108 BIRMINGHAM SOCIETY Ol<^ ARTS. 



vour to discover a fault, it will be that of too uniformly sumbre or 

 somewhat heavy a tone about the trees — requiring a strong light to 

 call up the real beauty of the picture. 283. River Scene, North 

 Wales, by the same artist, is a most lovely painting of a beautiful 

 spot, with the same dark hue on one side, but gleamy sunshine on 

 the other, which relieves and contrasts with it. In all Mr. Baker's 

 landscapes, the pureness and depth of his blue skies, and floating 

 airiness of his cloudy ones, are great beauties, and his figures and 

 animals are always introduced with skill and judgment. He is the 

 Bloomfield of landscape painters. 



259. The Alchijmist. — /. I . Williams. A very spirited and 

 clever little picture. The old enthusiast pouring out his precious 

 compounds, the attendant watching the mystic cookery over the fire, 

 and the many and divers chattels in the apartment, are touched in 

 with a light bul skilful pencil. 



264. Jonathan Martin, setting fire to York Minster. — Henry 

 Harris. IMr. Harris has fairly astonished us, high as was our opi- 

 nion of his talents, by the production of this superb and wonderful 

 picture. It has rarely yet been our good fortune to behold anything 

 approaching it in grandeur or pictoral delusion. From the title, it 

 may be imagined to be a glaring, fiery, combustible affair : but the 

 great subject was in good hands, and is worthily executed, — all is 

 solemn, grand, and calm. The work of destruction is just begun — 

 the prayer-books and pulpit cushions are slowly burning in the fore- 

 ground, and sending up long curling wreaths of smoke, which par- 

 tially curtain over the glare, and fling alternate light and shade on 

 the dark and polished oak carving of the opposite stalls. Looking 

 on, down the long and fretted aisle, the moon-beams are seen fall- 

 ing calmly and coldly on the tall columns in strange and beautiful 

 contrast to the red light and smouldering fire going on above, — and, 

 closing the view, the richly -hued stained window, with its delicate 

 tracery and storied panes, gleams softly through the intervening mist 

 and smoke, completing one of the most perfect, wondrous, and de- 

 lusive scenes ever created on canvas. We do not say, we hope soon 

 to greet JMr. Harris again on like ground, because we cannot spare 

 a York Minster to be burned every day ; but we do hope he wall 

 go on zealously, and prepare many pleasant surprizes for us equal to 

 that we have thus feebly attempted to acknowledge. 



275. The Installation of Captain Rock. — Daniel Mac Clise. 



*' There is an attempt in this picture to associate the ridiculous with the 

 sublime ; the Artist thinking he might represent what appears so often in 

 Irish story, either acted or written. So, in the centre of this picture, there 

 is a serio-comic group of " The Installation of the Captain llock," who, 

 while the hunchback raises himself on the back of one of the motley assem- 

 blage to crown him, in a mock-heroic manner, vows on the body of a deceased 

 relative, perhaps his predecessor in outlawry, to revenge his death ; others 

 engage in the same act according to their characters and temperament. — 

 Above their heads, a group is descending a broken portion of the wall, the 

 only access to the interior of the ruin, and bearing in a wounded man, sup- 

 posed to have been engaged in the affray which has proved fatal to his Chief 



