The Press. — London, England, 1853-05-28 00:00:00

(f' 92 the task she has undertaken in abridging into a small volume, and " adapting for tke use of schools," the history of a country so vast, and latterly so di vided, as that comprised within the limits of the ancient Germania. These difficulties, however, she has fairly grappled with, and overcome them as well, perhaps, as it was possible to do under the circum stances. Although the hook, historically considered, offers but a bare skeleton of multitudinous events and changes, Miss Corner has contrived to give some thing like life to the dry bones, and has endowed her narrative with more interest and picturesquesness than the auth(cs of e' abridgments" rail generally succeed in attaining. To the present edition some new chapters are added, which bring down the history to July, ItiGl, and briefly narrate the incidents ofthe last revolution in Vienna, and war of Hungary. Derecourt on Taxes and Duties, in a Letter to her alaiesty's Chancellor of the Exchequer previous to his Forming " The Budget" (and partly adopted). London : Robins. Is the compass of a few pages the author presents the germs of half-a-dozen budgets, and offers suggestions enough to set up any Chancellor of the Exchequer in business as a financial reformer for the rest of the century. Mr. Derecourt, however, proceeds always upon the safe principle, which it would be well if Mr. Gladstone could be induced to imitate, of se curing a surplus before setting about the pleasant work of tax remission. His schemes are certainly of the boldest—imposing burdens, and sweeping away imposts with a glorious disregard of vested interests. If adopted, indeed, more than one among the series would leave our financial system in a state of primitive simplicity ; despoiling it utterly of that elaborate complication, that balance of inequalities and adjustment of injustices, which some con temporary politicians regard with so much admiration. And, not content with merely putting his plans into print, the author proposes the establishment of a Tax and Duty League as the "only means whereby the old plans of taxation can he superseded, and the re venue of the country raised upon an entirely new system, of which reason and justice shall be the basis." A Letter to his Graee the Archbishop ►f Dublin, on the Nature, Government, and Te► n lency ty' Miss Senates Establishment at Plymouth, d'e. By the Rev. W. 1.. Cookesley, M.A. London : Ridgway. PARLIAMENT has confessed very recently the increasing numbers of what must be called Protestant monastic establishments, and Mr. Chambers's bill provides ac cordingly for the inspection of their arrangements, and the guardianship of their inmates. The author• of this pamphlet has endeavoured to do for our faith what the Legislature is about doing for our liberty, namely, to protect it from the insidious assaults of Popery in disguise, For this purpose he has col lected a multitude of facts relating to the too cele brated Plymouth Establishment, and to Mr. Pusey's " Home" in the Regent's-park, to show how danger ously near the doctrines and practices inculcated or enjoined in these institutions approximate to those of the Romish rituals. Copious and well-selected passages from the writings of Archbishop Whateley are appended, in order to add poignancy to the warn ing which Mr. Cookesley pronounces that these innovations, " if ratified by silent admission and adop tion, seem calculated, beyond all other conceivable methods, to carry back the Reformed Church of England, by alm►►st imperceptible steps, to the faith and allegiance of Rome." Usque kko? or. What May be Said for the People. With Introductory Remarks, addressed to the Members of the House of Commons. Hy an lonian. London : Saunders and Stanford. THE British public, any more than the British House of Commons, can seldom be stimulated into any active sympathy with the wrongs suffered by a colo nial community. Yet to that. community itself— however small their numbers, or complete their de tachment from the greater interests of the empire— the consequences of misgovernment are not less im portant than if they involved an absolute fraction of our "glorious constitution." The inhabitants of the lonian Islands thus eomplain that they have been misgoverned for the last thirty-five years, ever since Sir Thomas Maitland "took possession of all power under pretence of giving them a constitution, and made a liveried senate and sham assembly jingle the bells of liberty as they danced in the fetters of slavery." This complaint the " lonian " renews, especially with regard to the administration of Sir Henry Ward. His style, as the reader has seen, is somewhat. metaphorical ; but he writes with evident knowledge of his subject; does not sham either his indignation or his enthusiasm ; and has compiled a formidable array of facts and arguments by which to support the allegations brought by himself through . the press, and Mr. Hume in the house, against the present Lord High Commissioner and the state nochinary that moves at his bidding. THE PRESS. OUR LIBRARY TABLE. Mintsorandunuo Made its Ireland. 