Faulty Ilutiting Scenes. 117 



means toned down or their rude contrast moderated : 

 bright scarlet coats, bright white horses, harsh green 

 grass, prim dogs, stiff trees, human figures immov- 

 able in tight buckskins ; running water hard as glass, 

 the sky fixed, the ground all too small for the group- 

 ing, perspective painfully emphasized, so as to be 

 itself made visible ; the surface everywhere ' painty ' 

 — in brief, most of the possible faults compressed 

 together, and proudly fathered b}- the artist's name 

 in" full. 



One representing a meet, and the other full cry, 

 the pack crossing a small river ; the meet still and 

 rigid, ever}' horseman in his place — not a bit jing- 

 ling, or a hoof pawing, or any thing in motion. Now 

 the beauty of the meet, as distinct from a drilled cav- 

 alry troop, is its animation : horses and riders moving 

 here and there, gathering together and spreading out 

 again, new-comers riding smartly up, in continuous 

 freshness of grouping, and constant relief to the eye. 

 The other — in full cry — all polished and smooth and 

 varnished as when they left the stable ; horses with 

 gloss}' coats, riders upright and fatigueless, dogs 

 clean, and not a sign of poaching on the turf. The 

 dogs arc coming out of the water with their tails up 

 and straight — dogs as they trail their flanks out of 

 a brook alwa3's, in fact, droop their tails, while their 

 bodies look smaller and the curves project, because 

 the water lays the hair flat to the bod}' till several 

 shakes send it out again. Not a speck on a top- 

 boot, not a coat torn by a thorn, and the horses as 

 plump as if fresh from their mangers, instead of hav- 

 ing worked it down. Not a fleck of foam ; the sun, 

 too, shining, and yet no shadow — all glaring. And, 



