FINE ARTS.

FORTHCOMING womis.

TIIF. week having brought no new accession to our portfolio, we have taken a survey of the works in prospective ; and they are both nume- rous and important.

First in point of magnitude and interest is the forthcoming series of line engravings from the best pictures of the painters of the British school, announced by Mr. Pistols. It is to be on a grand scale, and in the highest style of excellence, and cheap withal—qualities it is difficult to combine, but which, when united, insure the success of an undertaking.

We arc glad to find Mr. FINDEN'S talent and enterprise directed to a national object. Such a publication as this which he announces can- not bat promote the public taste for the productions of our own coun- trymen, and do honour to the British school. The value of the work will greatly depend on a judicious selection—none but chefs- d'aurre should be admitted : at least one production of every painter of remarkable talent should find a place in this gallery; and the de- scriptive letterpress might constitute a biographical and critical his- tory of the rise and progress of British art. In this view, we regret that the work is to commence only with the foundation of the Royal Academy. That event certainly marks an sera in the history of paint- ing in this country; but there are English artists who lived before the formation of the Academy that arc worthy of commemoration : our first great portrait-painter, Mimosa and Coorea, the VANDYKE Of miniature painters, among others. In tracing the progress of art in a country the first rude beginnings are interesting; and even the por- trait painted by Ilrosos (who, being requested on one occasion to represent some person with his hat on, gave him another hat under his anti) is not without its value, as a curious evidence of the effect of mechanical habit in blinding the painter to absurdities obvious to all else but himself.

Messrs. HODGSON, Boys, and GRAVES, also announce a complete series of the works of Sir THOMAS LAWRENCE, engraved in mezzo- tint, on a similar scale with those Of LIVERSEEGE; to he published quarterly in parts, the first of which will shortly appear. The plates will be by Cousiss, TenNen, anti other mezzotint engravers; and, when completed, the work will range with that of REYNOLDS. We hope to see the graceful and poetic fancies of STOTHARD multiplied in a similar mariner ; but they almost require the aid of colour.

Our list of engravings in progress is a goodly one, and includes, as it should do, some of the best pictures that have been exhibited of late. Of most of them there are proofs taken of the etchings.

LINE ENGRAVINGS.

PAINTER. PICTURE.

" John Knox Preaching before the},-,.

ILKIE. Lords of the Congregation." " The Billet "—soldiers about to take refreshment in a cottage, sometimes D. WILKIE.

called " The Recruit."

" Greenwich Pensioners celebrating the } URNET. A nuiversaty of 'Trafalgar."

RENCE'S portrait of Sir W. Scott) T • PHILLIPS.

MEzzoriNTo.

" Monks at Bolton Abbey receiving

a LAN EER Present of Game and Fish." ..... • - IM.

E " A Monk Preaching in Seville." J. LEWIS. " Highland Hospitality." J. Lewis. "Allhallow Eve ;" or Snap apple Night D. APCI.ise.

Cave."

" Robinson Crusoe with Friday in his r RASER. " A Baptism among the Covenanters." HA RVEY. JOHN LEWIS is now employed in lithographing another volume of sketches of the Scenes and Characters of Spanish Life. Ilaarmac's Sketches if Scenery at Home and Abroad are in progress; and PROUT also has commenced his Second Volume of Sketches.

NATURAL HISTORY.

Mr. GOULD, the naturalist, has recently returned from the Continent with a fresh accession of drawings of some new species of Toucans arid Trogons, not yet figured in his monographs of the genera of these superb Tropical birds. These he has obtained, by permission of the Austrian Government, from the Imperial Collection of Natural History at Munich ; where the originals have been deposited by Professor NAT., TERER, who has been employed, at the Government expense, for eighteen years in the Brazils; during which time he has collected no less than a thousand species of birds in the Brazils only. Mr. GOULD Is pre- paring for publication these additions to his monographs, which will render those splendid publications complete. Mr. GOULD'S large work of the Birds of Europe is now two-thirds completed. The two last published Parts, XII. and XIII., support its high reputation for accuracy of form and plumage, and that living charac- ter which is the great charm of all representations of animals. The birds being nearly all of the natural size, some of the figures are very large; and we hardly know which drawings to admire most, the boldness of these by Mr. LEAR or the delicacy of the smaller ones by Mrs..Goutn. The colouring is extraordinarily rich and powerful; each print looks

Lord Byron (to correspond with LAW- ENGRAVER. G. Doo.

C. Fox]

BURNET. GRAVES.

S. COUSINS,.

BROMLEY. GILLER. SCOTT.

C. LEWIS. like an original drawing. The accounts of the habits of the different birds are concise and comprehensive ; and the work is doubly valuable as a scientific production anti a beautiful picture-book.

Mr. THOMAS BELL, whose monograph of tortoises, that equals in beauty and accuracy Mr. Goui.n'a publications, we have more than once noticed, is engaged upon a popular work of British quadrupeds, with highly-finished wood-engravings, to correspond with Mr. YA KRELL'S Fishes, in size, style, and price. The high reputation of Mr. BELL as a naturalist as well as a physiologist, will recommend this publica- tion to the scientific world ; while its neatness, cheapness, and interest, will secure for it popular favour.