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BACON-FLAXMAN-CHANTREY.

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Bacon, who died in 1799, produced at this time little besides public monuments of level modiocrity; but these he produced with a facility and profusion that aroused the envy of his rivals and the admiration of the multitude. The best are such as those of Dr. Johnson and John Howard in St. Paul's, in which he had no occasion to go beyond simple portraiture; but even in these the attempt to attain elevation of style by arraying such men in a costume borrowed from antiquity, has nearly destroyed personal resemblance, and even mental characterization. Nollekens shared only to a small extent in these public commissions, but he was in great request for private monuments. His strength lay however in portraiture; and his busts and statues are now the most life-like representations left of many of the most memorable personages of his time.

Flaxman lived throughout this period, the truest and greatest sculptor England had ever produced. Sculpturesque design was as much the genuine expression of his mind as it was that of the sculptors of ancient Greece. In some of his imaginative works, as well as in several of his public monuments, his genius was fettered by the current conventionalisms; but even in works of the latter class, as the monument to Lord Mansfield, he showed of how much grandeur of moral expression sculpture was capable. His private monuments, especially some of those to females, are of the most touching tenderness, and of the purest Christian sentiment. In the magnificent group at Petworth of the Archangel Michael overcoming Satan, illustrative of the famous lines in Milton, we have proof that our sculptors might find in our own poets, or in the Book which is a part of the very life of every one, subjects well fitted for sculpturesque treatment, and which, whilst they would require and repay the utmost exertion of mental power, and technical knowledge and skill, would as much come home to the feelings and the understanding of the men and women of to-day, as did the gods and heroes of the old Greek sculptors to the hearts of their contemporaries. The deities of a dead mythology never can thus come home to any modern people, unless treated as symbols of some deep or subtle truth, as they on rare occasions have been by genius of a high order. Flaxman's Psyche may perhaps take rank in this class. His Pastoral Apollo is like a breath of rustic poetry. But the Venuses, Dianas, nymphs, and the like, which Flaxman's contemporaries and successors put forth in any quantity at every exhibition, will be gazed at with as little genuine sympathy on the part of the spectator as was felt in their production by the sculptor. How thoroughly Flaxman's mind was imbued with the purest Greek feeling is evinced by his illustrations to Homer, Hesiod, and Eschylus; while in nobleness of conception, and beauty and delicacy of expression, the illustrations to Dante are fully equal to them.

Chantrey, during the latter years of the regency, had taken his place among the foremost living portrait sculptors. The manly simplicity of his style met with early recognition, and his chisel found ample and worthy employment. A large proportion of the men most distinguished in letters, art, and public life, sat to him, and in most instances he was considered to be successful in preserving the likeness, as well as in maintaining a certain elevation of character. His busts are finer than his portrait-statues, and these than his imaginative works. But his statues have the great merit of first fairly grappling with the difficulties of modern costume. The happiest

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TOWNLEY, PHIGALEIAN, AND ELGIN MARBLES.

[1784-1820. of the monuments in which he ventured on a poetic mode of treatment, "the Sleeping Children," in Lichfield Cathedral, belongs to the period under review, but the idea was certainly caught from Banks's monument of Penelope Boothby, and the design was made by Stothard. Westmacott's earlier poetic works include the "Psyche," and "Cupid," at Woburn; 'Euphrosyne," belonging to the Duke of Newcastle, and many other very pleasing classic subjects; but among them are some of a homelier and more original character, as "the Distressed Mother," "the Homeless Wanderer," and others of a similar order. Westmacott also executed at this time several monumental statues for Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's Cathedral; the well-known "Achilles," erected in Hyde Park "by the women of England," in honour of the Duke of Wellington, and numerous other commissions of a public character.

The taste in sculpture of both artists and the public was no doubt much influenced by the purchase and exhibition of three important collections of ancient marbles. The earliest purchase was in 1805, of the large collection formed by Mr. Charles Townley, of sculpture chiefly of Roman date, but the work of Greek artists, and embracing many works of exceeding loveliness and interest. This formed the nucleus of the magnificent national collection of ancient sculpture in the British Museum. The next grand addition was that of the series of reliefs which had adorned the Temple of Apollo Epicurius, near Phigaleia, and which the Prince Regent bought at a cost of nearly 20,000l., and presented to the nation in 1815. These rilievi, though falling short of the highest excellence of Greek art, are believed to be the work of some of the best scholars of Phidias. They are of great beauty, and of greater interest, as illustrating the history of Greek art. But the most important of the collections was that of the sculpture of the Parthenon, commonly known as the Elgin Marbles, for the purchase of which parliament voted, in 1816, the sum of 35,000l. These wonderful works are by far the finest extant examples of Greek sculpture when at its greatest perfection-the sculpture of the time of Pericles, executed by Phidias, or by his scholars under his immediate superintendence. For years the Earl of Elgin, who whilst ambassador to the Porte obtained the firman through which he was enabled to remove the sculpture from the Parthenon, was assailed with the bitterest invectives for this act of Vandalism as it was termed. But in truth, the earl by their removal saved these marvellous works from utter destruction; he was not in time to save them from grievous mutilation. The Parthenon had been shattered in the Venetian bombardment; afterwards, the eastern pediment, with its matchless statuary, was thrown down to fit the building for the service of the Greek Church; later, and up to the hour when they were rescued by Lord Elgin, the statues were used as targets by the Turkish soldiers; and finally, in the war of Greek independence (1827), the building received great additional injury during the bombardment of the city, but the best of the sculpture was then happily safe in the British Museum, preserved for ever for the free study of all.

