The Sun.
London, England, 1860-12-08 00:00:00

BY WILLIAM BEATTIE.

The really remarkable gifts of Mr. Beattie as
a sculptor we have already more than once had
occasion in these columns to signalise. In this
very noble group, however, a group emblematic
of the Triumph of Britain, we fail not upon the
instant to recognise the sculptor's most ambitious
effort, and in every essential respect, among all
his now numerous productions, unquestionably
his most successful achievement. And it is in
truth a work of art so simple and yet grand in
its design, and one at the same time so peculiarly
and imperially national in its character that it
is not unworthy of being designated in plain
matter of fact, as—an achievement.

The allegorical group is composed simply of
Britannia and her Lion. Britannia holding in
her left hand, supported lightly and gracefully
upon her left arm, an ingeniously abbreviated
sceptre-like trident—while her carelessly down-
stretched right hand is toying caressingly and
lovingly with the mane of the King of Brutes,
her immemorial companion, It is by an admi-
rably artistic effect merely of proportion that the
grandeur of the lofty stature of the Island
Goddess is realised by the spectator. This occurs
too, even upon the first momentary glimpse of
what we cannot but regard as Mr. Beattie's
masterpiece. Although the height of the now
perfected clay model is no more than four feet in
all—certainly a very corsiderable height in itself,
when we bear in remembrance the fact that this
work of art under notice is about to be reproduced
by the artist in parian—y et the sculptor has
contrived through a group thus moulded
upon a scale in itself so intrinsically minia-
ture, to produce an effect actually colossal,
an effect realised with the cunning of a
true artist; simply through the agency, as we
have said, of proportion ! Contrasted with the
majestic Goddess, by whose knee I he Lion is fawn-
ing. the glorious creature appears dwarfed to the
merest cub in its dimensions. Yet is it, when scruti-
nised apart from its Queenly mistress, a noble type
of the Lord Imperial among the brute creation !
A specimen of its genus, so far Miltonic in its every
limber movement, that it might have originally
emerged to view from the crumbling earth, as the
representative of its ancient prototype—

" The tawny Lion pawing to get free
Its hinder parts—then springs as broke frombonds—
And rampant shakes his brinded mane "
Yet, it is this formidable King of Brutes that in
Mr. Beattie's sculptured representation of "Britain
Triumphant," dwindles down to a whelp by the knee
of the Goddess, round whose feet he is frolicing as
innocently as though the millenial age had already
come, when the tiger is to dandle the kid and the
child toy unharmed with the basilisk.
As for the artist's sculptured embodiment of the
tutelary form of Britannia—from helmet to sandal
the figure stands before us as an unquestionable
masterpiece. Scarcely "stands" either—that is
hardly the word—the " Guardian Goddess" of
England (usually represented by sculptors and
medallists hitherto as seated) " slightly reclining"
—in this impressive group from the hand of
Mr. Beattie—against an oak-stump near the rocky
seashore—reclining thus, manifestly in indication of
Britain's blended majesty and composure in the
midst of all the storms and tumults around her.
Scrutinizing the details of the work under con-
sideration, with a critical regard even for the
minutiae of its mere subsidary adornments—the
ibserver will hardly fail to recognise the adroitly
delicate interweaving of the rose, the shamrock, and
the thistle indicated along the torque-like band
upon the Minerva-helmet of Britannia. Altogether
the work reflects honour upon the patriotism, no
less than upon the artistic genius of William
Beattie, hitherto known chiefly as the sculptor of
Wallace, henceforth certain to be known yet more
widely as the sculptor of Britain Triumphant,