689 



ART-UNIONS. 



ARTEMIS. 



670 



further remark that Waagen and Von Klenze, two of the witnesses 

 examined by them, highly estimated the advantages conferred on the 

 arts by such associations, which, according to Waagen, were introduced 

 into Prussia about the year 1825, under the patronage of the king and 

 his minister Von Humboldt. 



Down to the time at which this ' Report' was published, such 

 associations had made comparatively little progress in this country ; but 

 shortly after its appearance a society was established under the name of 

 The Art-Union of London,' which immediately obtained considerable 

 support, and which soon became an important institution. The pro- 

 fessed objects of this institution are " to aid in extending the love of 

 the Arts of Design within the United Kingdom, and to give encourage- 

 ment to artists beyond that afforded by the patronage of individuals ;" 

 and the mode in which these objects are attained is briefly as follows : 

 Every member of the association subscribes annually the sum of 

 21a. or upwards, those who choose to subscribe two, three, four, five 

 or more times that amount being considered to hold a proportionate 

 number of shares in the prospective benefits ; and, on the closing of 

 the annual subscription-list, which takes place early in the spring, the 

 committee of management set apart a portion of the aggregate sum for 

 the purpose of engraving and printing some work of art, a copy 

 of which is given to every subscriber for each guinea subscribed. By 

 the combination of a very great number of persons to subscribe for 

 this one work of art, and the avoidance of risk, incidental expenses, 

 and publisher's profits, this print, though superior to what would be 

 charged a guinea in the ordinary course of trade, is supplied to the 

 subscribers at so small a cost as to leave the greater part of the Bum 

 subscribed, as a fund applicable to the purchase of pictures, sculpture, 

 and other works of art. This sum is divided [by the committee into 

 several portions, or prizes, ranging at the present time ( 1859) from IOU 

 to 2001., and on the day appointed for the annual meeting of the 

 society, these prizes are distributed among the subscribers by a process 

 resembling the drawing of a lottery, which gives an equal chance for 

 every guinea subscribed. The prizeholdere are then allowed to select 

 a painting or piece of sculpture to the value of their respective prizes 

 from any of the annual exhibitions of works of art in the metropolis, 

 for the current year, which works, when selected by the prizeholders, 

 are purchased and paid for by the committee, who, at the close of the 

 exhibitions, collect the pictures and sculptures together, and exhibit 

 them gratuitously for some weeks, first to the subscribers and their 

 friends, and afterwards to the public. When the selected works fall 

 short of the amount of the prize, the difference is carried by the 

 committee to the Reserved Fund of the association, and when they 

 exceed it, the difference is paid by the prizeholder. A portion of the 

 funds is also applied to the production of bronzes and medals, porce- 

 lain groups and statuettes, etchings, photographs, &c., which are dis- 

 tributed as prizes at the annual meeting. The amount of subscriptions 

 in the first year, which closed in 1837, was 489t 6., but it increased so 

 rapidly that in 1844, it had reached 14,848J. It has since fluctuated 

 considerably, but the last report showed that the subscription for 1858 

 was 11,6582., of which 3,06(M. was set apart for the purchase of works to 

 be selected by the subscribers ; 2,249Z. for statuettes, bronzes, &c. ; and 

 2.998A for the engraving. 



The popularity of the Art-Unions, properly so called, brought into 

 operation several lotteries for the disposal of works of art, in which, 

 notwithstanding the adoption of a similar course of proceeding, the 

 principle was so essentially different, as to render them in fact mere 

 revivals of a species of gambling speculation which has long been 

 illegal in this country ; and the difficulty of dissociating Art-Unions from 

 lotteries unquestionably illegal, led government to issue a notice in 

 April, 1844, which had the effect of suspending their operations for 

 some months. A parliamentary committee was subsequently appointed 

 to inquire into the subject, with a view to placing them on a safe and 

 permanent basis, and so rendering them as subservient as possible " to 

 the improvement and diffusion of art through the different classes 

 of the community ;" the result of which was the passing in the session 

 of 1844, of a short Act to indemnify the managers against such penal- 

 ties as they might be considered subject to ; and eventually an Act 

 was passed (9 & 10 Vic. c. 48), to legalise Art-Unions under the con- 

 dition, that a royal charter shall have been obtained, or that the deed 

 of partnership or other instrument constituting the association, with 

 the 1 rules and regulations, shall have been submitted to and approved 

 by a Committee of the Privy Council. 



Having described the principles and mode of procedure of the Art- 

 Union of London, it may be proper to notice some other Art-Unions 

 which have been since established, and which have adopted a different 

 mode of distributing the selected works of art among their prize- 

 holdrs. Of these, the oldest and most important is the Art-Union 

 of Glasgow, established in 1841, and of which the annual subscrip- 

 tions for the year 1855 amounted to 20,336^. As in the Art-Union of 

 London, a copy of an engraving is given to each subscriber ; but the 

 pictures which are allotted as prizes are selected by the committee, the 

 prizeholders having no choice, but each receiving the picture which 

 falls to his lot at the annual meeting. The prizes for 1858 vary in 

 nominal value from SI. 3. to 3501. 



The Art-Union of Ireland, established in 1858, proposes to get rid of 

 the great ouflay rendered necessary by presenting each subscriber with 

 a engraving ; and instead, to increase the proportion of prizes, so that 



while hi the older Art-Unions the prizes are in the proportion of one to 

 every twelve or fifteen subscribers, in this, the prizes, " making large 

 provision for those of the higher class, may be estimated at about one 

 in every six " (' Address ' of Committee). Further, every prize is to be 

 selected by the prizeholders ; and while " all above 51. must be selected 

 from paintings or sculpture exhibited in Ireland," prizes below that 

 sum (of which there are to be a considerable number), may be selected 

 from any work of art " anywhere on sale in Ireland, of a class approved 

 by the committee." 



