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Leader (1850-1860), 21st August 1858, Edition 1 of 2, Page 845, BOOKS RECEIVED THIS WEEK. The Writings o...

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      Stanford' S Pans Guide , With Three Maps...

      Tegg ' First Book o / Geography for Children has the merit * of great simplicity and cheapness . As it is intended as a Companion to Tegg ' s First and Second Boohs for Children , we recommend parents and . teachers Xo provide themselves with these elementary-works , -which they will find admirably contrived to interest and at the same time to impart information to very young minds . The Orioin of ' the / ScottishLanguage . ~ R y JamesPaterson . ( Edinburgh : Nimmo . ) If the writer fail to convert those vho hold opposite theories to the one he advocates , he will not fail to satisfy the general Scottish reader that he has exerted much industry and research in getting together the materials for hia clever little volume . The author has produced a very readable affair that will certainly bes warmly appreciated on the other side of the Tweed .

      English Grammar , by 1 *< Direy and . A . Foggo ( Chapman and Hall ) , contains all that is valuable in Lindley Murray , -without Lindley Murray ' s obscurities and imperfections . The rules of grammar are not only laid down in simple language , but they are explained so as to be intelligible to the slowest intellect . The Christian Sabbath ; or , Rest in Jesus , by Robert Macnair ( Trubner and Co . ) , is out of our pale of criticism . The work , which is of pamphlet size , is written on the Sunday question , and its arguments are worthy of being studied by all who desire to come to an impartial decision on its merits .

      The Privateer ; a Tale of the Nineteenth Century . By Cecil Peicival Stone , 77 th Regiment . ( J . F . Hope . )—Tliis is a curious and a clever book , hut sadly misnamed . We shall find no perils by sea , no ocean fighte , nothing , in fact , tobearout the promise which the title holds out ; bat , in exchange , we shall come upon a series of sketches , linked together , it is true , to fornri something like coherence and connexion in the story , each of which contains the material for a separate romance . We will not venture to give even an outline of the plot , but will copy from the table of contents a few of the heads of chapters , to show there is no want of variety to reiider the work pleasant reading — " The Household —The Rescue—The Schoolgirl—The Hunt—The Gipsy Queen — The Trance—The Murder—A . Mother ' s Revenge-Love — Politics —The Squatter—The Slave—Revenge —The Death of Gnzmar . "

      The Little Philosopher ; or , the Science of Familiar Things . By Thomas Tate , F . R . A . S . Longman and Co . —An outline of Natural History , in which the facts are stated with & brevity and clearness that belongs only to the highly informed scientific mind . Such simplicity is not that of ignorance but of knowledge . It is a manual which young and old scholars in Nature ' s book may study with advantage . The woodcuts are characteristic and numerous- >

      • * Nojjgg, .Ajrcrost 21,Jl858.] The Lea...

      • * Nojjgg , . AjrcrosT 21 , JL 858 . ] THE LEAJBE . 845

      Books Received This Week. The Writings O...

      BOOKS RECEIVED THIS WEEK . The Writings of William Paterson , with Biographical Notices of the Author . By S . Bannister , M . A . 2 vols . 8 vo . Eflfingham Wilson . Every Man JIus Own Trumpeter . By George W- Thornbury . 8 vols . post 8 vo . Hurst and Blackett . Beatrice Cenci : An Historical Novel ' of the / Sixteenth Century . By F . D . Guerazzi . Translated by C . A . Scott . Post 8 vo . Bosworth and Harrison . Leaves from Lakeland . By James Payn . Post 8 vo . Hamilton , Adams , and Co . Le The & tre Moral desEcoles . Trois Comedies . ParC . A . De G . Liancourt . Post 8 vo . Newbr . Constable ' s Educational Series—Household Economy 16 mo . Constable and Co .

      Hopes And I>Reams. 1. Behold! My Hopes D...

      HOPES AND I > REAMS . 1 . Behold ! my hopes drift down the stream , Down to the silent Past , Sear'd by the bitter breath of Time , Time the Iconoclast . 2 . And nevermore shall those sweet hopes , lieturn to me , I ween , As distant as two distant lands With all the sea between . 8 . Out on tho bleak bnre beach I stand , And watch the ghostly sight-Youth and its halcyon golden dreams Grlido out into tho night . 4 . Poor heart ! why feel the bitter blight ? Gold dreams are only air , But ah ! how oft doth Wisdom teach Tho lesson of Despair . 5 . Farewell I I walk Life ' s weary way , Companionlcas , but not alone ; Thy memory still shall follow mo , And ainff her sad awoet antiphono . N .

