23 NOVEMBER 1867, Page 17

ART.

Dont's ILLUSTRATIONS OF TENNYSON.

CONSIDERING how often the attempt to illustrate an author, more especially an author of established renown, has ended in failure, it is no common praise to say that Gustave Dore has by his pencil in the illustrations just published by Messrs. Moxon to the Idyls of the King given help to the due appreciation of Tennyson, and (literally) illustrated his author's meaning. More especially is this true in the case of Vivien. To this poem there are nine illustrations, of which the four that represent passages in the direct course of the tale are, perhaps, the best of all the series. In the first, Merlin, followed by Vivien, disembarks "on Breton Sands," and is pursued by her, in the second, "to the wild woods of Broceliande." Admirably well is the affectation of deepest reverence represented by the figure of wily Vivien. Still more admirably is the half- magical atmosphere of the idyll translated into pictorial language by the landscape backgrounds, which form so large a part of these as well as of the other illustrations. As the first few words uttered by unimportant personages in the opening scene of Hamlet lead insensibly to the expectation of strange matters, or as the first line of Comas transports the reader at once into a realm of enchantment, so these landscapes immediately take hold of the imagination, and striking as it were the very key-note of the story, place us at once in perfect harmony with the poet. The last of these four pictures is where Merlin, "over-talked and over-worn," has told his charm,—

" And shrieking out 0 fool !' the harlot leapt Adown the forest," a picture which, though taking some liberty with the letter of the text, most fully expresses its sense, and with startling fidelity exhibits the sudden transformation of the pretended worshipper into the pitiless traitor. Of the rest, there is life and action in the sea fight, and an air of philosophic calm and retirement in the drawing where Merlin paints the young knight's shield with a motto that a little shocks the enthusiastic dreams of the latter. But the "founding of the table round" is perilously near to stage effect.

If the illustrations of Guinevere seem at all inferior to those of Vivien it must be acknowledged that the task was infinitely harder. Wherever there is a supernatural element, Dore's fancy bears him to an almost certain success. One need but allude to his illustrations of Dante and Don Quixote, and the extra- ordinary fertility and distinctness of his imagination in producing visions

"Of dire chimeras and enchanted isles,

And rifted rocks whose entrance leads to hell."

Of the same kind is the "flickering fairy circle," seen at evenings by the knight as he rode towards "the table round," and which, in Dose's hands, simulates a stream that sweeps and tumbles through a rocky gorge. Here the artist wields a pail that will not be denied. But in the endeavour to represent the King himself he has met the fate of all but a very few who have essayed the portrayal of moral perfection in a man. It is an old remark that a perfect character makes but an insipid figure ; and it must be confessed that the cloister scene, the scene of supreme interest in the poem, suffers an anti-climax in the illustration. Even ".the sinful queen" is, for some very different reason, less impressively rendered than might have been expected. But the parting between her and Lancelot may be mentioned as an instance of remarkable grace in the forms of the composition, and great skill in painting light and atmosphere.

Upon the whole, these illustrations will justly add to Dore's reputation in this country. The original drawings may be seen at Mr. Moxon's in Dover Street, and the opportunity ought not to be neglected. The English public have to thank him for enabling them to study the original works of this truly great artist. Generally he has been known only through the medium of woodcuts and (in the single instance of Elaine, the first of the present series) steel engravings. And as his practice has never been to make his drawing on the wood himself, or so as to be copied in fac-simile on the wood (like Leech), nor to work out anything like finished studies of light and shade for the engraver (like Turner), it will be readily imagined that the notion commonly entertained of his power as an artist, must be very imperfect. By help of the first method, the artist's execution can be imitated, or at least sug- gested, with considerable accuracy, so that in the hands of a sympathetic workman the woodcut may be made to approach, in some degree, to the expressiveness of an etching ; by help of the second, the due effect of the original is reproduced by careful attention to the relative values or intensities of lights and shadows, without aid from the artist's pecu- liar execution. But Dore follows neither of these methods. His drawings are slight water-colour sketches in neutral tint, commenced apparently by staining the paper with an uniform half-shade (or deeper), upon which the lights are painted with a full and free brush in body colour, and the deepest shadows added. Of "finish," in the popular sense, there is none ; but of the same quality, understood in the truer sense as the means whereby a con- ception or idea is thoroughly well conveyed to the mind, there is abundance. Finish of any other sort is Of very inferior value, and perhaps mere surplusage. But to a steel engraver, who is almost bound by the necessities of his process to finish (in the popular sense) every square inch of his plate, Dore must be a difficult artist to follow. Fortunately, his drawings have not only been engraved, but photographed, and the photographs are exceedingly good, rendering most faithfully every touch of the original, and preserving with comparatively little variation the relative values