all that God says; questioning doubt of all that man says. Only let us be sure that it is God's voice to which we listen, and not some vain human voice simulating His, and profanely assuming His infallibility. At present the spirit within us which knows is separated from the essence or nature to be known by the barriers of the material. To God alone has it direct access. Will a period ever arrive when, without the intervention of hearing, touch, or sight, without living voice or written symbol, the human mind, breaking through all disguises, piercing through all forms, shall instantaneously lay hold on the truth? This hope is the star which beckons us onward. Oftentimes wearied in the search of truth, sickened by discoveries of falsehood arrayed in stolen robes, let us hope on to the end. Then shall we know even as also we are known.

thence is it?

BY ADAM BEDE.

Whence is it, that the friends we loved of youth,
With strong soul-friendship that no power could sever;
Are chill'd by manhood's scenes of joy and ruth
And grown estranged for ever?

Whence, that amid this strange world's ebb and flow,
Bright cheeks are flush'd with hope, while pale ones tingle
With pangs of grief? Whence that so much of woe,
With so much joy should mingle?

Whence is it, that dark hearts with sin bedight,
Are often void of care and flushed with gladness;
While sainted bosoms tell the wakeful night,
The story of their sadness?

Whence is it, that yon reckless spendthrifts bear
No traces of distress or dark misgiving;
While worthier hearts toil on with frugal care,
Yet hardly earn a living?

Whence is it, that the labours of a life,

Propell'd and cherish'd by some fond ambition,
Are crown'd at length; but when success is rife,
Death blights the golden vision?

O! why is life's short hour not spent in peace?
Why is pure love despised for bauble glory?
Youth's dream-life's battle-death's release
Is not this human story?

Whence is it then, since life is frail and brief,

That hearts grow cold, and fond hopes are decaying;
That love is changed to hate, and joy to grief,

And friendship to betraying?

Mysteries are these, to our dim vision sealed,
Not yet to us, is their solution given,
But one day they shall fully be revealed,
In the pure light of heaven.

Willenhall, October 14th, 1862.

The Exhibition and its Picture Galleries. *

BY MRS. F. P. FELLOWS.

(CONTINUED FROM OUR LAST.)

It has frequently been urged by second rate painters, that the present costume of the XIX century, and prosaic manners and customs of this age, are a serious bar to the representation of events of the day; and Gil Blas, the Vicar of Wakefield, and Don Quixote, are the stock-intrade of these grumblers, who seek refuge in costume, till their personages sink into mere lay figures, magnificently apparelled, but destitute of expression. Hence arose the Keepsake School of Art, of which F. R. Pickersgill, Charles Landseer, and Hart, are the chief luminaries. It is not the subject that makes the picture, but the way in which that subject is handled. Prometheus made figures of clay, but touched by fire from heaven, these figures became men.

Two pictures in this Exhibition, by young and rising artists, go very far to prove that there is still poetry and pathos in this world-though it be a world of chimney-top hats and millinerisms. The first of these, entitled The Last Day in the Old Home (727) by R. B. Martineau, represents the interior of an old mansion, which has at last fallen into the auctioneer's hands. The spendthrift husband stands in the midst of the desolation he has caused-reckless, selfish, striving to brave it out, and drinking to the last. He has placed wine in his young son's hand, and is inciting him to follow his own example. But the mother

* Table of Errata in the October Article on the Exhibition and its Picture Galleries.-Page 290, line 4, for Brobdignajian read Brobdignagian. p. 291, 1. 26, for Diebitsch read Diebstel-p. 291, 1. 35, for Brandwhite read Branwhite.-p. 293, 1. 14, for Goffamy read Zoffany.-p. 294, 1. 1, for Hydville read Wyd ville.-p. 294, 1. 2, for fleety read fleeting.-p. 294. 1. 29, for sad read such.-p, 295, 1, 1, for mourning read murmuring. p. 295, 1. 44, for Mr. Collins read McCallum.-p. 295, 1. 48, for White read Whaite.

