We have a clear, brown, woody Landscape by Gaspar Poussin, in his fine determined style of pencilling, which gives to earth its solidity, and to the air its proper attributes. There are perhaps, no landscapes that excel his in this fresh, healthy look of nature. One might say, that wherever his pencil loves to haunt, ‘the air is delicate.’ We forgot to notice a St. John in the Wilderness, by A. Caracci, which has much of the autumnal tone, the ‘sear and yellow leaf,’ of Titian’s landscape-compositions. A Rape of the Sabines, in the inner room, by Rubens, is, we think, the most tasteless picture in the Collection: to see plump, florid viragos struggling with bearded ruffians, and tricked out in the flounces, furbelows, and finery of the court of Louis XIV. is preposterous. But there is another Rubens in the outer room, which, though fantastical and quaint, has qualities to redeem all faults. It is an allegory of himself and his three wives, as a St. George and Holy Family, with his children as Christ and St. John, playing with a lamb; in which he has contrived to bring together all that is rich in antique dresses, (black as jet, and shining like diamonds,) transparent in flesh-colour, agreeable in landscape, unfettered in composition. The light streams from rosy clouds; the breeze curls the branches of the trees in the back-ground, and plays on the clear complexions of the various scattered group. It is one of this painter’s most splendid, and, at the same time, most solid and sharply finished productions.
Mr. Wilkie’s Alehouse Door is here, and deserves to be here. Still it is not his best; though there are some very pleasing rustic figures, and some touching passages in it. As in his Blind-Man’s-buff, the groups are too straggling, and spread over too large a surface of bare foreground, which Mr. Wilkie does not paint well. It looks more like putty than earth or clay. The artist has a better eye for the individual details, than for the general tone of objects. Mr. Liston’s face in this ‘flock of drunkards’ is a smiling failure.
A portrait of Hogarth, by himself, and Sir Joshua’s half-length of Lord Heathfield, hang in the same room. The last of these is certainly a fine picture, well composed, richly coloured, with considerable character, and a look of nature. Nevertheless, our artist’s pictures, seen among standard works, have (to speak it plainly) something old-womanish about them. By their obsolete and affected air, they remind one of antiquated ladies of quality, and are a kind of Duchess-Dowagers in the art—somewhere between the living and the dead.
Hogarth’s series of the Marriage a-la-Mode[[2]] (the most delicately painted of all his pictures, and admirably they certainly are painted) concludes the Catalogue Raisonnée of this Collection.—A study of Heads, by Correggio, and some of Mr. Fuseli’s stupendous figures from his Milton Gallery, are on the staircase.
A CATALOGUE OF THE PICTURES IN THE ANGERSTEIN GALLERY
| 1. The Marriage à la Mode, No. 1. | Hogarth. |
| 2. The Marriage à la Mode, No. 2. | Ditto. |
| 3. The Marriage à la Mode, No. 3. | Ditto. |
| 4. The Marriage à la Mode, No. 4. | Ditto. |
| 5. The Marriage à la Mode, No. 5. | Ditto. |
| 6. The Marriage à la Mode, No. 6. | Ditto. |
| 7. Portrait of Lord Heathfield, the Defender of Gibraltar. | Sir Joshua Reynolds. |
| 8. His own Portrait, with his Dog. | Hogarth. |
| 9. The Village Festival. | Wilkie. |
| 10. The Portrait of Rubens. (Formerly in the Collection of Sir Joshua Reynolds.) | Vandyck. |
| 11. The Woman taken in Adultery. Painted for the Burgomaster Six. | Rembrandt. |
| 12. A Landscape; Evening; with Horses, Cattle, and Figures. (From the Collection of Sir Laurence Dundas.) | Cuyp. |
| 13. Christ praying in the Garden. | Correggio. |
| 14. The Adoration of the Shepherds. | Rembrandt. |
| 15. A Land Storm. (From the Lansdown Collection.) | Gaspar Poussin. |
| 16. Portrait of Pope Julius the Second. (From the Lancillotti Palace.) | Raphael. |
| 17. The Emperor Theodosius refused admittance into the Church by St. Ambrose. | Vandyck. |
| 18. A Landscape, with Figures; representing Abraham preparing to sacrifice his son Isaac. (From the Colonna Palace.) | Gaspar Poussin. |
| 19. Portrait of Govartius. | Vandyck. |
| 20. Pan teaching Apollo the use of the Pipe. | Annibal Caracci. |
| 21. A Sea-Port at Sunset, in which is represented the Legend of the Embarkation of St. Ursula. (Formerly in the Barberini Palace.) | Claude. |
| 22. Erminia discovering the Shepherds: From Tasso’s ‘Jerusalem Delivered.’ | Domenichino. |
| 23. Philip the Fourth and his Queen. | Velasquez. |
| 24. Venus and Adonis. (From the Colonna Palace.) | Titian. |
| 25. St. John in the Wilderness. (From the Orleans Collection.) | Annibal Caracci. |
| 26. A Landscape, with Figures. | Claude. |
| 27. Christ raising Lazarus. (From the Orleans Collection.) | Sebastian del Piombo. |
| 28. A Concert. | Titian. |
| 29. An Italian Sea-Port at Sunset, with Figures. | Claude. |
| 30. The Rape of Ganymede. (From the Colonna Palace.) | Titian. |
| 31. A Sea-Port, in which is represented the Embarkation of the Queen of Sheba on her visit to Solomon. (From the Collection of the Duke de Bouillon.) | Claude. |
| 32. A Study of Heads. (From the Orleans Collection.) | Correggio. |
| 33. A Study of Heads. (From the same Collection.) | Correggio. |
| 34. The Rape of the Sabine Women. | Rubens. |
| 35. The Holy Family, with St. George, a Female Saint, and Angels. | Rubens. |
| 36. A Landscape, with Figures; representing the Marriage of Rebecca. (From the Collection of the Duke de Bouillon.) | Claude. |
| 37. Susanna and the Elders. (From the Orleans Collection.) | Ludov. Caracci. |
| 38. A Bacchanalian Scene. | Nich. Poussin. |
THE DULWICH GALLERY
It was on the 5th of November that we went to see this Gallery. The morning was mild, calm, pleasant: it was a day to ruminate on the object we had in view. It was the time of year
‘When yellow leaves, or few or none, do hang
Upon the branches;’