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Leader (1850-1860), 24th May 1856, Edition 1 of 2, Page 499, ^ * * ®/ll£ ^iriJBl " / *" v *?•**" ?

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      metallic resources of his country , the chemical factories , the potteries and lass-houses , the means and facilities of transit for goods , the mode of conducting business , —all illustrate the state of practical science in Russia , nd in some degree the manners of the people , and show how backward sLe fill is in all those acquirements which can properly stimulate and develop the infinite branches into which industry and enterprise may be divided and subdivi ded . .

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      ANCIENT AND MODERN INDIA . India * Ancient and Modern . By David O . Allen , D . D . Triibner and Co . Da . Ali ^ en has compiled a work of great utility , and one that was much wanted . Though written especially for an American public , it will prove not less acceptable to the public of this country . The worthy divine apologises in some sort for taking up a subject which , he imagines , must be already familiar to English readers , and excuses himself by alluding to the very limited views concerning India and its inhabitants usually entertained in the United States . The apology would have been quite unnecessary had he even contemplated exclusive circulation in England , where such profound ignorance prevails on all Indian matters unconnected with curry and the Bengal tiger . This ignorance will , no doubt , give way now that the attention of the Legislature is so frequently directed to the internal administration of the British empire in the East . But so much prejudice prevails , so much passion has been exhibited with reference to the government of the East India Company ,-that it has been hitherto impossible to obtain a calm , unbiassed view of the progress of European power in the East , and of the

      relative position of the conquerors and the conquered . This want is at last supp lied . In about six hundred pages of clear type and pleasant reading , Dr . Allen has succeeded in giving a succinct and highly-interesting narrative of the three great periods of Indian history—the Hindoo , the Mahomxuedan , and the European . His outline of the external aspect of the country , its climate and natural productions , imparts as much information as the general reader usually seeks to obtain . His account of the Government of India is accurate and impartial . He gives praise where praise is due , and pleads many extenuating circumstances to excuse the shortcomings of the Honourable Company . Perhaps , to the majority of readers , the most interesting portion of his work is that which treats of the religion , manners , customs , institutions , and literature of the native population , while not a few will turn with anxious curiosity to his experiences of Christianity in that distant land . In short , it is the most complete compendium of matters relating to India that has yet appeared .

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      May 24 , 1856 . ] THE LEADER . 499

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      EXHIBITION OF THE ROYAL . ACADEMY . THE STORY-TELLING POAVER . If the picture is not a mirror it is a story ; and it rises in the scale of art iu proportion as it is a story . You judge , then , of a school in proportion as it is able to set before you the story that it professes to unfold ; and the question of this week is , What tale doth the Royal Academy unfold—what are the several tales which its contributors have to tell—and how do they do it ? In art , as in politics and in social matters , men seem at present not very settled in their purpose ; they differ among each other—they have no distinct shape of plan for

      themselves . The pencil vacillates between the conservatism of the studio , the ¦" good old plan" of doing things , and some subversive " new idea , " which makes the established forms look pale and insipid , unsettles sequacious minds , and yet does not exactly succeed in appointing its own Provisional Government . In the collection of this year , increased numbers are seen to be following Millais or the Naturalist school , which has sprung out of the prrc-Raphaelitcs ; Irat Frost still pursues his cold licentious study of life among supposititious boarding-school nymphs ; Grant still paints dashing portraits comma il Jaut ; O'Neill gives us gentle diagrams of touching incidents , and the balance of power proceeds with as regular a diplomacy as a Royal Academy dinner .

      Perhaps the most striking change of the story telling is in the negative direction . Wilkie presented you real life , but with a dash of humour in it . Webster has gradually devoted himself to portraying you real life as it may be caught any moment of the day when nothing particular is going forward . This year his " Hide and Seek" is the simplest scene in a cottage , where one child hides from another outside , while mother and sister at their domestic duties give a passing glance at the sport . It is a pretty scene , but the artist ' s share is little more than that of a looking-glass : there is not much to tell Aissde ll ' s " Browsers' holla" is also a matter-of-fact—the gamekeeper tending .

      the young fauns ; but the open scene , the active forms of the youthful deer , the play of character , demand a more animated pencil on a subject less hackneyed : there is more to tell , and the story rouses a greater interest . ITor in painting it is not always the eventfulness , but the suggestion of life , and of the capacity for meeting events which makes the subject of the- picture interesting . Thus the " Gipsy Water-carrier of Seville , " by Philip , succeeds so well in putting before you a creature full of life—handsome , Hynwnetrieul , slender , sharp in action , yet graceful—that the form is like thu volume of a atirring tale unopened . The spectator has a sense of power both in the painter and in his subject .

