life which comes of long observation and gradualassimilation of Nature. His picture of a yachtsman in this year'sAcademy was as paltry, as "realistic" as may be. 

Professor Herkomer is another well-known artist who is said to usephotography. It is even said that he has his sitter photographed on tothe canvas, and the photographic foundation he then covers up withthose dreadful browns and ochres which seem to constitute his palette. Report credits him with this method, which it is possible he believesto be an advance on the laborious process of drawing from Nature, towhich, in the absence of the ingenious instrument, the Old Masterswere perforce obliged to resort. It will be said that what matter howthe artists work--that it is with the result, not the method, withwhich we are concerned. Dismissing report from our ears, surely wemust recognise all the cheap realism of the camera in ProfessorHerkomer's portraits; and this is certainly their characteristic, although photography may have had nothing to do with theirmanufacture. 

Mr. Bartlett is another artist who, it is said, makes habitual use ofphotographs; and surely in some of his boys bathing the photographiceffects are visible enough. But although very far from possessing theaccomplishments of Mr. Gregory, Mr. Bartlett has acquired someeducation, and can draw, when occasion requires, very well indeed fromlife. 

Mr. Mortimer Menpes is the third artist of any notoriety that rumourhas declared to be a disciple of the camera. His case is the mostflagrant, for it is said that he rarely, if ever, draws from Nature, and that his entire work is done from photographs. Be this as it may, his friends have stated a hundred times in the Press that he usesphotography, and it would seem that his work shows the mechanical aidmore and more every day. Some years ago he went to Japan, and broughthome a number of pictures which suited drawing-rooms, and were soonsold. I did not see the exhibition, but I saw some pictures done byhim at that time--one, an especially good one, I happened upon in theGrosvenor Gallery. This picture, although superficial and betrayingwhen you looked into it a radical want of knowledge, was not lackingin charm. In French studios there is a slang phrase which expressesthe meretricious charm of this picture--_c'est du chic_; and themeaning of this very expressive term is ignorance affecting airs ofcapacity. Now the whole of Mr. Menpes' picture was comprised in thisterm. The manner of the master who, certain of the shape and value ofthe shadow under an eye, will let his hand run, was reproduced; butthe exact shape and value of the shadows were not to be gathered fromthe photograph, and the result was a charming but a hollow mockery. 

And then the "colour-notes"; with what assurance they were dashed intothe little pictures from Japan, and how dexterously the touch of themaster who knows exactly what he wants was parodied! At the firstglance you were deceived; at the second you saw that it was only suchcursive taste and knowledge as a skilful photographer who had beenallowed the run of a painter's studio for a few months might display. Nowhere was there any definite intention; it was something that hadbeen well committed to memory, that had been well remembered, but onlyhalf-understood. Everything floated--drawing, values, colours--forthere was not sufficient knowledge to hold and determine the place ofany one. 

Since those days Mr. Menpes has continued to draw from photographs, and--the base of his artistic education being deficient from thefirst--the result of his long abstention from Nature is apparent, evento the least critical, in the some hundred and seventy paintings, etchings, and what he calls diamond-points on ivory, on exhibition atMessrs. Dowdeswell's. Diamond-points on ivory may astonish theunthinking public, but artists are interested in the drawing, and notwhat the drawing is done upon. Besides the diamond-points, there isquite sufficient matter in this exhibition to astonish visitors fromPeckham, Pentonville, Islington, and perhaps Clapham, but notBayswater--no, not Bayswater. There are frames in every sort ofpattern--some are even adorned with gold tassels--and the walls havebeen especially prepared to receive them. 

These pictures and etchings purport to be representations of India, Burma, and Cashmire. The diamond-points, I believe, purport to bediamond-points. In some of the etchings there is the same ingenioustouch of hand, but anything more woful than the oil pictures cannoteasily be imagined. In truth, they do not call for any seriouscriticism; and were it not for the fact that they afforded anopportunity of making some remarks--which seemed to me to be worthmaking--about the influence of photography in modern art, I shouldhave left the public to find for itself the value of this attempt, inthe grandiloquent words of the catalogue, "to bring before mycountrymen the aesthetic and artistic capabilities, and the beauty invarious forms, that are to be found in our great Indian Empire. " Tocriticise the pictures in detail is impossible; but I will try to givean impression of the exhibition as a whole. Imagine a room hung withordinary school slates, imagine that all these slates have been gilt, and that some have been adorned with gold tassels instead of the usualsponge, and into each let there be introduced a dome, a camel, apalm-tree, or any other conventional sign of the East. 

On examining the paintings thus sumptuously encased you will noticethat the painter has not been able to affect with the brush any slightair of capacity; the material betrays him at every point The etchingsare _du chic_; but the paintings are merely abortive. The handlingconsists in scrubbing the colour into the canvas, attaining in thismanner a texture which sometimes reminds you of wool, sometimes ofsand, sometimes of both. The poor little bits of blue sky stick to thehouses; there is nowhere a breath of air, a ray of light, not even aconventionally graduated sky or distance; there is not an angle, or apillar, or a stairway finely observed; there is not even any sucheagerness in the delineation of an object as would show that thepainter felt interest in his work; every sketch tells the tale of aburden taken up and thankfully relinquished. Here we have white wall, but it has neither depth nor consistency; behind it a bit of sandysky; the ground is yellow, and there is a violet shadow upon it. Butthe colour of the ground does not show through the shadow. Look, forexample, at No. 36. Is it possible to believe that that red-brick skywas painted from Nature, or that unhappy palm in a picture close bywas copied as it raised its head over that wall? The real scene wouldhave stirred an emotion in the heart of the dullest member of theStock Exchange, and, however unskilful the brushwork, if the man couldhold a brush at all, there would have been something to show that theman had been in the presence of Nature. There is no art so indiscreetas painting, and the story of the painter's mind may be read in everypicture. 

But another word regarding these pictures would be waste of space andtime. Let Mr. Menpes put away his camera, let him go out into thestreets or the fields, and there let him lose himself in the vastnessand beauty of Nature. Let him study humbly the hang of a branch or thesurface of a wall, striving to give to each their character. Let himtry to render the mystery of a perspective in the blue evening or itsharshness and violence in the early dawn. There is no need to go toBurma, there is mystery and poetry wherever there is atmosphere. Incertain moments a backyard, with its pump and a child leaning todrink, will furnish sufficient motive for an exquisite picture; theatmosphere of the evening hour will endow it with melancholy andtenderness. But the insinuating poetry of chiaroscuro the camera ispowerless to reproduce, and it cannot be imagined; Nature isparsimonious of this her greatest gift, surrendering it slowly, andonly to those who love her best, and whose hearts are pure ofmercenary thought. 

THE NEW ENGLISH ART CLUB. 

This, the ninth season of the New English Art Club, has been marked bya decisive step. The club has rejected two portraits of Mr. Shannon. So that the public may understand and appreciate the importance ofthis step, I will sketch, _à coups de crayon peu fondus_, the portraitof a lady as I imagine Mr. Shannon might have painted her. A woman ofthirty, an oval face, and a long white brow; pale brown hair, tastefully arranged with flowers and a small plume. The eyes large andtender, expressive of a soul that yearns and has been misunderstood. The nose straight, the nostrils well-defined, slightly dilated; themouth curled, and very red. The shoulders large, white, andover-modelled, with cream tints; the arms soft and rounded; diamondbracelets on the wrists; diamonds on the emotional neck. Her dress isof the finest duchesse satin, and it falls in heavy folds. She holds abouquet in her hands; a pale green garden is behind her; swans aremoving gracefully through shadowy water, whereon the moon shinespeacefully. Add to this conception the marvellous square brushwork ofthe French studio, and you have the man born to paint Englishduchesses--to paint them as they see themselves, as they would be seenby posterity; and through Mr. Shannon our duchesses realise all theiraspirations, present and posthumous. The popularity of these picturesis undoubted; wherever they hang, and they hang everywhere, except inthe New English Art Club, couples linger. "How charming, howbeautifully dressed, how refined she looks!" and the wife who has notmarried a man _à la hauteur de ses sentiments_ casts on him awithering glance, which says, "Why can't you afford to let me bepainted by Mr. Shannon?"

We are here to realise our ideals, and far is it from my desire tothwart any lady in her aspirations, be they in white or violet satin, with or without green gardens. If I were on the hanging committee ofthe Royal Academy, all the duchesses in the kingdom should berealised, and then--I would create more duchesses, and they, too, should be realised by Messrs. Shannon, Hacker, and Solomon _les chefsde rayon de la peinture_. And when these painters arrived, each with avan filled with new satin duchesses, I would say, "Go to Mr. Agnew, ask him what space he requires, and anything over and above they shallhave it. " I would convert the Chantrey Fund into white satinduchesses, and build a museum opposite Mr. Tate's for the blue. Iwould do anything for these painters and their duchesses except hangthem in the New English Art Club. 

For it is entirely necessary that the public should never be left fora moment in doubt as to the intention of this club. It is open tothose who paint for the joy of painting; and it is entirelydisassociated from all commercialism. Muslin ballet-girl or satinduchess it matters no jot, nothing counts with the jury but _l'idéeplastique_: comradeship, money gain or loss, are waived. The rejectionof Mr. Shannon's portraits will probably cost the club four guineas ayear, the amount of his subscription, and it will certainly lose tothe club the visits of his numerous drawing-room following. This is tobe regretted--in a way. The club must pay its expenses, but it werebetter that the club should cease than that its guiding principleshould be infringed. 

Either we may or we may not have a gallery from which popular paintingis excluded. I think that we should; but I know that Academicians anddealers are in favour of enforced prostitution in art. That men shouldpractise painting for the mere love of paint is wholly repugnant toevery healthy-minded Philistine. The critic of the Daily Telegraphdescribed the pictures in the present exhibition as things that no onewould wish to possess; he then pointed out that a great many wereexcellently well painted. Quite so. I have always maintained thatthere is nothing that the average Englishman--the reader of the _DailyTelegraph_--dislikes so much as good painting. He regards it in thelight of an offence, and what makes it peculiarly irritating in hiseyes is the difficulty of declaring it to be an immoral action; heinstinctively feels that it is immoral, but somehow the crime seems toelude definition. 

The Independent Theatre was another humble endeavour which sorelytried the conscience of the average Englishman. That any one shouldwish to write plays that were not intended to please the public--thatdid not pay--was an unheard-of desire, morbid and unwholesome as couldwell be, and meriting the severest rebuke. But the Independent Theatrehas somehow managed to struggle into a third year of life, and the NewEnglish Art Club has opened its ninth exhibition; so I suppose thatthe _Daily Telegraph_ will have to make up its mind, sorrowfully, ofcourse, and with regret, that there are folk still in London who arenot always ready to sell their talents to the highest bidder. 

For painters and those who like painting, the exhibitions at the NewEnglish Art Club are the most interesting in London. We find there noanecdotes, sentimental, religious, or historical, nor the conventionalmeasuring and modelling which the Academy delights to honour in thename of Art. At the New English Art Club, from the first picture tothe last, we find artistic effort; very often the effort is feeble, but nowhere, try as persistently as you please, will you find the loudstupidity of ordinary exhibitions of contemporary painting. This is aplain statement of a plain truth--plain to artists and those few whopossess the slightest knowledge of the art of painting, or even anyfaint love of it. But to the uncultivated, to the ignorant, and to thestupid the New English Art Club is the very place where all the absurdand abortive attempts done in painting in the course of the year areexposed on view. If I wished to test a man's taste and knowledge inthe art of painting I would take him to the English Art Club andlisten for one or two minutes to what he had got to say. 

Immediately on entering the room, before we see the pictures, we knowthat they are good. For a pleasant soft colour, delicate andinsinuating as an odour of flowers, pervades the room. So we are gladto loiter in this vague sensation of delicate colour, and we talk toour friends, avoiding the pictures, until gradually a pale-faced womanwith arched eyebrows draws our eyes and fixes our thoughts. It is aportrait by Mr. Sargent, one of the best he has painted. By the sideof a fine Hals it might look small and thin, but nothing short of afine Hals would affect its real beauty. My admiration for Mr. Sargenthas often hesitated, but this picture completely wins me. It has allthe qualities of Mr. Sargent's best work; and it has something more:it is painted with that measure of calculation and reserve which ispresent in all work of the first order of merit. I find the picturedescribed with sufficient succinctness in my notes: "A half-lengthportrait of a woman, in a dress of shot-silk--a sort of red violet, the colour known as puce. The face is pale, the chin is prominent andpointed. There were some Japanese characteristics in the model, andthese have been selected. The eyes are long, and their look is aslant;the eyebrows are high and marked; the dark hair grows round the paleforehead with wig-like abruptness, and the painter has attempted noattenuation. The carnations are wanting in depth of colour--they aresomewhat chalky; but what I admire so much is the exquisite selection, besides the points mentioned--the shadowed outline, so full of theform of her face, and the markings about the eyes, so like her; andthe rendering is full of the beauty of incomparable skill. The neck, how well placed beneath the pointed chin! How exact in width, inlength, and how it corresponds with the ear; and the jawbone is underthe skin; and the anatomies are all explicit--the collar-bone, thehollow of the arm-pit, and the muscle of the arm, the placing of thebosom, its shape, its size, its weight. Mr. Sargent's drawing speakswithout hesitation, a beautiful, decisive eloquence, the meaning neverin excess of the expression, nor is the expression ever redundant. "

I said that we find in this portrait reserve not frequently to be metwith in Mr. Sargent's work. What I first noticed in the picture wasthe admirable treatment of the hands. They are upon her hips, thepalms turned out, and so reduced is the tone that they are hardlydistinguishable from the dress. As the model sat the light must haveoften fallen on her hands, and five years ago Mr. Sargent might havepainted them in the light. But the portrait tells us that he haslearnt the last and most difficult lesson--how to omit. Any touch oflight on those hands would rupture the totality and jeopardise thecolour-harmony, rare without suspicion of exaggeration or affectation. In the background a beautiful chocolate balances and enforces thevarious shades of the shot-silk, and with severity that is fortunate. By aid of two red poppies, worn in the bodice, a final note in thechord is reached--a resonant and closing consonance; a beautiful work, certainly: I should call it a perfect work were it not that thedrawing is a little too obvious: in places we can detect the manner;it does not _coule de source_ like the drawing of the very greatmasters. 

Except Mr. Sargent, no one in the New English Art Club comes forwardwith a clearly formulated style; everything is more or less tentative, and I cannot entirely exempt from this criticism either Mr. Steer, Mr. Clausen, or Mr. Walter Sickert. But this criticism must not beunderstood as a reproach--surely this green field growing is morepleasing than the Academy's barren stubble. I claim no more for theNew English Art Club than that it is the growing field. Say that thecrop looks thin, and that the yield will prove below the average, butdo not deny that what harvest there may be the New English Art Clubwill bring home. So let us walk round this May field of the younggeneration and look into its future, though we know that the summermonths will disprove for better or for worse. 

Mr. Bernard Sickert, the youngest member of this club, a merebeginner, a five- or six-year-old painter, has made, from exhibitionto exhibition, constant and consistent progress, and this year hecomes forward with two landscapes, both seemingly conclusive of a trueoriginality of vision, and there is a certain ease of accomplishmentin his work which tempts me to believe that a future is in store forhim. The differences of style in these two pictures do not affect myopinion, for, on looking into the pictures, the differences are moreapparent than real--the palette has been composed differently, butneither picture tells of any desire of a new outlook, or even toradically change his mode of expression. The eye which observed andremembered so sympathetically "A Spring Evening", over which a redmoon rose like an apparition, observed also the masts and the prows, and the blue sea gay with the life of passing sail and flag, and thegreen embaying land overlooking "A Regatta". 

I hardly know which picture I prefer. I saw first "A Regatta", and wasstruck by the beautiful drawing and painting of the line of boats, their noses thrust right up into the fore water of the picture, alittle squadron advancing. So well are these boats drawn that theunusual perspective (the picture was probably painted from a window)does not interrupt for a second our enjoyment. A jetty on the rightstretches into the blue sea water, intense with signs of life, and thelittle white sails glint in the blue bay, and behind the high greenhill the colours of a faintly-tinted evening fade slowly. The pictureis strangely complete, and it would be difficult to divine any reasonfor disliking it, even amongst the most ignorant. "A Spring Evening"is neither so striking nor so immediately attractive; its charm isnone the less real. An insinuating and gentle picture, whose delicacyand simplicity I like. 

