Nature and Art, March 1, 1867.] 
THE DUDLEY GALLERY. 
83 
grey sea and flying rain. Beyond the shower one 
sees the fair weather, but glimmering very pale and 
far away. Especially to be admired is the drawing 
of the surf line clinging round the low green head- 
lands and darkened hills. It would be pleasant to 
have this picture of the fresh west wind in one of 
our gas-dried London rooms. But there is another 
picture of Mr. Poynter’s that we should also like to 
hang up in some pleasant corner near a window. It 
is only of a cat stealing across a quiet gravelled walk, 
but it reminds one of so many pleasant country 
sights and sounds, that one becomes dreamy and 
idle merely by looking at it. 
Let us pass on to Mr. Goodwin’s “ Grey Day in 
Yorkshire ” (No. 238 ). It is a good example of this 
young artist’s serious power. If we miss some 
quality of high idealism in his work, we find 
in it evidence of an unusual grasp of the facts of 
nature, and of an almost passionate delight in their 
representation. The blots and lines of colour are 
placed firmly where they are to take their part in 
the effect, and with a certainty very unusual in so 
young an artist as we understand Mr. Goodwin to 
be. The tone of all his pictures is rich and power- 
ful, and, in this one particularly, is of admirable 
truth. The scene is only a little pool among the 
Yorkshire hills — one bank wooded, the other green 
sedge and peat-land. We can see it is summer 
there now ; but it is a place more known of the 
winter. The trees under their robe of leaves are 
knitted and braced against the strife of the moor- 
land winds. In the deep green of the heavy grass 
the feet of the heron plash cool when the hill-sides 
are hazed with heat. Hither come few men, or 
creatures that dwell with men ; the cry of the wild 
birds or the sound of the sighing wind that brings 
up the cold grey shower are the voices that befit it 
best. It is a place that reminds us that nature can 
get on very well without us and was not only made 
for our beholding. In all his work Mr. Goodwin 
seems to choose this side of nature : it is a great 
and solemn one. 
Now let us look at Mr. Ditchfleld’s pretty idyls. 
He seems enamoured of fair lawns and the quiet of 
green places. There are no brambles, or poor folk, 
or bluebottle flies in his lands. They are really 
sweetly pretty places, and we imagine that, perhaps, 
if we had very pink cheeks and a nosegay in our 
button-hole, and a lovely young lady with still 
pinker cheeks to make love to, and if we were both 
of us painted upon a fan, we might some day be 
accounted fit to dwell within their borders. As it 
is, Mi 1 . Ditchfield must pardon us for only taking 
in them a sort of fanciful interest. They must be 
views in the “ Pays du tendre,” and we should like 
to have them as such, particularly as there is great 
skill in their execution. Let us go back again, 
however, to waters that drown and airs that stir 
with storms sometimes. 
Mr. Arthur Severn’s “ Moonlight on the Seine” 
at Paris (No. 248) is a fine and largely-treated study 
of night. The strong river and the white glittering 
town are sunk deep in the shadow. There are no 
lamps alight, for it is late, and soon it will be day 
again, and the truce of night will be over. Mean- 
while the moon passes above the great city, making 
to herself a pageant of the silver clouds, and, one 
might think, reclaiming the spot for nature, minded, 
by the silence, of the time when no man dwelt by 
the marshy river and the wild swan built among 
the reeds of its islands. Many a sight of misery 
and wrong has she seen since that ancient time ; 
and one fancies she must mostly love the quiet 
pauses of the world when men and their works are 
still, and are as if they were not. To our minds 
this picture will bear out all this interpretation of 
its sentiment ; and it is pleasant to find that on 
the side of art it is sound and learned. The draw- 
ing of the sky is very fine, and the great lines of 
the picture well composed. The tone is good — if 
not exquisitely so — and the colour of the halo round 
the moon very delicately caught. It is well and 
vigorously painted, and seems done with one impulse. 
Mr. Severn has other works here, and we advise 
our readers to study them to find what may be 
found therein ; for Mr. Severn has the gift. 
Mr. Henry Moore’s “Strenshall Moor — Mid-day” 
(No. 326) is a very beautiful sketch. There is a 
sense of stir and gladness in it. The scene is wild 
but not unkindly. One sees that the afternoon 
will be fair after the showery morning. There is 
nothing in the gallery more excellent for natural 
and delightful colour than this picture, and we 
would call the attention of amateurs to the power 
of right tone to harmonize all tints and dignify 
the most commonplace subject. 
“Old Morton Hall, Cheshire” (No. 377), painted 
by Mr. Walter Crane, must be a delightful old house, 
and Mr. Crane has evidently felt it to be so. The 
picture is also noticeable for the clever use made of 
a black-and-white cow, to repeat and carry through 
it the black and white of the old stud-work house. 
If the sky were a little sweeter in colour, we should 
class this work very highly. 
Of Miss Spartali’s three pictures, we like that 
of the “ Lady Prays’ Desire ” (No. 606) the best, in 
spite of the somewhat weak drawing. It is through- 
out imbued with high sentiment and most noble 
grace. See, for example, how the delicate hand is 
placed against the cheek. The colour also is of 
such unusual harmoniousness, that we pass over the 
slight unskilfulness of execution, and will only say 
that we trust this young lady may soon attain the 
mastery in her art that her genius demands for its 
expression. 
Mi'. Ford Madox Brown’s large work, which he 
calls “Cordelia’s Portion” (No. 249), is undoubtedly 
the most noteworthy figure picture exhibited here. 
It illustrates the line, — 
“ The truth, then, be thy portion.” 
The true dramatic crisis has here been taken, 
when Cordelia, conscious of powerlessness to defeat 
the plots of her sisters, adheres with despair to her 
foolish quibbling answer, like some gentle creature 
that cannot strive. 
Here is a great subject, and, we venture to say, 
greatly treated. Of its faults we will resjiectfully 
o 2 
