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from, but accumulated in, the system, as is | rant was obtained to search the premises of generally believed. The minds of nervous the latter, when a quantity of green colorindividuals were, however, soon quieted by the knowledge that other experimenters had striven to make plants thrive under arsenical soaking, but had found that they either pertinaciously persisted in dying in a few days, or obstinately refused to imbibe any of the poison. Moreover, it was shown that, even allowing that turnips grown upon these manures absorbed arsenic, the quantity was so small that one hundredweight of roots would not contain more than half a grain; and that, notwithstanding the custom of soaking wheat in arsenical solutions previous to sowing it, in order to destroy the spores of the smut, no poison could ever be detected in the grain thrashed out.

ing matter, used for tinting sweetmeats, was discovered, which on analysis proved to be Scheele's green. There are many other articles in every day use, in the manufacture or finishing of which arsenic forms a dangerous ingredient; candles, for instance, are not uncommonly made up with either white or green preparations of arsenic, which may in combustion give rise to deleterious fumes; and only last February, the Tribunal of Correctional Police of Paris condemned a flowermaker to six days' imprisonment, and a fine of three hundred francs, for having severely injured the health of one of his workmen by employing him to spread a green powder over certain flowers, assuring him at the same time that it was not arsenical.

It is much to be regretted that some other and perfectly harmless green pigment is not One form yet remains to be mentioned, in substituted for this dangerous compound, which arsenic is unguardedly allowed to be since it leads one to look with suspicion on sold, and might become the means, either all cakes, lozenges, isinglass, gelatine, and intentionally or not, of poisoning; we allude confectionery, otherwise rendered doubly to the papier moure, or fly-papers, so much tempting by the beautiful tint. The very in use in summer weather for destroying seductive manner in which this painted con- these little household pests. Chemical analfectionery if offered for sale, is well illus-ysis has detected no fewer than from three trated by a case of poisoning mentioned to five grains of arsenious acid, the white some time ago in the Times. At a fair in arsenic of commerce, in each separate paper; the south of England six children were seized and yet, when offered for sale, we are told with symptoms of poisoning. On inquiry, that they are harmless to any thing save init was ascertained that they had been eating sect life. Surely, if the use of unglazed green some colored sweetmeats called bird's-nests, paper-hangings and green confectionery is so which they had purchased at the fair. On much to be condemned, a stop should be put apprehending the person who sold them, to the sale of these fly-papers, two or three several other bird's-nests were found in his of which contain arsenic sufficient to poison a possession; and as he averred that they were whole family. bought from a confectioner in Exeter, a war

AUCTUMNALIA.

LONDON is empty; sport begins;
Statesmen are seen in tweed apparel.
Hey for the flash of silver fins,

The glory of the double-barrel!
Some vagrants crowd the Scotch express-
Some fly by steam the Channel over.
Brougham doth the Irish mind address,
And Palmerston is off to Dover.

And Crinoline goes out of town

To country-houses cool and pleasant, Plays billiards (if mamma wont frown), And by and by will mark her pheasant;

In Lincoln-green enchants the men,

A charming archeress, lithe and lissom;
Fishes a little now and then-

She'll catch her fish: they never miss 'em.

Glad will the new Lord Warden be

To hear the Cinque Ports townsfolk cheering; Glad, too, the Chancellor, if he

Succeed in his electioneering.

Yet of the Whigs, their joys amid,
One painful thought will take possession:
Surgit amari aliquid-

"How shall we last another Session ?"
-Press

From Chambers's Journal.
RIVAL EASELS.

