1826.] 



Fine Arts' Exhibitions. 



637 



Tchemently to the " fashionable world. " 

 The " free list" is shut out, and Mr. 

 libers has thus the double indulgence of 

 doing the civility of writing the names on 

 tlie list, at the beginning of the season, and 

 of preduduig them from the use of the 

 privilege. It would be much handsomer 

 to extinguish the i)rivilege altogether, and 

 not take the credit of acting with the 

 liberality of his predecessors, until he in- 

 tends to keep his promise. In many in- 

 stances tlie privilege is one which no 



temporary Leaaee of the theatre ha£ a right I 

 to withdraw. For the instances in which ,' 

 he himself has given it, we cannot tnider- 

 stand how lie can reconcile his sense of 

 propriety to the idea of giving a privilege 

 which he determines to retract the first 

 moment that his theatre is worth visiting. 

 Better, and more gentlemanlike, to declare 

 that the List shall be totally and finally 

 abolished; or, to retract it distinctly and 

 publicly,— equivocation is contemptible. 



FINE ARTS' EXHIBITIONS. 



The fifty-eighth exhibition of the British 

 scliool is now open at Somerset House, 

 J abounding in all shapes and shades of hu- 

 manity and merit, from Sir Thomas Law- 

 rence and his Hjijantes, down to the hum- 

 blest labourer on the physiognomies of.the 

 Minories and Tothill-Fielils. The love of 

 looking at ourselves must be remarkably 

 vigorous in Great Britain, if we were to 

 judge from the deluge of portraits that 

 annually overflow those walls ; yet it must 

 be owned that it is like other Joves, sur[)ris- 

 ingly hable to disappointment ; for not one 

 in ten of the portraits ever indulge the 

 original witii the slightest similitude. And 

 tiiis, if not to the honour of the British 

 pencil, is to the honour of the nation ; for 

 we hope nothing is to be found among 

 us comparable to the puffed and pudding- 

 featured visages, the leaden animation, and 

 the rnurky and merciless grimncss of colour 

 of the infinite majority of the exhibition 

 faces. 



Yet, if we have not portraits, ^vhat have 

 we ? - A few landscapes from the lakes — a 

 few pieces from some passing poem — an 

 oriental foolery made up of turban, slippers, 

 and a dying rose — some grave caricature of 

 Don Quixote, by Leslie ; or some fair 

 penitent, by his compatriot Newtpn, flung 

 back in an arm-chair with the sallow 

 resignation of one waiting for tl;c operation 

 of an emetic. 



Then, let us have portraits. But they 

 must be something different from the opera- 

 tives that we have already. The Presi- 

 dent is an artist of unquestioned dexterity ; 

 but if the administration of the Laws 

 were intrusted in our hands for a day, 

 we should indict him for a multitude of 

 annual libels on the fair sex of England ; 

 not on their beauty, for his pencil is redun- 

 dant with civility to all ages, and bathes 

 tha most antique cheek m the most liberal 

 roses ; but on their reputation; his portraits 

 have that indescribable character which is 

 known by the delicate but expressive phrase 

 of "characters of a certain description." 

 The soliciting lip, the forward attitude, 

 the arms, whether rounding a lute or 

 pillowed on a bosom, the hair luxuriating 

 over the neck, as if it were carrying on a 



coqiiettish dialogue with every passing 

 zephyr ; and above all, the eye, the languid, 

 dewy, half-sleeping, half-sparkling eye ; 

 all tell the same story of tlxe President's 

 determination to libel all the pretty women 

 of the "fashionable world." 



And the misfortune is, that his portraits 

 are like, fatally like : and that his knowledge 

 of the whole glittering circle, from the 

 laughing female roue, just come into fashion, 

 to the faded and dowager figurante inevi- 

 tably going out ;from the./eH/ie debutante of 

 May-fair, dubious which duke or general- 

 in-chief she shall condescend to accept, to 

 the ponderous widow fighting her way 

 through the noble and moneyless, and de- 

 termining in her desperation lo harpoon the 

 first half-pay guardsman seizable, renders 

 mistake next to an impossibility. 



The President's two principal porttaits, 

 smilingat each other from the opposite sides 

 of the room. Lady Wallscourt, and the Hon. 

 Mrs. Hope, are fine exemplifications of 

 both his styles— what he can do and what 

 he does. Mrs. Hope, the very countenance 

 of purity, softness, and young raatronage : 

 Lady Wallscourt, a very potent expression 

 of the other powers of this accomplished 

 painter — beautiful certainly, and with locks, 

 and brifht eyes, and a lute, and all the 

 other essentials ; but, in our apprehension, 

 the very reverse of the sort of portraiture 

 in which the mother of the Gracchi would 

 have been pleased to exliibit herself to an 

 admiring world. 



Mr. Canning, another of the President's 

 pictures, is a much less able display of the 

 artist's powers. It has been of course 

 praised ; for where is the minister who will 

 not find a multitude of otficials and the 

 cousins of officials, to think that his por- 

 trait is the finest possible subject for the 

 pencil? or where is the president of a 

 royal academy of any thing who will not 

 find a similar host ready to magnify his 

 work ? yet, it would not be easy for a man 

 who is neither looking up to a place in the 

 foreign office, nor intending to stand for 

 R. A. on the first possible opportunity, to 

 ascertain ^vhy Sir Thomas Lawrence has 

 such a decided hoiTor of the manly form. 

 On all occasions, he WTops it up in soine 



