Angelica Kauffman. Figures typical of the arts form the subjects, which were no doubt painted at the time of the removal of the Academy from St. Martin's Lane to Somerset House, when Sir Joshua and the chief Academicians aided in the adornment of their new abode. The books are in wainscot cases, closely covered in with crimson silk, which gives the apartment a warm, rich aspect. The Library now comprises all the best works on art, a considerable number of prints, and a collection, of considerable value, of engravings of the Italian school from the earliest period, purchased from George Cumberland, who formed it. Busts ornament the top of the shelves, and over the fireplace is a cast of a Holy Family by Michael Angelo. We must not omit to add, before we leave the Library, that Wilson was saved perhaps from actual destitution, during some of the later years of his life, by the office of Librarian, which was given to him by the Academy.

Let us now step from the Library into the Council-Room. This is an apartment small in size for such a body as the Academy, but rich in its works of art, which are chiefly the diploma pictures and statuary: that is, the works given by the Academicians on their admission, each person being expected to present one work from his own hand. The ceiling is very elegantly arranged in compartments, filled with paintings by West, the centre representing the Graces unveiling Nature, and the surrounding pictures figures typical of the elements. First in size, in splendour, and in value, along the walls, we behold Sir Joshua's full-length portrait of George III., seated on the throne, and wearing his kingly robes. The author of the Nightmare,' Fuseli, has left here one of his most favourite works-Thor battering the serpent of Midgard in the boat of Hymer the giant'—a subject borrowed from the Scandinavian mythology, which had so many attractions for Fuseli's imaginative, romantic, and most daring genius. His love for the terrific was pleasantly satirised by his brother Academicians, who called him "Painter in ordinary to the Devil!" But the Academy has had few greater men-few men more generally great-than Fuseli. His lectures are admirable, enforcing in pregnant language the most pregnant truths. As with Reynolds, Michael Angelo is the great god of his idolatry; and he used often to tell his friends how he had been accustomed to lie on his back on the pavement of the Sistine Chapel for hours together, day after day, and week after week, intently wrapped in the grandeur of that matchless ceiling; and it is not difficult to trace in Fuseli's productions something more than a spark of the sublime genius of the Florentine. His paintings for the Shakspere Gallery, formed under the patronage of the enlightened and generous Boydell, and the series for the Milton Gallery, which was entirely his own production, testify a mind of the very highest order, though not perhaps always under the best regulation. Mr. Cunningham says of him, very happily, "Out of the seventy exhibited paintings on which he reposed his hope of fame, not one can be called commonplace: they are all poetical in their nature, and as poetically treated. Some twenty of these alarm, startle, and displease; twenty more may come within the limits of common comprehension; the third twenty are such as few men could produce; while the remaining ten are equal in conception to anything that genius has hitherto produced, and second only in their exccution to the true and recognised masterpieces of

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art." England may be proud of having fostered, and made, in every essential respect, her own, such a man as Fuseli. Passing over a variety of works, all of greater or less interest and importance, such as A Rustic Girl' by Lawrence, The Tribute Money' by Copley, A Shepherd Boy' by Westall, 'Charity' by Stothard, Jael and Sisera' by Northcote, The Falling Giant' by Banks (a work of wonderful power of expression), we pause a moment before the productions of the greatest of British sculptors, the Apollo and Marpessa,' and a cast of the shield of Achilles, by Flaxman. "If ever Purity visited the earth, she resided with John Flaxman," said one who knew him intimately; and it is impossible to gaze on his works without feeling some such truth, breathed, as it were, from out the marble. Sir Joshua's judgment was for once found tripping in Flaxman's case. As a student, he contended for the gold medal, which, however, was given to Englehart-a man now only remembered from that circumstance. Flaxman married early; and one day, shortly after, met Sir Joshua. So, Flaxman, I am told you are married: if so, sir, you are ruined for an artist.” Again was the President deceived: never was marriage more happy in all its consequences. We wish we could pause over some of the delightful domestic scenes recorded of this simple-hearted and lofty-minded pair. Again we must hurry quickly by Baily's bust of Flaxman, that of West by the recently-deceased sculptor Chantrey, the Cupid and Psyche' by Nollekens, Christ blessing Children' by West, &c. Many other paintings are at present in the Exhibition Room, hidden behind the modern works. Among these are a portrait of Hoppner by himself, Wilkie's picture of The Rat-Catchers' (now invested with a more melancholy interest from the recent death of the great painter), Opie's 'Infancy and Age,' Raeburn's Boy and Rabbits,' &c. &c. There, too, is a portrait of that most delightful and most English of landscape-painters-that somewhat wayward, and occasionally gross, but ever humorous, witty, and delightful member of society-that enthusiastic artist and half-mad musician-Gainsborough. He appears to have painted portraits for the same reason that everybody else does— money; landscapes because he loved them; but he was a musician because he could not help it. Musicians and their instruments, of every kind and in every degree, he worshipped them all. His friend Jackson says, "He happened on a time to see a theorbo in a picture of Vandyke's; and concluded, because perhaps it was finely painted, that the theorbo must be a fine instrument. He recollected to have heard of a German professor; and, ascending to his garret, found him dining on roasted apples, and smoking his pipe, with his theorbo beside him. I am come to buy your lute: name your price, and here's your money.' 'I cannot sell my lute.' 'No, not for a guinea or two; but you must sell it, I tell you.' My lute is worth much money: it is worth ten guineas.' 'Ay! that it is-see, here's the money.' So saying, he took up the instrument, laid down the price, went half-way down the stairs, and returned. I have done but half my errand. What is your lute worth if I have not your book?' What book, Master Gainsborough? Why, the book of airs you have composed for the lute.' Ah, Sir, I can never part with my book!' Poh! you can make another at any time :this is the book I mean: there's ten guineas for it-so, once more, good day.