passing through gradually the various stages. of studentship, and emerging at last a canTHERE have always been factions in art; didate for the highest prizes of the instituand while the schools have battled corpor- tion. He underwent few of the privations ately, there have been plenty of single com- of the beginner-few of the struggles of the bats amongst individual artists. Pordenone, ordinary student. As soon as he could draw painting his frescoes in the cloisters of S. and color decently, there were patrons for Stefano at Venice, with his sword drawn, and him; almost a "royal road" was open to buckler at hand, prepared for the violence of him. Mrs. Jordan sat now as the Comic Titian, is a sample of the masters who found Muse, now as Hippolite; a "lady of qualit necessary to combine the profession of the ity" appeared as a Bacchante. Then came fine arts with the business of a bravo. Do- portraits of the Duke and Duchess of York, menico Veniziano was brutally assassinated the Prince of Wales, and the Duke of by Andrea del Castagno; Annibale Caracci, Clarence. He resided in Charles Street, Cesari, and Guido were driven from Naples, close to Carlton House, and wrote himself and their lives threatened by Belisario, Spag-"portrait-painter to the Prince of Wales." noletto, and Caracciolo; Agostino Beltrano, The king and queen were quite willing to surpassed by his own wife Aniella di Rosa (the niece of a painter of eminence), murdered her in his jealous rage; Michael Angelo was envious of the growing fame of Sebastiano del Piombo; Hudson quarrelled with his pupil Reynolds, who, in his turn, grew uneasy at the progress of his rival Romney. Northcote says: "Certain it is that Sir Joshua was not much employed in portraits after Romney grew in fashion!" Reynolds spoke of him always as "the man in Cavendish Square," where he lived, in the house No. 32, afterwards Sir Martin Archer Shee's. Hoppner, on his death-bed, writhed under the polite attentions of Sir Thomas Lawrence. "In his visits," said the poor sick man, “there is more joy at my approaching death than true sympathy for my sorrows." The mother of John Hoppner was one of the German attendants at the royal palace. He was born in London, in the summer of 1759. The king took a personal interest in the bringing up and education of the child; who, from his sweet musical voice and correct ear, was in time adorned with the white stole of a chorister of the royal chapel. Of course there were motives attributed in explanation of the king's kindness and benevolence, and the boy himself was in no haste to contradict the slanderers who credited him with royal descent. The world chose to see confirmation of these rumors in the favor subsequently extended to the young man by the Prince of Wales, who supported him actively against such rivals as Lawrence, Owen, and Opie; and brought a stream of the aristocracy to his studio. He entered, as a probationer, the school of the Royal Academy,

favor their son's favorite, especially as they thought, with many other people of the time, that the Prince of Wales, like Visto, “had a taste." But soon obstacles seemed to intervene between them and the painter. They had never liked Reynolds. He had always been calm and unembarrassed in their presence-never awed or troubled— and the near-sighted king, looking close into his pictures, had pronounced them "rough and unfinished." He preferred the smoothness of West and Ramsay. Hoppner, full of honest admiration for Sir Joshua, did not hesitate to sound his praises even in the unwilling royal ears. This displeased the king very much. The Carlton House court, too, was going on in a way desperately annoying to good "Farmer George," and Hoppner made himself celebrated there, for he was gay and witty, and high-spirited. The Prince of Wales having joined the Whigs, Hoppner became a zealous politician, and of the party opposed to the king. He could expect nothing from their majesties after that. Certainly he was imprudent. What had a painter to do with politics? He thus diminished the area of his prospects. It became quite impossible for Tory noblemen to sit to a stanch Whig portrait-painter. He might caricature them: and having painted all the Whigs, what was he to do? With a rival in the field, too, by no means to be despised or spoken lightly of.

Thomas Lawrence, the son of a man who had been by turns a solicitor, a poet, and artist, a supervisor of Excise, a farmer and innkeeper, and, of course, a bankrupt, was born at Bristol ten years later than Hoppner.

an associate under the age of twenty-four. He was opposed by many of the academicians, and virulently attacked by Peter Pindar. In 1792, he attended the funeral of Sir Joshua in St. Paul's Cathedral, when Mr. Burke attempted to thank the members of the academy for the respect shown to the remains of their president, but overcome by his emotion, was unable to utter a word. In 1795, Mr. Lawrence was elected a member of the academy, having previously succeeded Sir Joshua as painter in ordinary to the king

Benjamin West being elected to the presidential chair. Add to his unquestionable art-abilities, that he was courtly in manner, an accomplished fencer and dancer, with a graceful figure and a handsome face; that he possessed an exquisitely modulated voice; and large, lustrous expressive eyes--the light in which seemed to be always kindling and brilliant.

He was the youngest of sixteen children; an infant prodigy, on a chair reciting poetry, when four years old; a little later, and he begins to draw. "He can take your likeness, or repeat you any speech in Milton's Pandemonium," says the father, landlord of the Bear Inn, posting-house, Devizes, "although he is only five years old." And at this age he produced a striking likeness of Mr. afterwards Lord, Kenyon. At seven, the portrait of the prodigy was taken and engraved by Mr. Sherwin the artist. At eight, it seems his education was finished. Perhaps he was wanted at the inn, for the readings of the child attracted crowds of visitors from Bath. He recited at various times before Garrick, Wilkes, Sheridan, Burke, Johnson, and others. All were charmed with the boy. He was splendidly handsome, with long redundant dark curls that tumbled over and hid his face when he stooped to draw. He longed to go on the stage, as much that he might at once assist his family as for any other reason, but he was overruled. In 1785, he received a medal from the Society of Arts for his crayon drawing of Raphael's "Transfiguration." In 1787, being then eighteen, he exhibited seven pictures at the Royal Academy. He painted his own portrait, and wrote of it to his mother: "To any but my own family, I certainly should not say this; but, excepting Sir Joshua, for the painting of the head, I would risk my reputation with any painter in London." It was broadly painted, threequarters size, with a Rembrandtish effect, as Sir Joshua detected when the canvas was shown to him. "You have been looking at The factions of Reynolds and Romney the old masters; take my advice, and study lived again in the rivalry of Hoppner and nature." He dismissed the young artist Lawrence. The painters appeared to be with marked kindness however. In 1789, well matched. Hoppner had the advantage Sir Martin Archer Shee wrote of him, as "a of a start of ten years, though this was nearly genteel, handsome young man, effeminate in balanced by the very early age at which his manner;" adding, "he is wonderfully Lawrence obtained many of his successes. laborious, and has the most uncommon pa- Hoppner was also a handsome man, of retience and perseverance." About this time fined address and polished manner; he, too, he painted the Princess Amelia, and Miss possessed great conversational powers, while Farren the actress, afterwards Countess of in the matter of wit and humor he was probDerby, "in a white satin cloak and muff;" ably in advance of his antagonist. He was and whole-length portraits of the king and well-read-" one of the best-informed paintqueen, to be taken out by Lord Macartney ers of his time," Mr. Cunningham informs us as presents to the emperor of China. In-frank, out-spoken, open-hearted, gay, and 1791, after one defeat, he was admitted an whimsical. He had all the qualifications for associate of the Royal Academy by a sus- a social success, and was not without some pension of the law against the admission of of those Corinthian characteristics which