The painter has caught that passing and pathetic shudder of cominglife which takes the end of a March day before the bud swells or anest appears. The faint chill twilight floats upon the field, and thered moon mounts above the scrub-clad hillside into a rich grey sky, beautifully graduated and full of the glamour of waning andstrengthening light. The slope of the field, too--it is there thesheep are folded--is in admirable perspective. On the left, beyond thehurdles, is a strip of green, perhaps a little out of tone, though Iknow such colour persists even in very receding lights; and high up onthe right the blue night is beginning to show. The sheep are folded ina turnip field, and the root-crop is being eaten down. 

The month is surely March, for the lambs are still long-legged--thereone has dropped on its knees and is digging at the udder of thepassive ewe with that ferocious little gluttony which we know so well;another lamb relieves its ear's first itching with its hind hoof--youknow the grotesque movement--and the field is full of the weirdroaming of animal life, the pathos of the unconscious, the pity oftransitory light. A little umber and sienna, a rich grey, not a bit ofdrawing anywhere, and still the wandering forms of sheep and lambsfully expressed, one sheep even in its particular physiognomy. Truly acharming picture, spontaneous and simple, and proving a painterpossessed of a natural sentiment, of values, and willing to employthat now most neglected method of pictorial expression, chiaroscuro. 

Neglected by Mr. Steer, who seems prepared to dispense with what isknown as _une atmosphère de tableau_. Any one of his three pictureswill serve as an example. His portrait of a girl in blue I cannotpraise, not because I do not admire it, but because Mr. MacColl, theart critic of the _Spectator_, our ablest art critic, himself apainter and a painter of talent, has declared it to be superior to aRomney. I will quote his words: "The word masterpiece is not to belightly used, but when we stand before this picture it is difficult tothink of any collection in which it would look amiss, or fail to holdits own. If we talk of English masters, Romney is the name that mostnaturally suggests itself, because in the bright clear face and brownhair and large simplicity of presentment, there is a good deal torecall that painter. But Romney's colour would look cheap beside this, and his drawing conventional in observation, however big in style. "

To go one better than this, I should have to say the picture was asgood as Velasquez, and to simply endorse Mr. MacColl's words would bea second-hand sort of criticism to which I am not accustomed. Besides, to do so would be to express nothing of my own personal sensations inregard to this picture. So I will say at once that I do not understandthe introduction of Romney's name into the argument. If comparisonthere must be, surely Mr. Watts would furnish one more appropriate. Both in the seeing and in the execution the portrait seems nearer toMr. Watts than to Romney. Of Romney's gaiety there is no trace in Mr. Steer's picture. 

The girl sits in a light wooden arm-chair--her arm stretched in frontof her, the hands held between her knees--looking out of the picturesomewhat stolidly. The Lady Hamilton mood was an exaggerated mood, butthere is something of it in every portrait at all characteristic ofour great eighteenth-century artist. The portrait exhibited in thisyear's show of Old Masters in the Academy will do--the lady who walksforward, her hands held in front of her bosom, the fingers pressedtogether, the white dress floating from the hips, the white broughtdown with a yellow glaze. I do not think that we find either thatgaiety or those glazes in Mr. Steer. From many a Romney the cleanerhas removed an outer skin, but I am not speaking of those pictures. 

But if I see very little Romney in Steer's picture, I am thankful thatI see at least very rare distinction in the figuration of a beautifuland decorative ideal--a girl in blue sitting with her back to an openwindow, full of the blue night, and on the other side the grey blind, yellowing slightly under the glare of the lamp. I appreciate the veryremarkable and beautiful compromise between portrait-painting anddecoration. I see rare distinction (we must not be afraid of the worddistinction in speaking of Mr. Steer) in his choice of what to draw. The colour scheme is well maintained, somewhat in the manner of Mr. Watts, but neither the blue of the dress nor the blue of the night isintrinsically beautiful, and we have only to think of the blues thatWhistler or Manet would have found to understand how deficient theyare. 

The drawing of the face is neither a synthesis, nor is it intimatelycharacteristic of the model: it is simply rudimentary. A round girlishface with a curled mouth and an ugly shadow which does not express thenose. The shoulders are there, that we are told, but the anatomies arewanting, and the body is without its natural thickness. Nor is thedrawing more explicit in its exterior lines than it is in its inner. There is hardly an arm in that sleeve; the elbow would be difficult tofind, and the construction of the waist and hips is uncertain; thedrawing does not speak like Mr. Sargent's. Look across the room at hisportrait of a lady in white satin and you will see there a shadow, soexact, so precise, so well understood, that the width of the body isplaced beyond doubt. 

But the most radical fault in the portrait I have yet to point out; itis lacking in atmosphere. There is none between us and the girl, hardly any between the girl's head and the wall. The lamp-light effectis conveyed by what Mr. MacColl would perhaps call a symbol, by theshadow of the girl's head. We look in vain for transparent darknesses, lights surrounded by shadows, transposition of tones, and the aspectof things; the girl sits in a full diffused light, and were it not forthe shadow on the wall and the shadow cast by the nose, she might besitting in a conservatory. Speaking of another picture by Mr. Steer, "Boulogne Sands", Mr. MacColl says: "The children playing, the holidayencampment of the bathers' tents, the glint of people flauntingthemselves like flags, the dazzle of sand and sea, and over andthrough it all the chattering lights of noon. " I seize upon thephrase, "The people flaunting themselves like flags. " The simile is apretty one, and what suggested it to the writer is the detached colourin the picture; and the colours are detached because there is noatmosphere to bind them together; there are no attenuations, transpositions of tone--in a word, none of those combinations of lightand shade which make _une atmosphère de tableau_. 

And Mr. Steer's picture is merely an instance of a general tendencywhich for the last twenty years has widened the gulf between modernand ancient painting. It was Manet who first suggested _la peintureclaire_, and his suggestion has been developed by Roll, Monet, andothers, until oil-painting has become little more than a sheet ofwhite paper slightly tinted. Values have been diverted from theiroriginal mission, which was to build up _une atmosphère de tableau_, and now every value and colour finely observed seem to have formission the abolition of chiaroscuro. Without atmosphere paintingbecomes a mosaic, and Mr. MacColl seems prepared to defend this returnto archaic formulas. This is what he says: "The sky of the sea-beach, for example, if it be taken as representing form and texture, isridiculous; it is like something rough and chippy, and if thesuggestion gets too much in the way the method has overshot its mark. Its mark is to express by a symbol the vivid life in the sky-colour, the sea-colour, and the sand-colour, and it is doubtful if therichness and subtlety of those colours can be conveyed in any otherway. " Here I fail altogether to understand. If the sky's beauty can beexpressed by a symbol, why cannot the beauty of men and women beexpressed in the same way? How the infinities of aërial perspectivecan be expressed by a symbol, I have no slightest notion; nor do Ithink that Mr. MacColl has. In striving to excuse deficiencies in apainter whose very real and loyal talent we both admire, he hasallowed his pen to run into dangerous sophistries. "The matter ofhandling, " he continues, "is then a moot point--a question oftemperament. " Is this so?

That some men are born with a special aptitude for handling colour asother men are born with a special sense of proportions is undeniable;but Mr. MacColl's thought goes further than this barren platitude, andif he means, as I think he does, that the faculty of handling is moreinstinctive than that of drawing, I should like to point out to himthat handling did not become a merely personal caprice until thepresent century. A collection of ancient pictures does not presentsuch endless experimentation with the material as a collection ofmodern pictures. Rubens, Hals, Velasquez, and Gainsborough do notcontradict each other so violently regarding their use of the materialas do Watts, Leighton, Millais, and Orchardson. 

In the nineteenth century no one has made such beautiful use of thematerial as Manet and Whistler, and we find these two painters usingit respectively exactly like Hals and Velasquez. It would thereforeseem that those who excel in the use of paint are agreed as to thehandling of it, just as all good dancers are agreed as to the step. But, though all good dancers dance the same step, each brings into hispractice of it an individuality of movement and sense of rhythmsufficient to prevent it from becoming mechanical. The ancientpainters relied on differences of feeling and seeing for originalityrather than on eccentric handling of colour; and all theseextraordinary executions which we meet in every exhibition of modernpictures are in truth no more than frantic efforts either to escapefrom the thraldom of a bad primary education, or attempts to disguiseignorance in fantastic formulas. That which cannot be referred back tothe classics is not right, and I at least know not where to look amongthe acknowledged masters for justification for Mr. Steer's jaggedbrushwork. 

Mr. Walter Sickert, whose temperament is more irresponsible, isnevertheless content within the traditions of oil-painting. Heexhibits two portraits, both very clever and neither satisfactory, forneither are carried beyond the salient lines of character. Nature hasgifted Mr. Sickert with a keen hatred of the commonplace; his visionof life is at once complex and fragmentary, his command on drawingslow and uncertain, his rendering therefore as spasmodic as a poem byBrowning. He picks up the connecting links with difficulty, and evenhis most complete work is full of omissions. The defect--for it is adefect--is by no means so fatal in the art-value of a painting as thefutile explanations so dearly beloved by the ignorant. Manet was tothe end the victim of man's natural dislike of ellipses, and Mr. Walter Sickert is suffering the same fate. Still, even the most remoteintelligence should be able to gather something of the merit of theportrait of Miss Minnie Cunningham. How well she is in that long redfrock--a vermilion silhouette on a rich brown background! I should bestill more pleased if the vermilion had been slightly broken withyellow ochre; but then, at heart, I am no more than _un vieuxclassique_. The edges of the vermilion hat are lightened where itreceives the glare of the foot-lights; and the face does not sufferfrom the red. It is as light, as pretty, as suggestive as may be. Thethinness of the hand and wrist is well insisted upon, and the trip ofthe legs, just before she turns, realises, and in a manner I have notseen elsewhere, the enigma of the artificial life of the stage. 

The aestheticism of the Glasgow school, of which we have heard so muchlately, is identical with that of the New English Art Club, and thetwo societies are in a measure affiliated. Nearly all the members ofthe Glasgow school are members of the New English Art Club, and it isregrettable that they do not unite and give us an exhibition thatwould fairly stare the Academy out of countenance. Among the Glasgowpainters the most prominent and valid talent is Mr. Guthrie's. Hisachievements are more considerable and more personal; and he seems toapproach very near to a full expression of the pictorial aspirationsof his generation. Years ago his name was made known to me by aportrait of singular beauty; an oasis it was in a barren and bitterdesert of Salon pictures. Since then he has adopted a different andbetter method of painting; and an excellent example of his presentstyle is his portrait of Miss Spencer, a lady in a mauve gown. Theslightness of the intention may be urged against the picture; it is nomore than a charming decoration faintly flushed with life. But in hismanagement of the mauve Mr. Guthrie achieved quite a little triumph:and the foreground, which is a very thin grey passed over a darkground, is delicious, and the placing of the signature is in the rightplace. Most artists sign their pictures in the same place. But thesignature should take a different place in every picture, for in everypicture there is one and only one right place for the signature; andthe true artist never fails to find the place which his work haschosen and consecrated for his name. 

I confess myself to be a natural and instinctive admirer of Mr. Guthrie's talent. His picture, "Midsummer", exhibited at Liverpool, charmed me. Turning to my notes I find this description of it: "Agarden in the summer's very moment of complete efflorescence; a bowerof limpid green, here and there interwoven with red flowers. And threeladies are there with their tiny Japanese tea-table. One dress--thaton the left--is white, like a lily, drenched with green shadows; thedress on the right is a purple, beautiful as the depth of foxglovebells, A delicate and yet a full sensation of the beauty of modernlife, from which all grossness has been omitted--a picture for which Ithink Corot would have had a good word to say. " In the same exhibitionthere was a pastel by Mr. Guthrie, which quite enchanted me with itsnatural, almost naïve, grace. Turning to my notes I extract thefollowing lines: "A lady seated on a light chair, her body in profile, her face turned towards the spectator; she wears a dress with redstripes. One hand hanging by her side, the other hand holding open aflame-coloured fan; and it is this that makes the picture. The feetlaid one over the other. The face, a mere indication; and for thehair, charcoal, rubbed and then heightened by two or three touches ofthe rich black of pastel-chalk. A delicate, a precious thing, rich inmemories of Watteau and Whistler, of boudoir inspiration, and whosedestination is clearly the sitting-room of a dilettante bachelor. "

Mr. Henry, another prominent member of the Glasgow school, exhibited aportrait of a lady in a straw hat--a rich and beautiful piece ofpainting, somewhat "made up" and over-modelled, still a piece ofpainting that one would like to possess. Mr. Hornell's celebrated"Midsummer", the detestation of aldermen, was there too. Imagine thepicture cards, the ten of diamonds, and the eight of hearts shuffledrapidly upon a table covered with a Persian tablecloth. To ignore whatare known as values seems to be the first principle of the Glasgowschool. Hence a crude and discordant coloration without depth orrichness. Hence an absence of light and the mystery of aërialperspective. But I have spoken very fully on this subject elsewhere. 

Fifteen years ago it was customary to speak slightingly of the OldMasters, and it was thought that their mistakes could be easilyrectified. Their dark skies and black foregrounds hold their ownagainst all Monet's cleverness, and it has begun to be suspected thateven if nature be industriously and accurately copied in the fields, the result is not always a picture. The palette gives the value of thegrass and of the trees, but, alas, not of the sky-the sky is higher intone than the palette can go; the painter therefore gets a falsevalue. Hence the tendency among the _plein airists_ to leave out thesky or to do with as little sky as possible. A little reef issufficient to bring about a great shipwreck; a generation has wastedhalf its life, and the Old Masters are again becoming the fashion. Mr. Furse seems to be deeply impressed with the truth of the _new_aestheticism. And he has succeeded within the limits of a tiny panel, a slight but charming intention. "The Great Cloud" rolls over a stripof lowland, lowering in a vast imperial whiteness, vague and shadowyas sleep or death. Ruysdael would have stopped for a moment to watchit. But its lyrical lilt would trouble a mind that could only think inprose; Shelley would like it better, and most certainly it would notfail to recall to his mind his own immortal verses--

 "I am the daughter of earth and water, And the nursling of the sky; I pass through the pores of ocean and shores, I change, but I cannot die. "

What will become of our young artists and their aspirations is a talethat time will unfold gradually, and for the larger part of itssurprises we shall have to wait ten years. In ten years many of theseaesthetes will have become common Academicians, working for the villasand perambulators of numerous families. Many will have disappeared forever, some may be resurrected two generations hence, may be raisedfrom the dead like Mr. Brabazon, our modern Lazarus--

 "Lazare allait mourir une seconds fois, "--

or perchance to sleep for ever in Sir Joshua's bosom. That a placewill be found there for Mr. Brabazon is one of the articles of faithof the younger generation. Mr. Brabazon is described as an amateur, and the epithet is marvellously appropriate; no one--not even thegreat masters--deserved it better. The love of a long life is in thosewater-colours--they are all love; out of love they have grown, in itslight they have flourished, and they have been made lovely with love. 

In a time of slushy David Coxes, Mr. Brabazon's eyes were strangelyhis own. Even then he saw Nature hardly explained at all--films offlowing colour transparent as rose-leaves, the lake's blue, and thewhite clouds curling above the line of hills--a sense of colour and asense of distance, that was all, and he had the genius to remainwithin the limitations of his nature. And, with the persistency oftrue genius, Mr. Brabazon painted, with a flowing brush, rose-leafwater-colours, unmindful of the long indifference of two generations, until it happened that the present generation, with its love of slightthings, came upon this undiscovered genius. It has hailed him asmaster, and has dragged him into the popularity of a specialexhibition of his work at the Goupil Galleries. And it was inevitablethat the present young men should discover Mr. Brabazon: for indiscovering him, they were discovering themselves--his art is no morethan a curious anticipation of the artistic ideal of to-day. 