The

wan and worn, yet still handsome-turns from the desk where she is writing her last directions for the old steward, and with extended, beseeching hand, and imploring countenance, entreats the boy to desist. Her little daughter stands beside her with tearful eyes, clasping fast her doll-almost the only possession she has left. Next the child is the old steward-grown grey in the service of the family, with face furrowed by anxiety-bowing low as he gives up his cherished keys to the aged grandmother, who weeps bitterly as she receives them. sorrow, mingled with respect, in the old man's face, and the struggle to keep back his tears, are marvellously rendered; and most admirably told are the delicate courtesy and extreme sympathy which he evinces toward these unhappy ladies. The ancestral portraits frown bitterly from the wall on their degenerate descendant; for the fatal word 'Lot,' is already affixed to their frames-to the antique armour, and to everything in the house. Beyond the open door are the brokers' men, making out a catalogue of the sale that will take place to-morrow, when the family shall have quitted the old home for ever. Through the window, blazoned with armorial bearings, is seen the park-the autumn trees already marked with the fatal cross, tossing their arms and lamenting in the blast, while their yellow leaves shower down like wasted gold.

The second of these pictures-Mr. Ford Madox Brown's Last of England (516) represents a broken-down gentleman, reduced either by his own folly, or by the fraud of others, to retrieve his shattered fortunes by emigration. The ship has weighed anchor, and is rapidly leaving England behind. Seated beside his young wife, who holds her infant under her shawl, the pair sit hand locked in hand, under the shelter of the umbrella which they spread as a temporary screen from the rest of the steerage-passengers, who with coarse gibe and jest are beguiling the tedium of the voyage. The husband frowns at the land that casts him forth, and a curse is on his lips; but the wife, with reddened eyes that tell of the sorrow of parting from home and kindred (how bitter a sorrow none can tell, save those who have so parted,) gazes sadly and lovingly, as the last of England fades slowly from her view-while true to her wifely vow, she follows her husband, for better or worse, to the strange unknown land beyond the sea.

We come now to the examples of the highest art of all: religious art. Of these the glorious Light of the World, by Holman Hunt, stands pre-eminent. The majestic figure of the Redeemer, crowned and robed as king and priest, comes in the watches of the night, through a wild deserted garden, with the rich fruit of promise scattered under foot, like the wreck of a ruined life. He stands with tearful loving eyes, listening intently for the slightest response from within, as he knocks at the door, over-run with vile weeds, typical of the sinner's torpid heart, hemmed round with worldly lusts. Words cannot tell the pathos -the beauty of this work, which places its author among the greatest artists that have ever lived-so with this brief description we must pass it by.

Herbert has two grand studies of the Magdalen: first where, kneeling at the foot of the Cross, with bare, attenuated arms, she embraces the fatal tree, whence the blood of the Saviour drops on her clasped hands; and again where the fearful tragedy ended, she passes tearworn, mournful, beneath the green twilight of the dawn, to the place where they have laid him who first spoke to her of life and hope, and who, after death, will appear first to her to tell of the immortal life that she will share with the blessed. Very poetical is this artist's Christ in the Wilderness (658), sitting alone, beneath the stars, where everything, save the Man of Sorrows is at rest, even the flowerets that sleep folded at his feet.

Now when we have enumerated these few works, we have mentioned all the English pictures in this gallery worthy to be ranked as religious art-that is, art which aids religion by awakening religious feeling. There are faint and feeble heads here and there, purporting to represent the Saviour, that are inane beyond conception. There are a few illustrations of sacred events, where a vapid unmeaning sentimentality usurps the place of any elevation of feeling, such as Dobson's Scriptural Subjects. Millais' Return of the Dove to the Ark (650) in spite of great painstaking in the painting, and admirable expression of the weary bird, is utterly marred by the unnecessary common-place ugliness of the two girls who receive the wanderer in their arms. His Vale of Rest (649) in which, beneath a sunset sky, two nuns are engaged in hollowing out a grave, in the convent cemetery-though not, strictly speaking, a sacred picture, is far beyond the former work in depth of feeling.

