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as those that have illustrated painting. A material has been wanting. A bronze statue is a manufacture; but the difficulties attending casting in metal have prevented this from becoming to any extent a method of popularising Art. Casting in plaster has most nearly fulfilled for sculpture what has been accomplished for painting by the burin; but the cheapness and frailness of the material have prevented that value from being attached to the works executed in it, which could alone lead to their being prepared with the highest artistic care. Sculpture is even a more exquisite art than painting; the stainless purity of marble enhancing the idealism of poetic conception. But it is one with which, from its costliness, and the long toil necessary to its production, the public cannot be made so easily familiar, unless some more adequate means than have usually been employed, be resorted to for multiplying copies of its beautiful creations. A substance at once durable, of moderate cost, and possessing something of the fine texture and delicate purity of the Pentelic and Carrara stones, has been therefore a most important desideratum.

Very lately, a plastic composition which answers to these requirements much more nearly than anything previously in use in this country, has been applied to statuary purposes. We hail its introduction as opening the way to most important developments in Art: and believe that casting in "Statuary Porcelain," as an Art ancillary to sculpture, is destined to fill a place of like importance with that which engraving holds in reference to painting.

It is true that in the last century the execution of statuary in porcelain was carried to a high degree of excellence in the Sèvres manufactory. We have seen statuettes which were formed some sixty or seventy years back, more admirable in their modelling, and more marblelike, than any thing that has yet been executed in England. Such, for instance, was a Bacchus from the antique, about a foot in height, of which the material nearly resembled a closegrained marble which had borne some exposure to weather. The majority of the works of that period, however, though beautifully white, and perfectly free from the waxy look so common in the modern English figures, had somewhat too vitreous an appearance; and, unlike the porcelain works of this country, showed a perfectly vitreous fracture. The fact that the Art of forming such statuettes has long ceased to be practised at Sèvres, might abate our expectations of the results to arise from the opening of this branch of manufacture in England, did we not take into consideration the very different spirit of the times. If art and luxury at that

| period were not withheld from the people by any absolute sumptuary law, yet their general diffusion was an object never contemplated; and there were no well devised systems of combination by which the poor might command in part the advantages of wealth. The precise cause of the decline of the Sèvres manufacture we shall not attempt to explain.

The first experiment in the new English material was made about two years since in Copeland's Porcelain Works at Stoke-upon-Trent ; when a miniature copy of Gibson's Narcissus, one of the most poetic productions of English Art, was executed for the subscribers to the "London Art Union." The beauty of the texture and color of the artificial alabaster, and the artistic excellence with which the work was produced, obtained immediate acknowledgement; and the manufacture of statuettes and ornamented works, in the new composition, has since been actively progressing.

The statuary porcelain has not the snowy lustre of the Parian or Carrara marbles, nor the sugary sparkle of Pentelic: but it is as close in grain as either, and as smooth in surface; and has a pleasant light creamy tint; though the color varies a little in different specimens. In the best moulded works there is such an easy undulation of surface, so much sharpness without hardness in the more defined parts - as in hair, fillets, flowers as scarcely to suggest the idea of a casting. The artist's own touches seem to appear upon the work.

And to some extent this is true. For besides that the separate portions of a figure have to be fitted together with the utmost nicety after they are taken from the moulds, the clay in other respects frequently requires to be wrought upon by hand before it can be committed to the furnace. Small parts may be ill-defined; the finger-tips, for instance, shapeless; portions of the surface rough; the joints of the mould traced upon the figure. These defects have to be remedied by a skilful modeller: a meritorious artist, who performs a part as necessary as the "bringing up" of a copper-plate or wood-block for the press. Some intervention of a hand under the direction of cultivated taste, will in all cases probably be requisite to confer on manufactures the character of Art.