The sketch he exhibits at the New English Art Club is a singularlybeautiful tint of rose, spread with delicate grace over the paper. Alittle less, and there would be nothing; but a little beauty hasalways seemed to me preferable to a great deal of ugliness. And whatis true about one is true about nearly all his drawings. We find inthem always an harmonious colour contrast, and very rarely anythingmore. Sometimes there are those evanescent gradations of colour whichare the lordship and signature of the colourist, and when _le tonlocal_ is carried through the picture, through the deepest shadows asthrough the highest lights, when we find it persisting everywhere, aswe do in No. 19, "Lake Maggiore", we feel in our souls the joy thatcomes of perfect beauty. But too frequently Mr. Brabazon's colour isrestricted to an effective contrast; he often skips a great manynotes, touching the extremes of the octave with certainty and withgrace. 

But it is right that we should make a little fuss over Mr. Brabazon;for though this work is slight, it is an accomplishment--he hasindubitably achieved a something, however little that something maybe; and when art is disappearing in the destroying waters ofcivilisation, we may catch at straws. Beyond colour--and even incolour his limitations are marked--Mr. Brabazon cannot go. He enteredSt. Mark's, and of the delicacy of ornamentation, of the balance ofthe architecture, he saw nothing; neither the tracery of carven columnnor the aërial perspective of the groined arches. It was his geniusnot to see these things--to leave out the drawing is better than tofumble with it, and all his life he has done this; and though we maysay that a water-colour with the drawing left out is a very slightthing, we cannot fail to perceive that these sketches, though lessthan sonnets or ballades, or even rondeaus or rondels--at most theyare triolets--are akin to the masters, however distant therelationship. 

I have not told you about the very serious progress that Mr. GeorgeThompson has made since the last exhibition; I have not described histwo admirable pictures; nor mentioned Mr. Linder's landscape, nor Mr. Buxton Knight's "Haymaking Meadows", nor Mr. Christie's pretty picture"A May's Frolic, " nor Mr. MacColl's "Donkey Race". I have omitted muchthat it would have been a pleasure to praise; for my intention was notto write a guide to the exhibition, but to interpret some of thecharacteristics of the young generation. 

The New English Art Club is very typical of this end of the century. It is young, it is interesting, it is intelligent, it is emotional, itis cosmopolitan--not the Bouillon Duval cosmopolitanism of the NewlynSchool, but rather an agreeable assimilation of the Montmartre café offifteen years ago. Art has fallen in France, and the New English seemsto me like a seed blown over-sea from a ruined garden. It has caughtEnglish root, and already English colour and fragrance are in theflower. A frail flower; but, frail or strong, it is all we have of artin the present generation. It is slight, and so most typical; for, surely, no age was ever so slight in its art as ours? As the centuryruns on it becomes more and more slight and more and more intelligent. A sheet of Whatman's faintly flushed with a rose-tint, a few strayverses characterised with a few imperfect rhymes and a wrong accent, are sufficient foundation for two considerable reputations. Theeducation of the younger generation is marvellous; its brains areexcellent; it seems to be lacking in nothing except guts. As educationspreads guts disappear, and that is the most serious word I have tosay. 

Without thinking of those great times when men lived in the giddinessand the exultation of a constant creation--when a day was sufficientfor Rubens to paint the "Kermesse" thirteen days to paint the "Mages", even or eight to paint the "Communion de St. François d'Assise"--andblotting from our mind the fabulous production of Tintoretto andVeronese, let us merely remember that thirty years ago Millais painteda beautiful picture every year until marriage and its consequencesbrought his art to a sudden close. One year it was "Autumn Leaves", the following year it was "St. Agnes' Eve", and behind these picturesthere were at least ten masterpieces--"The Orchard", "The Rainbow", "Mariana in the Moated Grange", "Ophelia", etc. Millais is far behindVeronese and Tintoretto in magnificent excellence and extraordinaryrapidity of production; but is not the New English Art Club even asfar behind the excellence and fertility of production of thirty yearsago?

A GREAT ARTIST. 

We have heard the words "great artist" used so often and so carelesslythat their tremendous significance escapes. The present is a time whenit is necessary to consider the meaning, latent and manifest, of thewords, for we are about to look on the drawings of the late CharlesKeene. 

In many the words evoke the idea of huge canvases in which historicalincidents are depicted, conquerors on black horses covered with goldtrappings, or else figures of Christ, or else the agonies of martyrs. The portrayal of angels is considered by the populace to be especiallyimaginative, and all who affect such subjects are at least in theirday termed great artists. But the words are capable of a less vulgarinterpretation. To the select few the great artist is he who is mostracy of his native soil, he who has most persistently cultivated histalent in one direction, and in one direction only, he who hasrepeated himself most often, he who has lived upon himself the mostavidly. In art, eclecticism means loss of character, and character iseverything in art. I do not mean by character personal idiosyncrasies;I mean racial and territorial characteristics. Of personalidiosyncrasy we have enough and to spare. Indeed, it has come to beaccepted almost as an axiom that it does not matter much how badly youpaint, provided you do not paint badly like anybody else. But insteadof noisy idiosyncrasy we want the calm of national character in ourart. A national character can only be acquired by remaining at homeand saturating ourselves in the spirit of our land until it oozes fromour pens and pencils in every slightest word, in every slightesttouch. Our lives should be one long sacrifice for this onething--national character. Foreign travel should be eschewed, weshould turn our eyes from Paris and Rome and fix them on our ownfields; we should strive to remain ignorant, making our livesmole-like, burrowing only in our own parish soil. There are nouniversities in art, but there are village schools; each of us shouldchoose his master, imitate him humbly, striving to continue thetradition. And while labouring thus humbly, rather as handicraftsmenthan as artists, our personality will gradually begin to appear in ourwork, not the weak febrile idiosyncrasy which lights a few hours ofthe artist's youth, but a steady flame nourished by the rich oil ofexcellent lessons. If the work is good, very little personality isrequired. Are the individual temperaments of Terburg, Metzu, and Peterde Hoogh very strikingly exhibited in their pictures?

The paragraph I have just written will seem like a digression to thecareless reader, but he who has read carefully, or will take thetrouble to glance back, will not fail to see, that although inappearance digressive, it is a strict and accurate comment on CharlesKeene, and the circumstances in which his art was produced. CharlesKeene never sought after originality; on the contrary, he began byhumbly imitating John Leech, the inventor of the method. His earliestdrawings (few if any of them are exhibited in the present collection)were hardly distinguishable from Leech's. He continued the traditionhumbly, and originality stole upon him unawares. Charles Keene was notan erudite, he thought of very little except his own talent and thevarious aspects of English life which he had the power of depicting;but he knew thoroughly well the capacities of his talent, thedirection in which it could be developed, and his whole life wasdevoted to its cultivation. He affected neither a knowledge ofliterature nor of Continental art; he lived in England and forEngland, content to tell the story of his own country and the age helived in; in a word, he worked and lived as did the Dutchmen of 1630. He lived pure of all foreign influence; no man's art was ever sopurely English as Keene's; even the great Dutchmen themselves were notmore Dutch than Keene was English, and the result is often hardly lesssurprising. To look at some of these drawings and not think of theDutchmen is impossible, for when we are most English we are mostDutch--our art came from Holland. These drawings are Dutch in thestrange simplicity and directness of intention; they are Dutch intheir oblivion to all interests except those of good drawing; they areDutch in the beautiful quality of the workmanship. Examine the rich, simple drawing of that long coat or the side of that cab, and say ifthere is not something of the quality of a Terburg. Terburg is simpleas a page of seventeenth-century prose; and in Keene there is the samedeep, rich, classic simplicity. The material is different, but thefeeling is the same. I might, of course, say Jan Steen; and is it notcertain that both Terburg and Steen, working under the sameconditions, would not have produced drawings very like Keene's? Andnow, looking through the material deep into the heart of the thing, isit a paradox to say that No. 221 is in feeling and quality ofworkmanship a Dutch picture of the best time? The scene depicted isthe honeymoon. The young wife sits by an open window full of sunlight, and the curtains likewise are drenched in the pure white light. Howtranquil she is, how passive in her beautiful animal life! No complexpassion stirs in that flesh; instinct drowses in her just as in ananimal. With what animal passivity she looks up in her husband's face!Look at that peaceful face, that high forehead, how clearly conceivedand how complete is the rendering! How slight the means, howextraordinary the result! The sunlight floods the sweet face soexquisitively stupid, and her soul, and the room, and the veryconditions of life of these people are revealed to us. 

And now, in a very rough and fragmentary fashion, hardly attemptingmore than a hurried transcription of my notes, I will call attentionto some three or four drawings which especially arrested my attention. In No. 10 we have a cab seen in wonderful perspective; the hind wheelis the nearest point, and in extraordinarily accurate proportion thevehicle and the animal attached to it go up the paper. The cabmanturns half round to address some observation to the "fare", an oldgentleman, who is about to step in. The roof of the cab cuts the bodyof the cabman, composing the picture in a most original and strikingmanner. The panels of the cab are filled in with simple straightlines, but how beautifully graduated are these lines, how much theyare made to say! Above all, the hesitating movement of the oldgentleman--how the exact moment has been caught! and the treatment ofthe long coat, how broad, how certain--how well the artist has saidexactly what he wanted to say! Another very fine drawing is No. 11. The fat farmer stands so thoroughly well in his daily habit; the greatstomach, how well it is drawn, and the short legs are part and parcelof the stomach. The man is redolent of turnip-fields and rick-yards;all the life of the fields is upon him. And the long parson, clearlyfrom the university, how well he clasps his hands and how the verysoul of the man is expressed in the gesture! No. 16 is very wonderful. What movement there is in the skirts of the fat woman, and the legs ofthe vendor of penny toys! Are they not the very legs that the gutterbreeds?

No. 52: a big, bluff artist, deep-seated amid the ferns and grasses. The big, bearded man, who thinks of nothing but his art, who lives init, who would not be thin because fat enables him to sit longer out ofdoors, the man who will not even turn round on his camp-stool to seethe woman who is speaking to him; we have all known that man, but tome that man never really existed until I looked on this drawing. Andthe treatment of the trees that make the background! A few touches ofthe pencil, and how hot and alive the place is with sunlight!

But perhaps the most wonderful drawing in the entire collection is No. 89. Never did Keene show greater mastery over his material. In thisdrawing every line of the black-lead pencil is more eloquent thanDemosthenes' most eloquent period. The roll and the lurch of thevessel, the tumult of waves and wind, the mental and physicalcondition of the passengers, all are given as nothing in this worldcould give them except that magic pencil. The figure, the man that thewind blows out of the picture, his hat about to leave his head, is nothe really on board in a gale? Did a frock coat flap out in the wind sowell before? And do not the attitudes of the two women leaning overthe side represent their suffering? The man who is not sea-sick sits, his legs stretched out, his hands thrust into his pockets, his facesunk on his breast, his hat crushed over his eyes. His pea-jacket, howwell drawn! and can we not distinguish the difference between itscloth and the cloth of the frock of the city merchant, who watcheswith such a woful gaze the progress of the gathering wave? The weightof the wave is indicated with a few straight lines, and, strangelyenough, only very slightly varied are the lines which give the verysensation of the merchant's thin frock coat made in the shop of afashionable tailor. 

It has been said that Keene could not draw a lady or a gentleman. Whynot add that he was neither a tennis player nor a pigeon shot, awaltzer nor an accomplished French scholar? The same terribleindictment has been preferred against Dickens, and Mr. Henry Jamessays that Balzac failed to prove he was a gentleman. It might be wellto remind Mr. James that the artist who would avoid the fashion platewould do well to turn to the coster rather than the duke forinspiration. Keene's genius saved him from the drawing-room, neverallowing his gaze to wander from where English characteristics may begathered most plentifully--the middle and lower classes. 

I find in my notes mention of other drawings quite as wonderful asthose I have spoken of, but space only remains to give some hint ofKeene's place among draughtsmen. As a humorist he was certainly thincompared to Leech; as a satirist he was certainly feeble compared toGavarni; in dramatic, not to say imaginative, qualities he cannot bespoken of in the same breath as Cruikshank; but as an artist was henot their superior?

NATIONALITY IN ART. 

In looking through a collection of Reynolds, Gainsboroughs, Dobsons, Morlands, we are moved by something more than the artistic beauty ofthe pictures. Seeing that peaceful farmyard by Morland, a dim remotelife, a haunting in the blood, rises to the surface of the brain, likea water-flower or weed brought by a sudden current into sight of thepassing sky. Seeing that quiet man talking with his swineherd, we aremysteriously attracted, and are perplexed as by a memory; we growaware of his house and wife, and though these things passed away morethan a hundred years ago, we know them all. That other picture, "Partridge Shooting", by Stubbs, how familiar and how intimate it isto us! and those days seem to go back and back into long ago, beyondchildhood into infancy. The life of the picture goes back into thelife that we heard from our father's, our grandfather's lips, a lifeof reminiscence and little legend, the end of which passed like awraith across the dawn of our lives. For we need not be very old toremember the squire ramming the wads home and calling to the setterthat is too eagerly pressing forward the pointer in the turnips. A manof fifty can remember seeing the mail coach swing round the curve ofthe wide, smooth coach roads; and a man of forty, going by road to theDerby, and the block which came seven miles from Epsom. And so dothese pictures take us to the heart of England, to the heart of ourlife, which is England, to that great circumstance which preceded ourbirth, and which gave not merely flesh and blood, but the minds thatare thinking now. We have only to pass through a doorway to seesublimer works of art. But though Troyon and Courbet were greaterartists than Morland, Morland whispers something that is beyond art, beyond even our present life; as a shell with the sound of the sea, these canvases are murmurous with the under life. 

That young lady so charmingly dressed in white, she who holds a rosein her hand, is Miss Kitty Calcraft, by Romney. Do we not seem to knowher? We ask when we met her, and where we spoke to her; and thatmystic when and where seem more real than the moment of present life. The present crowd of living folk fades from us, and we half believe, half know, that she spoke to us one evening on that terraceoverlooking those wide pasture lands. We see the happy light of hereyes and hear the joy of her voice, and they stir in us all theimpulses of race, of kith and kin. 

Romney is often crude, but the worst that can be urged against thisportrait is that it is superficial. But what charm and grace there isin its superficiality! Romney was aware of the grace and charm of theyoung girl as she sat before him in her white dress: he saw her as aflower; and in fluent, agreeable, well-bred and cultivated speech hehas talked to us about her. The portrait has the charm of rare andexquisite conversation; we float in a tide of sensation. He was onlyaware of her white dress, her pretty arm and hand laid on her softlap. But while we merely see Kitty, we perceive and think ofGainsborough's portrait of Miss Willoughby. We realise her in othercircumstances, away from the beautiful blue trees under which he hasso happily placed her; we can see her receiving visitors on theterrace, or leaning over the balustrade looking down the valley, wondering why life has come to her so sadly. We see her in hereighteenth-century drawing-room amid Chippendale and Adams furniture, reading an old novel. No one ever cared much about Miss Willoughby. There is little sensuous charm in her long narrow face, in her hairfalling in ringlets over her shoulders; and we are sure that she oftenreflected on the bitterness of life. But Kitty never looked into theheart of things: when life coincided with her desires, she laughed andwas glad; when things, to use her own words, "went wrong", she wept. And in these two portraits we read the stories of the painters' souls. 

