Art

WHERE we can hope in this country ever to have any one collection that shall contain a considerable number of important works of the masters in painting, from the earliest times down to our own century, may well be doubted. In the generous rivalry that is already foreshadowed between the cities of the Union in matters of culture, it is evident that the objects of art we may be able from time to time to secure, must be divided as spoils among the conquerors, and that to no one of our cities can be conceded the right to own all, or perhaps the greatest share, of our gettings. There can be no London or Paris for us. We can hope only to be — and this were indeed a gracious hope — as Germany or as Italy are, a chain of cities, each link hung with its peculiar jewel. New York has at least, in her Metropolitan Museum, got the start of the rest of us in laying the foundation for a collection of ancient art. It is true, the actual possessions of the museum are small. It owns little of value beside the Blodgett collection. The Di Cesnola collection is the personal property of Mr. John Taylor Johnston, and the Japanese objects, the porcelain, the wood-carvings, the early-printed books, and the bric-à-brac generally, are loaned by their owners, for longer or shorter times. Still it is an important fact that we have so much, and by the time the first portion of the new building in the Central Park is completed, we shall find that such an impetus has been given to culture by the study of the museum collections, as will make it comparatively easy to start the institution on a solid foundation. Meanwhile it is of real interest to all who care to watch the beginnings of things, to learn how in many places there are seeds being planted that must some day bear good fruit. We must not expect that what is done in the way of art collection in this country shall anywhere be done perfectly well. Would it not be extraordinary if it were so done, seeing that nowhere in Europe is there a public gallery with whose contents and arrangement severe fault is not found, by those who know most about the matter ?

The visitors to the Metropolitan Museum, even on the five paying-days of the week, are numerous enough to prove that the public is waking up to the value of these collections. As we look at the matter, this value consists greatly in the picked excellence of the things shown, and in their restricted number. The Old-World collections— Cluny and South Kensington, the Louvre and the British Museum—do well to be as rich as possible, for they are to serve the need of the erudite, the connoisseur and the student, no less than that of the general public. But the beginnings of such treasuries in our country should show us in several fields choice characteristic specimens by which we may learn the rudiments of these arts and industries, and so be well grounded in our knowing. Agassiz’s advice to teachers of natural history, to be content with showing their pupils a few things, is equally applicable to the teaching we get from a museum, and the trustees of the New York museum have done well in not crowding their walls and cases with objects. The pièce de resistance is of course the Di Cesnola collection of Cypriote antiquities, a collection which, considering how largely antiquarian and learned its value is, is fortunate in this, that it has enough beauty and incident in it to give large pleasure to a public that cares nothing for antiquities merely as such. The glass is probably not to be matched anywhere for the beauty, variety, and rarity of the specimens, the collection of lamps is very instructive and charming, and the value of the series of terra-cotta statuettes is not easily overestimated. It may be remarked that the whole collection is much increased in working usefulness by the classification and orderly arrangement it received at the hands of General di Cesnola himself: his absence from the rooms that owe everything to him must be felt as a serious loss by every one who knew his unostentatious learning, his address, and his unwearied enthusiasm. Next in importance to the Di Cesnola collection is the collection of pottery and porcelain, English, French, German, Italian, and Oriental, none of it the property of the museum, but contributed by various persons, Mr. S. P. Avery bearing off the palm in the Oriental specimens—principally Chinese and Japanese — and Mr. William C. Prime making a notable show in the European field. Comparison with private collections in London and in the other cities of Europe, to say nothing of the great public displays, would make the shelves of the Metropolitan Museum look third-rate as a whole, though there are here many first-rate specimens; but, we repeat, the museum outside of the Di Cesnola collection is not to be judged by comparison : we must take it as it stands. Looked at intrinsically, it may be said almost without exaggeration that in these rooms a young student may graduate in the study of the ceramic art, and not fear a rigid examination at the hands of Old-World doctors. In the absence of a catalogue,— which indeed would hardly be worth while making for it mere loan collection, and one too of such a shifting character, — the specimens, particularly those belonging to Mr. Prime, are usefully ticketed, and we suppose the same service would be rendered the public in the Oriental division, if anybody anywhere knew anything about the history, age, or locality of the different wares. The pictures belonging to the museum, as well as those loaned to it for a season, deserve more particular criticism than our space permits us to give them: we cannot, however, pass without mention the remarkable Tintoretto of Mr. Walter Brown, the Toilet of Venus, a picture which, taken in connection with the Portrait by the same master and belonging to the same gentleman, will prove, well studied, of great help to those who shall afterward see the great Venetian in his royal robes in the palace that was once the Doges’ and is now his.

