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only laugh if she knew that the two letters full of chat and family newsand I am afraid a little slang—which she has found excuse for writing to me since my return, are kept in my pocket-book, and are read almost daily before I set into my evening work, albeit this work is preparatory to a new edition of Erasmus.

'Be sure you tell me every word Patty Housewater utters the next time you dream of her,' she writes in each letter; but Patty has never revisited me, and is but one of the many pleasant memories of my past ten days at Bishop Thornton, with which I should be loath indeed to part.*

A. C. D.

THE FESTA ON THE WATERS, IN HONOUR OF PRINCESS MARGHERITA.

Venice, May, 1868.

SOME years back I came to Venice. The age of poetry, I thought, had long past with me, but I found not even a sexagenarian could resist its influence here, while floating noiselessly along in the graceful gondola. Whether the setting sun was gilding the beautiful dome of Sta. Maria di Saluto, or the silvery light of the moon sparkling on the water—all was lovely, all was poetry. Venice then was mourning, her nobles were exiles, her beautiful palaces were crumbling to decay, or serving as barracks for the Austrian soldiers. Nightly did the fine Austrian band play in the Piazza of San Marco, but to whom? to Austrians and strangers, for where were the Venetians? The gondoliers cheerlessly plied their oars, for then rarely indeed did one ever hear them sing the strains of Tasso, as had been their wont in days of yore.

A few years have passed, and here I am again. Venice is free, her port is free, and again she sits like a queen upon the waters.

Not only is she now rejoicing in her independence, but she is giving a right royal welcome to the youthful bride of the House of Savoy. The national flag now streams from every palace on the Grand Canal, while the smaller canals and narrow streets are arched over by the banners which hang on either side. The ships are decked in their gayest colours, a large band plays in the Piazza, brilliantly illuminated with gas standards. It is thronged with people, whose cries of 'Evviva Margherita!' bring the young and popular bride to the window to be welcomed with hearty cheers.

But Venice is a queen of the waters, so that on her own element must her joyous reception be given.

*This sketch must be taken as it is meant-not to censure, but to compare; to set us thinking what is the same, what is different; what is fashion, and what real improvement; what is conceit, and what is advance; what is the taste of time, and what is real principle.-EDITOR.

At nine o'clock on the evening of the 25th of May, two huge barges might have been seen towed up by six and eight gondolas off the Ducal Palace, over which towered the Campanella looking as if it were in sunshine from the brilliancy of the illumination in the piazza below. Near the barges assembled (apparently, at least) the eight hundred gondolas which are said to ply in Venice, independently of the private ones. The barges which were for the orchestra and music, were in themselves one blaze of light, while most of the gondolas hoisted their coloured lanterns at stem or stern-the private gondoliers in their costumes-some with hats and long white ostrich feathers, some in velvet dresses; though the generality were in sober coloured suits with red or blue sashes.

At half-past nine, the overture being finished, the barges began to move. They were followed by the royal gondola with its scarlet draperies and liveries, and then we all followed, as best we could, wondering at, and admiring, the patience and precision of eye with which each gondolier kept his place, or pushed into some narrow streak of water left open by the others. This was no easy matter when the crowd of gondolas was so great, that at one time the canal seemed boarded over by boats, so that one could have walked across it dry-shod. There was no sparring, no quarreling; yet amidst such a multitude, the clang of voices was prodigious-but we have come to a halt, and all is changed; silence reigns around-not a sound is heard. The barges stop, and the music begins; such is the silence and complete hush of every other sound, that not even the softest note of song or instrument is lost: by the light of the lamps or the Bengal fires which are burning around, one can see, here and there, a gondolier standing at his post in his naturally graceful attitude, seemingly entranced; while others, equally absorbed, are taking advantage of the rest, and lying on their gondolas. The silence was most striking, and must have been grateful to the performers, who afterwards received their full meed of applause and encores. The music was all new, and written expressly for this occasion. After repeated halts we at length arrived at the beautiful Foscari Palace, so lately a barrack, now restored by the city, and at this time handsomely fitted up for the reception of the royal party, who landed here, and, in answer to the repeated shouts and calls of 'Viva Margherita,' shewed themselves at its beautiful balcony. Here the Princess received the serenade prepared for her, and she and the music seemed to share alike in the hearty cheers given to both.

