FINE ARTS.

. A SECOND VISIT TO THE ROYAL ACADEMY EXHIBITION.

ON ont^second visit to the Royal Academy Exhibition, the poverty of the display of art was more conspicuous than before ; but in searching for beauties that we might have overlooked, we found so many glaring instances of gross injustice in the placing of pictures, that it would be dereliction of duty to refrain from exposing the scandalous abuses of power by the Academic body. Wearied as we are with denouncing the misdeeds of the Academy, silent toleration is yet more wearisome ; and now that some of our contemporaries who had hitherto kept silence on this subject, or supported the Academy, have been reluctantly compelled, by the growing magnitude of the evil, to come over to our side, it would ill become the Spectator to shrink from the performance of a dis- agreeable task. To make the case clear to those readers who have not given much attention to this matter, it is necessary to describe the nature of this anomalous institution called the Royal Academy of Arts, This is the title which GEORGE the Third gave an association of painters, sculptors, and engravers leave to assume, when he granted to them the gratuitous use of apartments in Somerset House for the purpose of an annual ex- hibition of the works of contemporary artists. No charter was given, nor any laws laid down for the governance of the body, but such as they themselves made; the only check upon their proceedings being the veto of the Sovereign on the appointment of members: this shadow of con- trol is no longer exercised; several of the Academicians lately elected not having received the Royal sanction. In short, the "Royal Aca- demy " is a private body of artists, usurping title, privilege, and power uncontrolled, and exercising the functions of a public body without any constituted existence or responsibility : for aoy thing that the Minister or the Sovereign could do, they might refuse to exhibit any works of art but those of their own members, and elect a sign-painter, a stone- mason, or a name-engraver, a member of their body. They assume rank and consideration, and exert great influence and authority, on the strength of their public character ; but when called to account for their doings, they claim immunity on the score of being a private body amenable to no one : in their public capacity they have the free use of a public building for an annual exhibition, which thence comes to be regarded as a national display of talent ; and in their private capacity they, on the principle of "doing what they like with their own," ap- propriate all the best places to themselves, pocketing all the money received for admission-fees and catalogues,, to, the amount of some thousands a year : this income they spend on entertaining their patrons and friends, pensioning themselves and families, and paying some of their body for teaching students to be unable to draw and paint; taking credit for generosity in not dividing the proceeds among themselves year by year, and for independence in not receiving any money from the public.

The present exhibition consists of 1,400 works of art, the production of about seven hundred different artists ; of whom rather more than

forty are "members" of the Royal Academy. The Academicians claim the first choice of places, and the " Associates " the next: when their works are placed to the best possible advantage, the Academicians select such productions as they think fit from among the two or three thou- sand sent in for exhibition, and the " Hanging Committee " direct them to be hung in whatever situations they choose. Personal motives, of course, are not supposed to influence the " Hanging Committee"; though they have the power, if they choose to exercise it, of putting the performances of a dangerous rival out of sight: every Academician, too, has the opportunity of " painting down " a competitor ; the privi- lege of " retouching" their pictures on the walls of the Exhibition belonging exclusively to members of the Academy.

