1829.] ^J'uirs in General. 429 



surrender nothing, through mutual distrust or party sycophancy. The 

 tiger never faces man who keeps his eye upon him. " Resist the 

 devil, and he will fly from you." The maxim is on high authority. 

 Let the West India proprietors remember it, and act accordingly. A few 

 months more, and they wiU find that they will have to buckle on 

 their armour. 



Though his IMajesty prefers making his residence at Windsor to 

 letting himself be known in his capital, where not one five hun- 

 dreth of his people know more of his royal presence than they do of the 

 Emperor of China, yet the painters and engravers do their best to keep 

 up the spirit of royal recollection. Colnaghi has just published a most 

 magnificent engraving of his IMajesty from the best picture that Law- 

 rence ever painted of him. The King is in his robes of the garter, with the 

 insignia, and looking the stately and handsome man that once made the 

 first ornament of the court and still makes the last resource of the 

 country. The conception is noble, the attitude bold and dignified, and 

 the whole figaire a combination of manliness and majesty. As a work of 

 art, the engraving is a chef-d'ceuvre, clear, brilliant, and forcible ; the 

 lights admirably brought out, and the shades rich and deep. The whole 

 is picturesque in the highest sense of the word, and would be valuable 

 merely as a fine oljject for the ej^e, even without the merit of resem- 

 blance. It must have cost the enterprizing publisher a very formidable 

 expence, and he has a right to expect all the remuneration that can 

 be given to him by the loyal and tasteful patronage of the empire. With 

 this matter we do not mingle. The artist and engi-aver of sucli works 

 deserve that the value of their talents should be appreciated. But there is 

 one point on which we think that no sliglit reprobation should be visited 

 — the miserable spirit of extortion in which one or two popular artists are 

 beginning to lay a double claim on their pictures. Formerly when an 

 artist sokl his work, it was une njfairejinie: the business was closed, and 

 the proprietor did what he liked with his property. But of late years, 

 since the " Forget-me-Nots" and other annuals have sent engravers in 

 pursuit of popular subjects, the painters have had the chicanery, and the 

 name is not beyond the thing, to say, that though they sold the jiicture, 

 they did not sell the right to have it co])ied ; and they have actually in 

 several instances made fierce battle with individuals who, from mere 

 liberality to the publishers of those works, had allowed little sketches of 

 their pictures to be taken. This however is mere vulgar coxcombry ; 

 and could go no further, if the noblemen and gentlemen who pur- 

 chase pictures should peremptorily express their contempt for such im- 

 pudent assumption. We know an instance in which a third rate artist 

 had the impudence to write a letter to a man of rank, actually remon- 

 strating with him for having lent one of his pictures to the publisher of 

 an annual. The noble lord, who had originally bought the performance 

 merely to assist a struggling candidate for l)read, coolly told him, that lie 

 would suffer no silly interference of the kind ; but that if the artist 

 wished to cancel the piuxhase, he was welcome to take back liis paltry 

 picture in his hand. The puppy of the pencil instantly felt his foolery, 

 and with some blundering apology for his presumption, slunk out of 

 the house. 



If Sir Thomas Lawrence has any care for the respectability of his 

 profession, he will put an end to this disgusting eagerness for lucre at 



