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Leader (1850-1860), 28th May 1859, Edition 1 of 2, Page 676, Untitled Article

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      be free of every interference with its internal government from -without . In consequence , we toowfr 6 m . it the feeling of the allies at that timea just and proper feeling then and now . The dictation of Austria to a free power on account of its haying a free press and free institutions , was not to be permitted any more than that of France , and the great powers of Europe were and are bound to prevent Austria ^ perforce , from doing a weak power an injustice by insisting on her noninterference with Italy , beyond the limits of her own territory . They well know that but for JjYance ^ . she would have had garrisons in every fortified town , from the Pp to the Gulf of Tarentum . In a country governed by a despotism , it is not the minister , nor a council , that is responsible—it is the despot himself , and personally , too . Despotism never tolerates advance of any kind . The want of sagacity in the Emperor Francis descended with the Imperial crown . The dread , the horror of a representative system of Government is a heir-loom in the Austrian family . The chambers alone , in Turin , were enough to generate a foray into that country according to the Austrian rule . The great law of nature , chan ge * in any thing political , is the bitterest offence that can be offered to the Austrian emperor . Nothing turns him aside undertheplea of reason , freedom ,-or humanity . In niatters of finance , where her interests are so deeply concerned , Austria exhibits no wisdom , and

      consequently does no honour to Lord Malmesbury ' s would-be cousin Germanship with England . We see Europe now about to pay the penalty of the bad arrangements of 1815 , when the weak heads of princes were directed to acquire in place of consolidate , and to make things stand still , as then , for ever . This country partook of the same feeling in many things- —I mean the ruling ministry Of George HI . and its partisans . * ' Constitutions ' alarmed the sovereigns of the Continent . When IYancis , tne late Emperor , visited Milan , a noted professor was stated to have made some discoveries in the " constitution" of the atmosphere , when the Emperor hastily exclaimed , with a countenance of much alarm . " Constituzioiie I constituziorie ! Ah I quella parola ehe ci na fatto tanto male !" ^ Constitution ! constitution !— -AhI that word has caused us many mischiefs . "

      It is the maxim in Austria that private men have nothing to do with the Government . Their own happiness or misery is not to be considered , their business is to obey the sovereign will . Xiet them be clothed or naked , empty or filled , ignorant or instructed , it is their ruler ' s duty only , under his " paternal " Government , to consider and act as they may deem fitting about men , the mere materiel of the Imperial will . Italy must be free , if she wills it , and has supplies of arms ; but the influence of the priesthood may have a neutralising tendency , and Austria knows how to make the most of it . To what extent that

      influence will operate ; it is difficult to say now , though a little time will show . It will be difficult for the Austrian armies to subsist without making more enemies of the Italians in her own territorv . To tax her pwn people out of Ital y by Austria , seems impossible . At ' present , even in the country , articles of cpnsumption pay from twenty-five to thirty per cent ., and in towns , from twenty-five to a hundred per cent ., while everything producible is under the same surveillance and action as our excise practises in the case of spirituous liquors

      Butchers , innkeepers , all traders * must submit to the most intolerable interference , and with all that can be levied or borrowed the Austrian debt augments continually . She thus rushes into wars still more impoverishing without regarding the people , or anything more than the bias of the '' paternal " rjjjfer , who makes his people's first duty to be " loyal subjects , " honouring him as the " father of nis people , " and in return gives them the most prominent opportunity of self-sacrifice for the gratification of This ' own purposes , however lawless and unjustifiable . Paolo .

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      THE BOTAI . Acxdemt . —( . Third Notice . ') There is , it must be confessed , some ground for the ferocity with which the exhibition handbook of " The Council of Four " denounces the monopoly of space on the Academy walls by the portrait painters ; although , on the other hand , Mr . Stewart ( whose excellent rival guide we also referred to in our last number ) well remarks that portrait painting deserves respect , if on no other grounds , as a good horse that has carried many a Worthy painter in every branch through the heart wearing days of his struggling period . Still there is , or should be , reason in all things ; and the fact is startling , as put

      forward by the Illustrated London News , that" there are , in the east room * no less than seventy of these staring effigie ' s > which , like the contents of a lost pOcketbook , are of no value or interest except to the owners ; and , as they are generally of enormous size ( portraits like carpettihg being sold by the square yard ) , they occupy a full half of the space on the Walls , and generally the most . commanding places . " They do indeed .: and so true is it that their exhibition , is generally speaking , either stolid evidence of weakness and vanity , ora mere form of placard , that we shall say little about them here . The exceptions to the general rule seem to be likenesses of painters done con dmore by their fellow craftsmen ,

