Page images
PDF
EPUB

some important changes in these respects will ere long take place; changes which may be beneficial to England as well as America, for the greater the intercourse between the two countries, the better it will I trust be for both. It would in particular be advantageous to England to be able to obtain a supply of tea from America, the trade with China, owing to the restrictions of the imperial government, being less profitable than that with countries adopting a liberal policy.

CHAPTER XXX.

THE FINE ARTS.

THE reader may smile at the mention of the fine arts in America; yet I cannot properly pass them over without a slight notice. The Americans hitherto have had so much to do in necessary works, that they have had but little leisure to attend to the merely ornamental. They have had so many roads to form, so many bridges to build, so much land to clear, that it would have been wonderful indeed, if they had become eminent as sculptors and painters. I have not heard of a single American sculptor, but West long since became famous as a painter, and within these few years several American artists have delighted Europe. The most remarkable thing connected with them is, that their own country offers so little encouragement to them, that nearly all of them are obliged to settle in a foreign land. When I was at New York, endeavours were used to persuade persons to purchase tickets, to view a painting which was then exhibiting for the benefit of the artist, that a sufficient sum might be raised to enable him to pro

ceed to England. So little do the Americans encourage their native artists, that it is a rare thing to see even a portrait in a private house; and their public edifices have few of any kind. The Capitols of Virginia and Pennsylvania are almost destitute of them: that of New York has a full length portrait of Washington, and of several of the State governors: that of the United States has two historical paintings of very interesting subjects, one being the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the other the final surrender of the British troops to the American, by which the revolutionary war was terminated. I must say however, that these two paintings appeared to me to be too much of daubs to be placed in the Capitol. The painting exhibited at New York was of St. Paul preaching at Athens. The execution, so far as I could judge, was, with one or two defects, such as would reflect credit on painters of more practice than the young man whose performance it was. But the design, exemplified a remark made by Dr. Adam Clarke, in one of his notes on the Bible, that painters are bad commentators. To produce

effect, they depart from probability. In this painting, as in almost all those taken from scripture, figures are introduced in situations quite unnatural. The same fault is particularly con

[ocr errors]

spicuous in West's painting of Christ Rejected, where a woman is lying on the cross in a way very unlikely to have been the case. Who amongst painters except Teniers, deserves the character of being a follower of nature? In several of the museums are some paintings creditable to the country.

The museums themselves may properly be here noticed. In Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Richmond, are museums of curiosities natural and artificial. Peele's Museum in Philadelphia is considered the best in the United States. It has treasures, of use to the geologist, the ornithologist, the zoographer and the antiquarian. To compare it with the British Museum in London, or that in the Garden of Plants in Paris, would be unfair, yet it may be believed, that few cities of the same magnitude in either England or France can show one superior. Some great additions are however requisite in the departments of entomology and mineralogy.

The only public exhibition of a collection of paintings by living artists that I saw or heard of, was that of the Academy of Arts of Philadelphia. It appeared to me to be a very creditable

exhibition. The number of pictures was about the same as that in the annual exhibition at Norwich, and the talent displayed also much on a par. Philadelphia however, be it observed, contains a population more than double that of Norwich, and is the metropolis of a State as large as England, whereas Norwich, though the capital of a county, is a city of only third rate importance. This is not mentioned with any invidious feeling, but with a view of giving a just idea of the progress of the fine arts in America.

I have mentioned that in several of the cities ornamental architecture has been in requisition to embellish the public buildings. I have little to add on this subject; yet it is right to state, that in some of the rising villages and small towns, a similar attention to beauty is apparent. In the western parts of New York in particular, I was much struck with the elegance of some of the church spires.

The University of Virginia at Charlottesville, is a large building, in which the architect has properly displayed all the different orders. Perhaps it may be called a beautiful building, though I cannot think that its construction is such as to manifest good taste. It has five divisions united

« PreviousContinue »