REPORT OF MR. MILLETT.
185
heart. The heads are, for the most part, broadly caricatured, and his attempts at sentiment fall flatly and coldly on the spectator. A group of peasants, gathered around a table, represent to the disinterested spectator little more than a collection of yellow faces, expressionless where not caricatured, and less impressive than so many mummies. A village funeral, with the dusty old mourners, the groups of children, the same ugly bier and black pall that have figured in so many similar conceptions, very little pathos, and no juiciness of color—this is hardly to be ranked with Ivnaus’ best efforts. The common motives among German genre painters are found in the comic incidents of peasant life, or pleasant little scenes at social gatherings, and among all the long list of painters who illustrate peasant life, there is not one to be found who acknowledges, with his brush, at least, that the being he represents has any deeper feelings than those which prominently distinguish him from the higher brutes, and more than the facial expression of grief and joy. Vautier, who was better seen in the Swiss department, exposed one of these scenes, irreproachably painted, full of humorous situation, and valuable only as an illustration of an interesting custom among peasants. It is a dance in a country inn, with a group of girls standing on the benches, to see the fun, three quaint musicians, and the room in the background full °f grotesque figures. Deffregger has more of the best side °f peasant life in his genres , and certainly paints with much ttmre feeling for color, and heartier sympathy with the peasants as something more than simple models for superficial citation. He exposed, among others, a picture similarly mspired with the one above mentioned, and conceived with more genuine humor, and having more interesting situations. The Munich artists contributed largely to the collection, and s °me idea of the number of pictures sent from that city may be gathered from the fact that to Munich alone went fifty art ln edals. It must be remembered that this is no criterion of fheir superior excellence, for the artists not rewarded with m edals are the exception, not the rule. The large proportion °f these pictures were of the class of genres I have described ; scarcely one poetical idea, and little seriousness of purpose bi them. It would be unjust, however, to place Kurzbauer 24