But the question of nationality, of country, in art detains us. Beautiful beyond compare is the art of Tourguenieff; but how much moreintimate, how much deeper is the delight that a Russian finds in hisnovels than ours! However truly the purely artistic qualities maytouch us--great art is universal--we miss our native land and ourrace in Tourguenieff. We find both in Dickens, in Thackeray. MissAusten and Fielding have little else; and vague though Fielding may bein form, still his pages are England, and they whisper the life weinherited from long ago. The superb Rembrandt in the next room, theGentleman with a Hawk, lent by the Duke of Westminster, is a humanrevelation. We only perceive in it the charm, the adorableness, theeternal adventure of youth; nationality disappears in the universal. This beautiful portrait was painted in 1643, a year after the"Night-watch". The date of the portrait of the Lady with the Fan isnot given. They differ widely in style; the portrait of the man is tenyears in advance of the portrait of the woman; it seems to approachvery closely, to touch on, the great style which he attained in 1664, the year when he painted the Syndics. Of his early style, thin, crabbed, and yellow, there is hardly a trace in the portrait of theMan with the Hawk; it is almost a complete emancipation, yet it wouldbe rash to say that the Lady with the Fan is an early work, painted inthe days of the Lesson in Anatomy. In Rembrandt's work we find suddenadvancements towards the grand final style, and these are immediatelyfollowed by hasty returnings to the hard, dry, and essentiallyunromantic manner of 1634. The portrait of the Young Man with the Hawkwas painted in middle life. But if it contains something more than thesuggestion of the qualities which twenty years later he developed andperfected for the admiration of all time, if the immortal flower ofRembrandt's genius was still unblown, this is blossom prematurelybreaking. The young man is shown upon darkness like a vision: the faceis illuminated mysteriously, the brush-work is large and firm, thepaint is substantial without being heavy, the canvas is smoky, anunnatural and yet a real atmosphere surrounds the head. The blackvelvet cap strikes in sharp relief against the background, whichlightens to a grey-green about the head. The modelling of the face isextraordinarily large and simple, and yet without omissions; we havein this portrait a perfect example of the art of being precise withoutbeing small. The young man is a young nobleman. He stands before uslooking at us, and yet his eyes are not fixed; his moustache is goldenand frizzled; his cheeks are coloured slightly; but the picture ispractically made of a few greys and greens, and white, slightly tintedwith bitumen; yet we do not feel, or feel very little, any lack ofcolouring matter. Rembrandt realised in the romantic young man hisideal of young masculine beauty. Truly a beautiful work, neither theboyhood nor the manhood, but the adolescence of Rembrandt's genius. 

Between the portrait of the Lady with a Fan and Sir Joshua's portraitof Miss Frances Crewe it would be permissible to hesitate; but tohesitate even for one instant between Miss Crewe and the Young Manwith the Hawk would be unpardonable. Sir Joshua painted as he thought;he had an instinctive sense of decoration and a deep and tenderfeeling for beauty; he was especially sensible to the agreeable andgay aspect of things; his eyes at once seize the pleasing andpicturesque contour, and his mind divined a charming and effectivescheme of colour. He saw character too; all the surfacecharacteristics of his model were plain to him, and when he was sominded he painted with rare intelligence and insight. He did not seedeeply, but he saw clearly. Gainsborough did not see so clearly, norwas his hand as prompt to express his vision as Sir Joshua's; butGainsborough saw further, for he felt more keenly and more profoundly. But light indeed were their minds compared with Rembrandt's. Rembrandtwas a great visionary; to him the outsides of things were symbols ofelemental truths, which he expressed in a form mighty as the truthsthemselves. There is no question of comparison between him on one handand Reynolds and Gainsborough on the other. Yet we should hesitate todestroy our Reynolds and Gainsboroughs, to preserve any works of art, however beautiful. Were we to keep what our reason told us was thegreatest, we should feel as one who surrendered England to save therest of the world, or as a parent who sacrificed his children to savea million men from the scaffold. 

SEX IN ART. 

Woman's nature is more facile and fluent than man's. Women do thingsmore easily than men, but they do not penetrate below the surface, andif they attempt to do so the attempt is but a clumsy masquerade inunbecoming costume. In their own costume they have succeeded asqueens, courtesans, and actresses, but in the higher arts, inpainting, in music, and literature, their achievements are slightindeed--best when confined to the arrangements of themes invented bymen--amiable transpositions suitable to boudoirs and fans. 

I have heard that some women hold that the mission of their sexextends beyond the boudoir and the nursery. It is certainly not withinmy province to discuss so important a question, but I think it isclear that all that is best in woman's art is done within the limits Ihave mentioned. This conclusion is well-nigh forced upon us when weconsider what would mean the withdrawal of all that women have done inart. The world would certainly be the poorer by some half-dozencharming novels, by a few charming poems and sketches in oil andwater-colour; but it cannot be maintained, at least not seriously, that if these charming triflings were withdrawn there would remain anygap in the world's art to be filled up. Women have created nothing, they have carried the art of men across their fans charmingly, withexquisite taste, delicacy, and subtlety of feeling, and they havehideously and most mournfully parodied the art of men. George Eliot isone in whom sex seems to have hesitated, and this unfortunatehesitation was afterwards intensified by unhappy circumstances. Shewas one of those women who so entirely mistook her vocation as toattempt to think, and really if she had assumed the dress and theduties of a policeman, her failure could hardly have been morecomplete. Jane Austen, on the contrary, adventured in no such dismalmasquerade; she was a nice maiden lady, gifted with a bright clearintelligence, diversified with the charms of light wit and fancy, andas she was content to be in art what she was in nature, her bookslive, while those of her ponderous rival are being very rapidlyforgotten. "Romola" and "Daniel Deronda" are dead beyond hope ofresurrection; "The Mill on the Floss", being more feminine, stilllives, even though its destiny is to be forgotten when "Pride andPrejudice" is remembered. 

Sex is as important an element in a work of art as it is in life; allart that lives is full of sex. There is sex in "Pride and Prejudice";"Jane Eyre" and "Aurora Leigh" are full of sex; "Romola", "DanielDeronda", and "Adam Bede" are sexless, and therefore lifeless. Thereis very little sex in George Sand's works, and they, too, have gonethe way of sexless things. When I say that all art that lives is fullof sex, I do not mean that the artist must have led a profligate life;I mean, indeed, the very opposite. George Sand's life was notoriouslyprofligate, and her books tell the tale. I mean by sex thatconcentrated essence of life which the great artist jealously reservesfor his art, and through which it pulsates. Shelley deserted his wife, but his thoughts never wandered far from Mary. Dante, according torecent discoveries, led a profligate life, while adoring Beatricethrough interminable cantos. So profligacy is clearly not the word Iwant. I think that gallantry expresses my meaning better. 

The great artist and Don Juan are irreparably antagonistic; one cannotcontain the other. Notwithstanding all the novels that have beenwritten to prove the contrary, it is certain that woman occupies but asmall place in the life of an artist. She is never more than a charm, a relaxation, in his life; and even when he strains her to his bosom, oceans are between them. Profligate, I am afraid, history proves theartist sometimes to have been, but his profligacy is only ephemeraland circumstantial; what is abiding in him is chastity of mind, thoughnot always of body; his whole mind is given to his art, and all vaguephilanderings and sentimental musings are unknown to him; the women heknows and perceives are only food for it, and have no share in hismental life. And it is just because man can raise himself above thesentimental cravings of natural affection that his art is soinfinitely higher than woman's art. "Man's love is from man's life athing apart"--you know the quotation from Byron, "Tis woman's wholeexistence. " The natural affections fill a woman's whole life, and herart is only so much sighing and gossiping about them. Very delightfuland charming gossiping it often is--full of a sweetness and tendernesswhich we could not well spare, but always without force or dignity. 

In her art woman is always in evening dress: there are flowers in herhair, and her fan waves to and fro, and she wishes to sigh in the earof him who sits beside her. Her mental nudeness is parallel with herlow bodice, it is that and nothing more. She will make no sacrificefor her art; she will not tell the truth about herself as frankly asJean-Jacques, nor will she observe life from the outside with thegrave impersonal vision of Flaubert. In music women have done nothing, and in painting their achievement has been almost as slight. It isonly in the inferior art--the art of acting--that women approach men. In that art it is not certain that they do not stand even higher. 

Whatever women have done in painting has been done in France. Englandproduces countless thousands of lady artists; twenty Englishwomenpaint for one Frenchwoman, but we have not yet succeeded in producingtwo that compare with Madame Lebrun and Madame Berthe Morisot. Theonly two Englishwomen who have in painting come prominently before thepublic are Angelica Kauffman and Lady Butler. The first-named had thegood fortune to live in the great age, and though her work isindividually feeble, it is stamped with the charm of the tradition outof which it grew and was fashioned. Moreover, she was content toremain a woman in her art. She imitated Sir Joshua Reynolds to thebest of her ability, and did all in her power to induce him to marryher. How she could have shown more wisdom it is difficult to see. LadyButler was not so fortunate, either in the date of her birth, in herselection of a master, or her manner of imitating him. Angelicaimitated as a woman should. She carried the art of Sir Joshua acrossher fan; she arranged and adorned it with ribbons and sighs, and wascontent with such modest achievement. 

Lady Butler, however, thought she could do more than to sentimentalisewith De Neuville's soldiers. She adopted his method, and from thissame standpoint tried to do better; her attitude towards him was thesame as Rosa Bonheur's towards Troyon; and the failure of Lady Butlerwas even greater than Rosa Bonheur's. But perhaps the best instance Icould select to show how impossible it is for women to do more than toaccept the themes invented by men, and to decorate and arrange themaccording to their pretty feminine fancies, is the collection of LadyWaterford's drawings now on exhibition at Lady Brownlow's house inCarlton House Terrace. 

Lady Waterford for many years--for more than a quarter of acentury--has been spoken of as the one amateur of genius; and thegreatest artists vied with each other as to which should pay the mostextravagant homage to her talent. Mr. Watts seems to have distancedall competitors in praise of her, for in a letter of his quoted in thememoir prefixed to the catalogue, he says that she has exceeded allthe great Venetian masters. It was nice of Mr. Watts to write such aletter; it was very foolish of Lady Brownlow to print it in thecatalogue, for it serves no purpose except to draw attention to theobvious deficiencies of originality in Lady Waterford's drawings. Nearly all of them are remarkable for facile grouping; and the colouris rich, somewhat heavy, but generally harmonious; the drawing ispainfully conventional; it would be impossible to find a hand, an arm, a face that has been tenderly observed and rendered with any personalfeeling or passion. 

The cartoons are not better than any mediocre student of theBeaux-Arts could do--insipid parodies of the Venetian--whom sheexcels, according to Mr. Watts. When Lady Waterford attempted no morethan a decorative ring of children dancing in a richly colouredlandscape, or a group of harvesters seen against a rich decorativesky, such a design as might be brought across a fan, her talent isseen to best advantage; it is a fluent and facile talent, strangelyunoriginal, but always sustained by taste acquired by long study ofthe Venetians, and by a superficial understanding of their genius. 

Many times superior to Lady Waterford is Miss Armstrong--a lady inwhose drawings of children we perceive just that light tenderness andfanciful imagination which is not of our sex. Perhaps memory betraysme; it is a long while since I have seen Miss Armstrong's pastels, butmy impression is that Miss Armstrong stands easily at the head ofEnglish lady artists--above Mrs. Swynnerton, whose resolute anddistinguished talent was never more abundantly and strikinglymanifested than in her picture entitled "Midsummer", now hanging inthe New Gallery. "Midsummer" is a fine piece of intellectual painting, but it proceeds merely from the brain; there is hardly anything of thepainter's nature in it; there are no surprising admissions in it; thepainter never stood back abashed and asked herself if she should haveconfessed so much, if she should have told the world so much of whatwas passing in her intimate soul and flesh. 

Impersonality in art really means mediocrity. If you have nothing totell about yourself, or if courage be lacking in you to tell thetruth, you are not an artist. Are women without souls, or is it thatthey dare not reveal their souls unadorned with the laces and ribbonsof convention? Their memoirs are a tissue of lies, suppressions, andhalf-truths. George Sand must fain suppress all mention of her Italianjourney with Musset, a true account of which would have been animmortal story; but of hypocritical hare-hearted allusions Rousseauand Casanova were not made; in their memoirs women never get furtherthan some slight fingering of laces; and in their novels they are toosubject to their own natures to attain the perfect and completerealisation of self, which the so-called impersonal method aloneaffords. Women astonish us as much by their want of originality asthey do by their extraordinary powers of assimilation. I am thinkingnow of the ladies who marry painters, and who, after a few years ofmarried life, exhibit work identical in execution with that of theirillustrious husbands--Mrs. E. M. Ward, Madame Fantin-Latour, Mrs. Swan, Mrs. Alma-Tadema. How interesting these households must be!Immediately after breakfast husband and wife sit down at their easels. "Let me mix a tone for you, dear, " "I think I would put that up alittle higher, " etc. In a word, what Manet used to call _la peinture àquatre mains_. 

Nevertheless, among these well-intentioned ladies we find one artistof rare excellence--I mean Madame Lebrun. We all know her beautifulportrait of a woman walking forward, her hands in a muff. Seeing theengraving from a distance we might take it for a Romney; but when weapproach, the quality of the painting visible through the engravingtells us that it belongs to the French school. In design the portraitis strangely like a Romney; it is full of all that brightness andgrace, and that feminine refinement, which is a distinguishingcharacteristic of his genius, and which was especially impressed on mymemory by the portrait of the lady in the white dress walking forward, her hands in front of her, the slight fingers pressed one against theother, exhibited this year in the exhibition of Old Masters in theAcademy. 

But if we deny that the portrait of the lady with the muff affordstestimony as to the sex of the painter, we must admit that none but awoman could have conceived the portrait which Madame Lebrun painted ofherself and her little daughter. The painting may be somewhat dry andhard, it certainly betrays none of the fluid nervous tendernesses andgraces of the female temperament; but surely none but a woman and amother could have designed that original and expressive composition;it was a mother who found instinctively that touching and expressivemovement--the mother's arms circled about her little daughter'swaist, the little girl leaning forward, her face resting on hermother's shoulder. Never before did artist epitomise in a gesture allthe familiar affection and simple persuasive happiness of home; thevery atmosphere of an embrace is in this picture. And in this picturethe painter reveals herself to us in one of the intimate moments ofher daily life, the tender, wistful moment when a mother receives hergrowing girl in her arms, the adolescent girl having run she knows notwhy to her mother. These two portraits, both in the Louvre, are, Iregret to say, the only pictures of Madame Lebrun that I am acquaintedwith. But I doubt if my admiration would be increased by a widerknowledge of her work. She seems to have said everything she had tosay in these two pictures. 

Madame Lebrun painted well, but she invented nothing, she failed tomake her own of any special manner of seeing and rendering things; shefailed to create a style. Only one woman did this, and that woman isMadame Morisot, and her pictures are the only pictures painted by awoman that could not be destroyed without creating a blank, a hiatusin the history of art. True that the hiatus would be slight--insignificant if you will--but the insignificant is sometimesdear to us; and though nightingales, thrushes, and skylarks were tosing in King's Bench Walk, I should miss the individual chirp of thepretty sparrow. 

Madame Morisot's note is perhaps as insignificant as a sparrow's, butit is as unique and as individual a note. She has created a style, andhas done so by investing her art with all her femininity; her art isno dull parody of ours: it is all womanhood--sweet and gracious, tender and wistful womanhood. Her first pictures were painted underthe influence of Corot, and two of these early works were hung in theexhibition of her works held the other day at Goupil's, BoulevardMontmartre. The more important was, I remember, a view of Paris seenfrom a suburb--a green railing and two loitering nursemaids in theforeground, the middle of the picture filled with the city faintlyseen and faintly glittering in the hour of the sun's decline, betweenfour and six. It was no disagreeable or ridiculous parody of Corot; itwas Corot feminised, Corot reflected in a woman's soul, a woman's loveof man's genius, a lake-reflected moon. But Corot's influence did notendure. Through her sister's marriage Madame Morisot came in contactwith Manet, and she was quick to recognise him as being the greatestartist that France had produced since Delacroix. 

Henceforth she never faltered in her allegiance to the genius of hergreat brother-in-law. True, that she attempted no more than to carryhis art across her fan; but how adorably she did this! She got fromhim that handling out of which the colour flows joyous and bright aswell-water, the handling that was necessary for the realisation ofthat dream of hers, a light world afloat in an irradiation--lighttrembling upon the shallows of artificial water, where swans andaquatic birds are plunging, and light skiffs are moored; light turningthe summer trees to blue; light sleeping a soft and lucid sleep in theunderwoods; light illumining the green summer of leaves where thediamond rain is still dripping; light transforming into jewellery thehappy flight of bees and butterflies. Her swans are not diagrams drawnupon the water, their whiteness appears and disappears in thetrembling of the light; and the underwood, how warm and quiet it is, and penetrated with the life of the summer; and the yellow-paintedskiff, how happy and how real! Colours, tints of faint green and mauvepassed lightly, a few branches indicated. Truly, the art of Manet_transporté en éventail_. 