Better specimens of Tintoretto than these are not to he found out of Venice, though there is another portrait by him in private hands in New York, that is nearly of equal value with this portrait of Verdizzo belonging to Mr. Brown. The little Parmigianino, the Marriage of St. Catherine; the Salvator Rosa, the Temptation of St. Anthony; and the Head of St. Paul, by Titian, three pictures also belonging to Mr. Walter Brown, are contributions of great value, and it were much to be wished that they could be acquired for the museum, if in no other way than by the sacrifice of a portion of the Blodgett collection, which would well bear weeding. But however little we might care to give permanent room in restricted quarters to many of the Blodgett pictures, we owe him thanks for a goodly number of them, and these will all find room and welcome in the new building when it shall be completed. For there is a wide field for study in the room that contains the Blodgett pictures, and one need never go away uninstructed nor unpleased who has passed a morning in questioning the heads by Van Dyck, Cornelis de Vos, Greuze, the younger Cranach, Aart de Gelder, Van der Helst, Mierevelt, and, above all, the Hiile-Bobbe of Franz Hals — a picture which, placed between the Young Girl of De Vos, and the Min de Christyn of Van Dyck, shows how little youth and beauty can do after all to snuff out the flame of a vigorous old age. Crumpled old hag as she is, HilleBobbe is so full of fire, she is almost a match in beauty for these pale Dutch tulips. Nor would the student do amiss to exhaust, if he can, the excellences of the landscapes by some of these Dutch masters : the Quai at Leyden, by Van der Heyden, almost Venetian in color; or Van Goyen’s The Moerdyck, lovely in its pearly purity. The catalogue of the Blodgett pictures is well arranged and handsomely printed, and the museum keeps on sale copies of the etchings which have been made of a few of the pictures by M. Jules Jacquemart, aud which are in themselves one of the most honorable tributes of admiration that any gallery could desire from a master.

Beside these larger elements that make the main attraction of the museum, there still remain a choice collection of early printed books, and early and modern bindings; a small lot of Greek and Roman coins, many of them rare ; several cases containing objets de virtu, chiefly of the Renaissance type, and articles in rock crystal (one cup of engraved crystal belonging to Mr. S. P. Avery is of exceptional delicacy and beauty, we never saw its equal), enamels, mounted gems, carvings, repoussé work, wrought work in metal; among these a bell attributed to Benvenuto Cellini, which fully justifies all that its maker ever said, and that was much, of his own skill. Too much cannot be said in praise of this bell; it is well worthy to have been the raison d’être of the museum, as the Sophocles was of the Lateran. Finally, the museum may plume itself not a little on its Japanese collection, which will be most admired by those who have seen most and know most of the art of fairy land, now dying out under the rolling wheels of the car of so-called civilization. The value of the articles in this museum is even now very great; in time it must become vastly greater, since it includes many perfect specimens of a skill that never existed anywhere else in the world in such perfection as among the Japs.