A disadvantage which has hitherto attended most works moulded in a composition afterwards to be submitted to the furnace—the change of form incident to irregular shrinkage in the baking, or to settlement from the gravitating power of the moist material has, by the skill of our present manufacturers, been, to a considerable extent, overcome. There is yet, however, and probably will continue to be, a good deal of

uncertainty; failures are frequent, from the clay cracking, or falling out of place.

tor himself, is more satisfactory, as regards the rendering in porcelain; whilst the design, though inferior to the German work for originality and poetic luxury of conception, is perfect for its grace, ease, and the air of idealised innocence imparted to the figure. Mr. Bell has been a very active contributor of designs to this and to other departments of Art Manufacture. His

drawn by Cervantes, whose description no one with a fondness for Art can have read without wishing to see its embodiment in marble. We greatly prefer the reduced copy to the sculptor's full-sized original. The casts we have examined of these works are a little disfigured in parts by the marks of the moulds; and in the two former, particularly, the attachment of the arms just below the shoulders (these portions are cast in separate moulds, and afterwards united by the modeller) is disagreeably visible. The foregoing designs have been brought out under the auspices of Felix Summerly, the originator of the series of works in several departments of mechanical ingenuity, called the " Art Manufactures." Messrs. Minton and Co. have produced others unconnected with him, and which are equally deserving of attention. Of these we must particularize the beautiful groups of "Naomi and her daughters; "-"The Guardian Angel; "- "Madona and Child; "-" St. Jo

Messrs. Copeland have already executed, in their new porcelain, statuettes, busts, figures of animals, vases, jugs, garden ornaments, and other works possessing artistic character. Among them may be instanced — a charmingly imagined "Ondine," from Pradier; -"Apollo as a shepherd," by Wyatt: a graceful figure, though by" Dorothea" is worthy of the lovely picture no means expressive of the intellectual grandeur of the god the artist would have done better to have called it simply a Grecian shepherd; "Paul and Virginia," by Cumberworth: a pret ty group, treated with some originality and poetic feeling, though not with quite so much simplicity as desirable in sculpture; an exquisite bust of Flora ; - one of Jenny Lind, by J. Durham pleasingly managed in the introduction of some flowers in the hair and drapery, and well executed; a likeness, though not a flattering one:- one also of Daniel O'Connell, by J. E. Jones: excellent in its portraiture, and in the workmanship of the head, but somewhat clumsily draped this work shows in another manner the application of mechanical ingenuity to the purpose of multiplying works of Art, the miniature model having been reduced from the original bust by Cheverton's Reducing Machine; a "Chained Cupid: " the "Portland Vase." A piece, called the "Armada Bottle," shows in the| most conspicuous manner, in the leaves and ten-seph," and "The Annunciation." Among the drils of the vine-wreath around it, the extreme humbler purposes to which the art has been delicacy of workmanship of which the material applied at the same factory, is the embellishment is susceptible. These foliated ornaments are of of a beer-jug, from a design by Townsend, course fashioned separately by hand, and ap- called "The Hop Story," and representing hopplied upon the moulded form. In a small bust gathering and cooperage. This is rich in effect, of Shakespeare, we must object to the too exact but the form is not elegant, and the cover is rendering of the lace; a sort of trickery unwor- ugly. Redgrave's water vase, a very graceful thy of Art. design, is about to be executed in Parian. We should add that two beautiful statuettes of praying children, by Bell, of which we have seen imperfect exemplars, are nearly ready to be added to the subjects already issued to the public.

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The Messrs. Copeland are not without rivals in this new field of productive ingenuity; though to them belongs the merit of first having entered upon it. At the Porcelain Works of Minton and Co., in the same town, a similar material, under the name of Parian, has been employed The "Parian" is somewhat whiter than the with like success; and, indeed, to the latter firm "Statuary Porcelain;" but from the limited we must award the palm as to the choice of sub- number of specimens of each that have come ject, and, in the largest number of instances, as under our examination, we cannot offer a decidto the excellence of the modelling. Many of ed opinion as to which presents the most marbleour readers have no doubt noticed in the shop like appearance. The works produced at the windows, their miniature copy of Danneker's same potteries vary in this respect; and some exquisite "Ariadne:" no piece of sculpture has have rather an unpleasant, waxy aspect. Our been more caricatured, by clumsy modellers in first impression was in favor of Copeland's; but alabaster and biscuit china; but the work now we have since been disposed to reverse that referred to, though not doing full justice to the judgment. Much, probably, depends upon the Frankfort original, is still a charming little draw- amount of heat to which the works are subjecting-room ornament. Bell's "Una and the Lion," ed. Copeland's composition, however, seems less executed as a companion-piece, and modelled, liable to flaw in the baking; and the works exewe believe, to the miniature size, by the sculp-cuted in his factory appear to be turned out

