Art Subjects and their Treatment. 359 



towards the light. But even allowing this, it would still make 

 the tree nearly 1000 years old, no contemptible age; and 

 although it is now showing symptoms of decay, for it is 

 said to be partly hollow, yet it is not impossible but what it 

 may, if the lavas of Etna spare it as they have hitherto done, 

 live some five or six centuries more. 



It is stated in the Handbook that there is another chestnut 

 tree, a little further up the mountain, seventy-six feet in cir- 

 cumference, but this I did not see, nor did the guide mention 

 it, and in those days handbooks were not as plentiful as they 

 are now. I therefore missed it, and indeed might probably have 

 missed also seeing the Oastagno la Nave, if my attention had 

 not been directed to it before I left Messina, for the guides are 

 so taken up with the Castagno di cento Cavalli that they can 

 think of nothing else. 



I may mention that I also measured an oak tree a little 

 lower down the mountain, and found it forty- six feet in girth ; 

 but it was much decayed in the branches, and probably con- 

 siderably older than the Oastagno la Nave. 



How these trees have escaped for so long a period the 

 devastating streams of lava and irruptions of fiery cinders 

 that have within that period destroyed innumerable towns and 

 villages, exterminated hundred of miles of vineyards and olive 

 groves, and buried thousands of human beings, is indeed a 

 wonder and almost a miracle. 



ART SUBJECTS AND THEIR TREATMENT. 



The Exhibition of Pictures at the Royal Academy for the year 

 1865 possesses, on the whole, a very considerable amount of 

 merit, but we cannot say that it leaves the mind of an ' ' intel- 

 lectual observer" quite satisfied with the indications it affords 

 of the state of education, thought, and feeling in the artist- 

 world ; although the choice of subjects is as varied as might 

 be expected in a collection of more than a thousand works, 

 produced at a time when no special books or circumstances 

 exercised a dominant influence over picture-makers or picture- 

 buyers. 



The absence of works adapted to public buildings is the 

 natural result of there being no demand for them. Our cities 

 and towns are not yet civilized enough to devote any portion 

 of their wealth to the gradual accumulation of works of art, 

 and the tastes and requirements of a few thousand wealthy 

 members of the middle class chiefly determine the nature of 