This being concluded, the procession went on to the Rialto. It was now one o'clock, and we were anxious to return, but to effect this seemed an impossibility; fortunately, however, at this moment the Princess's gondola was seen to make a homeward move. Instantaneously many a sturdy arm was at work and many a back bent to seize the happy moment, and push backwards through the crowd. Not an angry word was heard, and in an inconceivably short time we found ourselves in clear water returning to our hotel, pleased and gratified by this

unique festá. The procession itself did not conclude till three in the morning.

Beautiful Venice! none can see her without loving her. May she always value, and know how to make good use of, the freedom she now enjoys.

NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY.

THIRD SERIES.

THE present and concluding series of the Loan Exhibition of National Portraits at South Kensington, extends from A. D. 1800-1867, and consists of 624 portraits of or by deceased celebrities, beginning with Gainsborough's full-length portrait of George Augustus Frederick, Prince of Wales, and ending with Bonham-Carter's small-sized head of Arthur Hugh Clough; what a gulph in thought and spirit between these two men, who not only died but were born and bred within one century. The collection proper is supplemented by some 320 portraits of older date, from that of Sir Brian Tuke, Treasurer of the Chamber to Henry VIII., to the thirty portraits of the Dillettante Society, painted by Knapton, Reynolds, and others, in the middle or close of the last century: but older than all, and of inestimable artistic and historical value, hangs once more upon these walls, the now famous contemporary portrait of Richard II., from its present home, the Jerusalem Chamber at Westminster; the coats of more modern painting overlaying the work of five hundred years back now removed, so that the spectator stands face to face with that face that, having as the sun made all 'beholders wink,' was at 'the last outfaced by Bolingbroke.'

But it seems better to leave the older pictures for a time, to begin with what is the real collection of the year, and thus follow the numbers of the catalogue: a catalogue, as alone to be procured in April, shorn of many of the convenient indices of last year; containing no list of lenders, subjects, or artists; and as all the portraits of the same person are by no means invariably together, it was difficult to make sure of having seen even the best portrait present of any celebrity, or that by the best artist.

As before said, Gainsborough is the painter of the gallant young prince, standing beside his chesnut horse, in scarlet uniform and K. G. star, trees and landscape behind him. Let us put aside all thoughts of the padded, stiff-stocked, unpleasing, elderly beau of later years, and thus be free to enjoy the tall, well-proportioned beauty of the fair-skinned red-lipped young man, so well fitted by nature to be a nation's hope and pride: Nature assuredly intended him for better things than were ever his; let us hope that some of the real blame of the faults of later years may be laid on the uncongenial circumstances surrounding the youth of a prince of VOL. 6. PART 31.

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spirit and such great personal advantages. Here the powdered hair is tied behind in a queue, and thus helps to enhance the fairness of the clear smooth skin. Next to the finest gentleman in Europe, hangs his fourth brother, Ernest Augustus Duke of Cumberland, the late King of Hanover, apparently far less intellectually, as well as personally, gifted

than his brother.

Many portraits of Nelson hang in this first bay: in No. 16, Gainsborough, we see him as a mere boy in midshipman's uniform, his eyes apparently brown instead of the well known blue of all other likenesses: Rigaud, No. 9, paints him as a slim post-captain of two-and-twenty, the dark blue eyes keener than the mouth: in Nos. 5, (Devis,) 14, (Guzzardi,) 27, (Abbot,) he is again represented; in the two last numbers, the face reddened by exposure, the naturally sorrowful expression of countenance almost degenerating into that of lachrymose dissipation. In 25, Beechey paints the gray-haired clerical father of England's favourite naval hero, and hence we learn that this distressed expression was hereditary.

No. 24, Henry Howard, is Cuthbert Collingwood, the brave Christian admiral, who, in one of his charming letters to his father-in-law, (At sea, June 5, 1794,) notes how, after cruising for some days in vain in search of the French fleet, it was on 'little Sarah's birth-day' that it was discovered to the windward. Many a blessing he sent forth to his other Sarah on the night of watching and preparation preceding the day thereafter to be known as the glorious 1st of June, lest he should never bless her more; and yet he could enjoy the fray as a true Englishman. 'The ship we were to engage was two a-head of the French Admiral, so that we had to go through his fire and that of the two ships next him, and received all their broadsides two or three times before we fired a gun. It was then near ten o'clock. I observed to the Admiral, that about that time our wives were going to church, but that I thought the peal we should ring about the Frenchmen's ears would out-do their parish bells.' Sixteen years later (1810) he died, home-sick as any school-boy, after long ill-health and many vain petitions to be relieved from the duties for which he was no longer fit, just off Port Mahon, when at last invalided home to wife and children by the Government that could not spare, so killed him.

