particular object. The sleeping guards are also drawn with the utmost care, but they look more like statues chiselled from the marble, than men with warm blood in their veins. Nevertheless, the painting is very finely executed. The interest excited by the expectation of the maid, waiting for a tragical event which is about to be executed within the tent, gives the work, in the contemplation of the spectator, a higher degree of dramatic interest than historical pictures commonly possess. Mr. Etty's other works, “The Nymph Angling," "The Window in Venice during a festival," "Sabrina, from Milton's Comus," and "The Shipwrecked Mariner," have infinitely less pretension than the one of which we have just spoken, but they are all productions of considerable, though unequal, merit. We are happy to see Landseer raised to the well deserved rank of Royal Academician elect. No living artist can rival him in the figures of animals. His "Interior of a Highlander's House," "Poachers Deer-stalking," "Poacher's Bothy," and "Poacher and Red Deer," are all the emanations of a master-mind.

Who is that cheerful smiling pretty girl, whom Mr. Dyce has painted under the name of Miss Levieu? Although placed among the crack pictures of the exhibition, and not in a situation favourable for its display, yet this portrait is one of the first objects noticed by the visitor, and while he wanders round the room, he still occasionally looks back upon it with pleasure, as one of those visions of maiden grace and winning sprightliness, which sometimes pass us suddenly by in the paths of life, and, disappearing as it were into another world, meet our gaze no more. The portrait is one of great promise from a young artist. Mr. Dyce has succeeded in that most difficult part of his task, the giving to his figure the natural buoyancy of the living model, of whom we should easily believe it supplies a perfect likeness. The same artist has two other portraits, which, however, must be placed at an immeasurable distance of inferiority from that which we have just noticed. One of these is a head of the Rev. E. Irving, some years ago celebrated as a preacher, whose senseless rant, and affected and most theatrical oratory, the fashionable world, and even ministers of state, crowded to hear. His day is gone, and now his pretensions are seen in all their native poverty and raggedness. He is certainly a most ungainly subject for the pencil, being at least half a foot taller than the ordinary size, with a large mass of dark hair that falls upon his shoulders like snakes, and a pair of eyes that, we do not mean it disrespectfully,-look more like those of a fiend than of a man. When we first chanced to meet him in some street near the Caledonian Chapel, we thought involuntarily of Milton's Satan. Mr. Dyce is therefore not altogether to be blamed, if his head of Irving be a most frightful performance.

Mulready has been idle this year, at least so far as the exhibition is concerned, to which he has contributed but one painting, "The Sailing Match." The reader will very probably conjure up to his

mind's eye crowds of boats upon the Thames, filled with all the cocknies of London, and their fair dames and fairer daughters, witnessing a contest of skill between two favourite watermen, and he will expect to see a classical criticism upon the brawny limbs of the rival candidates for the prize, while every muscle operating on the oar, is pressed for its utmost vigour in urging the skiff over the surface of the water, towards the point of glory. Not one of these objects, not old father Thames, not one of his numerous boats, or still more numerous sons, not one cockney, or cockney's fair wife, or still fairer daughter, will be found in Mr. Mulready's picture. What then does it represent? Let us transport ourselves in the merry month of August, to Cowes, and, sitting upon the shingle of that abrupt shore, count some fifty of the most beautiful yachts that ever kissed the bosom of the sea, gradually collecting in sight and trimming their sails; while innumerable boats are seen hurrying to and fro, conveying from their splendid villas, hard by, to their respective vessels, parties of noblemen and gentlemen, members of the yacht club, bound on a general trial of power and skill. The signal is given; every inch of canvass is set to catch every breath of the healthy breeze that haunts in that season those pleasant waters, and the fleet dispersing, each of those picturesque vessels is seen taking its own course, until at length, lessening by degrees, they all dip below the horizon. After an absence of some four or five hours, a solitary sail is descried far away in the mist, which soon becomes higher and larger, and the figure and name of the yacht are soon discerned, which is at once hailed as the conqueror. But by and by another sail is seen, tacking in a different course, cunningly directed so as to profit by the current, by a land breeze, or the slightest possible inclination of the tide; and such is the certainty of its course, that though in the beginning it seemed completely distanced, it gains, moment after moment, upon her antagonist, comes up a-breast, shoots a-head, and wrests the laurel from her brow. The signal of victory thunders from the shore, and is borne in echoes, sweet to the conqueror's ear, to Spithead, and all the surrounding inlets and bays of the island. Here then is assuredly the subject of Mr. Mulready's picture! No such thing. His sailing match is quite a different affair, and though it is upon a small scale, it is replete with interest for those who are engaged in it. Over the brow of a pool of water, two urchins, who ought to have been at school, but prefer playing the truant, are half suspended, watching a pair of boats of their own manufacture, which they have pitted against each other; they are helping the gale with all their might by blowing upon the sails; one of them, whose boat lags a little, seems to yield up his last breath in the contest, while the other, an older hand, has contrived to lean upon a stone in the pool, thus getting nearer to his sail-an advantage which he so much increases, by conducting his puffs through a paper tube, that his boat far outstrips the other. Neither of the principals surpasses in

