1801. ] 
fhew in a private room. Opie’s Girl ina 
~ Green Chair, °* who never told ber love,” 
is painted with great force, and produces 
an effect that no other artift could give : 
but a phylician of the time of Hippocrates, 
and a Girl in a modern habit, border 
upon incongruity. The Cupid is pretty, 
but brought fo forward, that he looks like 
one of the party, and though it is a pro- 
per adjunct— 
—1In face and figure neither new nor rare, 
We wonder how the Devil it came there. 
_ Sir Jofhua’s Fiend, in the Death of Cardi- 
zal Beaujort, though not behind, the cur- 
tain, is fo completely in the back-ground, 
that many people looked at the picture for 
halfan hoar, and never (aw the Devil ;— 
but Mr. Opie’s Urchin is not only obvious » 
p 5 
but obtrufive, and more palpable ficth and 
blood than his Girl, Galen, or Old Wo- 
man. The Landfcape by Sir Francis 
Bourgeois is very pleafing ; but the figures 
want folidity, and for the ttyle of Claude 
if is too meretricious. Bigg’s Steward 
and Bailiff,is anaddrefs to the mind rather 
than the eye, and excites the feelings 
without much gratifying the fight. Like 
every thing that he does, it is fo well 
thought, tiat_Lycurgus, notwithftanding 
his fevere prombition, might have admit- 
ted it into his republic. Loutherbourg 
has proved his right to the title of the 
Deity of Fire; his Colebrooke Dale has a 
blaze of excellence. 
Daniell’s Views are difting&t, and ex- 
actly appropriate to the places which they 
defignate. We wif Mr. Downman 
would abide by his little portraiis of great 
peaple :—here he is at home, but when 
he rambles into the regions of romance, 
and creeps over the fame ground that has 
been prévioufly trod by Hogarth and Mor- 
timer, we can only regret that Don 
Quixote and his faithful Squire have been 
fo fhamefully treated. Stothart’s Fatal 
Sifters, are indeed a fierce triumvirate, 
<¢ fingling laft the d:flin'd dead!” Mr. 
Wheatley’s Four Times of the Day, are 
natural rural figures, very properly em- 
ployed, but have no very firiking effect. 
Lawrence’s portraits are very good; we 
do not yhink the Hamlet interefting: the 
manner in which he holds the fkni] does 
not give the ipectator any idea that it is 
the fubject he is moralizing on. The 
back ground of the piéture is more im- 
preilive and appropriate to the fcene and 
tuoject, than any thing we ever faw. 
The Prefident is in his ufual ftyle: his 
fketches {pivited; his finifhed pictures, 
* 
Retrofpect of the Fine Arts. 
439 
though well balanced, and bearing marks 
of a great mafter, arehard in the outline.* 
A Print, reprefenting the Vitory obtained over 
the Dutch Fleet by the Britifo Squadron under 
the Command’ of Aamiral Lord Duncan, Oct, 
11, 1797, from a Pifture painted by F. P. 
de Loutherbourg, R. A. by Fames Fittlery 
A. R. A. Marine Engraver to His Majefty. 
Dedicated to the Officers and Seamen of the 
Royal Navy. 
The picture from which this print is 
engraved, is in the beft ftyle of the mafter, 
and Mr. Fittler’s engraving is worthy of - 
the original. The point of time is, when 
the malts of the Flag fhip of the Dutch 
Admiral had gone over the fides. Such 
incidents are depicted as tend to fhew that 
charatteriftic generofity and humanity to 
the vanquifhed which fo eminently dif- 
tinguifh the Britith feamen, and illuftrate 
the poftion, that an enemy in his power 
ceales to be confidered as anenemy. M. 
de Loutherbourg has availed himfelf of the 
poetica licentia, by bringing into one point 
* We have been favoured with the following 
remarks upon the prefent Exhibition, by a muche 
valued Correfpondent, Inthe Exhibition of this 
year the principal fituations are occupied by 
Portraits, an uneguivogal acknowledgment 
that there were no pittures in the Hiftorical 
department of fufficient importance, at leaft- 
in point of magnitude, to intitle them to dif- 
tinguifhed places. From this cricumftance 
we are difpofed to augur the decline of 
the nobleft branch of the Artin this country 5 
a decline refulting either from radical defects 
in the inftitution or management of the Aca-= 
demy, fome of which were indicated by the 
late. enlightened Profeffor of Painting, in his 
Leétures to the Students 5; or from a want of 
tafte and liberality in the public towards 
works of the higheft clafs. 
Among the prefent performances, No. 183, 
The Lowe-fick Maid 3 or, the Doctor Puzzled 5 
painted by Ovre, claims our firft attention. 
The fubjeét is treated in an interefting, tho” 
not ina dignified ftile. The figures are well 
grouped and correctly drawn, the colouring is 
trueand brilliant, thelight and fhade forcible 
and clear, and the extraordinary empafto of co- 
lour gives an uncommon energy of efte&. 
The attitudes are natural, and the exprefiions 
charaéteriftic. "The dubiety in the counte- 
nance of the Doétor, the concern, evidently 
maternal, in that of the old woman, and the 
downcaft look: of the enamoured damfel fhun- 
ning ferutiny, are well conceived and happily 
executed. But in a familiar fcene, fuch as 
this, we more than doubt the propricty of in- 
troducing a heathen deity, and therefore ob- 
ject to the Cupid, however well painted. 
3L2 re) 
