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TURNER-HIS EARLY POPULARITY.

[1784-1820. feeling, gave it a standing quite apart from the work of any previous painter of English scenery. Gainsborough doubtless excelled Turner in a poetic rendering of close home scenery; Wilson perhaps excelled him in a certain classical elevation of style. But neither Wilson nor Gainsborough could have painted a picture like this. Nor did Turner ever equal it. "Richmond Hill," painted in 1819, was a grievous falling off; and he never again painted English scenery on a grand scale, for of course such pictures as "Rain, Steam, and Speed" are to be classed as poetic fancies rather than English scenes.

But it was not merely as a painter of English landscape scenery that Turner was pre-eminent. In his "Shipwreck," now in the National Gallery; "A Gale at Sea," in the gallery of the Earl of Ellesmere; "The Wreck of the Minotaur," belonging to the Earl of Yarborough, and some others, he had painted a stormy sea with a force and majesty such as no previous painter had ever reached. In such works again as the "Garden of the Hesperides (1806); "Apollo and Python" (1810); "Building of Carthage" (1815); and "Decline of Carthage" (1817); he had treated classical subjects with singular brilliancy and vigour of imagination. And not only these but a multiplicity of other pictures showed at once his wonderful versatility and poetic feeling, as well as his close observation of nature, especially of every variety of atmospheric phenomena, and his unrivalled knowledge of effect.

It is sometimes said that it was not till towards the close of his life that Turner's greatness as an artist was recognised. But this is a mistake. From almost the very outset of his artistic career, his superiority was admitted both by his professional brethren and such of the public as then took an interest in art. He was elected an associate of the Royal Academy at the earliest age (24), at which, by the laws of the academy he could be elected; and again, at the earliest legal age (27), he was elected a full member. Collectors bought his pictures at constantly increasing prices; and engravers and publishers eagerly outbid each other for his drawings, knowing well that engravings after Turner were more popular than engravings after any other landscape painter. He had indeed by the time at which we are arrived become a wealthy man by the exercise of his art,-which is certainly more than at that time could have been said of any other English landscape artist,—and in a country like England pecuniary success is at least an evidence that a man is admired by those to whom he addresses his efforts. There were differences of opinion respecting Turner's works, as there always are differences of opinion respecting the works of a man of original genius, but his genius was not without recognition. It was not till later, when his pictures had become to the ordinary observer unintelligible eccentricities, that his popularity as a painter began to wane.

During the later years of this period there were several other admirable landscape painters:-Callcott, a pleasing and graceful artist, coming sometimes close to the quieter manner of Turner, sometimes approaching the manner of the landscape painters of the Netherlands, but never very original or very vigorous; Constable, both original and vigorous-a hearty, unsophisticated delineator of homely English scenery, and especially of the scenery of the eastern counties-but a good deal of a mannerist, and somewhat confined in his range; Nasmyth, the best of the minute copyists of our woodlands and commons, ill-understood, and little appreciated in his life, and

1784-1820.]

MORLAND--WATER-COLOUR PAINTING-GIRTIN.

155

now perhaps a little overrated; Hofland, a genuine lover of quiet river scenery; and Collins, the ablest painter of his day of coast and inland scenery in combination with rustic groups.

Animal painting had in George Morland, at the early part of this period, a representative of great ability, but of coarse intemperate habits, and the character of the man too often found expression in his pictures. He was succeeded by James Ward, only lately passed from among us at a patriarchal age, a clever painter, but superseded while still young, by a yet younger rival, Landseer, and falling, perhaps as a consequence, into hopeless and most eccentric mannerism. Edwin Landseer, though yet a youth, had attained celebrity before the close of this period, but his real artistic career was hardly commenced.

