I The Memorials of an Eighteenth - Century Painter (James North- 40 4.
By Stephen Gwynn. (Fisher Unwin. 12s.)—Mr. Gwynn eays truly that Northcote was a link with the past. He was the Pupil and friend of Sir Joshua, and lived to exhibit with Turner. He beard Johnson exert his whole conversational powers when talking with Burke, and yet lived on to within the memory of old men still alive. The work before us has never before been printed, and consists of an unfinished autobiography, to which Northcote added reminiscences of Reynolds, and, finally, stray notes of interesting occurrences. In addition, Mr. Gwynn has supplemented the painter's somewhat fragmentary writing by extracts from Hazlitt's " Conversations " with Northeote, as well as by explanations of his own. Reynolds took the young Northcote into his house as a pupil and assistant, making him copy his pictures, and sit for the draperies of his portraits. But of direct teaching he seems to have got but little. It was at this time that the young man heard Johnson, Goldsmith, and Burke discourse at Reynolds's table. It was these illustrious men who witnessed Sir Joshua's macaw fly at the portrait, painted by Northcote, of the housemaid it disliked. This bird whose antics were watched by such an illustrious company is doubtless the macaw that may still be seen in the beautiful portrait group of Lady Cockburn and her children in the National Gallery. When Northcote had made s little money he set out for Italy. This part of the book is some what disappointing, though the artist's description of his passage of the Mont Cents is characteristic. In imitation of the Veturino, Northcote pulled a nightcap over his eyes, "concluding there must be some good reason for so doing." At the top of the pass his hat blew off, then the nightcap was raised, but instantly lowered when the hat was found. "By this means I saw nothing of the mountain," is the remark of the eighteenth-century painter's first sight of the Alps. At Turin Northcote made acquaintance with a Florentine nobleman who had lately returned disappointed from England. Thither he had gone to see the trial of the Duchess of Kingston, but as the ceremony did not end with a beheading, he considered himself defrauded. Paris a few years later would, no doubt, have suited his particular taste better than London. Northcote liked disparaging Reynolds, but allowed no one else to do so. He pays a tribute to his generosity to those who were unfortunate, as well as to his genius as a painter. Mr. Gwynn points out that it was Reynolds who first made Mr. Whistler's famous epigram. Lord Holland, indignant at the price asked for his portrait, exclaimed "How long were you about this picture ? " Sir Joshua quickly replied : "All my life." This volume contains a long list drawn up by Northcote of his pictures, which will be of use to experts. Mr. Gwynn must be congratulated on having made a very readable book out of these memorials of an eighteenth-century painter.
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