S78 Monthly Retrospect 
‘colouring, ofthe Venetian ; pathos, of the 
Lombard; er humour of the Flemish ; 
éach of these’ varieties is discoverable 
in the different artists of the English 
school. With West, Copley, Singleton, 
Fuseli, Howard, for the first; with Shee, 
Lawrence, Westa!l, Turner, De Louther- 
bourg, for the second; with Opie, North- 
cote, Howard, Londsdale, Phillips, for the 
third; with Wilkie, Sharp, Cook, Mul- 
ready, for the next; with the first Jand- 
scape and animal painters that ever dig- 
nified any school of art ; with the schools 
for design and drawing, that the Royal 
Academy and Town Museum present; 
with the school for colouring, that the 
Patriotic Institution now under notice 
has founded; what may not be hoped 
from the future exertions of the British 
school of the Fine Arts? The limits of 
this department wil! not admit even the 
titles of all thé pieces worthy of notice 
in this exhibition; many of them have 
been exhibited before at the Royal Aca- 
demy, and are consequently weli known 
to the public. 
Taking. them from the catalogue 
Seriatim : — Richard Sass’s Shipwreck 
(No. 6.) displays much knowledge 
of effect, and is an excellent picture. The 
Academician Westall’s Belisurius (No. 
19) is not unworthy of his fame, but is 
not equal ta.some of his* other pieces in 
the present collection. The Peasants of 
Subiaco in the Ecclesiastical States, re- 
turning from the Vineyard on a Holiday, 
by H. Howard, R.A. is an admirable 
picture, well composed and forcibly co- 
Joured. The Zephyr (No. 31) by West- 
all, is beautifully delicate; and a Holy 
Family, by the same Master, in the 
highest style of excellence. The Death 
of Nelson, by Devis (No. 70), is a na- 
tional picture of such merit as makes 
every British heart glow: it suffers from 
its situation amidst so many brilliant pie- 
tures of a different character, and from 
the injudicious colour of the walls. Ne- 
Ver was 2 story better told than this. 
The heroic, the regretted’ ‘Nelson is in his 
last moments; every man isin the act of 
doiug his duty ; and every figure is a use- 
ful accessary to the affecting tale.—There 
is a tolerably successful effort at humour 
in Cosse’s picture of a Private of the 17th 
Regiment endeavouring to inlist a Tuilor 
(No. 73); but a littl more attention to 
the model, and a higher degree of finish, 
will enable this artist to pursue such sub- 
jects with more efiect.—Cook’s Cymon 
and Iphigenia (No. 93) must not be 
passed over ; it 1s a vadmirably well COM 
of ihe Fine Arts. [April 1, 
posed picture, the wis comica is excel 
lently kept up in the figure of the fool 
of nature, whose gaping mouth and stupid 
eyes are so truly expressed, that it would 
be impossible to mistake the love-struck 
idiot.—Drummond’s Deserted Milk Maid 
(No. 101) possesses much merit, but there 
is too much affectation of colouring m 
this, as we!l as in some others of the same 
ar tist. —Barker’s Maniac (No. 105) is hor- - 
ror personified; it would serve to bring 
men to reason from the revels of Baecha- 
nalian debauchery, or seduction.—The 
jirst Navigator (No. 113), by Howard, 
is a fine idea; it possesses the rare merits 
of grand composition, and a chaste unaf- 
fected tone of colour. Atkinson’s Cossacks 
(No. 114) is a spirited characteristic de- 
sign, though but slightly finished. Poor 
Freebairn’s posthumous work of the Tem- 
ple of the Sun is eclipsed by none in the 
rooms. 
Portrait of William Congreve, Esq. directing the 
Discharge of the Fire Rockets, invented ty 
hint, into the town of Copenhagen, during the 
Bombardment by the British Forces, under the 
Command of the Right Hon. Lord Cathcart, 
in 1807 3 painted by Fs Londsdale, engraved 
by G. Cliat, and published by F. Lonasdale, 
8, Berner’s-street. 
Mr. now Lieut.-Colonel ee the 
ingenious inventor of the Fire-rockets, 
that proved so destructive to the metro- 
polis of Denmark at the commencement 
of the present war, and so essentially con- 
tributed to our success in the expedition 
against that Power, is here represented 
in whole length, with a fixed and earnest 
attention directed to the flight of a rocket, 
which has just reached above the picture, 
and from the tail of which all the light 
proceeds that illumines his figure. Co- 
penhagen on fire makes up the distance ; 
and several attendant figures employed in 
preparing or discharging the destructive 
engines, form the accessaries of the pic- 
ture.—Sir Joshua Reynolds has been 
much and justly praised for the dignified 
character with which he enrobed his por- 
traits, and his Lord Heathfield might be 
mentioned as one possessing the highest 
claims to this praise. Mr. Lonsdale has, 
in this very interesting picture, adopted 
the same principle, and with the greatest 
success; for instead of being only the 
dull delineation of the haman face on 
canvas, he has by this, as well as in 
many other well- sicwin portr aits, proved 
himself a truly phiesophical’ painter. 
The management of the chiaroscuro, the 
drawing of the figure, the penetration, 
mind, and depth of thought, in the phy- 
siognomy, 
/ . ei 