The Great or East Room, is generally supposed to contain the most important pictures. A stranger enters, perhaps a foreigner, curious to see what British art is capable of: what is his amazement to find but one great work—MacusE's Hamlet; and, with a few exceptions, no- thing but portraits, most of them worse than mediocre. The explana- tion is this : the Academicians drive a great trade in portrait-painting, and they seize on the most conspicuous places for showing their samples; sticking up a quantity of wretched daubs to serve as foils. A glance at the top row of heads in the Great Room will verify this statement. Ou looking at the pictures on the level of the eye, the visiter is struck with the extraordinary variety of strange styles of painting, and the incon- gruous mixture of works of the highest excellence with worthless trash. The solution of the mystery is this : the members of the Academy all claim places " on the line." Thus a trumpery picture by an illus- trious nobody, Mr. JOHN JAMES CHALON, as bright and hard as a new toy, is stuck close by EDWIN LANDSEER'S Highland Shepherd's Home ABRAHAM COOPER'S satin-skinned horses lift the hoof at the Raffael- esque heads of EASTLAKE'S Sisters; and the great Mr. JONES, who ex- hibits what appears to be the same heap of old houses and gaudy crowds that he has sent any time these twenty years, is placed on a level with CALLcorr, whose elegant Italian Landscape is made to look pale and sickly by the contrast of JONES'S florid hues. Poor old Mr. HOWARD'S painfully feeble attempts at design, that one would fain pass by in pity to his age, are thrust conspicuously on the attention : CoLLINs's pretty but weak landscapes with doll-like figures, and WrramusoroN't teaboards, are obtrusively prominent ; while Crteswrce's exquisitely- pencilled landscapes are put on the ground. Just as you enter the Great Room, on the right hand is a wooden- looking landscape, that no person of taste would bid a few shillings for at a broker's shop, which bears the name of R. R. REINAGLE, R.A.; while beneath it, on the ground, is a design of touching expression—a mother gazing " with pensive eyes" on her sleeping infant—Hope, (193,) by C. W. COPE, who is not an R.A. On the left hand is another admirable picture by COPE, of GOLDSMITH'S Village Schoolmaster, (8,) on the floor and further on, a waxen Portrait of a Lady, by Mr. It. It. REINAGLE, R.A., occupies a conspicuous place on the line ; while below it, almost out of sight, is a clever and pretty design by CALLcorr HORSLEY, Winning Gloves, (21,) a gallant cavalier about to steal a kiss from a slumbering damsel : another pleasing picture by a young artist fast rising into celebrity, F. GOODALL, The Tired Soldier Resting at a Road-side Well, (72,) is placed on the ground in the Great Room : all of these despised pictures being worthy of the best places. It might have been slily intended to contrast the sober truth and exquisite finish of CHESWICK'S sweet sylvan river-scenes with TURNER'S garish and flimsy daubs, by placing them in juxtaposition ; but that cannot excuse putting two such lovely landscapes by CRESWICK, as The Course of the Greta through Brignal Wood, (51,) and A River Scene, (180,) so low that their delicate execution is scarcely visible. In the Middle Room, instances of unfairness are no less glaring: a highly-wrought design of two figures, life-size, by H. O'NEILL, Paul and Francesca of .Rimini, (258,) whose merit must depend mainly on the expression, is stuck up so high that it is impossible to say whether the faces tell the story. A large and highly-finished picture, The Money- Lender, (279,) by R. M'INNEs, well-conceived and admirably painted, but low in tone, is placed above CHARLES LANDSEER'S lively and at- tractive picture, and almost escapes recognition in consequence. The story of the Money-lender is well told : the listless air of complacent coxcombry with which the voluptuous prodigal is about to sign the bond—the obsequious cunning of the lawyer handing him the pen— the fixed gravity of the old usurer, as close as his strong box—the supercilious look of contempt that one of the party casts on his dupe—

and the profligate peeping through the door at the usurer's pretty daughter—form a complete chapter in the annals of human folly. The drawing is excellent, the costumes are well chosen, and the accessories are skilfully arranged and cleverly painted; there is no gaudy colouring to attract the eye, and the execution is elaborate without being overwrought : Mr. M•INNEs should, however, beware of a' tendency to smoothness. Here is a picture claiming a place on the line, where its finished style of painting could be appreciated ; but it is placed above the eye ; while a miserable abortion by Mr.

HOWARD, called Aaron Staying the Plague—the " plague" being per- sonated by a livid half-figure with blue fire in both hands—occupies a

place on the line, because the painter writes R.A. after his name.

The Microscope, (363,) by G. LANCE—The Market-Girl, (352,) by G. POOLE—a dark-eyed laughing girl, The very. Picture of Idleness—and of Mischief, (377,) by RozewELL— and a most beautiful design, of true poetical character, Una and the Lion, (376,) by H. LE JEENe—all de- serving first places, are among the pictures thrust so low down that it is difficult to see them to advantage : some landscapes of merit by H. LANCASTER, J. THORPE, and W. KNELL, are similarly treated ; while such preposterous. absurdities as TURNER'S Peace and War, and a wooden landscape by the last new Academician, Mr. Jolts JAMES CILu.cor, are so conspicuous as to excite the ridicule and contempt of every visiter. In the West Room, the. same systematic injustice is done. to artists not members of the Academy ; though there are exceptions. A couple of poor old WARD'S horses, that look as if they had been flayed, occupy prominent places on the line ; while below them are two pretty designs, Moses Going to the Fair, (427,) by C. STONHOUSE, and a mother re- ceiving Bad News from Sea, (439,) by R. REDORAVE, who is only an Associate. Mr. WARD is an Academician, forsooth ; though he never in his best day produced such a clever picture as the Death of Sir William Lambton at the Battle of Marston Moor, (436,) by It. AN8- DELL-11 painter of men and horses, whose name we have not heard before, though it will soon most likely be well known. Over the door, just high enough to be out of sight, is a little design from " Faust," by P. F. POOLE, Margaret alone at her Spinning-wheel, (389,) which we would almost venture to predicate has the true expression of face, though without a ladder it is impossible to determine. One corner of this room is so rich in beauties, that while looking at one picture you obstruct the view of another. CRESWICK'S best landscape, a view on The Tees, (496)—where solid masses of gray rock, mossed over with time, obstruct the passage of the stream that chafes its " chan- nelled way" beneath overhanging trees of freshest green—is often eclipsed by persons attracted by COPE'S true and faithful picture from GOLDSMITH'S poetic sketch of " The ha., thorn bush, with seals beneath the shade