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      9 A Mtjuiliio? Before Tlie Last Hundred ...

      9 A MTJUILIiO ? Before tlie last hundred years comparatively little was known of Spanish pictures , and still less of Spanish painters . The Catholic abjeefcness and excltisivencss of Spain tended to retard and prevent any spirit of research from developing the intellectual , force which pervaded that kingdom during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries . So great washer retentiveness , that even Charles I ., tbe most tasteful collector that England lias ever known , was unable to

      name one Spanish picture in his catalogue ; and as we mean to prove the rule by an exception , Evel vn says that , at a sale of Lord Melford ' s effects in 1693 , " Lord Godolphin bought the picture of ' The Boys / by Murillo , the Spaniard , for eighty guineas , " remarking also , with a curt sneer , " deare enough . " And Cumberland ( an astute dealer ) , a century later , very ranch doubts the fact of any historical group or composition of his ( Murillo ) being in . English lianas . But the Napoleonic eagles—lutes ratherwith blood y beak and talons , tore and rent aside this " blanket o' the dark . " Soult at Seville , and

      Sebastiani at Grenada , with murderous enthusiasm and avaricious rapacity , rifled those cities , and grasped with unerring violence all their finest samples of intellectual and material wealth . King Joseph , too , ere his flight , laid in a goodly store of Madrid ' s coveted pictures . Out of evil cometh forth good . By Napoleon ' s ambition , Spain became an open book , where all who run may read . " We know now that Spain ' s intellectual advancement rose with . Ferdinand and Isabella ; culminated during the life of the fourth Philip ; declined during the evil days of Charles II ., and has remained , at the nadir down to the present hour . -

      Lithe sixteenth and seventeenth centuries rose the three greatest luminaries that adorn Spain's sphere of art— -Bibera , Yclasquez , and Murillo—all three of whom may be generically described as eminent examples of the naturalistic , in contradistinction to the idealistic school . The second of these in status ( Velasquez being indisputably the first ) was Bartholome Est 6 ban Murillo , who was born in 1617 and died hvl 6 S 2 . From his boyhood lie was a painter , and unto the age of twenty-four gained his livelihood by painting anything- ranging from melons to " Immaculate Conceptions" for tlie Wardour-street merchants of

      signees , and have nothing to do with tlie extraordinary circular issued about the picture . The very first line in the circular is a mistake ; it begins , " The Assumption of the Virgin . " In the seventeenth century a bull of the Pope , Paul V ., expressly settled the distinction that should exist between the two dogmas ; viz . that the Assumption of the Virgin should apply to the Virgin Mary , and the Conception to her motlier , Sfc . Ann ; and Pacheco expressly defined the symbols that were to indicate tlie Conception—namely , the lily , the palm and olive branches , and a mirror ; she was also to stand upon the crescent moon , all which sisms- are here .

      We mention these circumstances because in our estimation it throws considerable doubt upon the history of the picture , which states , " This picture originally formed part of the collection in the monastery of the Garmelites , who were stem up holders of the Conceptive Theory in Mexico , in the seventeenth century , " and remained there until the beginning of 1800 , when Lord Cochrane and the Viceroy of Mexico induced them to part with it ; it was , then taken to Vera Cruz and lodged there in a Carmelite monastery . In 1812 , Arclibishop Don . Antonio Joaquhn Perez Martinez

      obtained possession of it , —how is not stated . After his death , Don Francisco Pablo Vasquez , Archbishop of Mexico and Plenipotentiary of the Pope , purchased it . By hirn it was sold ' to Don Jose Lang , wlio sent it to his friend , Mr . J . Henry Dick , from whose hands it came to the present possessor . Amongst all this startling circumstantialit y they managed to lose the obvious title of the subject of the picture ! The next two lines fire an " assumption" indeed , for / they say , "An original and important work by Murillo / " Here we join issue at once , by a distinct , sincere ^ and forcible denial .