Byron did not criticise leniently his contemporaries, but he records in his diary: "The same evening I met Lawrence the painter, and heard one of Lord Grey's daughters play on the harp so modestly and ingeniously, that she looked music. I would rather have had my talk with Lawrence, who talked delightfully, and heard the girl, than have had all the fame of Moore and me put together. The only pleasure of fame is, that it paves the way to pleasure, and the more intellectual the better for the pleasure and us too." It will be seen that the "portrait-painter to the Prince of Wales" had no mean opponent in the "portrait-painter in ordinary to his majesty."

fanciful collars and lappels; and the waistcoats, many-topped and many-hued, winding about in tortuous lines. It is not to be much marvelled at that such items of costume as Cumberland corsets, Petersham trousers, Brummel cravats, Osbaldeston ties, and exquisite's crops, should be only sketchily rendered in paint. Of course, Mr. Opie, who went in for thorough John Bullism in art, who laid on his pigments steadily with a trowel, and produced portraits of ladies like washerwomen, and gentlemen like Wapping publicans of course, unsentimental, unfashionable Mr. Opie denounced the degeneracy of his competitor's style. "Lawrence makes coxcombs of his sitters, and they make a coxcomb of him." Still "the quality" flocked to the studios of Messrs. Hoppner and Lawrence, and the rival easels were always adorned with the most fashionable faces of the day.

were indispensable in a man of fashion, from white muslin that swathed the chins and the Prince of Wales' point of view. With necks of the sitters; and the coats, with Edridge, the associate miniature-painter, and two other artists, he was once at a fair in the country where strong ale was abounding, and much fun, and drollery, and din. Hoppner turned to his friends. "You have always seen me," he said, "in good company, and playing the courtier, and taken me, I dare say, for a deuced well-bred fellow, and genteel withal. All a mistake. I love low company, and am a bit of a readymade blackguard." He pulls up his collar, twitches his neckcloth, sets his hat awry, and with a mad humorous look in his eyes, is soon in the thickest of the crowd of rustic revellers. He jests, gambols, dances, soon to quarrel and fight. He roughly handles a brawny wagoner, a practised boxer, in a regular scientific set-to; gives his defeated antagonist half a guinea, re-arranges his toilet, and retires with his friends amidst the cheers of the crowd. It is quite a Tom-and-Jerry scene. Gentlemen delighted to fight coalheavers in those days. Somehow we always hear of gentlemen being victorious; perhaps if the coal-heavers could tell the story, it would sometimes have a different dénouement. Unfortunately for Hoppner, he had to use his fingers, not his fists, against Lawrence-to paint him down, not fight him.