— By the time this number of the Atlantic reaches its subscribers, the Seventh Annual Exhibition of the American Society of Painters in Water-Colors in New York will have been too long a thing of the past to make it useful for us to give a detailed account of it. But nevertheless it is important to note the remarkable growth of the society, and the improvement of individual members in the practice of their art, almost a new thing on this side the water. Mr. Louis C. Tiffany’s work of this year is much in advance of his first exhibited drawings, and Mr. Swain Gifford, who was a fellow-traveler with Mr. Tiffany in the East, and who seemed for a time in danger of being confounded with him both in choice of subject and in his way of work, has this year turned his face toward his home scenes, and besides some Eastern subjects had a number of really clever drawings of New England coast scenery. Miss Fidelia Bridges’ poetical and faithful drawings, in which are native birds of the smaller breeds, — tomtits and chickadees, sparrows and goldfinches, are the dramatis personæ, perched on weeds not of glorious feature but homely and familiar, — were warmly welcomed this year, and beside selling all she sent to the exhibition, the lady is rich in orders for the coming summer. Miss McDonald, too, had a great success, although she sent but three drawings, and all of them small. Yet there really was no better, solider work in the exhibition than hers, and she has deserved recognition by hard and modest work. Mr. W. F. Richards was another favorite contributor to the exhibition, or rather his pictures were favorites — for he himself sent nothing, his drawings were all loaned by their owners. This artist’s knowledge of nature, the fruit of unwearied study, has at last forced the public to recognize it, in spite of a prejudice against the extremely delicate execution through which it is revealed, and which does not please greatly outside the circle of women and the lovers of curiosities. But in the case of Mr. Richards the women have taught the connoisseurs, and these must now admit that all the artist’s delicacy, finish, and tameness, as they called it, are reconcilable with strength, breadth, and a masterly understanding of his subject. The exhibition was almost exclusively an American one, there being not more than a baker’s dozen of French and English drawings. Financially, the exhibition was most successful; there was a large daily attendance, beginning with the opening day, and at the close few really good drawings were left unsold. It has been a good example, and we learn that at last the members of the National Academy are bending to their oars, determined to pass the WaterColor Society and have an exhibition in the spring that shall prove we yet have some artists among us.

— The Gazette des Beaux Arts for December, contained a long article profusely illustrated, Les Editeurs Contermporains. I. Firmin Didot, by M. Réné Ménard, in which an account is given of some of the more important of the recent publications of this distinguished house. Some of these books have now reached us, and they are found to be every way worthy, for beauty and for permanent value, of all the praise they have received at M. Ménard’s pen. Those of the number mentioned in his article that we have on our table, and for which we are indebted to F. W. Christern & Co., New York, are the St. Cécile et la Société Romaine aux deux premiers Siècles, and the Nouveaux Mélanges archéologiques, par la père Cahier ; these, with the Conquête, de Constantinople, par Villehardouin, and the Histoire de Saint Louis, par Joinville, two publications of a series, Les Chefs-d’ œuvre historiqnes et litéraires da Mayen-Age, will perhaps be new to some of our readers, while others no less desirable are better known, the Chefs-d’ œuvre da la Peinture Italienne of M. Paul Mantz and the works of M. Paul Lacroix (Bibliophile Jacob) on the Arts, and Manners and Customs, Civil, Religious, and Military, of the Middle Ages. The beautiful type and paper of these books, with the number, excellence, and rarity of the illustrations, make it a perpetual wonder how they can be sold at so low a price. But that is a wonder the French publishers are all the time causing.