anxiety for the fate of the day a third garçon, who thrusts his head between them both; and even the dog, who partakes in the sport, seems ready to jump into the water to determine the contest. Crossing the pool at some distance is a rustic bridge, upon which a carefully dressed boy, followed by a very pretty servant girl, is seen going to school. But he cannot go on; he must stop to see who wins. Behind, from a thick embowering wood, are seen two or three more little idlers, who, holding up their newly finished boats, seem to desire that the match should not commence until their arrival. Thus every accessary tends to one point of interest, and the cool spectator cannot help being drawn into the feelings of the whole party. This is the perfection of art, on whatever objects it be bestowed. The picture, it will therefore be easily conceived, is one of the best in the exhibition. Landscape, umbrageous wood, deep perspective, clear water, figures that almost move and speak, and one story to connect them all, render this painting quite unique.

An artist, whose name we do not remember to have met with before, Mr. Gordon, of Edinburgh, exhibits a portrait of Sir Walter Scott, which seems to us to be a performance of high promise. It would seem to have been very recently drawn from the life, as the hairs upon that illustrious head are thinner and more silvery and his countenance altogether more worn by years, than any other portrait of the baronet confesses. The face is longer than we have been accustomed to think it, from the engravings which we have seen, and we should suppose it to be the truest likeness yet produced. As a picture it is exceedingly well painted.

We regret that we cannot speak in terms of uniform praise of the whole of the six paintings which Mr. Turner has placed in the collection. In one of these, "Caligula's palace and bridge," he has, we think, surpassed the most splendid of his former exertions.

"What now remains of all the mighty bridge
Which made the Lucrine lake an inner pool,
Caligula, but massy fragments left,

As monuments of doubt and ruined hopes
Yet gleaming in the morning's ray, that tell
How Baia's shore was loved in times gone by."

Fallacies of Hope.

The picture sketched out in these lines would afford but a feeble idea of the magnificent pile of ruins, which Mr. Turner has created upon his canvass. They have all around them, what ruins ought always to have, perfect stillness and repose. Far in the distance rises the proud dome, looking majestic even in decay. Beneath it are seen, crowded but not confused, so well defined is the perspective, innumerable wings of palaces, which stretch boldly into the foreground, the walls still lofty, although crumbling so rapidly into dust, that it would seem as if a single blast of storm would sweep them from the surface of the earth. A thick golden mist veils the whole of these splendid ruins, which, indeed, look more like an

enchanting vision of the night realized to the eye, than an elaborate design painted according to the best rules of art.

Mr. Hilton's two pictures, "Sir Calepine rescuing Serena," (see the Faerie Queene, canto viii.,) and "The Angel releasing Peter from Prison," are both very creditable performances; but we expect something still better from this rising artist.

The "View of Salisbury Cathedral, from the meadows," is an attempt of Mr. Constable to represent the picture which Thomson has given in the following descriptive lines:

"As from the face of heaven the scatter'd clouds
Tumultuous rove, the interminable sky
Sublimer swells, and o'er the world expands
A purer azure. Through the lighten'd air
A higher lustre and a clearer calm
Diffusive tremble; while, as if in sign
Of danger past, a glittering robe of joy,
Set off abundant by the yellow ray,

Invests the fields, and Nature smiles reviv'd."