A national collection of sculpture was thus formed; but it was not till 1824 that a national gallery of painting was founded. Something had, however, been done towards clearing the way for such a consummation. In 1805, a small body of noblemen and gentlemen who felt an interest in art, succeeded

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in establishing the British Institution, the primary object of which was declared to be " to encourage the talents of the artists of the United Kingdom;" and with this view the Shakspeare Gallery, built by Alderman Boydell, was purchased and appropriated to the exhibition and sale of the productions of British artists, and the exhibition of pictures by the old masters. This last was the grand novelty in the scheme. Most of the directors, and many of the subscribers, were themselves the possessors of collections of paintings by the old masters, and from their galleries, and the collections of other liberal amateurs, has been obtained annually enough pictures of a high class to make a most interesting and always varied exhibition. These exhibitions for the first time afforded to the general public the opportunity of seeing at their leisure paintings by the great masters; and there can be little doubt that to them is to be ascribed a large measure of the interest in art which resulted in the formation of the National Gallery. The directors at the same time sought to encourage living artists, not only by providing a gallery for the sale as well as exhibition of their works, but by offering annual premiums for pictures of a high character, and by occasionally purchasing their pictures. Among the painters to whom premiums were awarded were Hilton, Haydon, Alston, Bird, Linnell, Martin, and others whose names will be remembered, but as may be supposed more whose names are already forgotten. Up to 1820 the Society had only purchased four pictures, first among which was Benjamin West's "Christ Healing the Sick," for which the directors gave the painter 3000 guineas, and which they presented to the National Gallery immediately after its formation. The interest in art no doubt also received a considerable impulse from the opening to the public in 1812 of the collection of paintings, chiefly of the Dutch and Flemish schools, bequeathed to Dulwich College by Sir Francis Bourgeois, and for the reception of which a gallery was built by Sir John Soane. The Dulwich Gallery does not rank among the great picture galleries, but it has done good service to art in this country, and not least as a precursor of the National Gallery. It is understood that the pictures now forming the Dulwich Gallery, and which were collected by Mr. Noel Desenfans, were offered to the government during the ministry of Mr. Pitt on condition that a gallery should be built for their reception. The offer was declined.

After a few years of enfeebled health, Reynolds finally laid down his pencil in 1787, and died in 1792. From this time till the year at which this chapter closes, West, as president of the Royal Academy, was nominally at the head of the British school of painting. During these years he continued to paint pictures of large dimensions, and treating of the loftiest themes in sacred and profane history. But his style underwent no change, and we have nothing to add to the summary printed in a former volume. His friendly rival was John Singleton Copley, whose manner is favourably shown in his "Death of Chatham," now a leading ornament of the British section of the National Gallery. Fuseli, too, painted, lectured, and taught; but his spasmodic compositions now scarcely excite a passing remark; and though critics termed them sublime, it may be doubted whether they ever were in any degree popular. His greatest effort was his Milton Gallery, a series of fifty paintings illustrative of the poetry of Milton. The pictures were publicly exhibited in 1799, and again in the following year, but the receipts

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[1784-1820. at the doors were insufficient to defray the expenses, and the painter would have been seriously embarrassed had not private admirers come forward to purchase enough of the pictures to save him from the consequences of his temerity. Among the younger aspirants for immortality in "high art," the unfortunate Haydon was in the latter years of the regency the most conspicuous. His " Macbeth," "Judgment of Solomon," "Christ's entry into Jerusalem," and other gallery paintings, had aroused equal admiration and criticism, and Haydon in an evil hour was tempted to defend his own theories of art and to denounce those of his adversaries. Controversy has irresistible fascinations for some minds. Haydon was one of her victims. To his private and personal quarrels he added one with the Royal Academy. The result was what might have been predicted. He became a fluent speaker, and a piquant if not a very correct or altogether trustworthy writer. In his proper calling he made no advance. His earliest works were indeed his best. And as he found once ardent admirers grow cold, and timid friends fall away, his bitterness increased, and from this time to his unhappy death he was a disappointed man. Yet he might have been a good painter, and he was certainly a good teacher, if we may estimate a teacher's ability by the success of such pupils as Eastlake, Lance, and the Landseers. Hilton was elected an Academician in 1820, but he had as yet chiefly painted classical subjects, and had altogether failed of popular recognition. Etty had at present scarcely made his name at all known. Martin had startled the critics and fascinated the public by his "Joshua" (1814), and his still more extraordinary “Fall of Babylon" (1819). Stothard was delighting a narrow circle with his elegant but rather feeble paintings; and spending his real strength in making vignettes of almost matchless grace for engraving, at the rate of half a guinea or a guinea a-piece.