2 voim. .1. Forbes, 31. D. Smith, Elder, awl Co. Poem,. Dem is. Longman snot 1•41. Coalition; a Letter to Ilse Earl of .11.,r.lern. .1. Mortituor. Protest .Inaioutt Lim Tose,. J. li. •utuuut . .ysb•m Lryill lagtructi , m. P. 4 ,•141411 - ttli,l 77te Paoerverti Act, ust ~ ,,r I....neigrant.. .1. T..ludite. Piper uud CO. TIMMS Jurisprudence. Spittinalunle awl Shim. l'estunientary Jurisdiction. A. 11111. Spot iimvimmle Sliu%. 7'he ('ht,rclrrate question Con,idece.t. Lord stuule•r. .1. and W. Boone. 77te Brifitilt 11 'e4f I 'Witt T. xnerts. SALE OF THE PICTURES OF THE KING OF THE IBENCH. Os last Saturday (the ttlst) closed the sixth and last day of the sale of the pictures of the late King of the French. " There's revolution," as Hamlet says, in the circumstances attending the collectio►► not less than the dispersion of these pictures. When in aristocratical, ultra-Catholie Spain a series of revolu tions had abolished entails, and suppressed the reli gious houses, in the year 1535 Louis Philippe sent Baron Taylor and M. Danzats into the country to collect the treasures of art which these innovations might be expected to force into the market. The results of this mission were placed in suites of apartments appropriated exclusively to them in the Louvre, and were designated the " Spanish Gal lery." Perhaps the King was not unwilling that his munificence should thus be displayed to the best advantage. But there was an obvious propriety, for the purposes of instruction and comparison, in keeping unbroken the series of painters that compose the school ; and many of the pictures, of inferior merit in themselves, nevertheless possess a value as throwing light on the history of the art and of national taste and manners. We do not tel that we understand a school of art till we are acquainted with its rise and its decline, as well as with its meridian glory. In this collection, the dispersion of which we cannot but regret, there were specimens of every date of Spanish art, from Pietro di Coniolat in 1500, to Coello, the ukimum Romanormn, the last of the great painters, the contemporary of Luca Giordano, who is said to have died of mortification when that rapid and Jail hunt but careless artist. was sent for to the Spanish Court, end from Coello through a long stage of feeble ness and decline to Ginza and the Court painters of modern days. It cannot but. be admitted, however, that the spe cimens were of a varying degree of merit, and that the collection on the whole could not be accepted as a criterion by which to judge the powers of the Spanish masters. It must be remembered at the seine time that few collections have ever been so little prepared for sale before being submitted to the public. Few of the pictures had any frames; many wanted varnish; and those which required neces sary reparation had received it in a manner that quite acquits the agents of the Orleans family from the slightest intention of deception. On looking round the three exhibitions into which the collection has been divided, and which for three weeks have successively ornamented Messrs. Christie's walls, it is impossible not to be struck by the type of originality anti of national character which distin guishes the Spanish school front all others, and the strong mutual resemblance of its component parts, which unites it together as a whole. In all there is observable the rich, sober tones and transparent shadows which we admire so much in the chiefs of the school. In all its works there is the same deep religious feeling, combined with an absence of imagination, and a renunciation of all attempts to idealise. The wildest legends are treated in a plain matter-of-faet way, which seems to attest the earnest ness of the painters' belief in them. The most bar barous martyrdoms are painted in all their frightfid reality, without an attempt to idealise their horrors. Whatever the Church permits to be asserted must be plain undeniable fact ; nothing that tends to her exaltation can be revolting; nothing that she sanc tions can be ridiculous. It' in the churt•li we see a Madonna in a hoop and crowned with artificial flowers, there can be no objection to represent the beatified Virgin in the same dress; end so she is represented by some of the submit, whose merit in other respects would have been thought incompatible with so trivial a conception. In one picture a Virgin, clothed in cloth' of gold, supports an infant .lesns in &general's uniform, with red breeches, and the golden fleece round his neck. The shrine in which this idol is placed is lwautit'ully painted, and below are the self-complacent donors, obviously strong likenesses, who isnild not be content without. o btaining thi s memorial of their piety and taste. The question which will first occur to most of our readers is, probably, what acquisitions have the tens. tees of the National Gallery made from this collec tion" There are two. The first, in point of time, was " St. Francis in Prayer," by Zurbaran. Zurbaran is sometimes called the Caravaggio of 'Spain, but his SATURDAY, contrasts of light and shallow are less violent, anti his tones