The persons of such sufferers should be Michael Angelesque—punishment and suffering should be equally large. We venture to suggest this criticism to Mr Patten, because the subject is grand, and there is so much good in his manner of treating it, that he will do well to paint another picture of it.
Mr Etty has no less than seven pictures. His "In the Greenwood Shade" is by far the best. Cupid and sleeping nymphs—the rich and lucid colours, softly losing themselves in shade, and here and there playfully recovered, very much remind us of Correggio. We should more applaud Mr Etty for his general colouring, than for his flesh tints; nor have his figures in general the soft and luxuriant roundness which grace and beauty should have—the faces, too, have often too much purple shadow. We have before remarked that, painting too closely from the model, he exhibits Graces that have worn stays. And surely he often mistakenly enlarges the loveliest portion of the female form—the bosom—whose beauty is in its undefined commencement, its gentle and innocent and modest growth. How happily is this hit off by Dryden in his description of Iphigenia sleeping, to the gaze of the clown Cymon:—
"As yet their places were but signified." While so many pictures of acknowledged merit are rejected for lack of room, it is scarcely fair, perhaps, for one artist to exhibit so many. Mr. Eastlake has, however, been too liberal to others in his forbearing modesty; we could wish he had not confined himself to one. He might offer the lioness's answer, were not his picture one most tenderly expressive of all gentleness. It is an old subject, but treated in no respect after the old manner. The boy is faint and weary, on the ground. Hagar, with a countenance of sweet anxiety, is giving the water, with a care, and with a view to the safety of the draught. There is a dead, dry, burnt palm-tree lying on the ground, poetically descriptive. The expression of both figures is perfect, and they are most sweetly, tenderly painted. If we might make any objection, it would be that the subject is not quite poetically treated as to colour. It may be, and we have no doubt it is, most true to nature in one sense. We can believe that such a country would have such a sky, and such appearance in foreground and distance; but that very truth creates to our mind's eye an anachronism—it brings down the tale of antiquity to very modernism—it robs it of its antique hue—it shows it too commonly, too familiarly. As we read it, we do not so see it; we are not so matter-of-fact. There is an ideal colouring that belongs to sentiment—our minds always adopt it. We have not as yet correctly worked out that theory, and therefore it is not enough in our practice. More particularly in this subject do we require something ideal in the manner, for few are equally true in the characters as in the external scene. Here, certainly, neither Hagar nor Ishmael are of their nation and country. It is too lovely a picture to wish touched. The remarks we venture upon may be applied to most modern pictures of ancient subjects, and may be worth consideration. There are two other pictures, very beautiful pictures, too, in the Exhibition, which have, we think, this defect—"Jephtha's Daughter, the last Day of Mourning. H. O. Neil;" and "Naomi and her Daughter-in-law. E. N. Eddis." The first, Jephtha's Daughter and her attendant maidens is a group of very lovely figures, extremely graceful, all breathing an air of purity; it is loveliness in many forms; for its conception as to chiaroscuro and colour, is most skilfully managed; but it has this present day's reality, and we only force ourselves to believe it Jephtha's Daughter. Exquisitely beautiful, too, is the affectionate, the very loving, Ruth. Orpah, too, is sweet, but the difference is well expressed—"Orpah kissed her mother-in-law, but Ruth clave unto her." There is an unaffected simplicity about these figures that is quite charming, a simplicity of manner well according with the simplicity of character; but has not the picture in colouring too much of this day's familiar air? In historical design both these pictures are a decided advance in art. We are giving promise.
We could wish that Mr. Martin would not ruin his greatness by his littlenesses. There is often a large conception, that we overlook to examine interminable minutiæ of parts, and mostly parts repeated; his figures are always injurious. His "Canute the Great rebuking his Courtiers" would have been a fine picture had he contented himself with the real subject—the sea. It is, indeed, crude in colour, and the coldness to the right ill agrees with the red heat on the left; but still, in chiaroscuro, it would have been a fine picture, if completed according to his first intention, but Canute and his courtiers spoil it. In the first place, they make, by their position and ease, the awful overwhelming sea safe. It is, as Longinus remarks, the plank that takes away the danger and the poetry; and such an assemblage of courtiers put the times of Canute quite out of our heads—a collection from a book of fashions—Ladies' Magazines—in their velvet gauze and tiffany, in colours that put the sun to shame, and make him blush less red; and the little, minute work about the pebbly shore creates a weariness, for they tempt us to count the sands. All this arises from a mistaken view of the sublime, that we have before noticed in Mr. Martin. It is very strange that an artist of his undoubted genius should err in a matter so essential to the greatness at which he aims.
