—No. 1, " The Little Girl and her Dog " ; No. 2, " The Dog's Head, Stuffed " ; No. 3, " My Grandmother's Wax Flowers"; No. 4, " Her ditto Fruit"; No. 5, "Her Mantelpiece Ornaments " ; No. 6, " One Doll in Knee-breeches"; No. 7, "Two ditto in Baronial Interior " ; No. 8, " Ba Capo " ; and so on.' It would be easy to particularise the very pictures here alluded to; the criticism, however, is not merely individual, but generic.
Still more objectionable, however, is that newer wave of southern influence, which, as in Mr. Collier's 'Lilith,' seeks to enliven the traditional Royal Academy Philistinism by borrowing an idea from the Parisian decadence. One is tempted to say that the fact that such a picture should still be starring the provinces like ' Nana ' and the rest, says more for the good taste and reserve of the proprietors of menageries than for hanging committees; with modei'ation, how- evei-, Mr. Collier may doubtless reach equal success in the former even more popular line. The vulgarity of Mr. Stanhope Forbes' ' Palmistry ' is too obvious to be worth mention, were it not that from this painter we have been accustomed to better things ; l)ut a word of vigorous protest must be added with regard to Mr. Logsdail's ' St. Martin's-in-the-Fields,' since this surely most ill-advised of Chantrey Fund investments is sent to us as an example of what the Academy delighteth to honour. On the whole it is none the less an unpleasant picture ; despite tlie skilful treatment of the architecture, the cabs and omnibuses, the colour constantly becomes poor and even ugly, as notably in the young lady's crimson mantle ; some- times also absui'd or grotesque, as in the brewer's horse with its purple hide, and black mask fitted on at its collar. Nor in this attempt to delineate one of the great foci of the human stream is there the slightest real sympathy with its movement ; the policemen and newsboys are mere empty shadows, the lady and flower- model mere portraits of the hardest and most soulless kind. In a word, the good qualities of the picture are merely those which might be reached by the help of a few instantaneous photographs ; neither as a great work of art, nor as an intelligent contemporary record, does it deserve its honours.
It is with great pleasure, therefore, that we turn from these unhelpful influences to the real treasures of the gallery. These are, however, for the most part too well known to need any detailed mention. Mr. Whistler's famous portrait of his mother is, of course, that upon which painters will especially fasten with delight. Watts' beautiful composition of ' Diana and Endymion,' Burne-J ones' stately ' Tower of Brass,' and his softer ' Bath of Venus,' here exhibited for the first time, are the leading examples of contemporary ideal- ism. Millet's 'Laveuse,' Millais' ' Lord Salisbury,' a small ' Cornfield ' and ' Salisbui-y Cathedral ' of Constable's, together with ' Robbing the Orchard,' a peculiarly fine example of Morland, will also be remembered among the loan pictures. And with these, as perfect in its way, and so already classical, may be mentioned Mr. Arthur Melville's 'Snake-charmers,' illustrated here- with. From the Whistler portrait the eye unfortunately only passes too readily to that contributed by Mr. Guthrie (35) ; and thus more readily seizes on its faults than on its merits. The original, but hardly beautiful, scheme of coloiu- seems not to have lent itself to careful working out ; and however clever the adjustment of dress to hair, or vivid the relief of the whole from a slashingly put-in background, we cannot regard the picture as a serious representation of a lady in appropriate surroundings, much less as a style of portrait which ordinary people could be expected to enjoy and live with. These, nevertheless, are surely the fundamental limitations of portraiture ? Bettei', therefore, if less brilliant, is Mr. Millie Dow's portrait (6.51), or even Mr. Crawford Hamilton's clergj'- man (253), since in these we have serious and sympa- thetic characterisation ; and the subject is treated for his own sake, not that of illustrating the painter's ingenuity, brilliancy, and speed. The same con- siderations compel us altogether to object to Mr. Walton's exhibiting his two-hour study (-tl3), ' right' though it is as far as it goes. ' Products, not processes, are for the public eye.'
A welcome innovation on old lines are the few pastel portraits, contributed by Mr. Millie Dow and Mr. Guthrie, which are exceedingly pleasing, although the secret of permanence seems in the former case hardly to have been understood. Mr. Guthrie's single little pastel landscape (899) is so bright and fresh in colour as to leave little doubt that we shall soon see a considerable return to the use of this medium, of which some advantages are so obvious.
The remaining pictures we have space for are all landscapes, and, avoiding as far as may be all purely technical questions, let us look at these primarily as so many 'Readings of Earth,' each a record of what some nature-lover has seen or felt, or, it may be, imagined. That every landscape is a statement of objective natural fact combined with a subjective personal experience is, of course, an idea familiar to every painter. Even the extraordinary cliffs and moonlights of which Mr. Waller Paton has so long and industriously prosecuted the wholesale manufacture, must clearly at some time have derived their existence from deep application of inward to outward experience. With every man this union tends to become tolerably definite ; we call it style; hence the need of constant observation, of constant thought, even a brief cessation of either tending to land us in fixity. The point at which fixity happens to have been reached is, alas ! what determines the rank of most painters : thus, from the typically juvenile view of nature and mode of presentment retained by Mr. Beattie Brown (570), to the adolescent rusticity generally preserved by Mr. Smart (92), the step is considerable. A healthy commonplace enjoyment in
( Coittinuec^ OJi p, 27S. )