In portraiture, from the early part of the nineteenth century to his death in 1830, Lawrence was regarded as the undisputed successor to Reynolds. Northcote, Opie, Hoppner, Beechey, and Jackson, portrait painters of considerable ability and followers more or less of Reynolds, enjoyed a fair share of royal or popular patronage, but none obtained like Lawrence universal favour. Perhaps Lawrence owed somewhat of his good fortune to the very contrast afforded by his easy superficial elegance to the more sombre splendour of his predecessor. It would be foolish to compare Lawrence as a painter with Reynolds, but Lawrence was undoubtedly in his way an admirable artist. His sitters were the noblest and fairest in the land, and, whilst preserving the likeness, he seldom failed in the expression of manly intellect, and never in that of female beauty. His grand series of portraits of the distinguished actors in the affairs of 1814 and 1815 now in the Waterloo Gallery, Windsor Castle, could probably not have been so well painted by any contemporary artist. In a certain broad and vigorous delineation of a male head, however, Lawrence was surpassed by Raeburn, at this time the principal portrait painter in Scotland. But Raeburn was a supremely national painter. It was the hard-featured shrewd Scottish head he gloried in painting and painted so well. The southron fared but indifferently under his vigorous pencil. Of a wholly different stamp was the elegant Harlow, who might in time perhaps have rivalled his master, Lawrence, but who died in opening manhood. His "Trial of Queen Katharine," despite its popularity,

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gave little promise of greatness as a painter of history; it was in fact rather a group of portraits of the Kemble family, and as such it should be estimated.

Portraiture in the hands of Lawrence assumed a new phase at this period. But a far greater change was made in the painting of scenes of domestic life by David Wilkie. Hogarth had painted both high life and low life, but it was with the pencil of a stern and relentless satirist, and in order to point a moral. Bird had still more recently depicted scenes of humble life, but with a halting and unequal touch. Wilkie was the first to paint with thorough artistic skill, and a gentle genial humour and quiet appreciation of character, the pleasant side of the everyday life of the peasant and the yeoman. His earlier pictures, "The Village Politicians," "The Blind Fiddler," "The Card Players," "The Village Festival," "The Cut Finger," "Blindman's Buff," "The Penny Wedding," and the like, were all of this homely cheerful character. It was not till 1815 that he touched a more pathetic chord in his "Distraining for Rent." From the outset Wilkie achieved an almost unbounded popularity. His pictures told a story that all could understand; expressed a sentiment with which all could sympathise; and were in all respects painted with a truthfulness which every one could recognise. They won, therefore, the general suffrage; and at the same time their conformity, in composition, colour, and other obvious technical qualities, to the principles of the Dutch masters who excelled in similar subjects, was equally efficacious with the cognoscenti who then gave the law in pictorial criticism. Up to the close of the period before us, Wilkie continued to paint carefully studied subjects of the healthy homely class in which he first acquired fame. Two or three years later he visited the continent, and from that time he entirely altered his manner of painting and range of subjects. But that change we need not here anticipate. At the time we now leave him he was undoubtedly the most generally popular painter in England.

Far greater and probably more permanent was the influence on English art of the genius of Turner than that of either of the painters we have yet noticed. Landscape painting towards the close of the last century was fast falling into conventionalism and inanity. The authority of the men who had just passed away, and the imitation of the old masters, paralysed individual effort. Turner commenced his career by making coloured drawings, in which he aimed at little more than correct topographical representation. Long after he began to paint in oil he continued to study and imitate the manner of his predecessors,-Wilson, Loutherbourg, and occasionally Gainsborough, in English scenery; Vandevelde in representations of the sea; whilst Claude was his guide in classical compositions. But year after year he showed more and more self reliance and originality; an ever increasing knowledge of the capabilities of landscape art, and extended acquaintance with the phenomena of nature. The wonderful range of Turner's powers as a landscape painter were not wholly developed in the period before us. He visited Italy for the first time in 1819, and his Italian pictures were consequently as yet unpainted. But his power as a painter of English scenery had reached its farthest extent. The "Crossing the Brook," the noblest English landscape of its kind ever painted, was exhibited in 1815. It now forms one of the choicest of the Turner treasures in the National Gallery. Its hitherto unapproached expression of space, magical aërial perspective, quiet beauty of colour, and poetical