with the fewest superficial blemishes, caused by the joinings of the parts separately moulded, or by other causes. Still, Minton has produced the greater number of works of striking artistic merit. Very great praise is due to both; and their rivalry will lead yet, we doubt not, to important improvements. It is fair to mention that we have seen specimens formed of a new "body," (as their material is called by potters), produced by Messrs. Rose & Co. of Colebrookdale, which, if they can obviate an apparent tendency to too high a vitreous gloss of surface, is likely to surpass both the former. This composition they have named "Carraran;" but have not yet executed in it any works of merit sufficient to be made public.

lated to win ready favor with the ladies. But might not a modern drawingroom bride — some figure not pretending to the character of Art— be modelled as the support to spread this article upon, instead of subjecting us to the humiliation of seeing our general mother clad in costly finery, which she could not have come honestly by. Let it be remembered, that when Eve was at the fountain, she had not been an hour in existence; and as she had not yet seen her husband, the net-work scarf could not have been a present from him. But, ladies, the lace is not formed with all the labor you suppose. It is made by dipping real lace in a solution of the porcelain clay; and the original threads are destroyed in the baking, leaving the earthy coating. After this information, you will perhaps attach less value to it.

The impulse given by the public demand for Art-manufacturers, at the same time that it has introduced the use of these new porcelain clays, has led to improvements in the casting of iron for ornamental purposes; and the Colebrookdale Company have lately produced works in this material that quite deserve to be admitted into the category of works of Art. The most successful experiments that have come under our notice have been directed to the representation of animals; and we can speak, particularly, of a stag browsing, and of a brace of partridges, as having all the truth of character and the skil

Whilst we hail with much satisfaction an art which will supply us with "sculpture in little," we are sorry we cannot express unqualified approbation of all that has been done, or of all that has been attempted. Many instances have we met with in all departments of Art of strange perversions of taste; but none do we remember so ludicrously abominable as that which could cast a lace veil over the otherwise naked figure of Eve. So Bailey's sweet "Eve at the Fountain" has been treated at Messrs. Minton's pottery. "Spectatum admissi, risum teneatis amici?" It outdoes all that Horace could devise of incongruity. And we have "Rebecca at the Well," too, clad in a slip of purple lace, which sets off to advantage, the literally, snowy white-ful expression of the hair and feathers, that we ness of her flesh; but then, beneath the slip, she has a petticoat, and wears a turban and slippers, and other articles of dress. She does not make a compromise (a very indecent one) between Almacks' and the garden of Eden. The naked Eve is purity itself; but the lace is suggestive of the drawingroom; and where attire is needed is quite insufficient. We have heard of an African queen sitting at the door of her hut, very jauntily attired in a cocked hat and a pair of Wellingtons, but without the due medium between these extremes. We recommend the subject to the modeller of the Eve, as calculated to furnish a companion-piece to the Honiton and fig-leaves.

We suppose the chief blame must be thrown on the ill-taste of the public, which can make such sins against propriety and common sense profitable to the manufacturer. The manufacturer must be expected to deal with Art in a mercantile spirit; and it may be necessary for him to pander to the perverted taste of his patrons, even to obtain means to bring forward its remedy. No doubt, the lace, imitating so exactly real lace, and suggesting infinite labor and most delicate workmanship, as necessary to produce it in such a material as porcelain, is calcu

find in the best sculpture of similar objects. Two goats, and a group of a lion and wild boar, are almost equally excellent. This art, too, will progress.

