OF THE DICTATORS OF TASTE IN THIS GREAT
AGE.
[TO THR EDITOR OP Mil "SPECTATOR."] Sin,—In a thin stream of feeble English—which would be merely venomous if it were not so unutterably feeble, "and also" (as your critic would say) with overweening conceit— an inane attack is made upon my "History of Painting.' Now, Sir, I do not object to enmity—from fools or dullards. After all, a cockney has been known to spit at the very Sphinx. But I do object, and strongly, to your giving hand- somely produced books to your Aunt Matilda or the curate to play with simply because they make pretty presents. My "History of Painting" is quite unfit for Aunt Matilda to read, and may unsettle the curate ; in, the public interest I must lodge a strong demur. Aunt Matilda (I most strongly suspect Matilda) is fortunately dullard enough to be safe— even if she had read the book—which she clearly has not— since she finds nothing in it except what she already knew. And, most reassuring sign of all, she is so self-satisfied. But I put it to you, Sir—indeed my blood runs cold at the narrow escape you have had, since you are the latest recruit to the Defence of the Public Morals—fancy what might have happened if you had handed my history to an intelligent curate !
Yet must I throw a terrible bomb into your and her life ; the hideous truth is that "the precise information of diction- aries" is not—precise. The little spite about Berenson is just shrew' s logic, so let it pass; but, alas ! poor Michelangelo has suffered the fearful "indignity"; I plead guilty—though you and Aunt Matilda probably thought the picture was by William Rufus—for Michelangelo is reproduced in the very
first volume.—I am, Sir, Sze., HALDA.NE MACFALL. [This letter would, perhaps, have been more appropriately headed, "When Authors Write their Own Reviews."—En. Spectator.]
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