A brush that writes rather than paints, that writes exquisite notes inthe sweet seduction of a perfect epistolary style, notes written in aboudoir, notes of invitation, sometimes confessions of love, the wholefeminine heart trembling as a hurt bird trembles in a man's hand. Andhere are yachts and blue water, the water full of the blueness of thesky; and the confusion of masts and rigging is perfectly indicatedwithout tiresome explanation! The colour is deep and rich, for thevalues have been truly observed; and the pink house on the left is anexquisite note. No deep solutions, an art afloat and adrift upon thecanvas, as a woman's life floats on the surface of life. "Mysister-in-law would not have existed without me, " I remember Manetsaying to me in one of the long days we spent together in the Rued'Amsterdam. True, indeed, that she would not have existed withouthim; and yet she has something that he has not--the charm of anexquisite feminine fancy, the charm of her sex. Madame Morisot is theeighteenth century quick with the nineteenth; she is the nineteenthturning her eyes regretfully looking back on the eighteenth. 

Chaplin parodied the eighteenth century; in Madame Morisot somethingof its gracious spirit naturally resides; she is eighteenth centuryespecially in her drawings; they are fluent and flowing; nowhere do wedetect a measurement taken, they are free of tricks--that is to say ofignorance assuming airs of learning. That red chalk drawing of a nakedgirl, how simple, loose, and unaffected, how purged of the odiouserudition of the modern studio. And her precious and naturalremembrance of the great century, with all its love of youth and thebeauties of youthful lines, is especially noticeable in the red chalkdrawing of the girl wearing a bonnet, the veil falling and hiding herbeautiful eyes. As I stood lost in admiration of this drawing, I hearda rough voice behind me: "C'est bien beau, n'est pas?" It was ClaudeMonet. "Yes, isn't it superb?" I answered. "I wonder how much they'llsell it for. " "I'll soon find out that, " said Monet, and turning tothe attendant he asked the question. 

"Pour vous, sept cents cinquante francs. "

"C'est bien; il est à moi. "

This anecdote will give a better idea of the value of Berthe Morisotthan seventy columns of mine or any other man's criticism. 

MR. STEER'S EXHIBITION. 

1892. 

Before sitting down to paint a landscape the artist must make up hismind whether he is going to use the trees, meadows, streams, andmountains before him as subject-matter for a decoration in the mannerof the Japanese, or whether he will take them as subject-matter forthe expression of a human emotion in the manner of Wilson and Millet. I offer no opinion which is the higher and which is the lower road;they may be wide apart, they may draw very close together, they mayoverlap so that it is difficult to say along which the artist isgoing; but, speaking roughly, there are but two roads, and it isnecessary that the artist should choose between them. But this pointhas been fully discussed elsewhere, and I only allude to it herebecause I wish to assure my readers that Mr. Steer's exhibition is not"Folkestone at low tide" and "Folkestone at high tide". 

In all the criticisms I have seen of the present exhibition it hasbeen admitted that Mr. Steer takes a foremost place in what is knownas the modern movement. I also noticed that it was admitted that Mr. Steer is a born artist. The expression, from constant use, has lostits true significance; yet to find another phrase that would expressthe idea more explicitly would be difficult; the born artist, meaningthe man in whom feeling and expression are one. 

The growth of a work of art is as inexplicable as that of a flower. Weknow that there are men who feel deeply and who understand clearlywhat a work of art should be; but when they attempt to create, theirefforts are abortive. Their ideas, their desires, their intentions, their plans, are excellent; but the passage between the brain and thecanvas, between the brain and the sheet of paper, is full ofshipwrecking reefs, and the intentions of these men do not correspondin the least with their execution. Noticing our blank faces, theyexplain their ideas in front of their works. They meant this, theymeant that. Inwardly we answer, "All you say is most interesting; butwhy didn't you put all that into your picture, into your novel?"

Then Mr. Steer is not an abortive genius, for his ideas do not come toutter shipwreck in the perilous passage; they often lose a spar ortwo, they sometimes appear in a more or less dismantled condition, butthey retain their masts; they come in with some yards of canvas stillset, and the severest criticism that can be passed on them is, "With alittle better luck that would have been a very fine thing indeed. " Andnot infrequently Mr. Steer's pictures correspond very closely with themental conception in which they originated; sometimes little ornothing has been lost as the idea passed from the brain to the canvas, and it is on account of these pictures that we say that Mr. Steer is aborn artist. This once granted, the question arises: is this bornartist likewise a great artist--will he formulate his sensation, andgive us a new manner of feeling and seeing, or will he merely succeedin painting some beautiful pictures when circumstances and the mood ofthe moment combine in his favour? This is a question which all whovisit the exhibition of this artist's work, now on view in the GoupilGalleries, will ask themselves. They will ask if this be the furthestlimit to which he may go, or if he will discover a style entirely hisown which will enable him to convey all his sensation of life upon thecanvas. 

That Mr. Steer's drawing does not suggest a future draughtsman seemsto matter little, for we remember that colour, and not form, is theimpulse that urges and inspires him. Mr. Steer draws well enough totake a high place if he can overcome more serious defects. Hisgreatest peril seems to me to be an uncontrollable desire to paint inthe style of the last man whose work has interested him. At one timeit was only in his most unguarded moments that he could see alandscape otherwise than as Monet saw it; a year or two later it wasWhistler who dictated certain schemes of colour, certain harmoniousarrangements of black; and the most distressing symptom of all is thatMr. Brabazon could not hold an exhibition of some very nice tints ofrose and blue without inspiring Mr. Steer to go and swish water-colourabout in the same manner. Mr. Steer has the defect of his qualities;his perceptions are naïve: and just as he must have thought sevenyears ago that all modern landscape-painters must be more or less likeMonet, he must have thought last summer that all modern water-colourmust be more or less like Mr. Brabazon. This is doubly unfortunate, because Mr. Steer is only good when he is Steer, and nothing butSteer. 

How much we should borrow, and how we should borrow, are questionswhich will agitate artists for all time. It is certain, however, thatone of the most certain signs of genius is the power to take fromothers and to assimilate. How much did Rubens take from Titian? Howmuch did Mr. Whistler take from the Japanese? Almost everything in Mr. Whistler already existed in art. In the National Gallery the whitestocking in the Philip reminds us of the white stockings in theportrait of Miss Alexander. In the British Museum we find the shadowsthat he transferred from Rembrandt to his own etchings. Degas took hisdrawing from Ingres and his colour--that lovely brown!--from Poussin. But, notwithstanding their vast borrowings, Rubens is always Rubens, Whistler is always Whistler, and Degas is always Degas. Alexander tooka good deal, too, but he too remained always Alexander. We mustconquer what we take. But what Mr. Steer takes often conquers him; heis often like one suffering from a weak digestion, he cannotassimilate. I must except, however, that very beautiful picture, "TwoYachts lying off Cowes". Under a deepening sky of mauve the yachtslie, their lights and rigging showing through the twilight. We may saythat this picture owes something to Mr. Whistler; but the debt is notdistressing; it does not strike the eye; it does not prevent us fromseeing the picture--a very beautiful piece of decoration in a high keyof colour--a picture which it would be difficult to find fault with. It is without fault; the intention of the artist was a beautiful one, and it has been completely rendered. I like quite as well "The Casino, Boulogne", the property, I note with some interest, of Mr. HumphryWard, art critic of the _Times_. Mr. Humphry Ward must writeconventional commonplace, otherwise he could not remain art critic ofthe _Times_, so it is pleasant to find that he is withal an excellentjudge of a picture. The picture, I suppose, in a very remote anddistant way, may be said to be in the style of Wilson. Again asuccessful assimilation. The buildings stand high up, they are piledhigh up in the picture, and a beautiful blue envelops sky, sea, andland. Nos. 1 and 2 show Mr. Steer at his best: that beautiful blue, that beautiful mauve, is the optimism of painting. Such colour is tothe colourist what the drug is to the opium-eater: nothing matters, the world is behind us, and we dream on and on, lost in an infinity ofsuggestion. This quality, which, for want of a better expression, Icall the optimism of painting, is a peculiar characteristic of Mr. Steer's work. We find it again in "Children Paddling". Around the longbreakwater the sea winds, filling the estuary, or perchance recedes, for the incoming tide is noisier; a delicious, happy, opium blue, theblue of oblivion.... Paddling in the warm sea-water gives oblivion tothose children. They forget their little worries in the sensation ofsea and sand, as I forget mine in that dreamy blue which fades anddeepens imperceptibly, like a flower from the intense heart to thedelicate edge of the petals. 

The vague sea is drawn up behind the breakwater, and out of it thebroad sky ascends solemnly in curves like palms. Happy sensation ofdaylight; a flower-like afternoon; little children paddling; the worldis behind them; they are as flowers, and are conscious only of thebenedictive influences of sand and sea and sky. 

The exhibition contains nearly every description of work: full-lengthportraits in oil, life-size heads, eight-inch panels, and somehalf-dozen water-colours. A little girl in a starched white frock is acharming picture, and the large picture entitled "The Sofa" is a mostdistinguished piece of work, full of true pictorial feeling. Mr. Steeris never common or vulgar; he is distinguished even when he fails. "AGirl in a Large Hat" is a picture which became my property some threeor four months ago. Since then I have seen it every day, and I like itbetter and better. That hat is so well placed in the canvas; theexpression of the face and body, are they not perfect? What an air ofresignation, of pensiveness, this picture exhales! The jacket is donewith a few touches, but they are sufficient, for they are in theirright places. And the colour! Hardly do you find any, and yet there isan effect of colour which few painters could attain when they hadexhausted all the resources of the palette. 

CLAUDE MONET. 

Whether the pictures in the Royal Academy be bad or good, thejournalist must describe them. The public goes to the Academy, and thejournalist must follow the traffic, like the omnibuses. But thepublic, the English public, does not go to the Salon or to the Champde Mars. Why, then, should our newspapers waste space on thedescription of pictures which not one reader in fifty has seen or willsee? I suppose the demon of actuality is answerable for the wastedcolumns, and the demon of habit for my yearly wanderings over desertsof cocoa-nut matting, under tropical skylights, in continual tormentfrom glaring oil-paintings. Of the days I have spent in thoseexhibitions, nothing remains but the memory of discomfort, and thesense of relief experienced on coming to a room in which there were nopictures. Ah, the arm-chairs into which I slipped and the tapestriesthat rested my jaded eyes! ... So this year I resolved to break withhabit and to visit neither the Salon nor the Champ de Mars. An artcritic I am, but surely independent of pictures--at least, of modernpictures; indeed, they stand between me and the interesting articleninety times in a hundred. 

Only now and then do we meet a modern artist about whom we mayrhapsodise, or at whom we may curse: Claude Monet is surely such anone. So I pricked up my ears when I heard there was an exhibition ofhis work at Durand Ruel's. I felt I was on the trail of an interestingarticle, and away I went. The first time I pondered and argued withmyself. Then I went with an intelligent lady, and was garrulous, explanatory, and theoretical; she listened, and said she would writeout all I had said from her point of view. The third time I went withtwo artists. We were equally garrulous and argumentative, and with theresult that we three left the exhibition more than ever confirmed inthe truth of our opinions. I mention these facts, not, as theill-natured might suppose, because it pleases me to write about my ownsayings and doings, but because I believe my conduct to be typical ofthe conduct of hundreds of others in regard to the present exhibitionin the Rue Laffitte; for, let this be said in Monet's honour: everyday artists from every country in Europe go there by themselves, withtheir women friends, and with other artists, and every day since theexhibition opened, the galleries have been the scene of passionatediscussion. 

My own position regarding Monet is a peculiar one, and I give it forwhat it is worth. It is about eighteen years since I first made theacquaintance of this remarkable man. Though at first shocked, I wassoon convinced of his talent, and set myself about praising him aswell as I knew how. But my prophesying was answered by scoffs, jeers, supercilious smiles. Outside of the Café of the Nouvelle Athènes, Monet was a laughing-stock. Manet was bad enough; but when it came toMonet, words were inadequate to express sufficient contempt. A shrugof the shoulders or a pitying look, which clearly meant, "Art thoumost of madman or simpleton, or, maybe, impudent charlatan who wouldattract attention to himself by professing admiration for sucheccentricity?"

It was thus eighteen years ago; but revolution has changed depth toheight, and Monet is now looked upon as the creator of the art oflandscape painting; before him nothing was, after him nothing can be, for he has said all things and made the advent of another painterimpossible, inconceivable. He who could never do a right thing can nowdo no wrong one. Canvases beside which the vaguest of Mr. Whistler'snocturnes are clear statements of plain fact, lilac-coloured canvasesvoid of design or tone, or quality of paint, are accepted by acomplacent public, and bought by American millionaires for vast sums;and the early canvases about which Paris would not once tolerate aword of praise, are now considered old-fashioned. My personal concernin all this enthusiasm--the enthusiasm of the fashionablemarket-place--is that I once more find myself a dissident, and adissident in a very small minority. I think of Monet now as I thoughtof him eighteen years ago. For no moment did it seem to me possible tothink of him as an equal of Corot or of Millet. He seemed a painter ofgreat talent, of exceptional dexterity of hand, and of clear and rapidvision. His vision seemed then somewhat impersonal; the temper of hismind did not illuminate his pictures; he was a marvellous mirror, reproducing all the passing phenomena of Nature; and that was all. Andlooking at his latest work, his views of Rouen Cathedral, it seems tome that he has merely continued to develop the qualities for which wefirst admired him--clearness of vision and a marvellous technicalexecution. So extraordinary is this later execution that, bycomparison, the earlier seems timid and weak. His naturalism hasexpanded and strengthened: mine has decayed and almost fallen from me. 

Monet's handicraft has grown like a weed; it now overtops and chokesthe idea; it seems in these façades to exist by itself, like amonstrous and unnatural ivy, independent of support; and whenexpression outruns the thought, it ceases to charm. We admire themarvellous mastery with which Monet drew tower and portico: see thattower lifted out of blue haze, no delicacy of real perspective hasbeen omitted; see that portico bathed in sunlight and shadow, no formof ornament has been slurred; but we are fain of some personal senseof beauty, we miss that rare delicacy of perception which delights usin Mr. Whistler's "Venice", and in Guardi's vision of cupolas, stairways, roofs, gondolas, and waterways. Monet sees clearly, and hesees truly, but does he see beautifully? is his an enchanted vision?And is not every picture that fails to move, to transport, to enchant, a mistake?

A work of art is complete in itself. But is any one of these picturescomplete in itself? Is not the effect they produce dependent on thenumber, and may not this set of pictures be compared to a set ofscenes in a theatre, the effect of which is attained by combination?There is no foreground in them; the cathedral is always in the firstplane, directly, under the eye of the spectator, the wall running outof the picture. The spectator says, "What extraordinary power wasnecessary to paint twelve views of that cathedral without once havingrecourse to the illusion of distance!" A feat no doubt it was; andtherein we perceive the artistic weakness of the pictures. For artmust not be confounded with the strong man in the fair who straddles, holding a full-grown woman on the palm of his hand. 

Then the question of the quality of paint. Manet's paint was beautifulas that of an old master; brilliant as an enamel, smooth as an oldivory. But the quality of paint in Monet is that of stone and mortar. It would seem (the thought is too monstrous to be entertained) as ifhe had striven by thickness of paint and roughness of the handling toreproduce the very material quality of the stonework. This would berealism _à outrance_. I will not think that Monet was haunted for asingle instant by so shameful a thought. However this may be, the factremains that a _trompe-l'oeil_ has been achieved, and four inches ofany one of these pictures looked at separately would be mistaken bysight and touch for a piece of stonework. In another picture, in ahaystack with the sun shining on it, the _trompe-l'oeil_ has againbeen as cleverly achieved as by the most cunning of scene-painters. Sothe haystack is a popular delight. 

NOTES. 

MR. MARK FISHER. 

