The Sun.
London, England, 1863-06-18 00:00:00

LITERATURE,

The Fine Arts Quarterly Review. No. I. Royal
Bvo., pp. 224. Chapman and Hall.
A more admirable first appearance we certainly
cannot rectal to mind, than that which here fixes
public attention at once upon this most welcumi
addition to the number of our Quarterlies. It is
superbly " got up" to begat with—being exqui-
sitely printed, from a new fount of type, upon the
loveliest thick, glossy, tinted paper—illustrated
here and there with a select few of the very choicest
embellishments. As the prospectus had already
informed the public, before tt e apparitive of the
first number of this new periodical, it is ushered
into the world of letters and art under the very
highest patronage. Her most gracious Majesty the
Queen, several of their Royal Highnesses, his
eminence Cardinal Wiseman, and other distin-
guished promoters of the interests of the fine arts,
both in this country and abroad, have long since
been announced by the originators of the enterprise,
as having inscribed their names, not only readily
but eagerly, upon the list of the subscribers. The
.Fine Arts Quarterly Review, therefore, starts
under the happiest auspices. It is secure
from the very commencement of its career,
in the front rank, among the chief of the first
class organs of periodical literature—it is secure,
from the very outset, of finding itself recognised,
and even, it may be said, gladly welcomed at all
the great public institutions,
.in the Royal Library
at 'Windsor Castle, in the Queen's Private Library,
in the libraries of almost all the Royal palaces of
Europe, as well as in many of the mansions of
the private collectors upon the continent, and in
most of those scattered throughout the United
Kingdom. Mr. Wood ward, the Librarian in Ordi-
nary to her Majesty, and officially also the Keeper
of the Prints and Drawings at Windsor Castle, has
undertaken the office of editorship to The Fine Arts
Quarterly. A guarantee of itself of the efficiency
with which it is proposed that the enterprise shall
be erried out in every department. Having pre-
mised thus much in regard to the design of this
new and most important periodical, we turn now
to the initial number of it here published, in order
to see how far that first number shows that original
design to have been, as yet, (so far as in one
number it could be) realised. Lavater has some-
where said that, if, upon first meeting any man,
you are unfavourably impressed by his bearing and
physiognomy, no matter how eharmeal or fascinated
you may be by him upon a further acquaintance—
never forget that first impression! According to
Lavater's view, that first impression having about
it, in some most subtle and mystical way, an infal-
lible significance. Now, to a very considerable ex-
tent, we cannot but think that exactly the converse
to this might be maintained quite as confidently.
It certainly does appear to us to hold good, in refe-
rence to most of the new ventures in periodical lite-
rature. There was a case in point very recently,
in the instance of a weekly publication precisely
carrying out the notion expressed by Lavater's
axiom. A capital paper, in many respects, excel-
lently well written—by name " The Mirror"—and
yet, at our very first glance at the very first num-
ber, we knew for an absolute certainty that the
project must, of a dead necessity, fail. It had about
it that je ne sais quoi of an inexpressible something,
that told, as plainly as words even could tell, that
success in that instance was utterly hopeless. It
was so, we remember, also, a very few months back,
in regard to another literary weekly, still more
c'ever than the one already mentioned. A literary
weekly ca.led The Budget, sparkling with wit and
fun, with humour the most original and audacious
—and yet—so manifestly incapable in its very ap-
pearance of succeeding, that it might almost be said
at its birth to have hung ont its escutcheon as its
banner. With this difference only, that on its
escutcheon was nowhere legible—resurgand Qaite
manifestly the very reverse of all this, is the in-
stantaneous first impression produced by number one
of The Fine Arts Quarterly. A certainty of a success
already' achieved, of a triumph already assured, is
the result of that first impression. Upon more
carefully examining the contents of the initial num •
bar we may have, as indeed we here certainly have
had, that immediately favourable first impression
corrected and modified to a considerable extent in
regard to several of the lesser particulars, or minor
details. A modification we ourselves could
here and there suggest that if adopted, even
partially, would, to our thinking, lead to
very marked improvements in respect to the
general design, or at any rate in respect to various
parts of the general arrangement. First of all,
however, we would hero briefly particularize
among the thirteen principal contributions to this
first number of The Fine Arts Quarterly those
which appear to us more particularly deserving of
notice. As a comprehensive survey of the position
assumed at this epoch in this country by the most
glowing of all the fine arts, the introductory paper
entitled " English Painting in 1862" is undoubtedly
clever, is—more than that—in many respects not
unworthy of the able hand that penned it. The
hand, namely, of that accomplished and versatile
and indefatigable man of letters, familiarly known,
even to the public, as Tom Taylor, now yet more
familiarly identified upon the public placards about
our streets with a Ticket of Leave Man, meaning
(the placard should, it seems to us, al ways be so far
explained) not a veritable garotter, but an eminently
successful play, perhaps ernong all his dramatic pro-
ductions Tom Taylor's masterpiece. Not, however,
as a dramatist, as a writer of comedy, farce, or
melodrama, does Captain Tem Taylor, of the Rifle
Volunteers, lead off the good men and true, making
up the select,but still Dumerous,corps of contributors
to The Fine Arts Quarterly. His introductory
paper upon " English Painting in 1862" is penned
by him, rather, it should be said, in his capacity as
an art critic—a capacity so well known already,
and so conspicuously recognisable, that it has
long ago installed him in power among the artists
of his age, as the reviewer or art-critic upon our
chief morning contemporary. Comprehensive and
clever, though the survey here taken by Tom Taylor
in this opening paper in regard to his favourite art, it
still, for all that, is marred, we cannot but venture to
hint, by being at once slightly confused and some-
what superfcial. The most remarkable contribu-
lion, as it appears to us, in the whole of this initial
number of The Fine Arts Quarterly, is the one imme-
diately following—the second article,that is, descrip-
tive and explanatory of " H.R.H. the Prince
CONSORT'S Raphael Collection." Among all the tri-
butes,and some of them eminently beautiful tributes,
paid to the memory of our beloved and lamented
Prince, this little paper or treatise is unquestion-
ably about the most beautiful. As a recognition of
his consummate taste, of his rare and admirable
enlightenment—more particularly as affording evi-
dence of his (in truth) princely munificence in carry-
ing out a singularly original and refined project for
the development of the general knowledge of art
—this paper upon his Royal Highness's Raphael
Collection is entitled to very careful attention,
and is certain, when examined, to command
the reader's highest admiration. Towards the end
of the paper it is well and most gracefully re-
marked by the writers (Dr. Becker and Mr.
Roland, formerly H.R.H.'s librarians) that whereas
the splendid mausoleum at Frogmore will comme-
morate the undying love of the bereaved Sovereign,
while Wolsey's Tombhouse will serve to perpetuate
the warmest affection of their children, "The
Raphael Collection" deserves to bo regarded as
peculiarly and especially the Prince Consort's Own
Memnoriul And how noble, and beautiful, and
costly a memorial it will ha, who may not reedi y
enough conjecture when he learns that the en-
gravings and photographs and drawings consti-
tuting this literally unique Collection will extend,
when put together, to fully as many as fifty magni-
ficent volumes, destined to be received into a cabi
net expressly constructed for them by Mr. Crace—a
Cabinet that when completed and filled will as-
suredly constitute one of the art glories of Windsor
Castle, one of the mcst precious art treasures of
the
United Kingdom. In a paper especially referringto it, the very title chosen for the contribution
being " Poiute of Contact between Science and
Art," the masterly
lecture delivered upon that
at the Royal Institution
hems; very recently
his Eminence Cardinal Wiseman, receives, what it
so conspicuously deserves, the highest conementhi.