[86] The late Mr. Ralph Nicholson Wornum, who succeeded Mr. Uwins as Keeper of the National Gallery in 1855, and retained that office till his death in 1878.
[87] “The family of Darius at the feet of Alexander after the Battle of Issus,” purchased at Venice from the Pisani collection in 1857. Lord Elcho had complained in the course of the debate that the price, £13,650, paid for this picture, had been excessive; and in reply allusion was made to the still higher price (£23,000) paid for the “Immaculate Conception” of Murillo, purchased for the Louvre by Napoleon III., in 1852, from the collection of Marshal Soult.—Of the great Veronese, Mr. Ruskin also wrote thus: “It at once, to my mind, raises our National Gallery from a second-rate to a first-rate collection. I have always loved the master, and given much time to the study of his works, but this is the best I have ever seen.” (Turner Notes, 1857, ed. v., p. 89, note.) So again before the National Gallery Commission, earlier in the same year, he had said, “I am rejoiced to hear (of its rumored purchase). If it is confirmed, nothing will have given me such pleasure for a long time. I think it is the most precious Paul Veronese in the world, as far as the completeness of the picture goes, and quite a priceless picture.”
[88] The present letter was written in reply to a criticism, contained in the Literary Gazette of November 6, 1858, on Mr. Ruskin’s “Catalogue of the Turner Sketches and Drawings exhibited at Marlborough House 1857-8.” The subjects of complaint made by the Gazette sufficiently appear from this letter. They were, briefly, first, the mode of exhibition of the Turner Drawings proposed by Mr. Ruskin in his official report already alluded to, pp. 78 and 80, note; and, secondly, two alleged hyperboles and one omission in the Catalogue itself.
[89] The cloud-forms which have disappeared from the drawings may be seen in the engravings.
[90] “Notes on the oil pictures,” to be distinguished from the later catalogue of the Turner sketches and drawings with which this letter directly deals. See ante, p. 88, note.
[91] By the way, you really ought to have given me some credit for the swivel frames in the desks of Marlborough House, which enable the public, however rough-handed, to see the drawings on both sides of the same leaf.[94]
[92] The rest of this letter may, with the exception of its two last paragraphs, and the slight alterations noted, be also found in “The Two Paths,” Appendix iv., “Subtlety of Hand” (pp. 226-9 of the new, and pp. 263-6 of the original edition), where the words bracketed [sic] in this reprint of it are, it will be seen, omitted.
[93] From a vignette design by Stothard of a single figure, to illustrate the poem “On a Tear.” (Rogers’ Poems, London, 1834 ed.)
[94] The identical frames, each containing examples of the sketches in pencil outline to which the letter alludes, may be seen in the windows of the lower rooms of the National Gallery, now devoted to the exhibition of the Turner drawings.
[95] Doubly emphasized in “The Two Paths,” where the words are printed thus: “I still look with awe at the combined delicacy and precision of his hand; IT BEATS OPTICAL WORK OUT OF SIGHT.”