      Let us be understood . We mean "by " an original " picture ( to quote an example , No . 13 in the National Gallery ) , a work designed , begun , and finished by one bead and hand , all bearing au outward visible sign of the inward spiritual grace of none but Murillo . Kow turn we to the Henrietta-street picture , and what find we here ? Unquestionably Ifttrillo ' s design , not Miirilld's drawing , not Murillo's colour , and , to our serious conviction , hot one touch * of the hand of . the great Sevillian , but most clearly and distinctly two heads and two handsit mihtindeedbe three

      Seville , who sent them to Mexico and South America . Haying saved a little money , in . 1642 he went to Madrid , and spent some time in copying the works of Ribera , vandyck , and Velasquez , and mastered their styles so thoronghly as to be able to imitate them so as almost to defy detection . Prom this period is dated his first manner , which the Spaniards called frio , cold ; in 1648 , he generated another , which they called oalido , wixrm ; and about 1056 , commenced liis third , vapo / aso or vapory style , so called from the light and dark portions gliding one into the other , not light against

      ; g , , , or more , because tlie picture has been scrubbed down to the laying hi , being originally a clever copy from a very fine picture . One does not know which to be most shocked at , the ruthlessness of the savage scourer or the impudence of the impotent restorer . Two circumstances , we ate sure , will make our readers smile : the first , the price asked for this effete production—" Four Thousand Pounds ' . "—the other is the perusal of the following three letters by men notorious in art-history , and which are thus set forth : —

      dark , and vice versa . This he continued to practise to the last : fortunately so , for its elementary basis contains more truth and beauty . From the first period he never retrograded in artistic perception or power , but steadil . y and surely advanced . This truth , one of his last pictures , in the National Gallery ( No . 13—the Holy Family ) , proves beyond dispute ; and other p ictures of his arc to be found in that Gallery and the Dulvvich which suffice to prove his changes of style and progression' —besides very many others distributed , throughout the land ; one the "Return of the Prodigal Son" ) in Stafford House , especially to bo remembered for two circumstancesfirst , beincr one of his finest works : and next , that

      Opinions of Professor Waagcn , Professor Magnus , and Mr . Otto Mundler . * ( Translation . ) Professor Waagen says : " The picture is decidedly a Murillo , and even one of the finest Murillos which I have seen ; and whoever expresses a doubt upon this point can only intend to injure the possessor !" It is impossible that the Professor Waagen could have given utterance to such assertions as the above . Though he does sometimes speak micelle ex . cathedru , we have failed to discover in his works any such evidence of insolent arrogance as the few lines attributed to him express .

      Some wag * of a Maria must have dropped this before some Malvolio dealer . The next is Professor Magnus , who says : — This picture , like others in Spain painted by Murillo , is less imposing and effective than that in the Paris Museum , but according to my opinion it has not the less the stamp of originality , and is ev « n in a better state of preservation . So far as my knowledge and experience serve , lean assure you , without the least interest , and accoTding to truth , that I consider it a genuine picturo of Murillo . A . s we know not who the Professor is , or what he has done , we can have no objection to his expressing his opinion as far us his knowledge and

      exthat murderous scoundrel and Plunder-mastergeneral Soult , got 11 , 000 / . for it . The Spaniards ' favourite and most religious dogma was the miracle of the Immaculate Conception ; and so fond was the Scvillian painter of portraying this subject , that he was called , par excellency " The painter of the Conception . " We have thrco reasons for thia exordium : because it gives a brief history of Murillo ; because it will give to our readers the sources whence we lmvc gained , and wlienco they may gain , the requisite necessary bnsis on which to form a j udgment on that painter ' s pictures ; and lastly , that it may induce them to go to Messrs . Williams and Norgutc , 14-, Hcnricttu-strcct , Covcnt-gardcu , and see a . picture which , by a circular , and some of our contemporaries , is stated to be by Murillo . Let us state our conviction at starting , that Messrs . Williams and Norgatc are merely the

      conpertifnee may serve . Now last , though not least , comes a gentleman of whom we have had sonic experience He says —but wo will put it as printed m the circular : — TAx . Otto Mllnuler ( formerly Expert in tho Louvre , at present attached to tho National Gallery ) , says : " I h « r « by certify of my own accord , and from thorough conviction , that the picturo of Murillo , tlie ? Assumption of the Virgin , surrounded by cherubs , ' is not only with

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Aug. 21, 1858, page 845, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/ldr_21081858/page/21/