      Nor is it that the subject will supply the eventfulness or animation . LebU £ , who has known how to present the character of real life bo vigorously , chooMs this year a figure of "llermione" —mi injured lady , whom we arc to take for the wronged wife ; and a group of Italian wayfarers " near Rome , " who should have life in them : but the llenniono is a pale abstraction , with outline smoothed , down to the " fashions of the day" in such characters ; and the wayfarers are only wayfarers , with none but the most obvious characteristics brought out . so that the picture is not unfairly rated by tho question— " Whut then ?" Sometimes the artist trios to supply the intent and force of his subject by mechanical accessories ; but the spectator is not thus to bo deluded , and the adulteration will not pass . Wo have our oxample , alas ! in Poolm , who can do better things . There is a legend that throu Swiss conspirators met in a mountain recess to concert tho first plans for overthrowing the tyranny of Gkssluk - ^ -an incident str iking historically , but , since it lacks action , needing , to dramatize it for picturo , some great force of expression in tho men , or some dramatic

      allegory in the ominous war of elements , or , perchance , some excessive simplicity which would read its own moral . Mr . Poole feels the subject ; but he " fumbles" at the treatment , like a man not too familiar with glens , conspiracies , or wild passions . The force has to be supplied in another mode , and here it is done by a rough texture . There sit the three conspirators in rockygloom ; the very pigments shaken into broken atoms , which make the picture resemble an irregular mosaic , and impart a certain degree of turbid uncertainty to the painting : but difficulty of deciphering the meaning or the forms of an historical picture is not equivalent to mystery in the story . The telling of a story does not consist only in introducing human figures , whose particular pursuit may be rendered intelligible . Mr . Frith must this year be accounted amongst those hitherto rising artists who have decidedlysunk to the prosaical , and who take a matter-of-fact to be a matter worth expositing . We do not say this of a picture numbered 7 , " A Dream of the Future , " in which there is a pretty country girl that may be dreaming about anything at a stile in the midst of " landscape by T . Creswick . " The picture

      belongs to the class of decoration , and would be a very pretty ornament in any tasteful dining-room . We speak rather of the picture described , " Many happy returns of the Day , " in-which a happy couple is seated at a birthday dinnertable , to celebrate the first or second anniversary of the youngest in the party ; while a servant is bringing in toys for his delectation , and grandpapa , who sits a little aloof , is joining in the toast . Now here we have an English couple in good circumstances , with half a dozen extremely pretty children , a very handsome and " aristocratical " -looking grandpapa , and altogether a model family , such as might be found at Mornington Villas or Lansdowne Gardens , in any of the higher-rented houses of the best London suburbs . But what then ? There is no very striking incident ; there is no very remarkable trait of character in any of the persons . The still life is not faultless , nor is there anything but the most superficial exhibition of the c 6 hiruoiiest , though not discreditable , feelings which may be found under the roof of any Paterfamilias . Paterfamilias himself can supply quite as good a picture once a year if his income will permit him . Nothing could give value to the picture unless it consisted of portraits , and then the portraits would be valued only in . the particular family .

