FINE ARTS. 



':ni.' Cn-y, Parnlcy, IIi//'n>, 

 and ti. ii':i!-v rhirfs aii'l -tatesraen of 



tin- i - hakes near e, Ben Jonson, 



...n-rr. Tlu- n-i^n <>f ('harl<"> I. \\:is rep- 

 resented by no IVwi-r limn two liiimlivil and 

 uiK Tho commonwealth was il- 

 inwfll ami his family, with the 



.'* \\ in> led tho Parliamentary troops, and 

 of the Long Parliament Charle^ II., 



ii-iii-rs ami favorites, were represented by 



.mlrvil and ninety portraits. The leading 



ho flourished in England during tbo 



! by these pictures, were sev- 



!v|-iv-rnted by the following number of 



; llollu-in, 63; Sir Antony More, 18; 

 in Sonicr, 15; Vandyke, 61; 



>.">; and Kucller, 12. Tho exhibition 

 ! in August, and proved so successful as 

 to justify a repetition of it in future years, 

 During the last fortnight that it remained open, 

 it was visited by many thousands of the poorer 

 classes who were admitted at the very moderate 

 charge of 3d. per head. American art in tho 

 -h metropolis was represented by several 

 single works which elicited high praise from the 

 5, Among these were Bierstadt's " Rocky 

 Mountains," a view of Niagara Falls by Mignot. 

 and an ideal landscape with figures, entitled 

 "The Land of the Lotus-Eatcrs," by R. S. Dnn- 

 canson. The first of these was pronounced a 

 work of transcendent merit, and the critic of 

 the "Saturday Review" thanked the artist 

 for the lesson in landscape-painting which the 

 picture had taught A new picture by Holman 

 Hunt, "The Festival of St. Swithin," was ex- 

 hibited during the summer. It differed in sub- 

 ject from any thing previously attempted by 

 him, representing a flock of pigeons gathered 

 on a rainy day about a dovecote, and was said 

 to render effects of daylight with remarkable 

 truth and power. 



Of permanent art collections the first in im- 

 portance is the National Gallery, which is here- 

 after to occupy the whole of tho building in 

 Trafalgar Square, hitherto jointly nsed by itself 

 and the Royal Academy. Parliament has 

 voted a large sum for the purchase of additional 

 hind, adjoining this site, on which it is proposed 

 to erect an extension to the present building. 

 A spacious building will also be erected here 

 specially for the reception of the Raphael Oar- 

 toons, recently removed from Hampton Court 

 to tho Museum at South Kensington. Tho 

 National Gallery now contains 747 works, ex- 

 clusive of many thousand drawings ; and though 

 in point of numbers it falls behind the prin- 

 cipal Continental galleries, in respect to tho 

 quality of its contents, it takes very high rank. 

 Aided by liberal grants of money from Par- 

 . lament, it is constantly making additions to its 

 art treasures, and it also receives many valuable 

 bequests and gifts of pictures. Among recent 

 purchases were pictures by Raphael, Velasquez, 

 and Rembrandt, procured at an'outlay of nearly 

 18,000. One of the most important recent be- 

 quests was that of Landseer's celebrated " Mem- 



bi-r of the Royal Humane Society," aptlr de- 

 scribed as tho " noblest figure of a dog that ever 

 looked out from canvas." It is matter of regret 

 that many pictures in tho Gallery, emai. 

 from the national school, are threatened with 

 destruction from tho cracking of the varnish. 

 This arises from a practice common among 

 English painters, up to within thirty years ago, 

 of glazing their pictures with asphaltum ; and 

 the destruction is probably hastened by the in- 

 ferior ventilation of the building, and the humid 

 atmosphere caused by heating it by hot water. 

 The South Kensington Museum continues to 

 receive accessions of a miscellaneous character, 

 and promises in time to become a huge cu- 

 riosity-shop. That portion of the National Gal- 

 lery comprising examples by painters of the 

 British school, which is temporarily deposited 

 in it, has proved, as was expected, a great at- 

 traction to the public. Tho art schools have 

 been better attended during the past year than 

 ever before, and the actual results in respect to 

 employment obtained by students trained 

 therein are represented as more than usually 

 satisfactory. The permanent buildings intended 

 for this institution, and for tho construction of 

 which Parliament has already appropriated 

 several hundred thousand pounds, are still far 

 from completion. Portions of the facade are 

 to bo ornamented with mosaics from original 

 designs, by Leighton and others, for which 

 species of decoration a growing inclination is 

 manifested in England. The overcrowded con- 

 dition of the British Museum is a subject of 

 frequent complaint in Parliament and elsewhere. 

 Many of the invaluable marbles possessed by it 

 are defaced with dirt, the engravings and draw- 

 ings unavailable to those who could profit from 

 a stndy of them, and objects of vertu or of anti- 

 quarian interest are put away in obscure cor- 

 ners. Every thing, in fact, is said to show slat- 

 ternly neglect, except the library, which, thanks 

 to the principal librarian, Mr. Panizzi, is in 

 excellent order. An effective display of the 

 riches of the Museum would require a space 

 very far beyond what is now available,' but 

 Parliament has done nothing to supply the de- 

 ficiency, and in all probability nothing will bo 

 done for years to come. Among the treasures 

 secured by the institution during the past year 

 was the fine collection of cameos, bronzes, 

 medals, etc., belonging to the Duo de Blacas, 

 which was purchased in Paris for 48,000. It 

 includes a collection of coins, well known to 

 numismatists; the toilet service of a Roman 

 bride of about the year 800 ; a colossal head of 

 ./Esculapius, of the finest period of Greek sculp- 

 ture, found in the island of Milos ; a collection 

 of Greek fictile vases; mural paintings from 

 Pompeii and Herculaneum ; manuscripts, in- 

 scriptions, and numerous other articles of great 

 interest to antiquaries. 



The mural paintings in the Houses of Parlia- 

 ment which, it was once supposed, wero to in- 

 augurate a school of high art in England, seem 

 to have fallen far short of that result, partly ir 



