In the Admiral’s gallery are the pictures of the following celebrated Admirals, Sir George Rooke, Sir Cloudsley Shovel, Sir John Leake, the Lord Torrington, Admiral Churchill, Sir Stafford Fairborne, Sir John Jennings, Sir Thomas Hopson, Admiral Beaumont, Sir Thomas Dilks, Admiral Bembo, Admiral Whetstone, Admiral Wishart, Admiral Graydon, Admiral Munden; all painted by Dahl, and Sir Godfrey Kneller.
In the room of Beauties, nine ladies are placed in the following order: the Lady Peterborough, the Lady Ranelagh, the Lady Middleton, Miss Pitt, the Duchess of St. Alban’s, Lady Essex, Lady Dorset, Queen Mary, and the Duchess of Grafton. Q. Mary was painted by Wissing, and all the rest by Sir Godfrey Kneller.
In the Carton gallery are the celebrated cartons of Raphael Urbino, so called from their being painted on paper. These are seven pieces of sacred history, taken from the New Testament, and were at first designed only as patterns for tapestry. For these admirable pieces Lewis XIV. is said to have offered 100,000 louis d’ors.
These pictures, which may be properly termed coloured drawings on paper, as big as the life, are painted with great delicacy and beauty in water colours. The first is the miraculous draught of fishes, in which Christ appears in the boat with an air of divine gentleness. A very ingenious modern author, whose words we shall chiefly follow in the description of these admirable pieces, observes, that the exotic birds, the magnificent large fowl placed on the shore in the fore ground, have a sea wildness in them; and, as their food was fish, contribute to express the business in hand, which is fishing; and being thus placed on the shore, prevents the heaviness which that part would otherwise have had, by breaking the parallel lines that would have been made by the boat, and the base of the picture.
However in this carton Raphael has made a boat too little to hold the figures he has placed in it; but had he made it large enough for those figures, the picture would have been all boat; and to have made his figures small enough for a vessel of that size, would have rendered them unsuitable to the rest of the set, and less considerable: there would have been too much boat, and too little figure.
The second, which is the delivery of the keys, has received some injury, and is not now what Raphael made it. As this is the appearance of our Saviour after the resurrection, present authority, late suffering, humility and majesty, despotic command, and divine love, are at once visible in his celestial aspect. He is wrapt only in one large piece of white drapery, his left arm and breast are bare, and part of his legs naked, which was undoubtedly done to denote his appearing in his resurrection body, and not as before his crucifixion, when this dress would have been altogether improper. The figures of the eleven apostles all express the same passion of admiration, but discover it differently according to their characters. Peter receives his master’s orders on his knees, with an admiration mixed with a more particular attention; the words used on that occasion are expressed by our Saviour’s pointing to a flock of sheep, and St. Peter’s having just received two keys. The two next express a more open ecstasy, though still constrained by their awe of the divine presence. The beloved disciple has in his countenance wonder drowned in love; and the last personage, whose back is towards the presence, one would fancy to be St. Thomas, whose perplexed concern could not be better drawn, than by this acknowledgment of the difficulty to describe it. The apostle who stands in profile immediately behind St. John, has a yellow garment with red sleeves, which connects the figure with St. Peter and St. John, whose draperies are of the same species of colours; next is a loose changeable drapery, then another different yellow with shadows bearing on the purple, all which produce wonderful harmony.
The third is the miracle of healing the cripple at the Beautiful Gate of the temple. All the figures are admirably performed; the boys are done with great judgment, and by being naked make a fine contrast. The figures are placed at one end near the corner, which varies the side of the picture, and gives an opportunity to enlarge the building with a fine portico, the like of which you must imagine must be on the other side of the main structure, all which together make a noble piece of architecture.
The fourth is the history of the death of Ananias. Here is the greatest dignity in the apostles; they are however only a subordinate group, because the principal action relates to the criminal; thither the eye is directed by almost all the figures in the picture; what a horror and reverence is visible in the whole assembly on this mercenary man’s falling down dead!
The fifth is Elymas the sorcerer struck with blindness. His whole body from head to foot expresses his being blind. How admirably are terror and astonishment expressed in the people present? and how variously according to their several characters? the Proconsul has these sentiments but as a Roman and a gentleman, the rest in several degrees and manners. The same sentiments appear in Ananias’s death, together with those of joy and triumph, which naturally arise in good minds upon the fight of the divine justice and the victory of truth.
What grace and majesty is seen in the great apostle of the gentiles, in all his actions, preaching, rending his garments, denouncing vengeance on the sorcerer! The Proconsul Sergius Paulus has a greatness and grace superior to his character; and equal to what one can suppose in Cæsar, Augustus, or Trajan.