The Sun.
London, England, 1858-07-15 00:00:00

THE NATIONAL GALLERY.

If we fail in some great undertakings we succeed
in others, and it is our pleasing duty to-day to con-
gratulate the country on a triumph which some
will think quite sufficient consolation for the loss
of the Atlantic cable. No dne, indeed, in whose
breast one patriotic spark remains will fail to re-
joice and be proud at the great achievement of
Tuesday night in the House of Commons. Eng-
land has asserted her indomitable independence
and nationality. Terror will be depicted on the
countenance of every German despot and pedant,
fir Lord Elcho has won the day. Mr. Coningham
is avenged of his enemy. The hostile critics of
Paul Veronese are confirmed in their judgment by
the British House of Commons. The salary of Mr.
Otto Mundler is disallowed. The sum of 3001. a-
year is saved to the nation of which we form part.
and a blow struck which will resound in every
auction-mart of Europe. Some of our readers
may know nothing of Mr. Otto Mundler, and
not so much as they ought about Lord Elcho
and the genius of Paul Veronese. Many
of them are, perhaps, not possessed of high
art instincts, and only go to the National Gallery
with country cousins, or to the British Museum
with little boys home for the holidays, who want
to see the mummies and thestuffed ourang-outangs.
To these we shall, unhappily, not succeed in making
known the momentous character of last night's
vote. They are in a state of lamentable but, per-
haps not unblissful ignorance. Art-progress has
left ;hem far behind, and art-criticism has not re-
vealed to them its oracular utterances. They are
content with their own portraits, which simper on
them from above their dining-tables, and they look
with tenderness on the full-length of Charley,
with a coral and red shoes, taken at the age of one
year. If these works of art be degraded, bestial,
full of the mad licentiousness of a faithless age,
or if they be wanting in tone, poor in treatment,
wooden, stony, woolly, or anything else, it is lost
on the posse ssors and their friends, who think they
are very like what the subjects were in the days
when high-collared coats were worn, and ladies
drove tortoise-shell combs into the backs of their
heads. Many there are still, we fear, who are not
duly entranced at the sight of a red Agamemnon
offering a black daughter on an Etruscan vase, and
who can see without cupidity a real majolica plate
with its muscular divinities. Contorted saints of
the early German school are still gazed at with
wonder by some, and to Renaissance taste in furni-
ture they have no wish to give another birth. To
this large, though we should hope decreasing class,
we can only present the subject in its pecuniary
point of view. But even here there is matter for
no small congratulation. Three hundred a-year
has ben saved. The salary of a clerk in the
Custom-house, the income of a young medical
practitioner in a country town, the cost of
printing a return of the number of persons who
have ridden outside omnibuses from 1850 to
1857 inclusive, has been saved to this wise, pru-
dent, thrifty country. What a number of things
we shall be able to do with this 3001. ± A little
child with its first sixpence tells you of the wonders
it intends to buy, and so we may joyfully reflect
on what we shalt be able to accomplish with the
salary of Mr. Otto Mundler. We have rescued
from the clutch of this invading Getman enough
to supply the Growler or Snapper with coals from
Malta to Gibraltar and back ; enough to pay a
month's travelling expenses of a not overworked
Queen's messenger; enough to supply a year's
stationary to a third rate legation ; enough to re-
place a button of one pattern by the button of
another on the coats of a few regiments in the
army. Therefore, to all of our readers who pride
themselves on their respect for the good on-
fashioned proverb about taking care of the pence,
and who know nothing and care nothing about art,
we offer our com4ratulations on this reduction of
the national expenditure.
_

But to the artistic world the matter is of far
greater interest. To them we will say nothing of
the 3001. ; money is too sordid an object, and
finance is too dreary a study, to excite them. Nor
will we urge that sotnethirg 'is honestly due to a
gentleman who has been engaged. for the public
service by the proper authorities at a certain salary,
and who may consider it an injustice to be turned
off at a moment's notice. Mr. Mundler, if he
were fit for his work, ought to have known that
the ages of faith are past. What, indeed, can i e
expected of a country which buys a "Paul
Veronese ?" So we may put the individual travel-
ling agent out of the question, as having deserved
his fate ; and only look at the great victory in
which he has been stricken down. It i., indeed,
pretty clear that unfortunate Mr. Mundler has
baen taken as the representative of the constituted
authorities on this occasion, as the incarnation
of the National Gallery management, aad the
blows of his assailants were in reality aimed at
greater persons behind him. Sappy are all of us
whose destinies do not depend on contests of taste,
where every man plumes himself oa the originality
of his opinions, and any one who pretends to de-
cide between opponents is immediately attacked
and trampled upon by both. If it is not allowed
to poets to ba mediocre, it is not allowed to con-
noisseurs to be impartial. They must be exclusive
or die. Theological hatredis scftening down, but
the virus is passing into another section of the com-
munity. Art critics are nom possessed with the
spirit of Gardiner and Laud, and apparently would
"scrape" a rival with the utmost pleasure. In
other departments of mental exertion people can
appreciate geniuses of various kinds. We can
honour Shaksperue without thinking Sophocles an
impostor, and a respect for Newton does not neces-
sitate a contempt for Ouvier. • But the artistic
world is split up into sects, each with its divinity,
and looks upon anything like breadth of taste as
latitudinarian and lukewarm. Full sure we are
that if the victorious party of Tuesday night had
had the management of affairs they would have
been exposed to as many attacks as those whom
they have now censured. They would have pur-
chased something on which Mr, Otto Handler's
friends would have exhausted the usual art epithets
of " atrocious," " abomi !fable, " "a spiritless daub,"
" a Wardour-street imposture," and so on. Let us
of the public, however, who have no power or
authority in the world of art, and who only judge
of a picture by the pleasure it gives us, acquiesce
in the decision of the House of Commons. Lord
Elcho and his 128 friends have
stopped the
travels of the agent ; his modest salary will no
longer be forthcoming ; his movements will no
longer throw poverty-stricken Italian nobles and
sharping dealers into excitement ; he will no longer
raise the price of daubs by a look, or depress the
selling rate of a "school" by a depreciatory word.
All that England buys will now be by her own
unaided judgment ; German pedantry and Italian
knavishness will not combine to fill the rooms iu
Trafalgar-square with works which Lord Elcho
and Mr. Ooniegham are bound to denounce. The
travelling agent is, in short, a being of the past.
We trust, therefore, that the feud of the two
parties will now cease. Lord Elcho has been vic-
torious both in the matter of the site for the new
Gallery and in the discussion as to the benefits of
Mr. Mundler'a services. But the other party are
in pesetesion, and without - their help no:hine can
be done to improve the collection, and make it
worthy of the name of "national." It is really
high time that the four or five close and crowded
rooms which contain the country's pictures should
be expanded into a full-sized edifice, where the
visitor shall not be incommoded by the crush,
stifled by
the pent-up breath of the multitude, and
grieved by the sight of noble works suffering from
the deleterious influences to which they are exposed.
We have little doubt of the power of the Govern-
ment to obtain really estimable works of aft for
the national collection, and we are sure of the
willingness of the people to pay for such works,
and to provide a fitting receptacle for them. So
we hope that Lord Elcho and his Mends will now
leave their antagonistic position, and do their best
to assist the administration of the Gallery, in to
which they have introduced so important. an
economy.—Times.

Three Chinese concerned in the unurd-r of Capt.
More and the officers of the brig Gallant had been
executed on the iarade ground by the natiTe at.
thorities.