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carefully and judiciously applied, we should soou have a Gal- 

 lery of Art which would give a character to the town, and 

 force the government to higher and nobler efforts. Need I 

 mention the names of Etty, Mulready, Ward, Stanfield, East- 

 lake, Herbert, Johnston, Stone, Erith, Erost, and McClise, 

 with Gibson and Bailey. Many of these artists I have named 

 are known as contributors to our Exhibition. If this sugges- 

 tion could be acted upon, the name of our corporate body 

 would be held in esteem by all, and it would be said of it, as 

 it has been of Lord Elgin, " that as long as the arts are dear 

 to the civilized world, and as long as the splendid policy of 

 Pericles, and the responsive excellence of Phidias shall con- 

 tinue to be respected by statesmen and artists, his name will be 

 mingled with those noble in recollection." I have before 

 alluded to this being a time peculiarly fitted for higher efforts, 

 both in patronage and painting ; one of the instances which 

 can be brought forward to prove this statement, is the great 

 difference we find in the amount of the sales, and the character 

 of the pictures sold, in our annual Exhibition ; a few years 

 back (when our Exhibitions were held in this building), the 

 sales were small in amount, and the pictures generally sold, 

 low in character ; the pictures now sold are generally good, 

 and but few good pictures are returned to the artists at the 

 close of the Exhibition ; the amount of sales at first never ex- 

 ceeded £300, while for the last few years we have never sold 

 less than £2000 worth even in poor years, while in good times 

 nearly £4000 worth were purchased in one season. I think 

 these facts prove to demonstration that good taste is increasing 

 with us ; that we have learned to despise the feeble efforts 

 which first arrested our uncultivated judgment ; that we stand 

 in the position of a man, who, on first seeing a barber's block, 

 admired it from its slight resemblance to the human form, 

 but when introduced to the higher efforts of a cultivated and 

 refined mind, has been taught to look on his early associations 

 in their true light, and to see the difference between the first 