*British Painters,' vol. ii. p. 346.

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He went down a few steps, and returned again. What use is your book to me if I don't understand it? And your lute: you may take it again if you won't teach me to play on it. Come home with me, and give me the first lesson.' 'I will come to-morrow.' You must come now.' 'I must dress myself.' • For what? You are the best figure I have seen to-day.' 'I must shave, sir.' I honour your beard!' I must, however, put on my wig.' 'D-n your wig! Your cap and beard become you. Do you think, if Vandyke was to paint you, he'd let you be shaved?" And so the poor German professor was hurried off. Smith, the writer of the Life of Nollekens,' one day found Gainsborough listening in speechless admiration, and with tears on his cheeks, to the playing of a first-rate violin-player-Colonel Hamilton. Suddenly the painter called out, "Go on, and I will give you the picture of the Boy and the Stile,' which you have so often wished to purchase of me." He was as good as his word: the Colonel took away the picture with him in a coach.

With a brief account of the constitution of the Academy we conclude. It consists of forty Academicians-painters, sculptors, and architects—and twenty Associates, from whom the Academicians are elected by the Academicians. There are also six Associate Engravers, who, however, must remain Associates-a feature in which, it is said, we know not with what truth, this Academy stands alone in Europe. With the body of Academicians rests all the business of the Society, the Associates having no voice in any of its proceedings. The Associates are chosen by the Academicians from the great body of artists who exhibit. The chief officers of the Academy are the President, the Keeper (who has the general care of the Institution), the Treasurer, Librarian, and Secretary. There are four Professors, who lecture respectively on painting, sculpture, architecture, and perspective, who are Academicians, and a Professor of Anatomy, who is not always a member. The honorary members are a Professor of Ancient Literature, Professor of Ancient History, a Chaplain, of high rank in the Church (the Lord Bishop of London at present), and a Secretary for Foreign Correspondence. These offices have been held by Gibbon, Dr. Burney, Walter Scott, and other eminent men, in addition to those before mentioned-Johnson and Goldsmith. All elections require the Sovereign's signature to make them valid. The most onerous, in every sense, of the duties of the Academy is the choice of the works for the Annual Exhibition. Large as the number of pictures admitted always is, a great many are annually rejected; and sometimes not from want of merit on the part of the artist, but for want of space on the part of the Academy. The process of selection, as it has been described to us, forms a noticeable scene. Here sit the nine members of the Council behind a large table; whilst there porters, &c., are hurrying to and fro, passing every single work in review before them. Is it sufficiently good? —it is so marked, and placed in a certain part of the building. Is it only middling?-it goes, with a suitable mark, to another place, to take the chance of being included in the Exhibition, if the good ones should leave any room. Is it decidedly bad?—it is at once ordered to be returned to the artist. Where some seven or eight hundred artists are chosen, as in the present Exhibition, we may judge of the character of a great part of the rejected. Fuseli used to express, in his own satirical way, the anti-genial effect upon him of the greater part of

Many very many, Sir," was the "There are six landscapes, Sir, by

the works that came pouring in. Standing one day at the receipt of pictures, he called out, "What pictures are come?" reply. "I know that, but whose are they?" Mr. coat and umbrella, and I'll go and see them."

"Oh! don't name him: I know whom you mean. Bring me my

Our space will not admit of our doing more than merely referring to the splendid dinner given annually by the Academicians, to which the most distinguished personages of our country-nobles, warriors, statesmen, poets, literary and professional men, &c., &c.—are alone invited. A brilliant assemblage! and not unworthy of them the Institution-whatever its defects-they have met to do honour to.

[Francis Moore, 1657, From an anonymous print published at that date.]

LXVI.-LONDON ASTROLOGERS.

WHETHER there be prophecies, we are told they shall fail: but that has not yet altogether come to pass in London; for the Worshipful Company of Stationers, we believe, still continue to prophesy, even as they have been in the habit of doing for some hundreds of years past. And if, according to the proverb, the honour they thereby acquire among their countrymen be but small, we do not doubt that the profit is considerable. The prognostications which they publish to the world, in truth, were never so distinctly and all but avowedly their own as they have come to be in our day. They are now, if we mistake not, all put forth in the single name of Francis Moore-a most venerable name, we admit, but still for a long time past palpably nothing but a name; for the largest bump, or bumpkin, of credulity among the buyers and believers of their predictions cannot fancy that Francis, who has been star-gazing and almanac-making almost ever since almanacs or stars were heard of, can be still alive. It must be taken to be now as good as confessed that the magni nominis umbra of Francis Moore is nothing more than the fan, as it were, behind which the Worshipful Company half hide, half reveal themselves, in their astrological coquettings with the public -that they are their own dreamers of dreams and seers of visions-that all the signs and wonders and mystic lore of their almanacs are to be considered as, if not the actual produce of their worshipful brains, at least manufactured under their direction and offered to purchasers on their sole responsibility-in short, as

VOL. III.

R