fin arts.

THE SOCIETY OF BRITISH ARTISTS.

We seem to have arrived at a period when one general description suffices for all our minor yearly exhibitions of art,—that there is scarcely any intellectual originality or daring about them, such as would lead to the treatment of lofty subjects, and that the few such treatments attempted are theatrical commonplace ; but that there is a great deal of earnest endeavour among young artists—unambitious, but well-directed, true, and progressively fruitful. This is a tame but sound condition of art

The same painters who gave vitality to the Suffolk Street Exhibition of last year are again in the ascendant ; Mr. J. Campbell junior, and Mr. Chapman. "Waiting for Legal Advice," by the former, is a splendid piece of manly truth ; totally free from anything like affectation or making-up, and at the same time perfectly artistic. The client, an elderly gentleman with a fine prepossessing face, has evidently been waiting long. He rests on his umbrella with both hands, has his mouth somewhat pursed up in resolute expectation, and beats Isis foot, not hard but with some briskness, on the floor. His bundle of papers is under his arm, and his carpet-bag shows that he is up from the country. Of the two clerks to whom his back is turned, one lounges with a free-and-easy air at the fire, the other leans forward from behind his desk ; and nods and becks from both show that they are quite "up to" the client and his affairs. There is one serious blemish in the picture—the head of the client's little boy, who calls papa's attention to the teetotum which he has set going : this head is very red, hard, and ungainly, and should be thoroughly repainted. A second contribution by Mr. Campbell is "A tidy Job : Sketch of a North Countryman,"—a very complete and valu

able study. •

"A Lover of Art," by Mr. Chapman, presents an errand-lad, in some quiet old English town, who pauses with his parcel to look in at the Raffaelle in the print-shop window, hard by the grey Gothic church. The face, only just a shade sentimentalized, is pure and interesting, and full of aspiration ; the hectic cheek, and the wall-flowers stuck in the lad's button-hole, are thoughtful touches, tending further to individualize the subject. The execution, with a prevalence of neutral colour, shows genuine artistic fineness of style ; nothing is insipid, and nothing rude. "The Day after the Play" exhibits the Same hand, but less satisfactorily. A boy is here spouting a bit from last night's play to his companions : it is Richard the Third's soliloquy. Mr. T. Roberts has evidently made a hit with the public : his manner belongs to a school of unmeaning though dexterous manipulation, but he has a delicate and pleasing sense of expression. "A Tender Chord"— two very young lovers in sweet colloquy at the pianoforte—is prettily tender, as well as skilful. "Waiting for the Ferry-boat" is the best thing we have seen from Mr. Kennedy for some tinte,—a pale sunny vision, very sparkling and alluring. "II Ritorno della Contsdina," and "My own Look-out," are studies of Italian peasant-women by Mr. E. Eagles ; broad and foreign-looking in style, somewhat grand, and decidedly able and striking. Mr. Collineou'a "Home Again "—the return of a Crimean soldier, his beard grizzled with toil and trouble—is a domestic picture containing a good deal of matter, clearly if not very strongly presented; and Mr. Downard's "Katherine and Petruchio" is

a grade beyond the usual hackneyed attempts in such subjects. Mr. IL B. Paul is a vivid clever sketcher ; Mr. Anderson, in "I am helping Mamma," bright and agreeable, as well as elaborate ; Mr. Waite and Mr. Mossman, natural; Mr. Smallfield's single figures, very carefully studied and successful ; Mr. Olding's "Crisis"—a sick-bed scene—is impressively though not artistically rendered ; and Mr. Morgan is national and easy in "French Soldiers describing their Battles." There is some genuine prettiness in Miss Turck's diminutive head of "A Little Cottage. Girl."