— The Nouveaux Mélanges archéolugiques of Father Cahier, and another work on our table, L’Évangile, Études iconographiques et archéologiques, par Ch. Rohault de Fleurg, published by Mame of Tours, will, perhaps, be of less interest to the general reader than the St. Cécile, or even than the Histoire de St. Louis. But the student of such matters cannot fail to find them of exceeding interest. The magnificent edition of the Gospels lately published by Hachette with illustrations by Bida, with that of the whole Bible published some years ago, and illustrated by Doré, are examples of one way of making the Scripture speak to the mind by the eye, and it is a way which will always have more attractions to the average reader than the purely archæological method pursued by M. Rohault de Fleury. Dore did not trouble himself about archtcology at all. M. Bida, following the lead of Mr. Holman Hunt, has worked on the theory that men, women, and manners have not changed in the East since Bible times, and accordingly his illustrations are a sort of guide-book to the East of to-day. M. de Fleury has confined himself to archæology, pure and simple, and giving us a concordance of the four Gospels, he follows it story by story with a pictured commentary full and complete beyond anything that has been before attempted within our knowledge, drawing for his material upon the catacomb paintings, the frescoes and mosaics in the churches, the carved ivories, the illuminated manuscripts, the sculptures and utensils of the church from the earliest times down to the twelfth century. What makes these illustrations especially valuable is their faithfulness, their frank sincerity; they are in no wise dressed up so as to be palatable to our accomplished modern eyes. Father Cahier’s Mélanges is, as the name implies, a book of less unity of intention, but it is of no less archæological value. The work is composed of a series of articles on subjects attaching themselves naturally to the history and literature of the Middle Ages. One of the most interesting of these is the Bestiary, a subject which is treated with much less than his usual fullness by Viollet le Due in the Dictionnaire de l’ Architecture, and which the student, and no less the architect and designer, often finds puzzling. The present article is very full, and there are abundant illustrations showing the mediæval conception of many animals, as well real as fanciful. No doubt, however, our readers will on the whole take up with the greatest pleasure the St. Céecile; and their pleasure will be fully mstified, for it is a curiously suggestive and delightfully illustrated book. The author, Don Guéranger, Abbe de Solesmes, tries to show that the doctrines of Christianity, so far from having been accepted only by the poorer classes of Rome, the ignorant and the superstitious, were gladly heard and loyally, bravely adopted by the patricians, and were in vogue in the great world. Saint Cæcilia, according to M. Guéranger, is rightly believed to have belonged to the high Roman aristocracy. She belonged to the gens Cæcilia, the same to which belonged the Cæcilia Metella whose tomb is so conspicuous an object on the Roman Campagna. We read this book with the interest that attaches to an ingenious historical novel, and while finding ourselves unable to give great heed to the author’s theory, we find much in his learning and clearness of statement to admire. The archæology and the art of the book are of exceptional value, and the wood-cuts of the catacomb paintings, and of Cimabue’s St. Cæcilia in the Ufiizi, with the etchings from Raphael, Domenichino, Marc Autonio, and Giulio Romano, reproduced by the remarkable heliogravure process, make the book well worth having for their sakes alone. Beside two chromo-lithographs and five etchings, there are two hundred and fifty wood-cuts. This book makes a valuable introduction to the works of M. Paul Lacroix, to which we have above alluded.

— Nothing very important comes to us from Germany ; but we have received from B. Westermann & Co., New York, Christian Daniel Rauch, von Friedrich Eggers. Berlin. 1873. Only the first volume has as yet appeared. It contains a fine portrait of Rauch, engraved by E. Mandel in 1873, after a chalk drawing made by Gottfried Schadow in 1812, when Rauch, born in 1777, was thirtyfive years old. The work, begun by the brother of the editor, will probably be completed in a second volume. It is written with characteristic German faithfulness, and giving the whole story of the artist’s development and the art history of the time in which he lived, more particularly with regard to sculpture, and including beside Rauch’s journal of his travels in Southern France, Italy, and Germany, and notes of all the distinguished people he met with, it has an interest quite general and human.

— Westermann also sends us the first part of Ernst Förster’s Peter Von Cornelius, which has just been published in Berlin. It is a small octavo of 496 pages, and beginning with the artist’s birth-year, 1783, brings us down to 1830, with Cornelius established at Munich and actively working there. A second volume, completing the work, is promised in the course of the present year. An almost autobiographical interest is given to the work by the insertion, in the order in which they were written, of letters to Cornelius from many of the leading men with whom he came in contact, and of his answers to these. The work will fill a gap in the history of the rise of the modern German school of painting; or rather, as there exists no history of that school worthy of mention, this book may be considered as the corner-stone of such a work.

