The Sun.
London, England, 1870-04-05 00:00:00

FINE ARTS IN NEW YORK.

The most interesting, as well as the most extensive esta-
blishment of the kind in New York, is M. Knoedler's Art
Gallery, in conjunction with his Print-publishing and
Sales-rooms, on Fifth-avenue, near Madison-square. Mr.
Knoedler (successor to Goupils) is distinguished as much
for the high class of paintings he keeps on sale as for his
integrity as a business-man—qualities that are appreciated
by picture buyers, who throng his fine galleries from day
to day. At some future time a more detailed account will
be given of this establishment and its art treasures. En
passant, it may not be out of place, however, to state, that
great credit is due to M. Knoedler for having done
more than any other art dealer to elevate the standard
of taste in America, by introducing now and then a chef
d'auvre of some of the greatest living masters of the French,
German, or Belgian Schools, and by keeping his galleries
well filled with choice paintings of leading European
artists. Nor is American talent lost sight of ; for here
may be found fine works by our best painters. Mr. Felix
0. C. Barley, the distinguished artist, on his return from
his recent visit to Europe, has retired from the noisy me-
tropolis, and taken up his residence in the quiet village of
Claymont, Delaware, where ho is able to find those rural
beauties more congenial to the tastes of the artist, and
suggestive of subjects for his facile pencil, which has
already enriched so many of our galleries and libraries.
Mr. J. B. Bristol has just completed a fine landscape,
entitled " The Shades of Evening"— a twilight effect,
rendered with much true poetic sentiment. This picture will
probably be sent to the Spring Exhibition of the
National Academy of Design. Mr. Ed. Gay has finished
two or three interesting landscapes; one of them was sent
to Knoodler's Gallery, and the larger one (mentioned in a
former notice) is to go to the Academy. Mr. W. Cogswell,
an artist of note from Chicago, Illinois, recently passed
through New York, en route to the City of Washington.
Mr. Cogswell lately painted a family group for President
Grant. The New York Turf, Field, and Farm is respon-
sible for the following :—" Mrs. Em. Downey, the daughter
of ex-Governor Robinson, of Kentucky, recently visited
this city and sat for her portrait to Mr. B. F. Reinhart, the
eminent painter. Mrs. Downey is one of the reigning
belles of Lexington, a city famed for its beautiful ladies."
—Correspondent of Anglo- American Times.

" The gentleman from Massachusetts," Mr. But-
ler, furnishes the press with a great deal to discuss, much
of which is highly entertaining. There is an originality
about Butler, and an amount of audacity, as there is about
Fisk, which would make us loth to lose either of these
gentlemen, however beneficial the loss of one or both
might bo to public affairs. But General Butler did lately
get into a position, from which he has been trying t 3
wriggle out. His attack on newspapers, correspondents,
and reporters, and the declaration of his own superiority
to them all, he has not found to answer. First he wanted
to make out that he did not say what he did say ; next,
he attempted to define what the kind of newspaper is to
which he is superior, and in his efforts to extricate him-
self from the quagmire he has at last reached this stage :
"If there is anything on earth that I am superior to, it is
a newspaper man who swindles hotels and boarding-
houses, deadheads on railroads, and imposes generally on
the public." One newspaper asserts that he is superior
only to those newspapers which supported him in his
election, but in that case the papers inferior to him are so
few that the press generally must be acknowledged to be
vastly his superior. If he does nothing else be furnishes
amusement for the gallery, though we are very far from
saying that Gon. Butler's merit does not entitle him to the
prominence he has attained in the house. Mr. Woodward
bad a letter read there from a highly respectable gentleman
in Georgia, correcting some of Butler's statements. "A
pretty person," said Butler, "that man to advise or lecture
the House. He was a Rebel named Bacon, a member of
the Agricultural State Fair Committee, held recently in
Macon, which had refused to permit the United States
flag to be raised over the Fair building, although the
building itself belonged to the United States." Mr. Wood-
ward asked to wLoin he referred? "To Bacon," answered
Butler ; "is he not the man ?" "I do not know," replied Mr.
Woodward, when up jumped Butler, interrupting him with
these words, "I did nut yield the floor for the gent'eman
to state what he does not know, for that would take too
long ;" whereupon there was a roar from the galleries, and
Mr. Woodward was "paid off" for his letter. In fact,
"the gentleman from Massachusetts" has a very ham
knack of settling such accounts on the spot, and if he only
pays his other debts as quickly, he must, at any rate, be
unhampered by liabilities.