The Portland daily press., 1875-06-21
Art, Music and the Drama.

John Ruskin has renewed, after an interval
of fifteen years, his notes on the annual exhi-
bition of the royal academy, and gives the saw
agest blame to Millais and to Miss Thompson
the mos. liberal praise. 1t is quite a
proud matter for her, and something,
of the sort for the Prince of Wales also
whose Judgment in her favor has been
rather sneered at. Mr.. Ruskin says of her pic
ture of Quatre-Bras: 81 never approached a
picture with more iniquitous prejudice against
it than did Miss Thompson's; partly because
/ have always said that no woman could paint,
and secondly because L thought what the pub.
ic made such fuss about must be good for
nothing. But it is Amazon's work, this; no
doubt of it, and the first fine pre-Raphaelite
picture of battle we have had; profoundly in
teresting; and showing all manner of illustra-
tive and realistic faculty. OF course, all that
need be said of it, on this side must have been
said twenty times over in the journals; and
it remains only for me to make my tardy genu-
Election, on the trampled corn, before this Pal
las of Pail Mall; and to murmur my poor
words of warning to her, that she may remem-
ber, in her day of triumph, how it came to
pass that Atlanta was stayed and Camilla
slain. Camilla-like the work is-chiehy in
its refinement, quality had not in the least
expected, for the cleverest women almost
always show their weakness in endeavors to be
dashing. But actually here, what L suppose
few people would think of looking at, the sky
is the most tenderly painted, and with the
truest outlines of cloud, of all in the exhb-
tion; and the terrific piece of gallant wrath
and ruin on the extreme right, where the CUR
assier is catching round the neck of his horse
as he falls, and the convulsed fallen horse just
seen through the smoke below, is wrought,
through all the truth of its frantic passion,
with gradations of color and shade which L
have not seen the like of since Turner's
DEATH
Mile. Tetjen's engagement with Mr.. Strak-
osch is from October to April d. 1t covers
concerts, oratorios and opera, but it is at pres
ent very uncertain whether she will appear in
opera. Mile Tiejens will oe accompanied by
her niece, Miss Augusta Kruls, and Mr.. J.. II.
Mapleson, director of Her Majesty's opera.
Mr.. Mapleson will only remain in this country
a few days, but will cast his eye about him with
the view of seeing how the land lies for an op-
cratic speculation in the following year. A con-
cert company will be brought by Mr. Strak-
osch Mile Tetjens is to receive $500 gold a
night for each concert or oratorio, and half the
receipts over $200O If opera is attempted,
these rates are to be largely increased.
Concerning Mr.. Alb ery's new comedy, "The
Spendthrft," the London correspondent of the
Arcadan says: she has tried to initiate the
manner of Congreve. The scene is laid in the
past century, and the plot is thick with ladies'
in sedan chairs who are rescued from highway
men and all other kinds of perils by the Spend
thrift. Mr.. Albery's attempt is, it is needless
to deny, failure. Els wit is strained, his
characters are conventional in the extreme.
and his plot weak and improbable. Will he
ever give us another Two Roses? We begin
to fear that he will not
Mr.. Story, completed, before leaving Rome
for the summer, the model in clay of a magnif-
icent monument to Liberty" which is to be
erected in Philadelphia. Its proportions will
be colossal, the statue Of Liberty measuring
twenty. one feet in height, and standing upon
lofty pedestal midway around which moves a
serene and stately procession of forty-eight
lovely female figures, representing the States
and Territories of the Union. The expression
of the crowning statue is described as being one
of absolute calm and unruff1ed dignity. "Lib-
erty'' holds in her hand the eagle-bearing
standard of the republic, furled in negligent
repose, and rests upon her shield She is the
victorious and protecting, and the angry and
aggressive goddess of the West, and the
sculptor has sought to embody in this
image as Phidias of old embodied in his ideal
Hellenic Zeus the supreme deity of a free peo
pie, no longer contending with Titans or with
rebellion, but enthroned as sovereign law, the
States collected WILL" This thought pervades,
also, the chorc group like stars in their orbits
beneath the central majesty. The figures
which represent them, young, beautiful an
vigorous seem to move around the mighty base
on which the experimenting power stands firm
and fair, with solemn and majesti; grace.