— Bildende Kunst in der Gegenwart, gedenkbuch an die Kunsthalle der Wiener Weltaustellung, von Ernest Lehmann, is an account, after the high German fashion, of modern European art, a review of the pictures exhibited last summer at the Vienna Exposition, similar in purpose to those written by Tom Taylor and Francis Turner Palgrave about the Brampton Exhibition of 1862. It is a useful résumé of so much of modern painting as was represented at the Exposition, and the appearance of a second edition indicates that it has been successful with the general public.

— A curious sign of the times in Germany is the reproduction of the wood-cuts designed by Lucas Cranach, in 1521, and accompanied with text written by Luther, in which the acts and teachings of Christ are opposed to the acts and teachings of the Popes. This was the “ Passional Christi und Antichristi ” of which Luther wrote to Spalatin in 1521, “ Lucas has asked me to write something under these pictures of his : you will care for them. It is the pictured antithesis of Christ and the Pope, and is a good book for the people.” In the present state of the conflict between the German empire and the Pope, it has seemed a good thing to reprint this set of designs, but apart from the fact that it gives us a look at a forgotten work which no doubt influenced many in the time of it, no good can come from the use of such brutal and uncharitable weapons in a time like ours. There are twenty-six of the wood-cuts, and though they are fac-similes of very bad mechanical work, they are worth having as specimens of the design of a well-known master.

— The Histoire d'une Maison, Texte et Dessins par Viollet le Due, Paris, Hetzel & Cie., no date (1874), is a pleasant, instructive little book, which, if people ever built dwelling houses in America, or could be induced to do so, might be worth translating. Under the thin disguise of a narrative, we are led to study the theory and practice of good building, and so lively is our guide, and so lightly does he handle his learning, that almost he persuades us to try our hand at building like Christians. In truth, there is a deal of sound sense and practical teaching in this little volume, and any young man who thinks of being an architect, or any person who has a house in his mind’s eye, cannot do better than to mark, read, learn, and inwardly digest its pages. The book is printed in large, clear type on thick paper, and is well illustrated in the author’s known excellent style.

— The Guzette des Beaux Arts for February is an uncommonly interesting number. Charles Blanc resumes his Grammaire des Arts Décoratifs, of which portions have already appeared in Vols. III., IV., V., of the Gazette (2d period). The present article continues the subject of female dress, and gives hints, suggestions, bits of advice, which we wish ladies may agree with us in thinking as sensible and practical as they are artistic. The illustrations are pretty, but they are not as striking as those of the first of the papers on this important subject. But even a mere man may take pleasure in reading what M. Blanc has to say about the secondary objects that are so necessary to the harmony of the toilet—the gloves, the shoes, the fan, the parasol, and the ornaments added to the dress, and separable from it — fringes, furs, and laces. M. Réné Ménard writes a valuable paper on Spinello Aretino (Spinello of Arezzo), and illustrates his historical and critical notice with some good wood-cuts of the artist’s works, and a fine etching by Flameng of Spinello’s Vierge au Rosier. It will be noted that the theme of this picture is the same in effect with that of Millais’ early picture of Christ in the Carpenter’s Shop. In the English pre-Raphaelite picture, Christ, a homely child, has been wounded in the hand by one of his father’s tools, and he shows it to his mother, who weeps a flood of unnecessary and face-distorting tears. In Spinello’s lovely group, the child holds serenely up a hand pricked with a thorn from the rose-screen before which his mother sits, and she, with a sad face of presaging sorrow, lightly touches the child’s cheek with the tip of her slender hand. All the “ moral ” of Millais’ picture is here, and more, with beauty and tenderness such as he never knew how to paint. There are several other articles well worth reading, and many illustrations.