Attention was first turned to embellishing manufactures by the superaddition of Art. Manufacturing power already discharges the obligation. Art ornamented the beer-jug and the knife-handle; manufacturing appliances multiply statuettes. Here is a field of industry open, suited to the genius of the land. We have confessed that we are not an artistic people; but all admit our manufacturing skill; and did we hold a lower rank than is in reality the case, in respect to artistic talent, great results might, nevertheless, be expected from the coalition between Art and manufacturing ingenuity. For it must be remembered that the purpose of Art-manufacture is not invention but reproduction. Its special function is to put the beautiful within reach of the many; and for the attainment of that object, to select wisely and copy well is all that is important. We have already noticed the similarity of the offices to be fulfilled by engraving and by porcelain casting. Engraving is a fine art in itself; and yet the proportion of its works which include original design is very

small indeed. We cannot, however, feel that it | otherwise than as the shop-windows serve, to a

is less important when it eternises copies of the fading Parma frescoes, than it would be should Signor Toschi present the world with a series of works wholly of his own invention; and so with the new art for as a new art we must regard it if it would do no more than give us well-executed copies of the best existing sculpture, we might well rest satisfied. If it should serve but to bring the people acquainted with those, it would be ploughing up a never-broken ground of feeling, imbedded in which may lie dormant seeds of taste and invention, to spring and flower where they find air and light.

But to say that we are not, or have not approved ourselves an artistic people, does not imply necessarily that we have among us no artistic talent; and in sculpture, certainly, we hold a fairer position than in painting. What has already been done in porcelain moulding shows that native original genius is at command; and to work for a public will be favorable to its development. And an interesting question arises: What will be the extent to which these new means will be effectual in popularising the inventions of the artist? The cost of the porcelain casts is considerable, and must necessarily be so. Though the models and moulds are of course expensive, where many copies are produced, that original outlay would cease to be a consideration of much importance; but the fitting of the parts separately moulded, and the finishing of those which come from the moulds in an imperfect state, by the hands of artists who earn in that employment several guineas per week, together with the large proportion of casts which fail in the baking (we understand that works in Parian are submitted to the fiery ordeal twice, and occasionally three times, from periods of from seventy to eighty hours each) necessarily cause the prices to be high, whatever be the numbers produced of any individual work; nor does there seem much prospect that the casualties, whether of the moulding or of the furnaces, can be rendered so much lighter, as in any material degree to reduce the cost. Statuettes, therefore, will not find their way into the laborer's cottage, and the ten-pound house; unless through such means as proposed by W. B. J., in his scheme for an "Art Manufacture Union," set forth in the last December number of this magazine. But among the middle classes, also, of society, Art has to be popularised; and it will fall within the means of most of those constituting these classes to have some specimens in their drawing-rooms or parlours. This is all we could expect. We must not hope at once to refine the tastes of the multitude to a high standard. They will receive indirect benefit, if no

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certain extent, as repositories of Art for them. The Ariadne and the Una, the Ondine and the Dorothea, the Guardian Angel and the St. Joseph, the Flora and the Jenny Lind, are not passed without notice by those even who have been little familiar with Art. The shop-windows do more than we are aware in the gradual and unconscious education of the eye, and refinement of the taste of the people.

We hope, however, to see Galleries of Art for the people, established on the plan proposed in the January number of this magazine; * and into them some of the works we have been considering might with propriety be admitted. In the meanwhile, those who are friendly to the diffusion of Art among the multitude may do something by exerting any influence they may possess, to induce the introduction of works tending to refine the taste into the club-rooms, lecture-rooms, and other places frequented by artisans, (the reader may probably smile, and suggest gin-palaces), and into schools, no matter of what kind. The most rigid of our modern iconoclasts would scarcely object to the admission of the 'Guardian Angel,' or of Bell's Children Praying,' into a Sunday or Infant-school. To do so would but show that themselves needed the humanising influence of Art.-Douglas Jerrold's Magazine.

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Egypt the plague was unknown. Although densely populated, the health of the inhabitants was preserved by strict attention to sanitary regula

tions. But with time came on change - and that

change was in man. The serene climate, the enriching river, the fruitful soil remained; but when the experience of 2,000 years was set at nought,

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when the precautions previously adopted for preserving the soil from accumulated impurities were neglected,-when the sepulchral rites of civilized Egypt were exchanged for the modern but barbarous practices of interment, — when the land of mummies became, as it now is, one vast charnel-house-the seed which was sown brought forth its bitter fruit, and from dangerous innovations came the most deadly pestilence. The plague first appeared in Egypt in the year 542, two hundred years after the change had been made from the ancient to the modern mode of sepulture; and every one at all acquainted with the actual condition of Egypt will at once recognize in the soil more than sufficient to account for the dreadful malady which constantly afflicts the people. – Mr. Walker on the Metropolitan Grave-Yards.