more harmonious. The merit of this pic ture consists in the intense reality of its treatment it represents St. Francis on his knees, iu earnest sup plication, and holding a skull in his hand ; the effeet IS v ery broad, and the colouring rich and sober. The prier given for this picture (265/. ) has been censured, and the King of Prussia, it is said, has obtained a better picture at a less price. No doubt All excellent bargain made by a neighbour is very provoking. lint for this all frequenters of auctions, trustees, or private individuals, must be prepared. After all, there is no mode of purchasing pictures fin• the nation of which we so much approve as by pub lic auction. Unless we suppose great indiscretion on the part of the agents for the nation, and an un principled league of the dealers against it, no method seems more efiectual to prevent overcharge. If a picture be bought by private contract, no answer can be given to the insinuation that at some time, past or present, the owner had been willing, or might be willing, to part with it at a lower price. At a public auction we have the security that some one (the next bidder) was willing to give within a few pounds of the price paid. We must, at the same time, regret that further purchases were not made, and that all the best pictures were not secured to the National Gal lery. Such another opportunity of completing the Spanish department of the collection is not likely to occur again. The second picture purchased by the trustees is of a much more important character, and a much higher price was paid for it. It is the celebrated " Manger" by Velasquez—a picture that few, on first seeing it, would attribute to that master ; but the authorship is proved by the most undeniable historical evidence. It has been cited by various critics as a most remarkable speci. men of the early manner of the painter, bef re he had emancipated himself from the somewhat harsh style of his first master, Herrera. It was ordered of the painter by the Count d'Aguilar, and in his family it remained as an heirloom till the abolition of entails enabled his successors to sell it. The treatment of the subject is of that matter-of-fact, unidealixed cha racter that we have described. The colour is very rich, and the contrasts, though far stronger than we usually observe in the Spanish school, are well ma naged. The effect is broad, and the picture a very remarkable one in its school, and, among the pro ductions of its author, is one which we consider a great acquisition to the national collection. The very fine alterpieces painted by Zurbaran for the Carthusian Convent. at Seville have been pur chased by the Duke of Montpensier, at the price of 1,700!., for the purpose of restoring them to Spain. So also has the " Holy Family" by Murillo—sold on the first day for 1,550/. We have also understood that other members of the French Royal Family have made various purchases. Tile puma. PRINCESS'S THEATRE. Mrt. T. P. COOKE'S engagement still continues, anti this week be has appeared as Long Tom Coffin, in Mr. Fitzball's dramatic version of Cooper's novel, " The Pilot," to the great satisfaction of the audience. It is so long since this once-popular drama has been acted in London that our readers may perhaps require to be informed that the American characters of the novel are in the play turned into Englishmen, and vice venni. The ne cessity for the transmutation is, to our mind, an in superable objection to this revival. We dislike changing places with the Yankees, even in the re gions of fiction. Mr. Wright took his farewell benefit at this theatre on Thursday last. The nature and scene of his next engagement has not, as yet, transpired. 31r. Kean is about to produce I.ord Byron's play, Sardanapaltr, on the occasion of his benefit on Monday, June Lath. Report says that the scenery and appointments are to be on a scale of unusual magnificence. LYCEUM THEATRE. A VERY anmsing play, entitled The Lawyers, adapted from the French by Mc. Slingsby Lawrence, the author of Tie' Game of Speculation, was producM last week at this theatre. A dispute between husband and wife, and their recourse to legal pmeeed ings, is the groundwork of a piece depending principally for its effect upon the excellent acting of Mr. C. Mathews and Mrs. F. Matthews, which nightly elicits many a hearty and well-deserved laugh from the aullienee. As we ought always, especially in these days, to be thankful for any play which is in the slightest degree diverting, we would willingly dismiss the author without any unfavourable remark Nut we not been led from the dialogue to infer an at tempt to satirise lawyers in general, and to place the various phases of the legal profession in as ridiculous and contemptible a light as possible. Should we be right in this conjecture, we pronounce Mr. Lawrenee's present adaptation a complete failure, so thr as it seeks to remedygany moral or soeial,oil. Nothing t. Francis in Prayer," by Zurbaran. Zurbaran present adaptation a I' ompiete tanure, so air ISO times called the Caravaggio of ' Spain, but his seeks to remedyiany moral or socialevil. Nothing