Mr. Pettitt, as usual, takes the lead in landscape. His "Evening on the Llugwy, front the Bridge, Bettws-y-coed," and "Evening," are two very fine and solemn works ; the latter especially admirable. The -white owl is gravely waking up in his tree, and the rosy haze of clouds is dying a beautiful death amid the exquisite azure. Mr. Pyne also is in one of his better moods ; so is Mr. Gosling; and Mr. Niemann 1/1 immensely clever and effective in his "Sunset after a Storm," It is much to be regretted that such power as marks this work, and others of his doing, should not be accompanied by a faithful and deliberate study of nature. This latter quality, united with more or less artistic skill, gives honest value and pleasantness to pictures by Mr. Dingle, Miss Witeomb, Mr. Luker, Mr. Ferguson, Mr. Bond, and Mr. Dorman ; and, in the Water-Colour Room, to the very fresh and freely-growing vegetation of Mr. Michael, Mr. llayllar's eopsewood, and a nice sea-beach study by • Miss Chilman, "In Conway Bay." Mr. Hill, in his landscape of "The Hayfield," is very agreeable, and more to our taste than in most of his wonted rustic or fisher subjects ; and Mr. W. J. Boltou gives, under the quotation from Tennyson,

" The rusted nails fell from the knots That held the peach to the garden-wall," a little piece of still life, full of beauty, refinement, and good style.

PANORAMA OF MOSCOW.

Reversing chronological order, Moscow succeeds St. Petersburg at Burford's Panorama. The artists have chosen the occasion of the entry of the Emperor Alexander, for coronation, into the Kremlin ; from the esplanade of which the vast tableau is painted. On one side of the room, therefore, the foreground of the picture is occupied by tho procession, the Emperor on horseback with his brothers and sons, court-carriages, courtofficials, and guards ; of the crowd very little is given, and that little is scarcely marked by distinctive nationality. On the other side, the smooth stream of the Moskowa, winding but not very clear or lively, pursues its course. Behind, up and down go buildings of barbarian Gothic, pseudo-Greek, Rues-Byzantine, quasi-Chinese, and nondescript architecture : domes, pink and gilded, striped and starred, pinnacles, peaks, and gables, green-painted iron roofs, crowded knots of public buildings, cathedral jostling cathedral, and palace brow-beating palace. The sacred city is probably the most fantastically barbaric in Europe ; but it owes little picturesqueness to its position, as, front the point of view which the artists have selected, scarcely a single natural feattuu of distance, whether of hill or plain, wood or water, is discernible.

THE ART-UNION.

The engravings presented by the directors of the Art-Unin to the subscribers for the current year are "The Clemency of Occur de Lion," by Mr. Cross, and "The Piper," by Mr. Goodall. Mr. Cross's picture, which, it will be recollected, gained a premium of 3001, in one of tin; Westminster Hall competitions, is the worthiest selection yet made by the Art-Union, in point of dignified subject and high-class treatment combined. Belonging, in general character, less to the British school than to the French, in which Mr. Cross studied, the work is distinguished by learned drawing, historic style, and thoughtful arrangement, and occupies a front place among the few works of historic art which England has to boast of. The engraving, by Mr. Shenton, is somewhat unequal ; in some parts, true in expression, and satisfactory in light and shade—in others, manifestly deficient. The left arm of Richard is very indifferently expressed in drawing; and the systematic no-system which belongs to line-engraving of the present day has made the legs and feet of the archer considerably harder and distineter in the lines of mere shading than the chain-mail of the figure beside him.

If some of the Art-Union subscribers—not the most resthetie of bodies —should be inclined to vote Mr. Cross's subject an instance of " slow high art," they will have no such imputation to bring against Mr. Frederick Goodall's "Piper," engraved by Mr. Edward Goodall. Here we have a blind piper playing to a cottage family—apparently Scottish; and beyond that, as little of thought, elaboration, or artistic aubtilty, as need be.

BIRTHS.

On the 8th March, at Cirencester, Lady Gifford, of a son.

On the 19th, in Hill Street, the lion. Mrs. Henry Wentworth Foley, of a son. On the Slit, the Visemmtesa Somerton, of a daughter.

On the 22d, at Fort George, N.B., the Wife of Lieutenant Sir Lionel Smith, Bart,, Seventy-first Regiment, of a son. On the 25th,, at Cleveland House, Preetbury, Gloucestershire, the Wife of GM Rev. Morton Shaw, Rector of Roughen], Suffolk, of a daughter.