Mark Fisher is a nineteenth-century Morland; the disposition of mindand character of vision seem the same in both painters, the outlookalmost identical: the same affectionate interest in humble life, thesame power of apprehending the pathos of work, the same sympathy forthe life that thinks not. But beyond these qualities of mind common toboth painters, Morland possessed a sense of beauty and grace which isabsent in Mark Fisher. Morland's pig-styes are more beautifully seenthan Mark Fisher could see them. But is the sense of beauty, which wasmost certainly Morland's, so inherent and independent a possessionthat we must regard it as his rather than the common inheritance ofthose who lived in his time? Surely Mark Fisher would have seen morebeautifully if he had lived in the eighteenth century? Or, to put thecase more clearly, surely Morland would have seen very much as MarkFisher sees if he had lived in the nineteenth? Think of the work doneby Morland in the field and farmyard--it is in that work that helives; compare it with Mark Fisher's, subtracting, of course, all thatMorland owed to his time, quality of paint, and a certain easy senseof beauty, and say if you can that both men do not stand on the sameintellectual plane. 

To tell the story of the life of the fields, and to tell it sincerely, without false sentiment, was their desire; nor do we detect in eitherMorland or Mark Fisher any pretence of seeing more in their subjectsthan is natural for them to see: in Jacques, yes. Jacques tried tothink profoundly, like Millet; Mark Fisher does not; nor was Morlandinfluenced by the caustic mind of Hogarth to satirise the animalism ofthe boors he painted. He saw rural life with the same kindly eyes asMark Fisher. The difference between the two men is a difference ofmeans, of expression--I mean the exterior envelope in which the workof the mind lives, and which preserves and assures a long life to thepainter. On this point no comparison is possible between theeighteenth and nineteenth century painter. We should seek in vain inMark Fisher for Morland's beautiful smooth painting, for his fluentand easy drawing, the complete and easy vehicle of his vision ofthings. Mark Fisher draws well, but he often draws awkwardly; hepossesses the sentiment of proportion and the instinct of anatomy; weadmire the sincerity and we recognise the truth, but we miss the charmof that easy and perfect expression which was current in Morland'stime. Mark Fisher is a man who has something to say and who says it ina somewhat barbarous manner. He dreams hardly at all, his thoughts areordinary, and are only saved from commonplace by his absence ofaffectation. He is not without sentiment, but his sentiment is alittle plain. His hand is his worst enemy; the touch is seldominteresting or beautiful. 

I said that Morland saw nature with the same kindly eyes as MarkFisher. I would have another word on that point. Mark Fisher'spainting is optimistic. His skies are blue, his sunlight dozes in theorchard, his chestnut trees are in bloom. The melodrama of naturenever appears in his pictures; his lanes and fields reflect a gentlemind that has found happiness in observing the changes of the seasons. Happy Mark Fisher! An admirable painter, the best, the onlylandscape-painter of our time; the one who continues the tradition ofPotter and Morland, and lives for his art, uninfluenced by the clamourof cliques. 

A PORTRAIT BY MR. SARGENT. 

Mr. Sargent has painted the portrait of a beautiful woman and of abeautiful drawing-room; the picture is full of technicalaccomplishment. But is it a beautiful picture?

She is dressed in cherry-coloured velvet, and she sits on the edge ofa Louis XV. Sofa, one arm by her side, the other thrown a littlebehind her, the hand leaning against the sofa. Behind her are paleyellow draperies, and under her feet is an Aubasson carpet. Thedrawing is swift, certain, and complete. The movement of the arm is sowell rendered that we know the exact pressure of the long fingers thatmelt into a padded silken sofa. But is the drawing distinguished, orsubtle, or refined? or is it mere parade of knowledge and practice ofhand? The face charms us with its actuality; but is there a touchintimately characteristic of the model? or is it merely a vivaciousappearance?

But if the drawing when judged by the highest standard fails tosatisfy us, what shall be said of the colour? Think of acherry-coloured velvet filling half the picture--the pale cherry pinkknown as cerise--with mauve lights, and behind it pale yellowishdraperies and an Aubasson carpet under the lady's feet. Of course thisis very "daring", but is it anything more? Is the colour deep andsonorous, like Alfred Stevens' red velvets; or is it thin and harsh, like Duran? Has any attempt been made to compose the colour, to carryit through the picture? There are a few touches of red in the carpet, none in the draperies, so the dress is practically a huge splashtransferred from nature to the canvas. And when we ask ourselves ifthe picture has style, is not the answer: It is merely the apotheosisof fashionable painting? It is what Messrs. Shannon, Hacker, andSolomon would like to do, but what they cannot do. Mr. Sargent hasrealised their dreams for them; he has told us what the new generationof Academicians want, he has revealed their souls' desire, and itis--_l'article de Paris. _

The portrait is therefore a prodigious success; to use an expressionwhich will be understood in the studios, "it knocks the walls silly";you see nothing else in the gallery; and it wins the suffrages of theartists and the public alike. Duran never drew so fluently as that, nor was he ever capable of so pictorial an intention. Chaplin, for itrecalls Chaplin, was always heavier, more conventional; above all, less real. For it is very real, and just the reality that ladies like, reality without grossness; in other words, without criticism. So Mr. Sargent gets his public, as the saying goes, "all round". He gets theladies, because it realises the ideal they have formed of themselves;he gets the artists, because it is the realisation of the pictorialideals of the present day. 

The picture has been described as marvellous, brilliant, astonishing, superb, but no one has described it as beautiful. Whether because ofthe commonness of the epithet, or because every one felt thatbeautiful was not the adjective that expressed the sensation thepicture awoke in him, I know not. It is essentially a picture of thehour; it fixes the idea of the moment and reminds one somewhat of a_première_ at the Vaudeville with Sarah in a new part. Every one is onthe _qui vive_. The _salle_ is alive with murmurs of approbation. Itis the joy of the passing hour, the delirium of the sensual present. The appeal is the same as that of food and drink and air and love. Butwhen painters are pursuing new ideals, when all that constitutes theappearance of our day has changed, I fear that many will turn with ashudder from its cold, material accomplishment. 

AN ORCHID BY MR. JAMES. 

A Kensington Museum student would have drawn that flower carefullywith a lead pencil; it would be washed with colour and stippled untilit reached the quality of wool, which is so much admired in that arttraining-school; and whenever the young lady was not satisfied withthe turn her work was taking, she would wash the displeasing portionout and start afresh. The difference--there are other differences--but the difference we are concerned with between this hypotheticalyoung person of Kensington education and Mr. James, is that thedrawing which Mr. James exhibits is not a faithful record of all thedifficulties that are met with in painting an orchid. A hundredorchids preceded the orchid on the wall--some were good in colour andfailed in drawing, and _vice versâ_. Others were excellent in drawingand colour, but the backgrounds did not come out right. All these weredestroyed. That mauve and grey orchid was probably not even sketchedin with a lead pencil. Mr. James desired an uninterrupted expressionof its beauty: to first sketch it with a pencil would be to losesomething of his first vividness of impression. It must flow straightout of the brush. But to attain such fluency it was necessary to paintthat orchid a hundred times before its form and colour were learntsufficiently to admit of the expression of all the flower's beauty inone painting. It is not that Mr. James has laboured less but ten timesmore than the Kensington student. But all the preliminary labourhaving been discarded, it seems as simple and as slight a thing as maybe--a flower in a glass, the flower drawn only in its essentials, theglass faintly indicated, a flowing tint of mauve dissolving to grey, the red heart of the flower for the centre of interest. A decorationfor where? I imagine it in a boudoir whose walls are stretched andwhose windows are curtained with grey silk. From the ceiling hangs achandelier, cut glass--pure Louis XV. The furniture that I see ismodern; but here and there a _tabouret_, a _guéridon_, or a delicate_étagère_, filled with tiny volumes of Musset and two or three raremodern writers, recall the eighteenth century. And who sits in thisdelicate boudoir perfumed with a faint scent, a sachet-scentedpocket-handkerchief? Surely one of Sargent's ladies. Perhaps the ladyin the shot-silk dress who sat on an eighteenth-century French sofatwo years ago in the Academy, her tiny, plump, curved white hand, drawn as well in its interior as in exterior limits, hanging over thegilt arm of the sofa. But she sits now, in the boudoir I haveimagined, in a low arm-chair covered with grey silk; her feet lie oneover the other on the long-haired rug; the fire burns low in thegrate, and the soft spring sunlight laps through the lace curtains, filling the room with a bland, moody, retrospective atmosphere. Shesits facing Mr. James's water-colour. She is looking at it, she doesnot see it; her thoughts are far away, and their importance is slight. 

THE WHISTLER ALBUM. 

The photograph of the portrait of Miss Alexander is as suggestive ofthe colour as a pianoforte arrangement of _Tristan_ is of theorchestration. The sounds of the different instruments come throughthe thin tinkle of the piano just as the colour of the blond hair, thedelicate passages of green-grey and green, come through the black andwhite of the photograph. Truly a beautiful thing! But "Before theMirror" reflects perhaps a deeper beauty. The influence of thatstrange man, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, is sufficiently plain in thispicture. He who could execute hardly at all in paint, and whose verseis Italian, though the author wrote and spoke no language but English, foisted the character of his genius upon all the poetry and paintingof his generation. It is as present in this picture as it is inSwinburne's first volume of Poems and Ballads. Mr. Whistler took thetype of woman and the sentiment of the picture from Rossetti; he sawthat even in painting Rossetti had something to say, and, lest anartistic thought should be lost to the world through inadequateexpression, he painted this picture. He did not go on paintingpictures in the Rossetti sentiment, because he thought he hadexhausted Rossetti in one picture. In this he was possibly mistaken, but the large, white, indolent shoulders, misshapen, almost grotesquein original Rossettis, are here in beautiful prime and plenitude; theline of the head and neck, the hair falling over the stooped shoulder--a sensuous dream it is; all her body's beauty, to borrow a phrasefrom Rossetti, is in that white dress; and the beauty of the arm inits full white sleeve lies along the white chimney-piece, the fingerslanguidly open: two fallen over the edge, two touching the blue vase. Note how beautiful is the placing of this figure in the picture; howthe golden head shines, high up in the right-hand corner, and thewhite dress and white-sleeved arms fill the picture with an exquisitemusic of proportion. The dress cuts against the black grate, and theangle of black is the very happiest; it is brightened with pink spraysof azaleas, and they seem to whisper the very enchanted bloom of theirlife into the picture. Never did Dutch or Japanese artist paintflowers like these. And the fluent music of the painting seems only toenforce the languor and reverie which this canvas exhales: the languorof white dress and gold hair; languor and golden reverie float in themirror like a sunset in placid waters. The profile in full light isthrilled with grief of present hours; the full face half lost inshadow, far away--a ghost of a dead self--is dreaming with half-closedeyes, unmindful of what may be. By her mirror, gowned in white as iffor dreams, she watches life flowing past her, and she knows of no useto make of it. 

INGRES. 

Raphael was a great designer, but there are a purity and a passion inIngres' line for the like of which we have to go back to the Greeks. Apelles could not have realised more exquisite simplifications, couldnot have dreamed into any of his lost works a purer soul of beautythan Ingres did into the head, arms, and torso of "La Source". Theline that floats about the muscles of an arm is illusive, evanescent, as an evening-tinted sky; and none except the Greeks and Ingres haveattained such mystery of line: not Raphael, not even Michael Angelo inthe romantic anatomies of his stupendous creations. Ingres was aFrenchman animated by the soul of an ancient Greek, an ancient Greekwho lost himself in Japan. There is as much mystery in Ingres' line asin Rembrandt's light and shade. The arms and wrists and hands of thelady seated among the blue cushions in the Louvre are as illusive asany one of Mr. Whistler's "Nocturnes". The beautiful "Andromeda", headand throat leaned back almost out of nature, wild eyes and mass ofheavy hair, long white arms uplifted, chained to the basalt, --how rarethe simplifications, those arms, that body, the straight flanks andslender leg advancing, --are made of lines simple and beautiful asthose which in the Venus of Milo realise the architectural beauty ofwoman. We shrink from such comparison, for perforce we see that thegrandeur of the Venus is not in the Andromeda: but in both is the samequality of beauty. In the drawing for the odalisque, in her long back, wonderful as a stem of woodbine, there is the very same love of formwhich a Greek expressed with the benign ease of a god speaking hiscreation through the harmonious universe. 

But the pure, unconscious love of form, inherited from the Greeks, sometimes turned to passion in Ingres: not in "La Source", she iswholly Greek; but in the beautiful sinuous back of the odalisque weperceive some of the exasperation of nerves which betrays our century. If Phidias' sketches had come down to us, the margin filled with hishesitations, we should know more of his intimate personality. Younotice, my dear reader, how intolerant I am of criticism of my idol, how I repudiate any slight suggestion of imperfection, how I turn uponmyself and defend my god. Before going to bed, I often stand, candlein hand, before the Roman lady and enumerate the adorable perfectionsof the drawing. I am aware of my weakness, I have pleaded guilty to anidolatrous worship, but, if I have expressed myself as I intended, mygreat love will seem neither vain nor unreasonable. For surely forquality of beautiful line this man stands nearer to the Greeks thanany other. 

SOME JAPANESE PRINTS. 

"Ladies Under Trees". Not Japanese ladies walking under Japanesetrees--that is to say, trees peculiar to Japan, planted and fashionedaccording to the mode of Japan--but merely ladies walking under trees. True that the costumes are Japanese, the writing on the wall is inJapanese characters, the umbrellas and the idol on the tray areJapanese; universality is not attained by the simple device ofdressing the model in a sheet and eliminating all accessories thatmight betray time and country; the great artist accepts the costume ofhis time and all the special signs of his time, and merely by thelovely exercise of genius the mere accidents of a generation becomethe symbolic expression of universal sensation and lasting truths. Donot ask me how this transformation is effected; it is the secret ofevery great artist, a secret which he exercises unconsciously, andwhich no critic has explained. 

Looking at this yard of coloured print, I ask myself how it is thatever since art began no such admirable result has been obtained withmeans so slight. A few outlines drawn with pen and ink or pencil, andthe interspaces filled in with two flat tints-a dark green, and a greyverging on mauve. 

The drawing of the figures is marvellously beautiful. But why is itbeautiful? Is it because of the individual character represented inthe faces? The faces are expressed by means of a formula, and are aslike one another as a row of eggs. Are the proportions of the figurecorrectly measured, and are the anatomies well understood? The figuresare in the usual proportions so far as the number of heads isconcerned: they are all from six and a half to seven heads high; butno motion of limbs happens under the draperies, and the hands andfeet, like the faces, are expressed by a set of arbitrary conventions. It is not even easy to determine whether the posture of the woman onthe right is intended for sitting or kneeling. She holds a tray, onwhich is an idol, and to provide sufficient balance for thecomposition the artist has placed a yellow umbrella in the idol'shand. Examine this design from end to end, and nowhere will you findany desire to imitate nature. With a line Utamaro expresses all thathe deems it necessary to express of a face's contour. Three or fourconventional markings stand for eyes, mouth, and ears; no desire toconvey the illusion of a rounded surface disturbed his mind for amoment; the intention of the Japanese artists was merely to decorate asurface with line and colour. It was no part of their scheme tocompete with nature, so it could not occur to them to cover one sideof a face with shadow. The Japanese artists never thought to deceive;the art of deception they left to their conjurers. The Japanese artistthought of harmony, not of accuracy of line, and of harmony, not oftruth of colour; it was therefore impossible for him to entertain theidea of shading his drawings, and had some one whispered the idea tohim he would have answered: "The frame will always tell people thatthey are not looking at nature. You would have it all heavy and black, but I want something light, and bright, and full of beauty. See theselines, are they not in themselves beautiful? are they not sharp, clear, and flowing, according to the necessity of the composition? Arenot the grey and the dark green sufficiently contrasted? do they notbring to your eyes a sense of repose and unity? Look at theembroideries on the dresses, are they not delicate? do not thestar-flowers come in the right place? is not the yellow in harmonywith the grey and the green? And the blossoms on the trees, are theynot touched in with the lightness of hand and delicacy of tone thatyou desire? Step back and see if the spots of colour and the effectsof line become confused, or if they still hold their places from adistance as well as close.... "

Ladies under trees, by Utamaro! That grey-green design alternated withpale yellow corresponds more nearly to a sonata by Mozart than toanything else; both are fine decorations, musical and pictorialdecorations, expressing nothing more definite than that sense ofbeauty which haunts the world. The fields give flowers, and the handsof man works of art. 

Then this art is wholly irresponsible--it grows, obeying no rules, even as the flowers?