      and the striking likeness of Mr . Dickens , by Frith . About the most laughable of all is that " of H . R . H . the Prince Albert , taken in his full-dress uniform as an Elder Brother of the Trinity House , on the edge of a cliff , a chart in his hand , no hat on his head , and a hurricane blowing in the background . Whether the Prince Consort is supposed to have sallied forth On such a fearful night and in such a holiday guise , simply byway of change from the tedium of a . Cinq Port dinner at the Lord Warden Hotel ; whether he has been hastily summoned from table to improvise national defences against a French fleet in the offing ; and lost his head gear

      in the gale ; or , whether the latter is a mere allegorical allusion to Lord Clarence Paget and the mediatization or extinction with which that gallant officer and his supporters threaten the ancient corporation of Deptford-le-Strpnd , we leave wiser men to determine . The work will find a peaceful resting-place on Tower-hill , where the eyes of few but the jovial Elders will be offended , and where critics will cease from troubling ; and in , the fulness of time , when the brethren are matters of history , and their house a portrait gallery of east central worthies , the solutions we have suggested may be adopted in turn by a faithful cicerone . of Gaskells round hatankles

      The portrait Mrs . , , and Balmoral boots , by Mr . Grant , is flirty , therefore piquant $ and as it is itself the result of a former portrait ( that of the artist ' s daughter , shown in 1857 ) , so it will , we dare say , beget a brood of others in the same style . Lord Derby ' s portrait ( 236 ) , by Grant , and that of Mr . Lane , the lithographer , by Mr . Knight , are also admirable works in their way . and interesting to the learned and lettered , to whom the ruck of likenesses about the place are utterly immaterial . To continue , then , with a few of the more noteworthy canvasses , let us observe that Mr . David Boberts , who has a " Cathedral Exterior " ( 420 ) , for which he has drawn partly upon his imagination and partly on

      the ohurch of St . Mark at Venice , and who has taken similar liberties with that of Santa Maria do Salute ( 160 ) , is becoming more scenic in his manipulation than ever , and far more complimentary to the observer , to whose fancy , poetic feeling , and moral consciousness he leaves the agreeable task of getting up pictures from his apt suggestions . Of course , when , one ' s taste and talent are so far successful , ono ia pleased with oneself , and gratified with the painter who has provided the eye and mind with the raw materials for the poetic process . If , on the other hand , one is unsuccessful , one need but to veil the deficiency under silence or general approval . Mr . Roberta is certainly the

      very antithesis of Prio-Raphaelism . This does a great deal too much for us , and ho now does as little as possible . Everybody must look at the " Dogberry ' s Charge" ( 427 ) , by H . S . Marks—an admirable comic picture by this excellent draughtsman and caricaturist , ana conveying , moreover , a very fair notion of how Mr . Rojbson , of Olympic , celebrity , would look in the character of the officer of the night . This work hanga close by the " St . Mark ' s " of Roberts , in the middle room-, and near the Academician ' s " Santa Maria , " in foot , with an aurCole of academic magnificoa all about it , ia a picture that has boon very much noticed , by ( we beliero , Mrs . ) J . B . Hay . It 1 b a nervously painted work , excellent , we appre-

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      hend , in a technical point of View , and in sentiment an admiration trap ; but though stated to have b ^ n painted on the spot , we must demur to the specimen chosen as types of the British and Italian youths The former is a knock-kneed weedy little fellow who may have gone abroad for his health ; the latter is more like a London Arab than the children of th £ Gracchi , with whom we are familiar , through ]« y Hurlstone ' s assistance , who also paints on the snot " Mr Dyce ' s « Good Shepherd » ( 174 ) is an Honour to the Academy , and we are sure is one of the moat faultless of all the pictures that ever were at the _ same time interesting . Unfortunateiv

      your picture philosopher , like an avocato del diavolo is ever ready to prove ( and he too often does it too } that what happens to be charming is false , foolish poor , paltry , mediocre , or meretricious . But this picture is , we insist , a pure and holy and wellpainted one , without being monstrous in size or at all peculiar in either sentiment or handling . Mr . J . R . Herbert , too , in his " Mary Magdalen" ( 165 ) has given us a truly religious picture , which he has the modesty , by the way , to call only " a study , " for which the British School , and all well-wishers to its progress , should be thankful to him . We are glad here to quote from the " Council of Four : "— .