We cross a hall of statuary, and are now in the Foreign Gallery, commencing with the French School. What a contrast to the art we have left! Few pictures of home scenes, very few landscapes, but many large canvasses-some 12 feet by 20-filled with battle, and murder, and sudden death. Colour not so good as the English pictures with their brilliant harmony of tints, being often blurred and clayey; but form much grander, bolder, better drawn, though withal a certain pose, a certain consciousness of attitude, recalling the academy and the atelier. This is particularly exemplified in a contribution by Ingres— the Nestor of French art-a man above eighty years of age, having been a pupil to the celebrated David, the painter in the Reign of Terror. It is called The Spring (79) and represents a water-nymph, standing and bearing a vase, whence pours the source of the stream, Nothing can exceed the purity of drawing, the statuesque outlines of this most graceful figure; but the colour is cold and gray, and the landscape accessories are slurred over in the most inaccurate and slovenly manner. As a rule, the French, with the exception of Melle. Rosa Bonheur, and a few other artists, are not successful landscape painters; and Delaroche's Virgin Martyr (110), sweet and pathetic as it is, is greatly marred by the bad painting of the water in which the murdered maiden floats-water that recalls nothing so much as the blue blanket at the

minor theatres, which, when shaken by energetic scene-shifters at the wings, is interpreted to mean a storm at sea.

Delaroche is greater in his Marie Antoinette (113) who dimmed, discrowned, yet every inch a queen, passes from her trial to her doom. Most strikingly original in treatment are his three small pictures (112, 111, 109) from the Crucifixion. In the first, the Disciples watch from a small upper chamber, the procession to Calvary. Powerless to save-overcome with horror-the Virgin Mother sinks on her knees in the midst of the chamber, as she hears the tramp of soldiery, and the cries of the multitude, thirsting for the death of her Son. The Magdalen has thrown herself prostrate, in agony, beneath the casement, through which we see the glittering Roman spears, and standards, and the head of the fatal cross, with the inscription INRI,' already affixed. The next picture shows us evening, and the Disciples returning home from the tremendous scene on Calvary. Staggering, blindly catching at the wall, they seem scarcely able to reach their dwelling-the beloved Apostle carefully upholding his sacred charge, the mournful Mother of Jesus. The third scene is the interior of the chamber at midnight-the Disciples plunged in the heavy slumber that often follows the exhaustion of great sorrow. All sleep, save the Mother, who rises to contemplate, by the light of a feeble lamp, the bloody crown of thorns-the sole relic she could bear with her from the scene of agony.

Another very original picture is Jobbe's Procession to Calvary (141), where the train of mourners, bearing ladders and weeping in wild lamentation, ascend the accursed mound, and approach the crosses that with their dead burdens, loom dimly through the misty moonlight.

Gleyre's Illusions Destroyed (90) is a masterpiece of painted poetry. the last gleam of twilight, on a lone sea-strand, sits an aged poet, whose lyre with broken strings-silent for ever-has fallen from his hand. A bark filled with maidens, and replete with love song, and all that gilds a lifetime, glides slowly away, into the dim distance, never to return, leaving the old man alone on the solitary shore.

A most complete contrast to this soft and dreamlike scene, is the noonday glare of Gerome's crowded amphitheatre, with its sanded, blood-stained arena, and awning painted with strange figures of wild-beasts. The bloated Emperor Vitellius in the chair of state, surrounded by his slaves and lictors, hardly heeds the greeting of the fresh group of gladiators, who, with upraised shield and spear, exclaim "Ave Cæsar Imperator, morituri te salutant.” "The men who are to die, salute thee, Cæsar! Slaves are dragging out the dead bodies of the last band slain, by the aid of long hooks. An attendant is scattering fresh sand to obliterate the gory traces of the combat, and the impatient crowd is eager for the game of death to recommence. Can we wonder that the mighty empire tottered and fell, with such a canker as this eating at its core ?

The battle-pieces with which the French department is densely crowded, mostly represent the conflicts in the Crimea, and throw a new light upon that memorable campaign. It would appear that the severest struggles, such as Alma, Inkerman, the taking of the Redan and Malakoff, were contested without the aid of the English; as, with the exception of a solitary disabled highlander, not a Briton is to be seen-the combats raging solely between the French and the Russians.