The Sun.
London, England, 1866-08-06 00:00:00

LI

RE.

4 Dictionary of Recent and Living Painters and
Engravers. By Henry Ottley. One vol. Pp. 184.
Henry G. Bohn.
Strictly speaking this valuable publication is no '
more than an expansion of " Bryan's Dictionary of
Painters and Engravers," revised, enlarged, and
continued fourteen years ago, by Mr. George
Stanley, and now, as far as possible, perfected and
completed by Mr. Henry Ottley, aided and assisted
materially in his editorial labours by Mr. Henry
Bohn, the publisher. So materially has Mr. Bohn
participated in the toil of compiling this new edition
of Stanley's Bryan's Dictionary, that he himself has
contributed with his own hand (each of his aricles
being distinguished by his initials 11. G. B.) no Jess
than seventy biographic notices to the collection—
and, among those seventy, notices of James Sant,
Lumb Stocks, and John Tenniel. "As far as pos-
sible," we have said, the work in its new form has been
"perfected and completed"—several names, some
among them of real importance, having been still
unavoidably omitted, because of the over modest
reluctance of their possessors to furnish any par-
ticulars whatever in regard to themselves or their
artistic achievements. Dictionary-fashion, of.course,
the work is alphabetically arranged. It comprises
within it—in spite of the tantalizing reluctance
but just now alluded to—a really surprising
amount of curious and for the most part entertain-
ing information, information nowhere else that we
are aware of thus readily procurable Another and
more important work, completing the publisher's
notion of the book as it ought to be, is announced
by Mr. Bohn as in preparation. The present
volume, he tells us in his preliminary notice, must
only be regarded as an instalment of his intention,
adding that it will " with all convenient speed be
followed by another, supplying whatever may be
found deficient." Even as it is, however, the com-
pilation is really remarkable. Its value will, never-
theless, be very conspicuously enhanced when, as is
projected in regard to the future issue of the work,
there shall be interspersed among the biographies
" more of the mercantile element," upon the plan set
forth in " Bohn's Bibliographer's Manual," namely,
by the notification of the auction prices of the prin-
cipal pictures specified. All due acknowledgment
is honourably made :by Mr. Ottley, of the various
sources from which he has derived much of the in-
formation here compacted together, among other
such sources thus announced, being a little anony-
mous book, published in 1858, under the title of
"Our Living Painters," the Biographic Universelle
and the Nouvelle Biographic Generalle," Sandby's
" History of the Royal Academy," the " Art Jour-
nal" and the " Gentleman's Magazine," "Men of
the Time," and a few other lesser but kindred
publications. However much the work may still
admit of further expansion, we cannot, even as it is,
do otherwise than accord our earnest welcome to
Mr. Bohn's latest issue, of what we must be per-
mitted to call Ottley's, Stanley's, Bryan's " Dic-
tionary of Recent and Living Painters and
Engravers."

