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676 THE LEADER. FFine Apt«
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The Brussels journals state that a young...
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the kotal ac/u>bmt..— (Third Notice. ") ...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Italian Liberty. No. Iii. Lokd Boi-Ingbr...
be free of every interference with its internal government from -without . In consequence , we know from it the feeling of the allies at that time— - a just and proper feeling then and now ; . * The dictation of Austria to a free power on . account of its having 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 France , she would have had garrisons in every fortified town , from the Po 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 , change , in anything political , is the bitterest offence that can be offered to the Austrian emperor ,, Nothing turns him aside under the plea of reason ^ freedom , or humanity . In matters 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 Germansbjp with England . We see Europenow 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 Francis , the late Emperor , visited Milan , a noted professor was stated to have made some discoveries in the " constitut ion " of the atmosphere , when the Emperor hastily exclaimed , with a countenance of much alarm . " Constituzione >•! constituzione ! 4 h ! quella parola che ci na fatto tanto Male f " Constitution ! constitution J— -AhJ 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 . Let them be clothed or naked , empty or filled ^ ignorant or instructed , it ia 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 Im- * perial 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 territory . To tax her own people out of Italy by Austria , seems impossible . At present , even in the country , articles of consumption 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 " ruler , wb . o makes his people ' s first duty to oe " loyal subjects , " honouring him as the " father of This pepple , " and in return gives them the most prominent opportunity of self-sacrifice for the gratification of ins own purposes , however lawless and unjustifiable . Paoxo .
676 The Leader. Ffine Apt«
676 THE LEADER . FFine Apt «
The Brussels Journals State That A Young...
The Brussels journals state that a young girl in that city had been ill for some time , and at last fell into ' a kind of trance , which tho doctor mistook for death . Preparations wore making for the interment , when tho woman who laid out tho supposed corpse observed that the cheeks still retalnod a little colour . Anotjhor phyBician was called in , and found the girl to be still aUve .
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The Kotal Ac/U>Bmt..— (Third Notice. ") ...
the kotal ac / u > bmt .. — ( 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 laat 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 ,
hend , in a technical point of view , and in sentiment an admiration trap ; but though stated to havetS painted on the spot , we must demur to the specimens chosen as types of the British and Italian youths The former is a knock-kneed weedy Uttle feUow who may have gone abroad for his health : the latt er is more like a London Arab than the children of the Gracchi , with whom we are familiar , through Mr Hurlstone ' s assistance , who also paints on the snot Mr . Dyce ' * " Good Shepherd » ( 174 ) is an hoS to the Academy , and we are sure is one of the most faultless of all the pictures that ever were at the same time interesting . Unfortunately
your picture philosopher , like an avocato del diavolo is ever ready to grove ( 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 well painted 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 , Cooper and Lee just Contrive to hold their own . Sir Edwin 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 coinedy , and tells its story very nicely , though the mastiffs fore arms are exaggerated in size . Mr . Brett , of " Stonebreaker" celebrity , has a fine " Val 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 Stanfield and Mr . Cooke are the last of the dons whom we shall name to-day . Their marine pieces are no less scientific than attractive , and may be warmly spoken of by the greatest ignoramus before the profoundest 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 volubilis sevum , " is a pleasant country scene . Men work rather hard to find out an inner meaning for it . The poet-painter 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 of Whaites
exhibitor , and is abased—as we said Mr . " Barley Harvest " ( 391)—most inequitably I At is untitledin 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 , being a study of a striated ferruginous cliff—it may bo on the Suffolk or Essex coast , for we have scon something like it there . It is clearly true ; and the stony beach and sunlit water are true also . I no Jast gentle heave of . the quiet shoro wave that has just force to crawl , as it were , up tiic shingle and then retire ineffectively , is very boldly attempted and accurately rendered . J » r . . Tnhii Burcess . who is rapidly improving , sttowa
some fruit of Spanish Wei in No . 457 , "Castl " ! n Almsgiving , " ft conscientious and lltera VA ? mT Mr . Shalders has a sweet pair of landscapes , " Glengauff" ( 221 ) , and "Near Bantry' » ( 241 ) . , Mr . U S . Liddordalo , a very charming domestic scene , " Happy ! " ( 230 ) which is a good way abo > cit no average of its Bchool in conception , and not inferior to the best of older hands in execution . I . his " « " > notable a work as Mr . J . Clark ' s " Draught Players ( 209 ) , whore the emotions of a grandsiro and S ™""" eon engaged in that peaceful strife , amito * tho mother and her baby who form the aulorle , arc iiius tratod with genuine humour , and no loss souik U ™ Y ing . YoungMr . Pettitthasagood « Wols i L' » 8 « ft P ° ( 238 ) . Mr . M , ason ( 508 ) has some good " CamWJfJ Scenery . " " Slxtus V ., when ft shop lord , studying at a waysido altar" ( 290 ) , by O . Goldlo , -Is ntonro Merchant
and praiseworthy . "A Lovantino j ^ v by E . Crawford , also doaorvea notice ; Waving now drawn attention to a few ( and alas ! how very foj i ; of the moritoriouB undecoratod , lot up bid aaiou to them , and good snood until our next morry mooting , a twelvemonth henoo .
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 effigies , 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 wallsj 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 , or a 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 qtnore 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 by way 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 Deptfprd-le-Strond , 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 tune , 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 .
The portrait of Mrs . Gaskells round hat , ankles , 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 . ICmgnt ; > 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 Roberts , who has a " Cathedral Exterior " ( 420 ) , for which he
has drawn partly upon his imagination and partly on the church of St . Mark at Venice , and who has taken similar liberties with that of Santa Maria de Salute ( 160 ) , is becoming more scenic in his manipulation than ever , and far more complimentary tp 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 , one is 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 . Roberts is certainly the
very antithesis of Prre-Raphaelism . This does a great deal too much for us , and ho now does an 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 con * veying , moreover , a very fair notion of how Mr . Robson , of Olympic celebrity , would look in the character of the officer of the night . This work hangs close by tho " St ; Mavk ' , s " of Roberts : in the middle room ; and near the Academician ' s " Santa Maria , " in foot , with an aureole of academic raagniflcoa all about it , Is a picture that ! has been very much noticed , by ( we betiere , Mrs . ) J . Hay . It is a nervously painted work , excellent , we appre-
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), May 28, 1859, page 20, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_28051859/page/20/
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