this nature that stipple stands unrivalled; even with all the possibilities of modern photography such a portrait could not be produced that would convey as faithfully the lineaments of the wondrous queen who enslaved Marc Antony,—"for her own person," to quote Shakespeare, "it beggared all description."
But to the collector who is desirous of obtaining specimens of good work there are fields afar from the much sought-after examples in the auction-room. The books of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries were embellished with stipple engravings by men whose work is not to be despised. Besides the names of those we have already mentioned there are many others who executed plates in stipple. They are to be found in hundreds of little volumes as frontispieces and as plates, and in execution and brilliancy they do not fall very far short of the more ambitious plates of the greater men.
The three illustrations we reproduce are types of this class, which represent pence rather than shillings to the collector. They will never take their place in the market as rare prints—they are not showy enough to attract the "mob of gentlemen" who frequent Christie's and elsewhere metaphorically to cut each other's throats to obtain possession of them. The quiet collector may delve at his will in out-of-the-way places and disinter them by the hundred from forgotten volumes. The portrait of Dryden, executed by Caroline Watson—whose work is, in spite of the size, masterly and possessed of great vigour—was published in 1808. Caroline Watson's stipple engravings are sought after by collectors. She was the
