VII. 



THE ARTIST'S BIRDS. 



But very few Artists, save those who make 

 Ornithology a special study, possess sufficient know- 

 ledge, even of the most elementary character, to 

 introduce the Bird correctly and effectively into 

 their works. It is cause for surprise that the artist 

 who portrays inanimate nature with such marvellous 

 fidelity and feeling should become so palpably 

 inaccurate when his pencil depicts animate life, and 

 especially bird-life. Nowhere has this been more 

 forcibly exemplified to the present writer than at 

 the exhibitions of the Royal Academy. It may be 

 safely said that these annual collections of works 

 thoroughly represent all the best artistic talent of 

 modern times ; so that a critical review of these 

 pictures applies to British Art generally. So far as 

 Ornithology is concerned this is universally and 

 lamentably true. In no branch of his work does 

 the artist's mind seem less educated in that fidelity 

 to detail which Nature inexorably demands as in 