The Crystal Palace Art-Union, established in 1858, chiefly aims at 

 the production and distribution of works of ornamental art of a high 

 order of artistic merit. Each subscriber of a guinea has the right of 

 selecting one of the objects of ornamental art (including bronze and 

 parian statuettes, articles of ceramic ware, photographs, &c.), " executed 

 under the supervision of the council, the copyright of which, as far as 

 possible, will be vested in the society," and of which the ordinary 

 trade price would be not less than the amount of the subscription. 

 Besides which, every subscriber is to have a chance of obtaining a 

 prize from among works of fine or ornamental art, " of the highest 

 class," which are to be selected by the council and exhibited at the 

 Crystal Palace previous to the annual drawing. 



ARTANTHE ELONGATA, the plant which yields the medicina 

 agent known by the name of Matico. This plant belongs to the natural 

 order Piptracea, and is the Piper angustifolmm of Ruiz and Pavon, the 

 Piper ekmgatum of Vahl, and the Stephenxia elonyata of Kunth. 

 Although this plant has long been used by the natives of Peru as a 

 remedy in various diseases, it was not known till recently that it 

 produced the substance known as matico. The term matico is, however, 

 applied in Peru to other substances, and Dr. Lindley states that the 

 leaves of Eupatarium glutinosum were sent to him under that name. 



Artanthe elongata, the true matico plant, is a shrub about 12 feet 

 high, with jointed stem and branches. Its leaves are harsh, short- 

 stalked, lanceolate, acuminate, pubescent beneath, tessellated or rough 

 on the upper side on account of the sunken veins. The spikes are 

 solitary, cylindrical, and opposite the leaves ; the bracts lanceolate and 

 the flowers hermaphrodite. 



It is a native of Peru, and is found at Huanuco, Cucheco, Pauao, 

 Chaclea, and Muna. It flowers from July to September. An infusion 

 made with cold water is the best form of administration. 



A'RTEMIS, one of the ancient Greek divinities, known to the 

 Romans as Diana, whose attributes were so numerous and of such 

 opposite kinds, that it would be difficult to imagine how they should 

 have been assembled in the same deity, if we did not know that the 

 imaginative spirit of the Greeks loved to invest their gods with the 

 most opposite characters. In the poetry of Homer and Hesiod she 

 appears as the daughter of Zeus and Leto (Latona), sister of Apollo, 

 and the goddess who presides over hunting. She traverses the woods, 

 armed with the bow and arrow, and attended by numerous nymphs. 

 Her bow is employed, not only against the beasts of the forests, but 

 also against man ; and in those early poems she is represented as never 

 yielding to the allurements of love. She is a chaste and pure virgin. 

 In the ' Orphic Hymns ' (35, 36), we find her invested with other attri- 

 butes. There she assists at childbirth, is the assuager of pain, looks 

 with benignant eye on the labours of man, and is the author to him of 

 abundant harvests, of peace, and of health. In this she seems to have 

 appropriated to herself part of the duties of Ceres, and indeed, 

 according to ^Eschylus, she was daughter of that goddess. In a temple 

 at Megalopolis in Arcadia her statue stood by the side of that of Ceres, 

 and she was clothed with the skin of a hind ; a quiver hung from her 

 shoulder ; she had a lamp in one hand, and two serpents in the other. 

 (Pausan. viii. 37.) In the Greek tragic poets she appears under 

 another character, according to which the favour of the goddess must 

 be obtained by the sacrifice of human victims. Iphigenia, daughter of 

 Agamemnon, on her return from the Tauri, introduced this barbarous 

 feature in the worship of Artemis. At Sparta there was a temple of 

 Artemis Orthia, where they exhibited an old wooden statue, said to be 

 that brought by Iphigenia from the Tauri ; and though in later times 

 human victims were not offered, the thirst for blood, which the god- 

 dess was supposed to feel, was satisfied by the severe scourging of the 

 Spartan youths before her statue. (Pausan. iii. 16.) All these various 

 fables were collected by the Alexandrine poets of later times, and fitted 

 to one another so as to form a whole. 



The worship of Artemis was very general throughout Greece and 

 the colonies ; but she was more particularly the goddess of the Arca- 

 dians, if we may judge from the numerous temples found in that 

 district. There almost every height, fountain, and river supplied her 

 with a distinctive epithet, so the poet Alcman (who flourished probably 

 B.C. 672) says, that she derives names from ten thousand mountains, 

 cities, and rivers. She is Lycoatis on Mount Msenalus (Paus. viii. 36), 

 Cnakeatis at Tegea (viii. 53), Stymphalia on Stymphalus (22), Cnacalesia 

 and Condyleatis at Caphyse (23) : and it is curious to observe that this 

 old Peloponnesian divinity is frequently found in connection with 

 streams and rive.rs. She is amnium domina, ' mistress of rivers,' in 

 Catullus (34, 12) ; \tnivf<raiv MtrKovos, inspectress or superintendent of 

 portt, in Callimachus (iii. 40). Again, as Apollo was identified, by the 

 later Greek writers, with the sun (Helios), so was Diana with the 

 moon (Silene). [APOLLO.] 



Artemis was a favourite subject with the artists of Greece, and they 