— The Exhibition of the Portfolio Club was, we believe, the first general exhibition of the work of our Boston architects, and was a very interesting one. The club is a society of the younger men in the profession, — mainly of those who have studied abroad,— organized within the past year, and already known by the Sketch Book which they have published, aided by contributions from other architects. Their invitation to others of their profession to unite with them in the exhibition was well responded to : so that, although some wellknown names were lacking among the exhibitors, the drawings which filled the rooms of the Art Club were a pretty fair indication of what the better part of the profession is doing. They included sketches made during travel abroad, showing often much cleverness of execution as well as freshness of feeling; drawings of works actually executed ; designs for competitions, of churches and public buildings, and many admirable designs for dwelling-houses. There were pen drawings, brush drawings in ink and sepia, pencil sketches, and water-color drawings.

It was interesting to notice here, as in the new buildings in the burnt district which we had occasion to notice a while ago, the struggle of opposing influences,—French, English, and German, — both in design and rendering; and it is significant, that while far the greater part of our architects who have studied or resided abroad, have done so in Paris, and while the influence of distinct tradition and systematic training is almost entirely French, yet in the designs shown here the English tendency was decidedly prominent. The French architects have devoted themselves almost unanimously to a certain modified treatment of classical and Renaissance forms, which has developed for them what may almost be called a distinct style, and has in fact been baptized the “ romantic ” style, while the English, in spite of the efforts of such men as Mr. Ferguson and Mr. Digby Wyatt, are becoming almost as unanimous in their preference for a modified Gothic. And in this exhibition, which quite represented the active tendencies of our architects, with a few marked exceptions all the designs of any pretension had at least a quasi-Gothic character.

The best substitute for the singleness of effect of a pure indigenous style, in our time, has been the skill of the French architects in their careful balancing and subordination of parts, and their nice adjustment of detail. It would seem, however, that the active, flexible, and, as it were, familiar spirit of the modern Gothic, with its free eclecticism, suited the temper of our artists and people better, even though the public has taken to its heart the so-called “ French roof,” which in its Chinese modification bestrews the country. It is not to he expected that a community so many-minded, and so full of experiments as ours, shall settle quickly into a steady movement in any one path of art, or that our architects shall easily attain that quiet mastery of form and expression which is hardly acquired singly, or directly transmitted from one to another, bud which comes of the continued labor together of men with common aims. Styles crystallize very slowly, at best, and not at all in the agitation of discordant influences. Therefore wo welcome gladly every sign of concerted action among our architects, a body of men who have hitherto been far too little at one for their own good or that of the public.

The designs for public buildings showed a good deal of study and invention ; they were often ingeniously combined, and rich in detail. The cramping conditions of our street architecture were evident; but there was a distinct effort to overcome them, often a very successful one. We noticed a tendency to utilize the unavoidable tallness of our buildings by the introduction of towers. On the whole, the churches seemed perhaps the least successfully treated ; and this is hardly to be wondered at, for no part of architecture requires such fineness of combination and such purity of detail as church building, and in none is there so little unity of feeling among proprietors or designers. The best and most individual part of the exhibition seemed to us the domestic architecture. Here the distinctive habits of our people react most strongly on the designs, and the effort to meet their wants has given, especially in our country houses, a character that is apt to be lacking in more ambitious designs. The drawings of this class in the exhibition were varied and picturesque, and what is better still, looked like the attractive homes of a cultivated and comfortable people.

The execution of the drawings varied as much as the character of the designs, and here too, considering the antecedents of many of the exhibitors, the absence of the French manner was remarkable. One excellent habit of our architects is their use of perspective. It is known that the French architects hardly make any use of it, and any one who has studied the buildings of Paris is likely to have noticed faults into which they have been led by their exclusive dependence on geometrical elevations. Their symmetrical combinations and evenly balanced facades, it is true, are more fairly represented in this way than more irregular compositions would be. But the tendency of our architects toward picturesque effect absolutely requires perspective drawings of their variously grouped masses.

The pen drawings were straightforward, expressive, and brilliant. We somewhat regret to notice a growing tendency to neglect, like the English draughtsmen, effects of light and shade. This comes partly perhaps from a desire to save time and partly from the feeling that much shading disturbs the clear definition of form aimed at in a pen drawing. But the study of masses of light and shade is so essential a part of architectural design, and so important a discipline in acquiring breadth of effect, that we are sorry to see it relinquished in the drawings, and fear that this must tend strongly to its neglect in design itself.