For talking age and whispering love's made."

(507,) whose merits are of a class that deserve for it a foremost place : CHESWICK'S rocky river-bed would bear comparison with RUYSDAEL'S

waterfalls, and is worthy to hang beside Cau.corfs English Land-

scape, instead of being made the pendant to a cold, hard, chopped- up mess of wood and slate, by LEE. What may be the merits of LAUDER'S Meg Me.rilies and the Dying Smuggler, (506,) it is impossible

to discern ; the picture, a night-scene, being dark, and stuck so close into the corner as to be invisible. Could no more fitting place than the

floor be found for a fanciful picture of Fairies dancing, by R. DADD,

(527)—little elfin troop of sprites footing it on the yellow sands so featly that they le•tve no foot-prints ? Close by in another corner is a

humorous Scene from the Bourgeois Gentilhomme, (538,) by T. M. JOY, which, had it been painted by LESLIE or ALFRED CHALosr—aud it is not unworthy of either—would have found a place on the line in the

principal room, and been lauded in all the papers ; and near to it is a

coast-scene, Morning on the Beach at Hastings, (539,) by A. CLINT, that has more nature and better art than Messrs. WITUEBINGTON, R. R. REINAGLE, and. J. J. CHALON, put together, can muster. Neither are good portraits so rife that such heads as these of an old gentleman read- ing, by S. LAURENCE, (515,) Miss Clark, (517,) by R. VENABLES, and a sweet blooming girl with a pet, called Rivals, (443,) by J. G. MIDDLE- TON, should have been hung. up as mere fill-gaps.

We have not space to point out the numerous instances where merit is made to give place to R.A. pretensions in the Miniature-room; but we cannot pass unnoticed the shameful treatment of two large water-

colour paintings by F. W. BURTON, admirable studies of Irish character, though not skilfully arranged for pictorial effect—The Arran Fisherman's Drowned Child, (786,) and A Connaught Toilet—Connemara Girls on

their Way to Market, (897,)—both placed so high that we are indebted to an artist for pointing them out to our notice. The group of the mother and daughter gazing distractedly on the pale face of the drowned child is most pathetic ; the silent agony of the father, and the train of hooded women filling the cottage, tell the sad story in a manner the more affect- ing from its accordance with national custom and character.

The "Condemned Hole," as that lumber-closet the Octagon Room is aptly termed, which admits just light enough to make the darkness visible, ought never to have been opened for the reception of pictures ; but it is too bad to put into it a work of so much pains and promise as The Man of Ross, 0,2620 by C. LUCY. We have pointed out some of the most obvious instances of unfairness in the treatment of pictures by painters who do not belong to the Academy, by reason of the unjust preference given to the works of members : the wholesale injustice involved in the rejection of hundreds of others for want of room can only be known to the Academy and felt by the rejected. This is no new thing; the system has existed ever since the Academy was established, and every exhibiter has by turns experienced its injurious operation ; and it will continue, so long as the Academicians are suffered to mismanage the Exhibition for their own benefit, o the detriment of their younger rivals. Here is a public building, given up for the express object of encouraging art, prostituted to private purposes and selfish interests ; and an annual display of works of art, which is regarded in the light of a national exhibition both by this country and foreigners, is deteriorated, to say the least, by the Academicians monopolizing all the best places for themselves. How long is such a monstrous usurpation and abuse of power to be suffered to continue? If artists choose to submit to it, the country ought not. What says Sir ROBERT PEEL?