Would that we could say a word in of Mr Haydon's one historical picture, "The Heroine of Saragossa." She is most unheroic certainly, stretching across the centre of the picture with a most uncomfortable stride, with what a foot! and a toe that looks for amputation—a torch suspended out of her hand, held by nothing—not like "another Helen," to "fire another Troy," but purposing to fire off a huge cannon, without a chance of success; for not only do not her fingers hold the torch, but her face is averted from the piece of ordnance, and her feet are taking her away from it. She is splendidly dressed in red, and without shoes or stockings—a great mistake, for such a foot might have been well hid. She is the very worst historical figure we have ever seen in a picture of any pretensions; there is another figure that only attempts to hold a pistol. The whole is a most unfortunate display of the vulgar historical. The unfortunate woman has two heads of hair, and both look borrowed for the occasion. How very strange it is that an artist who could paint the very respectable picture of the "Raising of Lazarus," now at the Pantheon, should not himself be sensible of the glaring faults of such a picture as this; and we may add, the large one exhibited last year. Mr Haydon understands art, lectures upon it, and is, we believe, enthusiastic in his profession. Does he bring his own works to the test of the principles he lays down? The misconception of men of talent with regard to their own works is an unexplained phenomenon.
Edwin Landseer, R. A., exhibits but two pictures, both excellent. Of the two, we prefer the smaller, "Two horses drinking"—nature itself. Lord Kames, in his Elements of Criticism, remarks, that the fore-horse of a team always has his ears forward, on the alert, while the rest mostly, throw theirs back. This watchfulness Landseer has observed in the eye of the animal; the eye of the one, protected by the horse nearest to the spectator, has a quiet, unobserving look; the eye of the other is evidently on the watch. A cunning magpie is looking into a bone. The picture is beautifully coloured.
Mr Redgrave's three pictures are exquisitely beautiful, and in his own truly English style. "The Fortune Hunter,"
"Neglects a love on pure affection built,
For vain indifference if but double-gilt."
A screen separates the deserted one from the courting pair. The contrast in expression of the two fair ones is as good as can be. The "vain indifference" is not as many, treating this subject, have made her, deformed, old, and ugly, for that would have removed our pity from the suffering one, showing the man to be altogether worthless, and the loss an escape; on the contrary she is of a face and person to be admired; but she looks vain and void of affection. We like not so well his "Going to Service;" but his "Poor Teacher," is most charming; it is a most pathetic tale, though it be one figure only, but that how sweet! A lovely girl in mourning is sitting in deep thought waiting for her scholars; on the table is her humble fare, and of that she takes little heed. She is thinking of her bereavement, perhaps a father, a mother, a sister—perhaps she is altogether a bereaved one—a tear is on her cheek. These are the subjects, when so well painted; that make us love innocence and tenderness, the loveliness of duty, and, therefore, they make us better. The habitual sight might rob a villain of his evil thoughts—such human loveliness is the nearest to angelic—indeed it is more, for we must not forget the exceeding greatness, loveliness, of which human nature is capable. Divine love has given it a power to be far above every other nature, and that divine love has touched the heart, and speaks in the countenance of the "Poor Teacher."
Mr Creswick has this year rectified the fault of the last. His greens were thought somewhat too crude and too monotonous. "In culpam ducet culpæ fuga"—the old foot-road is scarcely green enough. All Mr Creswick's pictures have in them a sentiment—nature with him is sentient and suggestive. The very stillness—the silence, the quiet of the old foot-road is the contemplative of many a little history of them whose feet have trod it: such is the character of "The Terrace." But the most strikingly beautiful is "Welsh Glen"—