Hoppner paints Sir Ralph Abercromby, (23,) and Sir R. Porter the same hero at the Battle of Alexandria. (3.) Nos. 12 and 18 are small full-lengths, after Gainsborough, of George III. and Queen Charlotte, the latter in a gauze dress striped and spotted with gold, her hair powdered and drawn up over a high cushion, yet this erection crowned with a wreath of flowers and leaves: No. 13, Beechey, gives us Frederica Charlotte Ulrica, Princess Royal of Prussia, later, Duchess of York, as a young girl in a low white dress, her brown hair much in the present short dishevelled half-curled mode, with a red and white complexion, truer, probably, in this mere girl, than in many of Sir W. Beechey's other and elder sitters. Had he been sent to Prussia to see whether the

young princess would be to the taste of the second son of his royal master?

Reynolds paints Richard Brinsley Sheridan, comely and plump in face, his gray eyes smiling, in 28: who that has seen 'The Rivals,' even read them, can forget the wit and pleasantry that once made the writer a favourite with the heir apparent of the day? William Pitt precedes and follows the author and statesman in Nos. 15, 31, and 32. Gainsborough, in the earliest number, gives the upright pose and small-eyed sensible face with which last year's Exhibition made us familiar: Hoppner, 31, paints the great statesman as a far older man, the face broader, and but for the erect attitude scarcely recognizable without the aid of the catalogue; a wreath of laurel dimly makes an oval of the otherwise square picture. A little later, 33, Reynolds gives us Fox, burly, free, and hearty, his short thick hair powdered. Lord Erskine, Nos. 36 (Gainsborough) and 46, (Lawrence,) has the marked peculiar face to be expected in the clever eccentric man, who beginning life as a sailor ended it as ex-Lord Chancellor. Lord Eldon, Erskine's Tory rival and successor, appears, as painted by Owen, 37, overpowered by his stiff and gorgeous robes: 51, (Lawrence,) he has a fine face, grey hair and eyebrows. Samuel Whitbread, 41, (Gainsborough,) another of the last century political celebrities, is by no means the strong-bodied man one would have expected to see, rather a delicate, almost effeminate looking, fine gentleman, the small oval eyes of the pale, fair, and oval face singularly far apart. In George Canning, 52, Hoppner's colours have apparently faded. The Rev. Rowland Hill, 57, (Keeling,) has a keen face, but the portrait is hung so as to be little visible on a darkish day. Spencer Perceval, 67, (Joseph,) is represented as a little shrunken old man, though he was but fifty when he was killed. He has a half-smiling expression as he sits in his arm-chair, ink-stand and boxes around him. The picture is marked as a posthumous portrait. Assassinated in the House of Commons, 1812, his tragic death was commemorated in Westminster Abbey by Westmacott, at the cost to the nation of £5,250; but he sleeps quietly in the little old-fashioned church of Old Charlton, Kent, then a quiet village burial place where many loved to lay their bones, whether parishioners or no, and Perceval was brother-in-law of the Sir T. Maryon Wilson, then lord of its manor.

Beechey and Evans paint two naval heroes, Gambier and Hardy, Nos. 72 and 75, the latter him to whom 'Kiss me, Hardy,' of Nelson's last hours was addressed. He was once a Dorset chemist's assistant, here an old man in naval uniform, with a short face and good low bald forehead. Lord St. Vincent and Sir John Moore hang near Hardy, in Nos. 76 and 77.

A little later we come to another class of celebrities. Sarah Kemble, (Mrs. Siddons,) by Romney, 81, a sketch in half-tones, the wonderful eyes up-cast, their expression heightened by the depth of shade above them, the countenance calm, steady, and soft: 95 is Reynolds's representation of the same gifted actress as The Tragic Muse, two long plaits of the light brown

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