REPORT OF MR. MILLETT.
203
refined and beautiful, and well drawn as well; but the arms are carelessly modelled, and arranged with a painful repetition of the right angle. Sir Francis Grant’s portrait has little to recommend it in drawing or color, and the same may be said of J. Archer’s portrait of a lady in white. An Old Student , by J. P. Knight, is a characteristic study-h£ad, and James Sant’s portrait of Master Wilson-Patten is a strong one. One cau but regret the absence of better representative portraits, the existence of which is hinted at by those above noticed.
The landscapes numbered very few. It was not surprising to find Turner’s Walton Bridges among them, and it was not encouraging to turn from this to the more modern works. T. Graham sent A Freshet in the Highlands, breezy and moist, with a fine cloud effect and well-painted water, and Ticat Cole was represented by Evening, a crudely yellow, nnatmospheric twilight, not altogether wanting in feeling, but false in tone. R. Ansdell, who paints quite as conventionally as any one else, exposed a sheep picture, and as no exhibition would be complete without a Landseer, Queen ^ ictoria and the Prince of Wales contributed The Sanctuary, The Arab's Tent, and the artist’s portrait of himself. A large room was hung with water-colors, and most of the well- known artists were represented. Newton’s Evening Shades ^vas perhaps the most charming bit there, although the historical pieces by Sir John Gilbert, familiar through the engrav- ln gs, are almost beyond reproach. Two of Harper’s much bilked of oriental scenes were also shown, remarkable only for a decidedly original pea-green general tone.
Italian art in all its frivolity, weakness and conventionalism, ''ras represented by a large display of statuary and a tiresome number of paintings. The rooms of the pavilion occupied by ike Italian exhibit, were hung with a succession of mediocre productions of almost endless variety of execution and subject, but of about the same relative merits. The main object °f the Italian artists is evidently to cover as many canvases ns possible during the dull season, in order to be ready for the next influx of visitors. The mercenary character of this s ort of work was indelibly impressed on a large proportion °f the pictures shown, and in the midst of so much indifferent