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*We take this opportunity of noticing an Erratum in the paper referred to, page 73, line 5, from the bottom: for" Panton-street," read " Hemming's-row."

THE ART OF ANGLING.

1. The Angler's Companion to the Rivers and Lochs of Scotland. By THOMAS TOD STODDART. Edinburgh and London, 1847.

2. A Handbook of Angling; Teaching Fly-fishing, Trolling, Bottom-Fishing, and Salmon-Fishing. By EPHEMERA. London, 1847.

The Art of Angling has for a length of time been among the most highly favored, and most assiduously pursued, of all our British sports, and any contributions which tend either to explain its theory, or improve its practice, cannot be otherwise than welcome to a piscatorial public. It is pleasant to read about angling during wintry weather, when close-time and the fear of water-baliff's debar the uses of the rod; and when the remembrance of bright and balmy summer days, all past and gone, and, it may be, the anticipation of still more genial seasons yet to come, throw a radiance even over the surrounding actualities of frost and snow -the imagination of the "Contemplative Angler " being, at the same time, no doubt, considerably enlivened by the sparkling presence of a steady though consuming fire.

That the study of works on angling during the other seasons of the year, the genial spring, the sultry summer, or the melancholy, though many-colored "fall," is productive of equal advantage, is another question. The fireside pleasure, and the water-side profit of such works, are two distinct matters, though each is well worthy of attentive consideration in its way. That one man may read about angling by the household hearth till his shoes are consumed

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achievements of Alexander the Great, of Julius Cæsar, and other men of renown, we fear, can now be only learned "from the record," seeing that they lived and died, came, saw, and conquered, in ages long gone by, into which we can not cast ourselves; and certain it is, that no exploration nowadays of the banks of the Granicus will tell us who headed the Macedonian phalanx, and overthrew Darius and his 600,000 Persians (surely a numerous people, if not a strong), any more than a walk, however lengthened, along the Rubicon, even from its lowly Adriatic mouth to gurgling fount on rocky Appenine, will tell us who crossed it one fine day, when perhaps he ought not to have done so, at least if he respected the Senate, or feared Pompey and a civil war. The student of these passages in history may practise what he pleases by the sides of famous streams, but they will tell him nothing unless he also deeply ponders over many a dark and dismal-looking volume, the very names of which we scarcely know, and if we did, would almost fear to write; but we are sure that his notes would not be of Limerick hooks (O'Shaughnessy's), or Kirby bends, of lance-wood, hickory, whalebone, or bamboo; nor yet of mohair, dubbing, silk, or silver-twist; nor of any form of feathers or their hue, "white, black, and gray, with all their trumpery." Instead of these would stand such mystical memoranda as the following: "Diod. 17. — Plut. in Alex. Justin. Curt. iii. c., 1.— Lucan. i. v., 185 and 213.- Strab. 5.

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Suet. in Cas. 32;"- and for anything we can aver to the contrary, the supposed student might not be much wiser than he was before, in spite of all this dread array. But the true piscator must be practical in all his ways; for no from off his feet, and his winter store of coals re- perceptive teaching can give the steady arm and duced to ashes, and know nothing of the sub-all-observing eye, or that peculiar combination ject after all, is just as certain as that another of their powers by which an adept's artificial fly man may be a first-rate angler without having is made after a semicircular sweep in upper ever had in hand a single book upon his much-air-to vault boldly across a raging river, and loved art. This only proves the truth of the old alight upon its surface within a couple of inches adage - that "practice is better than precept," of some chosen spot, - chosen either from past a saying which we don't here quote as any experience of its value, or it may be merely thing very original, but rather as being pecu- from that instinctive feeling by which a pracliarly applicable to the art of angling, with a tised angler ascertains, even in unaccustomed brief consideration of which we are now waters, about to beguile ourselves, if not our readers.

Let the student, then, bear thoughtfully in mind, that angling differs in many respects from most other subjects-for example, history and in nothing more than this, that books, by themselves books, are of no earthly use. The

"Where low submerged the princely salmon lies."

Neither can anything but ample and assiduous practice give that other combination of relentless firmness and gentle pliability, with which

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