      There is not a single human being in Hunt ' s painting of "The Scapegoat , ' and yet there is human interest , and something more than human . He has taken the custom of the Jews , who adorned a goat , loaded it with the sins of the people , and drove it forth into the wilderness , thinking that they should gain some immunity by that sacrifice . Here , then , is the creature driven forth , stumbling and staggering to the salt desert , where it is brought by weariness to a stand—the melancholy of death in its eyes , helplessness in its limbs , thirst in its anxious mouth , and a wonderful brightness of the setting sun glancing on its hairy hide . It has strayed into a sinking ground on the border of the salt sea ; skeletons surround it . It is a perfect type of innocence and helplessness , sent to die for the superstition , the senseless selfishness , the ignorance and cruelty of the people—a sacrifice of any day and any place . The colouring is verypowerful . The pigments are so employed that their contrast , or their

      tranalucence one through the other , gives the exact points of light reflected from different surfaces with different colours ; and this artful use of the pigments results in bringing to eye the exact tints , the very substances , and the light of the sun itself . We except the extreme background , which is harsh and violent . The hues marked upon the rocks and sky by tlie setting sun are not too positive , but too little uniform and sweeping in their texture . When such prismatic colours are reflected by mountain or cloud in southern climes , they are seen in great sweeps , and the slight breaks of local form or colour are submerged in the deluge of brilliancy . But the picture is one of great power , both in the force of its colours , in the portrayal of animal character , and in the great moral story which tho illustration enforces . If Hunt is a student , he is a great painter . If this is what he means to Jlnisfi with , he is but a part of a painter ; though a better part than most of the mere limners whose finished failures

      surround him . We might use the same words in speaking of Millais , who has , however attained to a far greater degree of finish than Hunt . Millais exhibits five pictures : —" Peace concluded , 185 G ; " "Portrait of a Gentleman ; " " Autumn Leaves ; " " L'Enfant du Regiment ; " and " The Blind Girl . " Four of these ought properly to be classed as studies ; and , accepted as such , they are full of power and beauty . The " Portrait of a Gentleman" is the portrait of a little child—a bold outlooking boy , of whom we conceive that we have here the exact facsimile . And when you remember how difficult it is practically to comprehend and to seize that expression of latent faculties and purpose which you see in the straightforward look of a young and resolute boy , you will understand what a mastery of hand and eye the artist must possess . The " Enfant du Re ' "iment" is a very small picture ; a child who lias been sitting upon a

      monument , has fallen back asleep , and is covered with a soldier ' s coat . You mayguess it to be the son , or daughter , of a dead soldier , whose comrades are thus taking care of the orphan . The patch of coloured clothing on tho stone monument , with a graceful form almost hidden by the covering , constitutes what painters call a " bit , " perhaps worth preserving , but too small to be prized much . It is to a real picture what an epigram upon some small subject is to a work . " Autumn Leaves" is altogether a higher class of work . It is tho portrait of four girls , who are burning up the dead leaves of a garden in the twilight of an autumn evening ; serious girls , intent upon their labour , with an expression that harmonizes to the sombre hues of the foliage around them . The whole picture is grave ; tho tints perhaps too heavy ; the colouring of the hair where , as in some lights a line of brighter tint marks the contour , is one of the accidents of c fleet which it may be well to remember if a use be found

      for it , though it is too strunyenot to suggest its own purpose . " The Blind Girl" is a study of a perfectly different class . It is a wandering musician , who . se sight is gone ; she has boated herself by the roadside , in a country district , while a younger companion who leads her , and is sheltered under her cloak , looks back at the horizon , where the storm is passing away and the arch of hope appears . The power of the painter is here Been in the powerful drawing , and not less powerful colouring , with which ho has caught tho entire manner of the blind : the limbs unconcentratcd in their action by eyesight , —the uplifted countenance , the abstracted , but not desponding look , are contrasted with the animate action , though in repose of the younger girl . lne spectator will observe with interest how the painter has copied , in the grassy risintf ground behind , every variety of form , tlio endless breaks on the surlaco , tho truth of tho perspective through almost ceaseless changes ol outline , tlio grades of tint , the gentle gradations which in tlio apace almost of a few hairs breadth convey the effect of long diatunco towards the background . Hero aRuin as in the whole of the- school once pne-liuphaelite , wo find that tho tints of the diHtancc are much too harsh , positive , and angular ;—an error which will , perhaps , bo corrected by the study of their grujit rival , tho photograph We have called these four pictures studios , -because- tho artist has to a great

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  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), May 24, 1856, page 499, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2142/page/19/