      " We predict that this picture will attain priceless worth . We wait impatiently for the great work of which it is only a part . If the whole should be as successful as this portion , it will become one of the wonders of the world . " But all the great men here speak loudly enough for themselves . Their position on the wall , and the handles to their names in the catalogue , ensure their being fully seen , and often more than duly admired . Among the latter Mr . Creswick may be classed . Messrs . Witherington , Copper and Lee just contrive to hold their own . Sir

      Edwm Landseer , who is but a valetudinarian , is worthily represented ( or nearly so ) , by only one of his works . His" Doubtful Crumbs" is a clean piece of canine comedy , and tells its story very nicely , though the mastiff ' s fore arms are exaggerated in size . Mr . Brett , of " Stonebreaker" celebrity , has a fine " Vat d'Aosta . " That Mr . Maw Egley , still too hard and sharp , is striding ahead manfully , is proved by his " Richelieu" and " Anne of Austria . " He is already a first-rate upholstery painter ; but Mr . E . M . Ward ' s " Marie Antoinette , " and " Fouquier Tinville , " will not help to maintain the artist's position . Mr . Redgrave ' s " Emigrant ' s Last Sight of Home" ( 218 ) is a better picture than we have seen of late from his hand . The figures are not unimpressive or unsatisfactory , and the landscape is a delicious bit of English scenery . Mr . Clarkson Stanfleld and Mr . Cooke are the last of the dons

      whom we shall name tp-day . pieces are no less scientific than attractive , and may be warmly spoken of by the greatest ignoramus before the profouridest critic with calm certainty of being right . Mr . Hook ' s ( 250 ) , with the quatrain for a title , paraphrasing the one line of Latin , " Labitur et labeter in omne yolubilis ajvum , " is a pleasant country scene . Men work rather hard to find out an inner meaning for it . The poet-paintor has led them astray . In our county we should call it " A wet lane . " Look now to a wonderful piece of work , — . down on your knees to it , for it is by no favoured Whaites

      exhibitor , and is abased— -as we said of Mr . " Barley Harvest " ( 391)—most inequitably ! It is untitled in the book , but is fancifully called on the frame " God ' s Gothic , " by Miss A . Blundcn ( 441 ) . It is a work of most extraordinary fidelity , bomg a study of a striated ferruginous cliff—it may bo on the Suffolk or Essex coast , for wo have seen something like it there . It is clearly true ; and the stony beach and sunlit water are true also , llio Jasc gentle heave of the quiet shore wave tuac has just force to crawl * as it were , up the shinglo and then retire ineffectively , is very boldlv attempted and accurately rendered . Mr .

      John Burgess , who is rapidly improving , snow * some fruit of Spanish travel in No . 457 , " Castillan Almsgiving , " a conscientious and « t ° « M X ? " *" Mr . Shalders has a sweet pair of landscapes , J * " " gauff "( 22 l ) , and " Near Bantry " ( 241 ) . Mr . C . S . Liddordalo , a very charming domestic scono , "Happy I " ( 230 ) which is a good way above _ Ujo average of its achool in conception , and not inferior to the best of older hands in execution . ¦ " >« " $ notable a work aa Mr . J . Clark ' s " Draught Players ( 209 ) , where the emotions of a grandsiro ancignumson engaged in that peaceful strife , anil o the mother and her baby who form tho oalorln , ™ ° ' ? tratod with genuine humour , and noloaa soum 1 ?*"" ing . Young |[ r . Pettltthaaagood" We Bh Landscape ( 238 ) . Mr . Mason ( 508 ) has some good " CoiiiiMignow Scenery . '' " Sixtus V ., when a shepherd , stm ing at a wayside altar » (« oo ) , by O . Goldk » Is ntgw ivior \/

      and praieoworthy . » AJLovanunQ «»»» -- - by E . Crawford , also doaorvos notice . IIftVinS . n . ^ drawn attention to a few ( and alas ! how very low U of tho moritorioua undocoratod , lot us bW ft « J «" to them , and good apeed until our next moriy meeting , a twelvemonth henco .

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      676 THE LEADEB . TFine Ap ™

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      Tlio Brussels journals state that a young girl in that city had been ill for oome time , and at last foil Into a kind of trance , whioh the doctor mistook for death , Preparations were making for the interment , when the woman who laid out the supposed corpse otisorved that the cheeka . etiU retained- a little colour . Another physician was called ia , and found tho girl to bo still alive .

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  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), May 28, 1859, page 676, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2296/page/20/