PICTURES. 125 



Marner.' Walter Scott, Miss Austen, and Mrs. Gaskell, were 

 read and re-read till they could be read no more. He had 

 two or three books in hand at the same time a novel and 

 perhaps a biography and a book of travels. He did not often 

 read out-of-the-way or old standard books, but generally kept 

 to the books of the day obtained from a circulating library. 



I do not think that his literary tastes and opinions were 

 on a level with the rest of his mind. He himself, though 

 he was clear as to what he thought good, considered that 

 in matters of literary taste, he was quite outside the pale, and 

 often spoke of what those within it liked or disliked, as if they 

 formed a class to which he had no claim to belong. 



In all matters of art he was inclined to laugh at professed 

 critics, and say that their opinions were formed by fashion. 

 Thus in painting, he would say how in his day every one 

 admired masters who are now neglected. His love of 

 pictures as a young man is almost a proof that he must have 

 had an appreciation of a portrait as a work of art, not as a 

 likeness. Yet he often talked laughingly of the small worth 

 of portraits, and said that a photograph was worth any number 

 of pictures, as if he were blind to the artistic quality in a 

 painted portrait. But this was generally said in his attempts 

 to persuade us to give up the idea of having his portrait 

 painted, an operation very irksome to him. 



This way of looking at himself as an ignoramus in all 

 matters of art, was strengthened by the absence of pretence, 

 which was part of his character. With regard to questions of 

 taste, as well as to more serious things, he always had the 

 courage of his opinions. I remember, however, an instance 

 that sounds like a contradiction to this : when he was looking 

 at the Turners in Mr. Ruskin's bedroom, he did not confess, 

 as he did afterwards, that he could make out absolutely 

 nothing of what Mr. Ruskin saw in them. But this little 

 pretence was not for his own sake, but for the sake of courtesy 

 to his host. He was pleased and amused when subsequently 