The essentially English art of Water-colour Painting dates its rise from this period. In the catalogues of the earliest exhibitions of the Royal Academy we find entries of "stained drawings." These belong to the first crude stage of the art. They were produced by the entire drawing being in the first instance made in light and shadow, with a grey or neutral tint. Over this the several local colours were passed in thin transparent washes, the ground tint softening the harshness of the superposed local colours. The sharp markings of the details were then added, usually with a reed pen. In this manner, modified by the habits of the respective artists, some very pleasing drawings were made by Paul Sandby, Hearne, and especially Cozens, a landscape draftsman of refined feeling and considerable power. Turner and his friend and fellow student, Thomas Girtin, for some time practised in this manner; but they were led gradually to abandon it, and adopt the methodwhich originated with them—of painting every object in the first instance in its proper local colour, and by subsequent shades and tints, and various manipulatory processes, modifying this first painting till the whole picture is brought to the desired appearance. By this improved method water-colour painting acquired an exquisite freshness and transparency quite its own, and which in the opinion of many almost atoned for the absence of the depth, force, and richness of oil. Girtin was a landscape painter of considerable ability if not genius, and some of his water-colour paintings are of exceeding beauty; but he died young, and it is mainly to Turner that the infant art owed its early culture and vigorous growth. His sketches and finished pictures in water-colours are extremely numerous and extremely fine; and in them may be traced at least the germs of almost every improvement or modification of the water-colour process. Turner early turned aside to oil painting, though he continued to execute his vignettes for the engravers in water-colours; but many able artists devoted themselves wholly to the rising art, and brought it to the perfection which it ultimately reached. Among these may be mentioned Prout, unrivalled as the delineator of picturesque old houses and fragments of crumbling ruins; and David Cox, one of the boldest, and at times one of the grandest, painters of English hills, meadows, and sandy coasts, under the influence of storm and rain. So rapidly did the new art become popular, and so confident were its professors in their own strength and resources, that in 1805 they formed themselves into a Society of Painters in Water Colours, which has ever since continued to hold with unfailing success an annual exhibition of the works of its members.

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ENGRAVING.

[1784-1820. The great extension of a taste for art was in no way more clearly shown than in the increased demand for engravings and for illustrated publications. The higher branches of engraving were however hardly so successfully culti vated. There was no engraver like Strange or Woollett, and the prints called for by the public were of a less elevated class of subjects. But engravers of unquestionable ability were very numerous, and an unparalleled number of excellent prints was published. Boydell's Shakspeare was issued towards the close of the century at a vast expense. To such works as this, the folio Milton, Macklin's Bible, the Poet's Gallery, and the like, succeeded a host of topographical works, editions of the poets, essayists, and novelists, with small vignettes, and handsome folios and quartos of antiquarian and architectural subjects. In the former class the drawings of Turner may be said to have formed a school of landscape engravers neat, refined, and brilliant beyond previous example in the execution of small plates, but wanting in grandeur and vigour when grappling with plates of a large size. The architectural publications, especially those of John Britton and the elder Pugin, aided by the singular talent of the Le Keuxes in engraving mediæval buildings, did much to arouse that strong interest in Gothic architecture which has in our own day led to such remarkable results.

The demand for illustrated works had however an inevitable tendency to stimulate their more rapid and cheaper production. Engravers, instead of executing their plates throughout with their own hands, employed pupils and assistants on the earlier and less important parts. Further to expedite the process machines were at this time invented, the best being that of Mr. Lowry, by which the skies, plain backgrounds, and the like, could be ruled in, and thus the work of weeks be accomplished in a few hours. The tendency of this employment of mechanical appliances, and of the system of journeywork, was undoubtedly to interfere with the development of the highest individual excellence; but the increasing of the quantity and cheapening the cost of works only inferior to those of the first class in the higher refinements of the art, assisted largely to diffuse a knowledge and a love of art. The use of steel plates instead of copper, which carried this cheapening process so much farther, was introduced early in the century; but steel plates were not tried for fine art purposes till about 1818, and did not fairly come into use till five or six years later.

At the head of the line engravers, at the commencement of this period, was William Sharp, who has left some good prints from the works of the old masters, but who was greatest as a portrait engraver: his print of John Hunter after Reynolds, is of its kind a masterpiece. Other line engravers of ability, his contemporaries and successors, and like him engravers of subject pieces and portraits, were Fittler, Sherwin, Warren, John Landseer the father of the painter, James and Charles Heath, Raimbach, who engraved the earlier prints after Wilkie, and John Burnet, like Raimbach best known by his prints after Wilkie, but like him an excellent engraver of general subjects. The landscape engravers in line were very numerous, and the later ones especially brilliant executants. Among them were Middiman, Byrne, Cooke, John Pye, a thoroughly conscientious and able artist, the Findens, and others. In mezzotinto engraving, landscape was most successfully cultivated during this period, as portraiture had been in the preceding. Earlom, who

1784-1820.]