MARRIAGES.

On the 8th January, at Belgaum, Bombay Presidency, William Henry, eldest son of the late Lieutenant-Colonel Havelock, (who was killed at the Battle of Rheasntivir,) to Augusta Caroline, the eldest daughter of Dr. Waller, Garrison Surgeon

On tfie 6th March, at the Cathedral, Waterford, George Ricketts Roberts, Esq Captain in the Bengal Army, eldest son of Major-General A. Roberta CB., Harriett, daughter of the late Captain Thomas Roberts, Captaiu in the Bengal Army, and of Montpelier Square, K.nightsbridge, and niece to William Lawn Esq., of the Bury, Chesham, Bucks. On the lfftb, at St. Pancras Church, Robert Thomas Landells, Esq., to Elisabeth Ann Rodwell, youngest daughter of the late George Herbert Rodwell. On the 19th, at Nice, Lieutenant-Colonel Hume, commanding Ninety-fifth

ment, C.A., and Chevalier de la Legion d'Ilonneur, to Emma, youngest survint% daughter of Joseph Sykes, Esq., Raywell, Yorkshire. On the 21st, at the Church of the Assumption, Warwick Street, Major the Hon. Henry HClifford, third son of the Right lion. Lord Clifford, to Josephine Elizabeth, daughter t of the late Joseph Anstice, On the , at Bordeaux, Kenelin Digby Wingfield, son of William Wingfield Baker, Esq., of Eaton Square, and Orsett Hall, FAIWI , to Mademoiselle Louise Gate bridle Sainte Marie, daughter of Monsieur A. Sainte Marie, of that city.

On the 25th, at the parish-church of West Mailing, John Philip Green, Esq., of Ceylon, eldest son of Philip James Green, Esq., of Boyne House, Notting 1(111, formerly British Consul for the Mores, to Jane Mary, second daughter of the late Aretas Akers, Esq.. of Mailing Abbey, Kent.

On the 261h, at Highgate, Major Algernon Brendon, Royal Artillery, eldest son of John Brendon.Eoq, of TrerlMe, Cornwall, to Elizabeth Atkinson, stepdaughter of Josiah Wilkinson, Esq., of Southampton Lodge, Highgate.

DEATHS, On the 12th January, at the Mauritius, Captain Edmund Henry Ithn5 Flint, LA., youngest son of the late Sir C. W. Flint ; in his 32d year.

On the 15th March, at Ilemprigge House, county of Caithnesa, the Right Hon. the Lady Duffus ; in her 89th year.

On the 15th, at his residence, Redhill, Surrey, Dr. Brinsley William Hewitson Nicholson, I.R.C.S., Deputy-Inspector-General of Hospitals; in his 69th year. On the 17th, at Paris, Sir John Kenward Shaw, Bart. ; in his 74th year. On the 18th, in Wimpole Street, Vice-Admiral Sir.I.R.Rowley, Bart., of Tendring Hall, Suffolk. •

On the 18th, in Shandwick Place, Edinburgh, Edwina, relict of the late Thomas Miller, Esq., of Glenke, and daughter of the late Sir Alexander Penrose Gordon Cumming, of Altyre, and Gordon Town, Dart.; in his 71st year.

()lithe 20th, in Paris, Lieutenant-Colonel Bolton, late of the Fifth Dragoon Guards, deeply lamented and desencdly regretted by a numerous circle of relatives and friends.

. On the 21st, at Berwick-upon-Tweed, George Sherass Brittain, Captain R.N.

On the 24th, suddenly, while on a visit to his son at Staunton Harold, Leicestershire, the Rev. John Letts, M.A., Rector of St. °lave, Hart Street, London ; in his 56th year. On the 25th, at the rendenee of his step-father, Sir John Easthope, Great Cumberland Place, Ilyde l'ark, Lieutenant Raynsford Cytherus Longley, of the Royal Morse Artillery, the second son of Lady Easthope and the late Major Long,ley, ILA.; in his 21th year.

On the 25th, at Tunbridge Wells, the Lady Susan Maria Hotham.