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at becoming the father of a clever son.

"Yes," replied the reverend jester," he must have felt, like a hen, that had hatched a duck, and saw it suddenly take water."

THE BRITISH GALLERY.

THAT good pictures do not always attract the attention due to their merits is an observation of which we see the truth in every exhibition of this as well as all other institutions. Perhaps this is no more attributable to a want of discrimination in the visitors, than the neglect of a pale beauty in a throng of painted ones. The eye is naturally arrested by colours, and that which is to receive its admiration from thence must, for the most part, depend upon its hues, or remain in the shade till time and research have brought its perfections to light. Indeed, so sensible are artists themselves of this hard fate of retiring excellence, that, unless our information deceives us, it has occasionally been the practice of the Royal Academy to re-touch such of their pieces as have been placed in the vicinity of others more vividly coloured; and we have been eye-witnesses of the alteration of many clever performances, which, altogether overlooked in Somerset-house, have only obtained praise when they no longer deserved it by being made worse for the British Gallery.

Amongst those of the present exhibition, whose merits we could have wished to see more fully rewarded, are some admirable efforts of the best contributors. We will only particularize the two Barkers; convinced as we are, that the comparative neglect of these will form no feeble excuse for others, whose excellence has shared

the same fate. The picture of the Boy extracting a thorn from his foot-No. 95, by T. Barker; and the Scene from Nature, 292, by B. Barker, bear the strongest evidence of the abilities of these artists, who in their separate styles are decidedly unsurpassed. The first piece is one of Mr. Barker's most finished productions it has all the taste, simplicity, and breadth of Gainsborough, with a solidity and transparent sobriety of colouring peculiarly belonging to the hand which painted it. There is a pensive sweetness and patient submission in the countenance of the boy; as of one initiated early in the labours of a hard life, to which he is unfitted, but unavoidably destined. There is a nature, a poetical feeling throughout the performance, which places the author in a rank with the inimitable Crabbe; indeed, whatever we see of these kindred geniuses, is but the common thought expressed by different means. Beautiful, however, and faultless as this picture is, it is not, by any means one by which the powers of Mr. Barker may be calculated. The grand characteristics of his mind are strength, rapidity, and versatility; his pencil has the potency of a wizard's wand, and his creations start into life as it were at a single touch."Black spirits and white spirits, red spirits and grey,” pay him equal obedience; and the pathos of the Mother and Infant perishing in the snow from the cruelty of a hard father, the wildness of the Maniac*, and the fury of the Fighting Horses, form a contrast to the grotesque garb of rustic comedy, in which he appeared with the

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* This picture was returned to Mr. B. by the gentleman who first purchased it, from his inability to sustain the daily contemplation of such an affecting reality.

The Scene in the Tyrol-No. 245, was painted some years ago, and sold. Mr. B. afterwards bought it himself at the hammer of a celebrated auctioneer, who warranted it a true Morland.

Mower and Gipsies last year, such as never perhaps was manifested by any individual before him.

The landscapes of Mr. B. Barker are entitled to not less praise than the figures of his brother. He is said originally to have formed his style upon Ruysdael; but however this may be, his manner is now perfectly distinct from any other. If we have some who attempt a greater grandeur and extent of composition, we have none who can, in the remotest degree, compete with him in clearness, facility, and truth to nature. His home is on the desolate heath and barren mountain; his lonely ash creaks aloud in the dreary blast, and his dark stream gushes from its gloom with hoarse and visible motion. The bleakness of the atmosphere seems to add vigour to his power; and where he affords himself the greatest opportunity for spirit, he will be found breathing in his most congenial region. To him it is no step from the darkness of the moody elements to the corresponding hue on the feelings of those who behold them-it is the same thing, equally easy and equally excellent :-no landscape figures have been better painted since the days of Salvator: his banditti have the listless ferocity of minds which can be excited only by acts of rapine, or the spirit and activity of combatting fiends, which, in either case, cannot fail of whirling the imagination into a scene of striking and perilous reality. The picture to which we have alluded is the direct opposite to the style which we have described as Mr. B. Barker's forte. We speak of it as a proof that genius will be itself, whether at home or abroad; and that Mr. B., if he cannot rival himself in some of his wilder flights by the glowing luxuriance of classical composition, can be surpassed, even in this department, by no one else. We know of no reason why the performances of this artist should be

unsuccessfully exhibited, and are convinced that those who will take the pains to examine them will agree in our astonishment, that, if he did not submit to the drudgery of being a teacher, Mr. B. Barker would obtain as little profit from his talents, as if he had never possessed them.

Our anxiety to speak of these two artists has led us out of the usual and more methodical manner of noticing exhibitions; and we are not sorry for it, as a regular, numerical survey must either subject us to the charge of invidious omissions, or extend our observations to an inconvenient length.

The pictures of Mr. E. Landseer have a high claim upon our praise, because we think they possess excellence of the very first order in their style, and a higher still because we believe the artist to be the youngest man who ever attained the summit of his profession. In this situation we venture fearlessly to place him, assured as we feel that in his picture of the Larder Invaded it is utterly impossible to suggest a single improvement. The most honourable testimony to the early and powerful abilities of Mr. Landseer is conveyed in the prize which he has received from the Directors of the Institution; after this, all the commendations we could bestow would be superfluous. We will only remind him of the general and just complaint that many young artists, whose earlier works achieved considerable reputation, have, from an ill-judged confidence in its protection, sunk into comparative oblivion, and that it will require no small attention to preserve the place to which his admirable exertions have raised him.

Within three or four of the Larder Invaded hangs Mr. Newton's delineation of Lovers' Quarrels. Mr. N. is a young exhibitor, a very young man, and a

stranger. These are reasons why, from the specimens he has given of his powers, much is to be expected from him, and why no encouragement should be spared which is likely to secure him amongst us. His genius is unquestionably original; his colouring is beautiful, and it is his own; and he tells his story with a gentlemanly humour which is equally so. The Lovers' Quarrels display nothing broad or outrageous, as we might suppose from the title. There is an exquisitely elegant indifference in the belligerent parties, who exchange pictures with the cool hauteur of men of honour exchanging cards; and, with the arch smile of the wily waitingmaid, who evidently does not behold this awful catastrophe for the first time, the group is truly natural, tasteful, and diverting.

On taking leave of Mr. Newton, whose playful and delicate pencil we hope to meet more frequently, our attention is rivetted by a scene of such interest and admirable execution as we were not prepared to encounter even from the masterly hand of Stephanoff. The Poor Relations is a picture painted from the heart. We may judge of delineated stories as we do of single heads, in which the physiognomist tells at a glance whether the likeness be correct, though he has never seen the original. It is the congruity of features, the unity of expression, that bear this unfailing testimony; and this true combination we find, upon a more extended and arduous scale, strongly manifested in the piece before us. Not a single thing is int:oduced which can remind us that we are gazing on a fiction; every particle tends to elucidate the story and corroborate the opinion which we form of the characters upon the first view. The wealthy man, his proud, comfortable wife, and her two wheezing lap-dogs, have just finished their breakfast,

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