WOOD ENGRAVING-BEWICK-LITHOGRAPHY.

157

engraved the Liber Veritatis of Claude; Lupton, who engraved many plates. in the Liber Studiorum and the Rivers of Turner; Charles Turner, who in his plate from Turner's Shipwreck produced the noblest print of its class yet published; and S. Reynolds, were eminent in this branch of art. Aquatinta, now almost a lost art, was at this time successfully practised by F. C. Lewis, Daniell, and others. Bartolozzi at the beginning of the period was in the height of popularity for his engravings in the dotted or chalk manner, but they were really of a very meretricious character. William Blake was also an engraver in various manners, some of them peculiar to himself. But Blake is best known by his designs, full of the wildest extravagancies, yet with constantly recurring quaint, graceful, and suggestive fancies, always however running along the narrow line which proverbially divides genius from madness.

Wood Engraving dates its revival from this period. Thomas Bewick, to whose rare application and ability this revival is almost entirely to be ascribed, began to engrave on wood while apprentice to a general engraver; and he received from the Society of Arts a prize for a wood-cut of a "Huntsman and Hounds," almost as soon as his apprenticeship had terminated. Bewick resided all his life at his native place, Newcastle-on-Tyne; drew most of his designs, and engraved them with a combined vigour and delicacy of line, power of expression, and felicitous characterization of surface, that came with all the freshness of novelty upon his contemporaries. Bewick published bis "General History of Quadrupeds," the work by which he acquired celebrity, in 1790. It passed through several editions, and secured a ready reception for all his subsequent publications. In finish it was surpassed by later works, but only his "British Birds" (1797-1804) equalled it in design. Among single prints, the finest was his "Chillingham Bull." Bewick was always happiest in drawing and engraving objects of natural history. But his little tail-pieces, especially those illustrative of the effects of cruelty to animals, have some of them touches of a grim humour that would have done no discredit to Hogarth's pencil.

Lithography was invented by Alois Senefelder towards the end of the 18th century. It was introduced into England in 1801 by M. P. H. André, under the designation of Polyautography. André's chief publication was a series of thirty-six prints from sketches by West, Stothard, and other eminent artists; but his rude and blurred impressions were regarded as mere curiosities. In 1805 he transferred his business to a Mr. Volweiler, who was equally unsuccessful. The art seems then to have been neglected for some years, till Mr. R. Ackerman established a press, from which was issued in 1819 the illustrations to his translation of Senefelder's " Complete Course of Lithography." These prints, though much better than André's, were still very deficient in strength and clearness. It was not till the subject was taken up by Mr. Charles Hullmandel, who to the training of an artist added some chemical knowledge and great manipulative dexterity, that the capabilities of the art were fairly developed in this country. A really good lithograph can, however, hardly be said to have been produced in London as early as 1820.

REIGN OF GEORGE IV.

1820.-LIST OF THE KING'S MINISTERS.

Earl of Harrowby

Lord Eldon

Earl of Westmoreland

Earl of Liverpool

CABINET MINISTERS.

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Lord President of the Council.
Lord High Chancellor.
Lord Privy Seal.

First Lord of the Treasury.
Chancellor of the Exchequer.
First Lord of the Admiralty.
Master General of the Ordnance.
Secretary of State for the Home Depart-
ment.

Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.
Secretary of State for the Department of
War and the Colonies.

President of the Board of Control for the Affairs of India.

Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.
Master of the Mint.

Treasurer of the Navy, and President of
the Board of Trade.
Without office.

NOT OF THE CABINET.

Secretary at War.

Paymaster-General of the Forces.

Joint Postmaster-General.

Joint Secretaries of the Treasury.

Vice-President of the Board of Trade
Master of the Rolls.
Vice-Chancellor.

Attorney-General.

Solicitor-General.

GREAT OFFICERS OF STATE.

Lord Steward.

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Lord Chamberlain.

Master of the Horse.

His Royal Highness the Duke of York Commander-in-Chief.

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Lieut.-General of the Ordnance.

First Commissioner of Woods and Forests, and Land Revenue.

IRELAND.

Lord Lieutenant.
Lord High Chancellor.
Chief Secretary.
Vice-Treasurer.

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