FACSIMILES OF OF MASTERPIECES.
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—It was, I believe, Cardinal Newman who said that it is only by the thoughtful contemplation of all that is best in art that we can attain to any real degree of appreciation of what art might mean to us. Since it is, of course, impossible that all that is greatest In pictorial art should ever find its way to our shores, and for many impecunious lovers of art to indulge in foreign travel, I have long thought that it should be possible to study here what would be, I suppose, the best substitute for the great originals themselves in the form of a national collection of really good facsimiles, which should consist of a series of exact reproductions of all those acknowledged masterpieces to see which one must " journey in far lands." Even " La Gioconda " is, I believe, known to many quite genuine lovers of the beautiful only through the medium of cheap photogravures, or of Pater's marvellous description ; and yet to reproduce it by, some such process as that employed with such success by the Medici Society would, I suppose, cost not twenty pounds.
The late Sir Henry Howorth proposed a somewhat similar scheme only a few weeks before he died, in the columns of one of our weekly papers. I venture to suggest that it would be not inappropriate to commemorate the work of this great scholar, whose learning was only equalled by his versatility, by the establishment of a fund for the endowment of a collection of this description, which would, I feel sure, meet a very real need at a very small cost !—I am, Sir, &c., W. S. C. COPEMAN, F.S.A.Scot. Guards' Club, Brook Street, W.
[But how large a gallery would be needed ? A collection of photographs of pictures in foreign galleries made by Sir Robert Witt, 82 Portman Square, W. 1, may be seen by all bona-fide students on application to the Secretary. This collection is much used and is practically public. Also at the National Portrait Gallery there is a collection of photographs of almost all portraits that are not in the Gallery.—En. Spectator.]
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