The Bentley Ballads. New Edition. One Vol. ;
pp. 469. Richard Bentley.
Immediately after that most delectable repertory
of ryhthmical and rhyming fun, known to all true
lovers of a laugh in this and the immediately pre-
ceding generation as " The Ingoldsby Legends,"
come, beyond all doubt, " The Bentley Ballads."
Edition after edition, since the time when these
ballads were first collected together, has been
making its appearance—one following the other
in rapid succession. And here is the latest
issue—the last and best, because the largest and
the completest. It comprises within it all the
choicest ballads, songs, and poems contributed to
Bentley's Miscellany. As for the rollicking drollery,
the radiant wit, the side-shaking humour and the
frolicsome vivacity of the writers, who is there that
knows the book in the least but will acknowledge
all that with a sort of enthusiasm born from many
a grateful and delightful remembrance of such ini-
mitable writers the very names are in them-
selves a complete justification (if that were
needed) of our eulogium such matchless
wags as Father Prout, as Sam Lover, as
George Colman, as Torn Moore, as Dr. Maginn, as
Albert Smith, as George Canning, as Haynes
Bayley, as Heinrich Heine, as Tom Ingoldsby, and
(to name no more out of the long catalogue of con-
tributors to the collection) last, not least, with a
twirl of his shillelagh, and a sparkle in his eye, and a
" cut" like old Fezziwig's (so deftly giving it, that he
seems to " wink with his legs" like his great proto-
type each time he bounds on to the scene to give us
one of his hilarious staves with variations)—last, not
least, we say, among them all, " The Irish Whisky
Drinker 1" As for Father Prout's tidbits of
classicality and comicality combined, who that
has once stumbled across them can ever lose the
recollection of them or the relish for them ? In-
stance merely his version of the refrain to " The
Sabine Farmer's Serenade"—
Somel tantum die Only say
I
Eris nostra Lalag6 ; You'll be Mrs. Brallagan ;
No recuses sic. Don't say nay
I
Dulcis Julia Callagd. Charming Judy Callaghan.
Scattered among the miscellaneous contents of the
volume are such world-famous touches of true
poetry as " The Voices of the Night," " The Vil-
lage Blacksmith," and " The Rainy Day," of Pro-
fessor Longfellow—as Robert Southey's Unfinished
Lines on his Library, or as Thomas Ingoldsby's
last song of all, "As I lay a-thykynge !" Alto-
gether " The Bentley Ballads" form a quite un-
rivalled collection of Ballads, Songs, and Poems, set
to the music of their words by Poets, Songwriters,
and Ballad-mongers as delightful as ever before
sang of Love and War, of Frolic and of Drinking.

Gilderoy : a Scottish Tradition. By Robert S.
Fittis. One vol. pp. 353. George Routledge
and Sons.
The dedication of his book to James Grant, author
of the " Romance of War " and of so many other al-
most equally fatuous romances, as a tribute prof-
fered to him by an unknown admirer of his genius
and of his true old Scottish spirit, will of itself afford
a notion of the purpose held before him by Mr.
Fittis in the composition of these pages—namely, the
vivifying (if only by one spark) through that same
true old Scottish spirit, of another good old Scottish
tradition, the tradition of Gilderoy. It is the
" Handsome Gilderoy" of the old Scotch ballad, in
effect, who is the central figure, the main attraction,
the hero of this story. And it is to the honour of
Robert Fittis that he has done for the reputation of
" the earlier scion of the Gregalich," as he himself
aptly calls him, what the great author of " Waver-
ley" did so many years ago for the reputation of
Rob Roy Macgregor—that is to say, he has en-
hanced it, and enhanced it, too, by the simple pro-
cess of its celebration.

THE HANDY VOLUME &TAMPERE (Bradbury
and Evans) we are glad to see still flourishes : the
second issue of it, comprising within it the whole of
the Merry Wives of Windsor, of 11Seasure for Mea-
sure,:and of Midsummer Night's Dream—fifteen acts
in all, and purchaseable for a shilling! It still ap-
pears to us, this serial publication of Shakspere, a
very paragon of excellence in the way of cheapness
and of beauty, of compactness and of portability, as
a traveller's edition, suitable for either pocket or
knapsack, of England's, the world's greatest poet,
dramatist, and philosopher.

The Earl and Countess of Dudley left town on
Saturday for Whitley Court, Worcestershire, where they
intend to pass a few weeks before going to Scotland.
Viscount and Viscountess Sydney have returned
to their seat, Frognal, in Kent, from visiting the Countess
Cowper, at Wrest Park, Beds.
Sir Robert and Lady Buxton have left Farrance's
Hotel for Shadwoll Lodgo, Norfolk.
" THE PRESS" and " ST. JAMES'S CHRONICLE"
appeared on Saturday amalgamated—the younger taking
precedence of the elder journal, though adopting the latter's
No. and size, while removing from its own offices in the
Strand to those of the St. James's Chronicle in Henrietta-
street, Covent-garden.
" THE TIMES" CORRESPONDENCE FROM THE
PRUSSIAN ARMY is written by Captain Hosier, of the
Guards. The Moniteur de l'Armee did him the honottr of
translating his account fur its pages, and it is said that
the King of Prussia is so pleased with the chronicler of
his glory that ho 1/3tOnd4 to decorate