It was with some regret too that we noticed how small was the proportion of sketches from the hands of architects themselves ; for these, though necessarily less elaborate and complete than the drawings of professional draughtsmen, have a suggestive interest that no second-hand rendering gives, and generally a much quieter and more attractive character. The pressure of business upon an architect in active practice, it is true, leaves him little time for even slight sketches of his work, and the great increase in the number and capability of professional draughtsmen among us during late years brings great temptation to rely exclusively on their renderings. The excitement, too, of frequent competitions, which crowds too many offices with profitless labor expended under pressure, increases the hurry of architects, and tempts them to rely on elaborate and showy drawings, which they themselves would have neither the time nor the disposition to make.

There were a good many vigorous colored drawings, but most of them disagreeably glaring as well as often excessive in scale. It was rather disheartening to notice that among the visitors on the opening night the most violent drawings commonly attracted the greatest praise. Thus the large drawing of the new “ Old South ” Church, in a style worthy of a chimney-board, received the praise which belonged to the quieter sketch of the same subject on the opposite wall; and the clever but painfully gaudy drawing of a design for the Chicago Court House excited great admiration. It was pleasant to turn from these to a quiet, well-considered representation like that of the Berkeley Street Church, or to some of the out-door sketches in the first room, where there was force of color without glare. The appetite of the public, and especially of competitive committees, for showy pictures, and the weakness of architects in pampering a taste which they privately laugh at, will do great mischief to our growing art if they are not withstood.

Some renderings by pupils in the Institute of Technology show the satisfactory way in which the instruction there is carried on. The drawings of King’s Chapel suggest the thought that the studies of the pupils may be further utilized in securing us accurate records of other venerable monuments which still remain to us, and of which it is to be feared that the vandalism of cultivated municipalities and the cupidity of corporations will soon leave us nothing else.

We would not forget to mention two figure drawings, — designs for stained glass, — the only things of the kind in the exhibition. One was a boat load of Cupids rowing along the Nile, fancifully incongruous, but nicely composed, and charmingly fresh and graceful in the drawing. It is to be wished that our architects would in their education give some serious study to figure-drawing. Not that many of them would acquire skill or freedom in designing the figure, but that it would give them readiness in applying it to architectural decoration, whether painted or sculptured, a thing more neglected here and now, than ever before or elsewhere in the civilized ages of the world ; and still better, would more than supply the place of the once worshiped, now neglected, classical orders, in developing a feeling for combination in line, a nice sense of proportion and of harmonious unity.

Our mention of the Sketch Book, published monthly by the Portfolio Club, reminds us to say that the heliotype process of Messrs. Osgood & Co., by which it is produced, has given us the first means by which our architects have been able freely to reproduce and circulate their designs. It is, we believe, some modification of the “gelatine ” process, and has the merit of lending itself to printing with letterpress. It reproduces drawings both in line and tints, — and even in colors, with the necessary shortcomings of every process which depends on photography. This universality bids fair to set it among the most valuable of autographic inventions, when its results are fully developed. At present, its mechanical execution seems not to be completely under control, some of the impressions being admirable and others occasionally quite unsatisfactory. Thus in the heliotypes of the Gray Collection which we have seen, the vigorously engraved prints are very well represented, while the delicate tints of the etchings are lost through thickening the lines in the reproduction. On the other hand, we have seen a large engraving after one of Raphael’s works, minutely finished in roulette, reproduced in the heliotype with a delicacy that was astonishing. Of the heliotype’s use to architects, besides the Sketch Book already mentioned, and the similar one published by the New York architects, the clever Notebook Sketches, of Mr. R. S. Peabody, are a good example.

— In our notices last month of the Boston Art Club Exhibition, we inadvertently attributed certain white rabbits to Mr. J. Foxcroft Cole. These quadrupeds were in fact painted by Mr. Cass.