For a time the rivalry was continued in a spirit of much moderation. The painters were calm and forbearing, and scrupulously courteous to each other. Lawrence was too gentle and polite ever to breath a word against his antagonist, if, indeed, he did not respect his talents too highly to disparage them. Perhaps he was conscious that vicHe was a skilful artist, working with an tory would be his in the end, as Hoppner eye to Sir Joshua's manner, and following might also have a presentiment that he was him oftentimes into error as well as into to be defeated. He was of a quick temper; truth and beauty. Ridiculing the loose was a husband and a father; entirely detouches of Lawrence, he was frequently as pendent on his own exertions, though he faulty, without ever reaching the real fasci- could earn five thousand a year easily when nation of his rival's style. He had not the fully employed; but certainly the innkeepLawrence sense of expression and charm; er's son was stealing away his sitters, even he could not give to his heads the vivacity his good friends the Whigs. He chafed unand flutter, the brilliance and witchery, of der this. He began to speak out. He deSir Thomas' portraits. They both took up nounced Lawrence's prudent abstinence from Reynolds' theory about it being "a vulgar all political feeling as downright hypocrisy. error to make things too like themselves," He thought it cowardice to side with neither as though it were possible to paint too truth-faction, and be ready and willing to paint fully. And painting people of fashion, they the faces of both; and then he commenced had to paint-especially in their earlier days to talk disrespectfully of his rival's art. He -strange fashions; and an extravagant, and claimed for his own portraits greater purity fantastic, and meretricious air clings as a of look and style. The ladies of Lawconsequence to many of their pictures; for rence," he said, " show a gaudy dissolutethe Prince of Wales had then a grand head ness of taste, and sometimes trespass on of hair (his own hair), which he delighted to moral as well as professional chastity." This pomatum and powder and frizzle; and, of was purposed to be a terrible blow to Lawcourse, the gentlemen of the day followed rence. Of courset here were plenty of repethe mode; and then the folds and folds of titions of the remark, and people laughed

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over it a good deal; but in the end it injured Hoppner rather than Lawrence. The world began to wonder how it was that the painter to the purest court in Europe should depict the demure and reputable ladies of St. James' with such glittering eyes and carmine lips-a soupçon of wantonness in their glances, and a rather needless undraping of their beautiful shoulders; while the painter to the prince was bestowing on the giddy angels of Carlton House a decency that was within a little of dull, a simplicity that was almost sombreness, a purity that was prudery. The beauties of George III.'s court were not displeased to be pictorially credited with a levity they did not dare to live up or down to; and the ladies of the prince's court, too honest to assume a virtue they had not, now hastened to be represented by an artist who appeared so admirably to comprehend their allurements. Poor Mr. Hoppner was deserted by the Whig ladies; he had now only the Whig lords to paint, unless he took up with landscape art, for which he had decided talent, as many of the backgrounds to his pictures demonstrate. He grew peevish and irritable. He took to abusing the old masters, and cried out at the neglect of living men. Examining a modern work, he would say: "Ay, it's a noble picture, but it has one damning defect -it's a thing of to-day. Prove it to be but two hundred years old, and from the brush of a famous man, and here's two thousand guineas for it." Northcote tells of him: "I once went with him to the hustings, to vote for Horne Tooke, and when they asked me what I was, I said, "A painter." At this Hoppner was very mad all the way home, and said I should have called myself a portrait-painter. I replied that the world had no time to trouble their heads about such distinctions."

He

Hoppner now produced but few pictures, and these met with small success. looked thin and haggard, talked incoherently, with occasional bitter repinings and despondency. He resented and misinterpreted, as has been shown, Lawrence's inquiries as to his health. Certainly, there is every appearance of feeling in Lawrence's letter, where he writes to a friend, "You will be sorry to hear it. My most powerful competitor, he whom only to my friends I have acknowledged as my rival, is, I fear, sinking

to the grave. I mean, of course, Hoppner. He was always afflicted with bilious and liver complaints (and to these must be greatly attributed the irritation of his mind), and now they have ended in a confirmed dropsy. But though I think he cannot recover, I do not wish that his last illness should be so reported by me. You will believe that I can sincerely feel the loss of a brother-artist from whose works I have often gained instruction, and who has gone by my side in the race these eighteen years." Hoppner died early in April, 1810, in the fifty-first year of his age. To quote Lawrence's letters again: "The death of Hoppner, leaves me, it is true, without a rival, and this has been acknowledged to me by the ablest of my present competitors; but I already find one small misfortune attending it; namely, that I have no sharer in the watchful jealousy, I will not say hatred, that follows the situation." A son of Hoppner was consul at Venice, and a friend of Lord Byron in 1819.

For twenty years Lawrence reigned aloné. After the final defeat of Napoleon, the artist was commissioned by the regent to attend the congress of sovereigns at Aix-la-Chapelle, and produce portraits of the principal persons engaged in the great war. These European portraits-twenty-four in number

now decorate the Waterloo Hall at Windsor. In 1815, he was knighted by the regent; on the death of West, in 1820, he was elected to the presidentship of the academy. "Well, well," said Fuseli, who growled at every thing and everybody, but was yet a friend to Lawrence," since they must have a face-painter to reign over them, let them take Lawrence; he can at least paint eyes!" In 1829, he exhibited eight portraits; but his health was beginning to decline. He died on the 7th June, 1830. He had been painting, on the previous day, another portrait of George IV. in his coronation dress. "Are you not tired of those eternal robes?" asked some one.

"No," answered the painter; "I always find variety in them-the pictures are alike in outline, never in detail. You would find the last the best."

In the night he was taken alarmingly ill ; he was bled, and then seemed better; but the bandage slipped, he fell off his chair into the arms of his valet, Jean Duts.

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