The painter has certainly given in abundance the scattered and tumultuous clouds, of which the poet speaks; we never saw such a chaos of dense masses of vapour black and blue before, either in the sky or upon the canvass. We know not whence the foam has arisen, which is sprinkled so copiously over the picture, as if it had come from a vexed sea, which could hardly have been the case, seeing that Mr. Constable's storm takes place at Salisbury; though why it should have occurred there, we are at a loss to know, unless the artist chose to kill two birds at one stone, by representing at once the cathedral and the storm. We should almost suspect that his original design was limited to that celebrated edifice, but finding that it had no natural back ground to his fancy, he, as an afterthought, summoned the tempest to his assistance. We have spoken of foam. That was but a very mild expression, for we ought to have said that a great portion of the picture looks exactly as if it had been washed in suds.

The spectator who, having mounted the stairs, instead of going forward to the great room, turns to the left into the School of Painting, will be struck with astonishment by a gigantic, savage, murderous-looking picture, which he will see suspended over the door that connects the two chambers. He will naturally ask what is the purpose of such a performance? A vast mass of flesh and muscle and bone, huge limbs, shaggy hair, great staring eyes, are given to a most abominable figure, to which the artist, Mr. Noble, has chosen to give the name of Cain. It can afford pleasure, we apprehend, to no class of visitors, whether painters, amateurs, or mere ignorant idlers, who go to the exhibition as they do to a bazaar, for a lounge in order to kill a devoted portion of the day. If there be any display of anatomical knowledge in this work, which

we suppose to be the case, we doubt whether Mr. Noble would not have derived more fame from suspending it in the student's room, for their private instruction, than from exposing it to the public, who never feel the slightest interest in such laboured efforts of mere skill.

As a curiosity, we may mention in passing Mr. Macartan's portrait of "Patrick Gibson, formerly of His Majesty's Royal Navy," of whom we are told, that he was "born in the year 1720, entered the navy in 1757, and in that year assisted in bearing General Wolfe off the field at Quebec; continued in service afloat up to his 90th year; has been in twenty-six general engagements, and is now living, in his 111th year, in the full enjoyment of his mental, and most of his physical faculties." He certainly does look a fine old fellow.

Of Mr. Hollins's five paintings, the portrait of Lord Nugent is decidedly the best, and we may say that, with respect to the truth of likeness, and the execution of the details, it may be compared, not disadvantageously, with most of the superior works in this line, of which the present exhibition can boast. A trifling accessary, new in portraits, sets off the dress of his lordship amazingly; it consists of a very small portion of the watch-guard chain, of very highly burnished gold, which appears, or rather shines, as if unintentionally, along the inside of the lapel of the frock coat upon the left breast. It is like one of those lights which the ancient masters were so fond of introducing upon all occasions, relying upon the well-known pleasure which light is universally found to give to the human eye. By the way, we are rather surprised that these guard chains, which have recently become so much the fashion, have not been introduced more generally into portraits. Our costume is, in general, so little favourable to art, that no ornament, however slight, which is usually worn, ought to be omitted. The resemblance of the picture to Lord Nugent is perfect; his lordship every body knows to be a handsome man.

What a very lovely family that is which Mr. Rothwell has grouped together,-"The children of the late Charles Herbert, of Muckruss Abbey, Killarney"! The two brothers, fine youths, just going out to shoot, appear as if to wish their sisters good bye for the day; the eldest and youngest sister strongly resemble each other in their beauty, while the two between them have a peculiar style of countenance, not quite so pleasing, but more intellectual. The family likeness, that mysterious impression, of which our books can give no satisfactory explanation, shines with more or less strength in the countenances of all. It is a picture of which the family, not less than Rothwell, may be justly proud.

Mr. W. E. West has displayed a very high order of fancy and of feeling, in his representation of that most unhappy domestic affliction, the insanity of a young woman. She is the belle of the country round, a slender figure, wrapped in a red shawl, with a figured