In obedience to the laws of some irregular metre so delicate andsubtle that its structure escapes our analysis, the flowers bloom infaultless, flawless, and ever-varying variety. We can only say theseare beautiful because they are beautiful.... 

That is begging the question. 

He who attempts to go to the root of things always finds himselfbegging the question in the end.... 

But you have to admit that a drawing that does not correspond to theobject which the artist has set himself to copy cannot be well drawn. 

That idea is the blight that has fallen on European art. The goodnessor the badness of a drawing exists independently of the thing copied. We say--speaking of a branch, of a cloud, of a rock, of a flower, of aleaf--how beautifully drawn! Some clouds and some leaves are betterdrawn than others, not on account of complexity or simplicity of form, but because they interpret an innate sense of harmony inherent in us. And this natural drawing, which exists sometimes irrespective ofanatomies and proportions, is always Utamaro's. 

I do not know how long I stood examining this beautiful drawing, studying the grey and the green tint, admiring the yellow flowers onthe dresses, wondering at the genius that placed the yellow umbrellain the idol's hand, the black masses of hair above the faces, socharmingly decorated with great yellow hair-pins. I watched the beautyof the trees, and was moved by the placing of the trees in thecomposition, and I delighted in the delicate blossoms. I was enchantedby all this bright and gracious paganism which Western civilisationhas already defaced, and in a few years will have wholly destroyed. 

I might describe more prints, and the pleasure they have given me; Imight pile epithet upon epithet; I might say that the colour was asdeep and as delicate as flower-bloom, and every outline spontaneous, and exquisite to the point of reminding me of the hopbine and ferns. It would be well to say these things; the praise would be appropriateto the occasion; but rather am I minded to call the reader's attentionto what seems to me to be an essential difference between the East andthe West. 

Michael Angelo and Velasquez, however huge their strength inportraiture and decoration, however sublime Veronese and Tintoretto inmagnificent display of colour, we must perforce admit to Oriental arta refinement of thought and a delicacy of handicraft--the outcome ofthe original thought--which never was attained by Italy, and which sotranscends our grosser sense that it must for ever remain only halfperceived and understood by us. 

THE NEW ART CRITICISM. 

Before commenting on the very thoughtless utterances of twodistinguished men, I think I must--even at the risk of appearing toattach over-much importance to my criticisms--reprint what I saidabout _L'Absinthe_; for in truth it was I who first meddled withthe moral tap, and am responsible for the overflow:--

 "Look at the head of the old Bohemian--the engraver Deboutin--a man whom I have known all my life, and yet he never really existed for me until I saw this picture. There is the hat I have always known, on the back of his head as I have always seen it, and the wooden pipe is held tight in his teeth as I have always seen him hold it. How large, how profound, how simple the drawing! How easily and how naturally he lives in the pose, the body bent forward, the elbows on the table! Fine as the Orchardson undoubtedly is, it seems fatigued and explanatory by the side of this wonderful rendering of life; thin and restless--like Dumas fils' dialogue when we compare it with Ibsen's. The woman that sits beside the artist was at the Elysée Montmartre until two in the morning, then she went to the _ratmort_ and had a soupe _aux choux_; she lives in the Rue Fontaine, or perhaps the Rue Breda; she did not get up till half-past eleven; then she tied a few soiled petticoats round her, slipped on that peignoir, thrust her feet into those loose morning shoes, and came down to the café to have an absinthe before breakfast. Heavens! what a slut! A life of idleness and low vice is upon her face; we read there her whole life. _The tale is not a pleasant one, but it is a lesson_. Hogarth's view was larger, wider, but not so incisive, so deep, or so intense. Then how loose and general Hogarth's composition would seem compared to this marvellous epitome, this essence of things! That open space in front of the table, into which the skirt and the lean legs of the man come so well--how well the point of view was selected! The beautiful, dissonant rhythm of that composition is like a page of Wagner--the figures crushed into the right of the canvas, the left filled up with a fragment of marble table running in sharp perspective into the foreground. The newspaper lies as it would lie across the space between the tables. The colour, almost a monochrome, is very beautiful, a deep, rich harmony. More marvellous work the world never saw, and will never see again: a maze of assimilated influences, strangely assimilated, and eluding definition--remembrances of Watteau and the Dutch painters, a good deal of Ingres' spirit, and, in the vigour of the arabesque, we may perhaps trace the influence of Poussin. But these influences float evanescent on the canvas, and the reading is difficult and contradictory. "

I have written many a negligent phrase, many a stupid phrase, but theitalicised phrase is the first hypocritical phrase I ever wrote. Iplead guilty to the grave offence of having suggested that a work ofart is more than a work of art. The picture is only a work of art, andtherefore void of all ethical signification. In writing the abominablephrase "_but it is a lesson_" I admitted as a truth the ridiculouscontention that a work of art may influence a man's moral conduct; Iadmitted as a truth the grotesque contention that to read _Mdlle. DeMaupin_ may cause a man to desert his wife, whereas to read _ParadiseLost_ may induce him to return to her. In the abominable phrase whichI plead guilty to having written, I admitted the monstrous contentionthat our virtues and our vices originate not in our inherited natures, but are found in the books we read and the pictures we look upon. Thatart should be pure is quite another matter, and the necessity ofpurity in art can be maintained for other than ethical reasons. Art--Iam speaking now of literature--owes a great deal to ethics, butethics owes nothing to art. Without morality the art of the novelistand the dramatist would cease. So we are more deeply interested in thepreservation of public morality than any other class--the clergy, ofcourse, excepted. To accuse us of indifference in this matter isabsurd. We must do our best to keep up a high standard of publicmorality; our living depends upon it--and it would be difficult tosuggest a more powerful reason for our advocacy. Nevertheless, by acurious irony of fate we must preserve--at least, in our books--adistinctly impartial attitude on the very subject which most nearlyconcerns our pockets. 

To remove these serious disabilities should be our serious aim. Itmight be possible to enter into some arrangement with the bishops toallow us access to the pulpits. Mr. So-and so's episcopal style--Irefer not only to this gentleman's writings, but also to his style offigure, which, on account of the opportunities it offers for a displayof calf, could not fail to win their lordships' admiration--marks himas the proper head and spokesman of the deputation; and his well-knownsympathies for the pecuniary interests of authors would enable him toexplain that not even their lordships' pockets were so gravelyconcerned in the maintenance of public morality as our own. 

I have allowed my pen to wander somewhat from the subject in hand; forbefore permitting myself to apologise for having hypocriticallydeclared a great picture to be what it was not, and could not be--"alesson"--it was clearly incumbent on me to show that the moralquestion was the backbone of the art which I practise myself, and thatof all classes none are so necessarily moral as novelists. I think Ihave done this beyond possibility of disproof, or even of argument, and may therefore be allowed to lament my hypocrisy with as many tearsand groans as I deem sufficient for the due expiation of my sin. Confession eases the heart. Listen. My description of Degas' pictureseemed to me a little unconventional, and to soothe the reader who isshocked by everything that lies outside his habitual thought, and tododge the reader who is always on the watch to introduce a discussionon that sterile subject, "morality in art", to make things pleasantfor everybody, to tickle the Philistine in his tenderest spot, I tolda little lie: I suggested that some one had preached. I ought to haveknown human nature better--what one dog does another dog will do, andstraight away preaching began--Zola and the drink question from Mr. Richmond, sociology from Mr. Crane. 

But the picture is merely a work of art, and has nothing to do withdrink or sociology; and its title is not _L' Absinthe_, nor even _UnHomme et une Femme assis dans un Café_, as Mr. Walter Sickertsuggests, but simply _Au Café_. Mr. Walter Crane writes: "Here is astudy of human degradation, male and female. " Perhaps Mr. Walter Cranewill feel inclined to apologise for his language when he learns thatthe man who sits tranquilly smoking his pipe is a portrait of theengraver Deboutin, a man of great talent and at least Mr. WalterCrane's equal as a writer and as a designer. True that M. Deboutindoes not dress as well as Mr. Walter Crane, but there are many youngmen in Pall Mall who would consider Mr. Crane's velvet coat, rednecktie, and soft felt hat quite intolerable, yet they would hardly bejustified in speaking of a portrait of Mr. Walter Crane as a study ofhuman degradation. Let me assure Mr. Walter Crane that when he speaksof M. Deboutin's life as being degraded, he is speaking on a subjectof which he knows nothing. M. Deboutin has lived a very noble life, inno way inferior to Mr. Crane's; his life has been entirely devoted toart and literature; his etchings have been for many years theadmiration of artistic Paris, and he has had a play in verse performedat the Théâtre Français. 

The picture represents M. Deboutin in the café of the _NouvelleAthènes_ He has come down from his studio for breakfast, and he willreturn to his dry-points when he has finished his pipe. I have knownM. Deboutin a great number of years, and a more sober man does notexist; and Mr. Crane's accusations of drunkenness might as well bemade against Mr. Bernard Shaw. When, hypocritically, I said thepicture was a lesson, I referred to the woman, who happens to besitting next to M. Deboutin. Mr. Crane, Mr. Richmond, and others havejumped to the conclusion that M. Deboutin has come to the café withthe woman, and that they are "boozing" together. Nothing can befarther from the truth. Deboutin always came to the café alone, as didManet, Degas, Duranty. Deboutin is thinking of his dry-points; thewoman is incapable of thought. If questioned about her life she wouldprobably answer, _"je suis à la coule"_. But there is no implicationof drunkenness in the phrase. In England this class of woman isconstantly drunk, in France hardly ever; and the woman Degas haspainted is typical of her class, and she wears the habitual expressionof her class. And the interest of the subject, from Degas' point ofview, lies in this strange contrast--the man thinking of hisdry-points, the woman thinking, as the phrase goes, of nothing at all. _Au Café_--that is the title of the picture. How simple, howsignificant! And how the picture gains in meaning when the web offalse melodrama that a couple of industrious spiders have woven aboutit is brushed aside!

I now turn to the more interesting, and what I think will prove themore instructive, part of my task--the analysis of the art criticismof Mr. Richmond and Mr. Crane. 

Mr. Richmond says "it is not painting at all". We must understandtherefore that the picture is void of all accomplishment--composition, drawing, and handling. We will take Mr. Richmond's objections in theirorder. The subject-matter out of which the artist extracted hiscomposition was a man and woman seated in a café furnished with marbletables. The first difficulty the artist had to overcome was thesymmetry of the lines of the tables. Not only are they exceedinglyugly from all ordinary points of view, but they cut the figures intwo. The simplest way out of the difficulty would be to place onefigure on one side of a table, the other on the other side, and thiscomposition might be balanced by a waiter seen in the distance. Thatwould be an ordinary arrangement of the subject. But the ingenuitywith which Degas selects his point of view is without parallel in thewhole history of art. And this picture is an excellent example. Oneline of tables runs up the picture from left to right, another line oftables, indicated by three parts of one table, strikes right acrossthe foreground. The triangle thus formed is filled by the woman'sdress, which is darker than the floor and lighter than the leatherbench on which both figures are seated. Looking still more closelyinto the composition, we find that it is made of several perspectives--the dark perspective of the bench, the light perspective of thepartition behind, on which the light falls, and the rapid perspectiveof the marble table in the foreground. The man is high up on theright-hand corner, the woman is in the middle of the picture, andDegas has been careful to place her in front of the opening betweenthe tables, for by so doing he was able to carry his half-tint rightthrough the picture. The empty space on the left, so characteristic ofDegas's compositions, admirably balances the composition, and it isonly relieved by the stone matchbox, and the newspaper thrown acrossthe opening between the tables. Everywhere a perspective, and theseare combined with such strange art that the result is synthetic. Abeautiful dissonant rhythm, always symphonic _coulant longours desource_; an exasperated vehemence and a continual desire of noveltypenetrated and informed by a severely classical spirit--that is myreading of this composition. 

"The qualities admired by this new school are certainly the mirrors ofthat side of the nineteenth-century development most opposed to finepainting, or, say, fine craftsmanship. Hurry, rush, fashion, are theenemies of toil, patience, and seclusion, without which no great worksare produced. Hence the admiration for an art fully answering to ademand. No doubt impressionism is an expression in painting of thedeplorable side of modern life. "

After "forty years of the study of the best art of various schoolsthat the galleries of Europe display", Mr. Richmond mistakes Degas foran impressionist (I use the word in its accepted sense); he followsthe lead of the ordinary art critic who includes Degas among theimpressionists because Degas paints dancing lessons, and because hehas once or twice exhibited with Monet and his followers. The bestway--possibly the only way--to obtain any notion of the depth of theabyss on which we stand will be by a plain statement of the facts. 

When Ingres fell down in the fit from which he never recovered, it wasDegas who carried him out of his studio. Degas had then been workingwith Ingres only a few months, but that brief while convinced Ingresof his pupil's genius, and it is known that he believed that it wouldbe Degas who would carry on the classical tradition of which he was agreat exponent. Degas has done this, not as Flandren tried to, byreproducing the externality of the master's work, but as only a man ofgenius could, by the application of the method to new material. Degas's early pictures, "The Spartan Youths" and "Semiramis buildingthe Walls of Babylon". Are pure Ingres. To this day Degas might bevery fairly described as _un petit Ingres_. Do we not find Ingres'penetrating and intense line in the thin straining limbs of Degas'sballet-girls, in the heavy shoulders of his laundresses bent over theironing table, and in the coarse forms of his housewives who spongethemselves in tin baths? The vulgar, who see nothing of a work of artbut its external side, will find it difficult to understand that theart of "La Source" and of Degas's cumbersome housewives is the same. To the vulgar, Bouguereau and not Degas is the interpreter of theclassical tradition. 

'Hurry, rush, fashion, are the enemies of toil, patience, andseclusion, without which no great works are produced. '

For the sake of his beloved drawing Degas has for many years lockedhimself into his studio from early morning till late at night, refusing to open even to his most intimate friends. Coming across himone morning in a small café, where he went at midday to eat a cutlet, I said, "My dear friend, I haven't seen you for years; when may Icome?" The answer I received was: "You're an old friend, and if you'llmake an appointment I'll see you. But I may as well tell you that forthe last two years no one has been in my studio. " On the whole it isperhaps as well that I declined to make an appointment, for anotherold friend who went, and who stayed a little longer than he wasexpected to stay, was thrown down the staircase. And that staircase isspiral, as steep as any ladder. Until he succeeded in realising hisart Degas's tongue was the terror of artistic Paris; his solitarydays, the strain on the nerves that the invention and composition ofhis art, so entirely new and original, entailed, wrecked his temper, and there were moments when his friends began to dread the end thathis striving might bring about. But with the realisation of hisartistic ideal his real nature returned, and he is now full of kindwords for the feeble, and full of indulgence for the slightestartistic effort. 

The story of these terrible years of striving is written plainlyenough on every canvas signed by Degas; yet Mr. Richmond imagines himskipping about airily from café to café, dashing off littleimpressions. In another letter Mr. Richmond says, 'Perfectcraftsmanship, such as was Van Eyck's, Holbein's, Bellini's, MichaelAngelo's, becomes more valuable as time goes on. ' It is interesting tohear that Mr. Richmond admires Holbein's craftsmanship, but it will bestill more interesting if he will explain how and why the head of theold Bohemian in the picture entitled "L'Absinthe" is inferior toHolbein. The art of Holbein, as I understand it--and if I do notunderstand it rightly I shall be delighted to have my mistakeexplained to me--consists of measurements and the power of observingand following an outline with remorseless precision. Now Degas in hisearly manner was frequently this. His portrait of his father listeningto Pagan singing whilst he accompanied himself on the guitar is pureHolbein. Whether it is worse or better than Holbein is a matter ofindividual opinion; but to affect to admire Holbein and to decline toadmire the portrait I speak of is--well, incomprehensible. Theportrait of Deboutin in the picture entitled "L'Absinthe" is a laterwork, and is not quite so nearly in the manner of Holbein; but it isquite nearly enough to allow me to ask Mr. Richmond to explain how, and why it is inferior to Holbein. Inferior is not the word I want, for Mr. Richmond holds Holbein to be one of the greatest painters theworld ever knew, and Degas to be hardly a painter at all. 

