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THE BERNAL COLLECTION.
Every novi and then the world of art or vertu is subject to a kind of rage, which is to healthy patronage what fever-heat is to blood-heat. It yields a vast deal of excitement, energy, and enterprise, while it lasts; but it subsides pretty soon, leaving you more languid than before, and with much less to show for yourself as the results of the interval in the way of calm permanent pleasure or solid achievement. The rage of the day is the sale of "the Bernal Collection." One of the features of such complaints is their infectious character : it is caught from man to man, and, within a certain circle, each person is bound to have it because his neigh- bour has. The origin also of the rage is generally of some ambiguous nature ; the name of a collector, or some circumstance of gossiping curiosity about the collection, or the factitious value of the objects ratber than their intrinsic worth on artistic or other essential grounds. In the pre- sent instance, the collection is doubtless "rich and rare." Messrs. Christie and Manson have been hard at the sale of the porcelain all the week ; and purchasers hard at outbidding each other, till we read of such incidents as a cabaret, bought by Mr. Bernal for 65 guineas, being knocked down to the Marquis of Bath for 4651. Today the sale of the pictures commences, and after the first eight days the house lately occu- pied by Mr. Bernal is to be itself the scene of action. Although Govern- ment declined to purchase the collection en masse, many of the lots are understood to have been secured for the Marlborough House Museum; where they will in all likelihood be among the principal ornaments of the
section which they illustrate.
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