For three weeks the pens of art critics, painters, designers, andengravers have been writing about this picture--about this roughBohemian who leans over the café table with his wooden pipe fixed fastbetween his teeth, with his large soft felt hat on the back of hishead, upheld there by a shock of bushy hair, with his large batteredface grown around with scanty, unkempt beard, illuminated by a fixedand concentrated eye which tells us that his thoughts are in pursuitof an idea--about one of the finest specimens of the art of thiscentury--and what have they told us? Mr. Richmond mistakes the workfor some hurried sketch--impressionism--and practically declares thepainting to be worthless. Mr. Walter Crane says it is only fit for asociological museum or for an illustrated tract in a temperancepropaganda; he adds some remarks about "a new Adam and Eve and aparadise of unnatural selection" which escape my understanding. Anengraver said that the picture was a vulgar subject vulgarly painted. Another set of men said the picture was wonderful, extraordinary, perfect, complete, excellent. But on neither side was any attempt madeto explain why the picture was bad or why the picture was excellent. The picture is excellent, but why is it excellent? Because the sceneis like a real scene passing before your eyes? Because nothing hasbeen omitted that might have been included, because nothing has beenincluded that might have been omitted? Because the painting is clear, smooth, and limpid and pleasant to the eye? Because the colour isharmonious, and though low in tone, rich and strong? Because each faceis drawn in its distinctive lines, and each tells the tale ofinstincts and of race? Because the clothing is in its accustomed foldsand is full of the individuality of the wearer? We look on thispicture and we ask ourselves how it is that amongst the tens andhundreds of thousands of men who have painted men and women in theirdaily occupations, habits, and surroundings, no one has said so muchin so small a space, no one has expressed himself with that simplicitywhich draws all veils aside, and allows us to look into the heart ofnature. 

Where is the drawing visible except in the result? How beautifullyconcise it is, and yet it is large, supple, and true without excess ofreality. Can you detect anywhere a measurement? Do you perceive abase, a fixed point from which the artist calculated and compared hisdrawing? That hat, full of the ill-usage of the studio, hanging on theshock of bushy hair, the perspective of those shoulders, and the roundof the back, determining the exact width and thickness of the body, the movement of the arm leaning on the table, and the arm perfectly inthe sleeve, and the ear and the shape of the neck hidden in the shadowof the hat and hair, and the battered face, sparely sown with anill-kempt beard, illuminated by a fixed look which tells us that histhoughts are in pursuit of an idea--this old Bohemian smoking hispipe, does he not seem to have grown out of the canvas as naturallyand mysteriously as a herb or plant? By the side of this drawing donot all the drawings in the gallery of English, French, Belgian, andScandinavian seem either childish, ignorant-timed, or presumptuous? Bythe side of this picture do not all the other pictures in the galleryseem like little painted images?

Compared with this drawing, would not Holbein seem a littlegeometrical? Again I ask if you can detect in any outline or accent afixed point from whence the drawing was measured, calculated, andconstructed. In the drawing of all the other painters you trace themethod and you take note of the knowledge through which the model hasbeen seen and which has, as it were, dictated to the eye what itshould see. But in Degas the science of the drawing is hidden fromus--a beautiful flexible drawing almost impersonal, bending to andfollowing the character, as naturally as the banks follow the courseof their river. 

I stop, although I have not said everything. To complete my study ofthis picture we should have to examine that smooth, clean, supplepainting of such delicate and yet such a compact tissue; we shouldhave to study that simple expressive modelling; we should have toconsider the resources of that palette, reduced almost to a monochromeand yet so full of colour. I stop, for I think I have said enough torouse if not to fully awaken suspicion in Mr. Richmond and Mr. Craneof the profound science concealed in a picture about which I am afraidthey have written somewhat thoughtlessly. 

 * * * * *

In the midst of a somewhat foolish and ignorant argument regarding themorality and the craftsmanship of a masterpiece, the right of the newart criticism to adversely criticise the work of Royal Academicianshas been called into question. I cull the following from the columnsof the _Westminster Gazette_;--

'Their words are practically the same; their praise and blame aresimilarly inspired; the means they employ to gain their objectidentical. So much we can see for ourselves. As for their object andtheir _bona-fides_, they concern me not. It is what they do, not whatthey are, that is the question here. What they do is to form a caucusin art criticism, and owing to their vehemence and the limitation oftheir aim, a caucus which is increasing in influence, and, to the bestof my belief, doing cruel injustice to many great artists, and muchinjury to English art. It is for this reason, and this reason only, that I have taken up my parable on the subject. I have in vainendeavoured to induce those whose words would come with far greaterauthority than mine to do so. I went personally to the presidents ofthe two greatest artistic bodies in the kingdom to ask them to speakor write on the subject, but I found their view to be that such actionwould be misconstrued, and would in their position be unbecoming. '

The meaning of all this is that the ferret is in the hole and the ratshave begun to squeak already. Soon they will come hopping out of St. John's Wood Avenue, so make ready your sticks and stones. 

In April 1892 I wrote: 'The position of the Academy is as impregnableas Gibraltar. But Gibraltar itself was once captured by a smallcompany of resolute men, and if ever there exist in London sixresolute art critics, each capable of distinguishing between a badpicture and a good one, each determined at all costs to tell thetruth, and if these six critics will keep in line, then, and not tillthen, some of the reforms so urgently needed, and so often demandedfrom the Academy, will be granted. I do not mean that these sixcritics will bring the Academicians on their knees by writingfulminating articles on the Academy. Such attacks were as idle aswhistling for rain on the house-tops. The Academicians laugh at suchattacks, relying on the profound indifference of the public toartistic questions. But there is another kind of attack which theAcademicians may not ignore, and that is true criticism. If sixnewspapers were to tell the simple truth about the canvases which theAcademicians will exhibit next month, the Academicians would soon cryout for quarter and grant all necessary reforms. '

I have only now to withdraw the word "reform". The Academy cannotreform, and must be destroyed. The Academy has tried to reform, andhas failed. Thirty years ago the pre-Raphaelite movement nearlysucceeded in bringing about an effectual shipwreck. But when Mr. Holman Hunt went to Italy, special terms were offered and accepted. The election of Millais and Watts saved the Academy, and instead ofthe Academy, it was the genius of one of England's greatest paintersthat was destroyed. "Ophelia", "Autumn Leaves", and "St. Agnes' Eve"are pictures that will hold their own in any gallery among pictures ofevery age and every country. But fathomless is the abyss whichseparates them from Sir John Millais' academic work. 

The Academy is a distinctly commercial enterprise. Has not Sir JohnMillais said, in an interview, that the hanging committee atBurlington House selects the pictures that will draw the greatestnumber of shillings. The Academy has been subventioned by the State tothe extent of three hundred thousand pounds, and that money has beenemployed in arrogant commercialism. The Academy holds a hundredthousand pounds in trust, left by Mr. Chantry for the furtherance ofart in this country; and this money is spent on the purchase ofpictures by impecunious Academicians, and the collection formed withthis money is one of the seven horrors of civilisation. The Academyhas tolerated genius when it was popular, it has trampled upon geniuswhen it was unpopular; and the business of the new art criticism is torid art of the incubus. The Academy must be destroyed, and when thatis accomplished the other Royal institutes will follow as a matter ofcourse. The object of the new art criticism is to give free trade toart. 

LONG AGO IN ITALY. 

Come to the New Gallery. We shall pass out of sight of flat drearyLondon, drab-coloured streets full of overcoats, silk hats, drippingumbrellas, omnibuses. We shall pass out of sight of long perspectivesof square houses lost in fine rain and grey mist. We shall enter anenchanted land, a land of angels and aureoles; of crimson and gold, and purple raiment; of beautiful youths crowned with flowers; offabulous blue landscape and delicate architecture. Know ye the land?Botticelli is king there, king of clasped hands and almond-eyedMadonnas. It was he who conceived and designed that enigmatic Virgin'sface; it was he who placed that long-fingered hand on the thigh of theInfant God; it was he who coiled that heavy hair about that triangleof neck and interwove it with pearls; it was he who drew the gracefullace over the head-dress, and painted it in such innumerable delicacyof fold that we wonder and are fain to believe that it is but themagic of an instant's hallucination. Know ye the land? Filippo Lippiis prince there, prince of angel youths, fair hair crowned with fairflowers; they stand round a tall throne with strings of coral andprecious stones in their hands. It was Filippo Lippi who composed thatpalette of grey soft pearly pink; it was he who placed that beautifulred in the right-hand corner, and carried it with such enchantingharmony through the yellow raiment of the angel youth, echoing it in asubdued key in the vesture which the Virgin wears under her bluegarment, and by means of the red coral which decorates the tall thronehe carried it round the picture; it was he, too, who filled thoseangel eyes with passion such as awakens in heaven at the touch ofwings, at the sound of citherns and cintoles. 

Know ye the land where Botticelli and Filippo Lippi dreamed immortaldreams? Know ye the land, Italy in the fifteenth century? Exquisiteangel faces were their visions by day and night, and their thoughtswere mystic landscapes and fantastic architecture; aureoles, roses, pearls, and rich embroideries were parcel of their habitual sense; andthe decoration of a surface with beautiful colour was their souls'desire. Of truth of effect and local colour they knew nothing, andcared nothing. Beauty for beauty's sake was the first article of theirfaith. They measured a profile with relentless accuracy, and followedits outline unflinchingly, their intention was no more than to producea likeness of the lady who sat posing for her portrait, but somemiracle saved them from base naturalism. The humblest, equally withthe noblest dreamer, was preserved from it; and that their eyesnaturally saw more beautifully than ours seems to be the onlyexplanation. Ugliness must have always existed; but Florentine eyesdid not see ugliness. Or did their eyes see it, and did they disdainit? Do they owe their art to a wise festheticism, or to a fortunatelimitation of sight? These are questions that none may answer, butwhich rise up in our mind and perplex us when we enter the NewGallery; for verily it would seem, from the dream pictures there, thata time once existed upon earth when the world was fair as a garden, and life was a happy aspiration. In the fifteenth century the worldseems to have been made of gold, jewellery, pictures, embroideredstuffs, statues, and engraved weapons; in the fifteenth century theworld seems to have been inhabited only by nobles and prelates; andthe only buildings that seem to have existed were palaces andcathedrals. Then Art seemed for all men, and life only forarchitecture, painting, carving, and engraving long rapiers; andlength of time for monks to illuminate great missals in the happysolitude of their cells, and for nuns to weave embroideries and tostitch jewelled vestments. 

The Florentines loved their children as dearly as we do ours; but intheir pictures there is but the Divine Child. They loved girls andgallantries as well as we do; but in their pictures there are but theVirgin and a few saints. 

History tells us that wars, massacres, and persecutions were frequentin the fifteenth century; but in its art we learn no more of thepolitical than we do of the domestic life of the century. The Virginand Child were sufficient inspiration for hundreds of painters. Nowshe is in full-face, now in three-quarter face, now in profile. Inthis picture she wears a blue cloak, in that picture she is clad in agrey. She is alone with the Child in a bower of tall roses, or she isseated on a high throne. Perhaps the painter has varied thecomposition by the introduction of St. John leaning forward withclasped hands; or maybe he has introduced a group of angels, asFilippo Lippi has done. The throne is sometimes high, sometimes low;but such slight alteration is enough for a new picture. And severalgenerations of painters seem to have lived and died believing thattheir art was to all practical and artistic purposes limited to thecontinual variation of this theme. 

Among these painters Botticelli was the incontestable master; butabout him crowd hundreds of pictures, pictures rather than names. Imagine a number of workmen anxious to know how they should learn topaint well, to paint with brilliancy, with consistency, with ease, andwith lasting colours. Imagine a collection of gold ornaments, jewels, and enamels, in which we can detect the skill of the goldsmith, of thepainter of stained-glass, of the engraver, and of the illuminator ofmissals; the inspiration is grave and monastic, the destination apalace or a cathedral, the effect dazzling; and out of this miraculoushandicraft Filippo Lippi is always distinct, soft as the dawn, mysterious as a flower, less vigorous but more illusive thanBotticelli, and so strangely personal that while looking at him we areabsorbed. 

To differentiate between the crowd of workmen that surrounded FilippoLippi and Botticelli were impossible. They painted beautiful thingsbecause they lived in an age in which ugliness hardly existed, or wasnot as visible as it is now; they were content to merge theirpersonalities in an artistic formula; none sought to invent apersonality which did not exist in himself. Employing without questiona method of drawing and of painting that was common to all of them, they worked in perfect sympathy, almost in collaboration. Plagiarismwas then a virtue; they took from each other freely; and the result isa collective rather than individual inspirations. Now and then geniusbreaks through, as a storm breaks a spell of summer weather. "TheVirgin and Child, with St. Clare and St. Agatha", lent by Mrs. Austinand the trustees of the late J. T. Austin, is one of the mostbeautiful pictures I have ever seen. The temperament of the painter, his special manner of feeling and seeing, is strangely, almostaudaciously, affirmed in the mysterious sensuality of the angels'faces; the painter lays bare a rare and remote corner of his soul;something has been said that was never said before, and never has beensaid so well since. But if the expression given to these angels isdistinctive, it is extraordinarily enhanced by the beauty of thecolour. Indeed, the harmony of the colour-scheme is inseparable fromthe melodious expressiveness of the eyes. Look at the gesture of thehand on the right; is not the association of ideas strangely intimate, curious, and profound?

But come and let us look at a real Botticelli, a work which convincesat the first glance by the extraordinary expressiveness of thedrawing, by the originality of the design, by the miraculoushandicraft; let us look at the "Virgin and Child and St. John", lentby Messrs. Colnaghi. 

It is a panel some 36 by 25 inches, almost filled by a life-sizethree-quarter-length figure of the Virgin. She is seated on the right, and holds the Infant Saviour in her arms. In the foreground on theleft there is a book and cushion, behind which St. John stands, hishands clasped, bearing a cross. Never was a head designed with moregenius than that strange Virgin, ecstatic, mysterious, sphinx-like;with half-closed eyes, she bends her face to meet her God's kiss. Inthis picture Botticelli sought to realise the awfulness of theChristian mystery: the Mother leans to the kiss of her Son--her Son, who is likewise her God, and her brain is dim with its ecstasy. She isperturbed and overcome; the kiss is in her brain, and it trembles onher lips. You who have not seen the picture will think that thisdescription is but the tale of the writer who reads his fancies intothe panel before him. But the intention of the painter did notoutstrip the power of expression which his fingers held. He expressedwhat I say he expressed, and more perfectly, more suggestively, thanany words. And how? It will be imagined that it was by means of someillusive line that Botticelli rendered the very touch and breath ofthis extraordinary kiss; by that illusive line which Degas employs inhis expressions of the fugitive and the evanescent. How great, therefore, is our surprise when we look into the picture to find thatthe mystery and ecstasy of this kiss are expressed by a hard, firm, dark line. 

And the sensation of this strange ecstatic kiss pervades the entirecomposition; it is embodied in the hand placed so reverently on thethigh of the Infant God and in the eyes of St. John, who watches thedivine mystery which is being accomplished. On St. John's face thereis earthly reverence and awe; on Christ's face, though it is drawn inrigid outline, though it looks as if it were stamped out of iron, there is universal love, cloudlike and ineffable; and Christ's kneesare drawn close, and the hand of the Virgin holds them close; andthrough the hand come bits of draperies exquisitely designed. Indeed, the distribution of line through the picture is as perfect as thedistribution of colour; the form of the blue cloak is as perfect asthe colour, and the green cape falls from the shoulder, satisfyingboth senses; the crimson vesture which she wears underneath her cloakis extraordinarily pure, and balances the crimson cloak which St. Johnwears. But these beauties are subordinate to the beauty of theVirgin's head. How grand it is in style! How strange and enigmatic!And in the design of that head Botticelli has displayed all his skill. The fair hair is covered with delicate gauze edged with lace, andovercoming the difficulties of that most rebellious of allmediums--tempera!--his brush worked over the surface, fulfilling hisslightest thought, realising all the transparency of gauze, theintricacy of lace, the brightness of crimson silk, the very gravity ofthe embossed binding of the book, the sway and texture of everydrapery, the gold of the tall cross, and the darker gold of theaureole high up in the picture, set against a strip of Florentine sky.