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The Artists' Fund Society.
should mean, that it is itself promising
or not promising; he should not mean
to predicate too positively the future of
the painter he criticizes.
There is much of Mr. Farrer's picture
that is better than ever before-and that
is hopeful. There is much of it that is
no improvement on past work of his,
even on work long past, and that is not
hopeful. This year's exhibitions will not
decide, and next year's exhibitions may
not decide whether the omens of good
or the omens of ill will prevail.
What a lovely sky! Distant, serene,
and pure, with white summer clouds,
which slowly rise from the horizon, and
begin their solemn march across its blue
breadth. From one point behind the
green hill, which seems to be Mount
Holyoke, the clouds have come into
sight, scarcely above the horizon; they
separate, and begin their course by three
different principal routes, radiating like
a fan. It is very beautiful. And it is
very true to Nature. It is not once nor
twice, but many times in the course of
every summer that those clouds fan out
from their starting-point on the horizon,
and spread across the sky. The belt of
lower cloud in the centre of the picture
seems to us not less truthful in inten-
tion, but less successfully painted. On
the other hand, the bank of mist which
lies along the distant hills in front of
the spectator, and just beneath the belt
of cloud we last spoke of; is wonderfully
perfect in effect.
The whole distance is charming.
Mount Holyoke, on the right hand,
takes off the eye from much more bril-
liant color in the foreground fields. The
distant armies of forest, that seem to ex-
tend their lines away to the mountain,
where their strongest point is and their
most compact array, are as truthful as the
sky, and are less beautiful only than it.
And between the forests and the spec-
tator the rich Northampton Meadows
with great elms dotted over them like
skirmishers, stretch from the uplands to
the banks of the smooth Connecticut,
rich with varied color, and broken by
spots of shade.
It seems to have been the attempt to
get general truth of effect, in this pic-
ture, that has injured it, and made the
foreground so very faulty as it is. The
distance is distant and yet brilliant, and
the middle distance is made to glow
with color;-but at a heavy cost. Ex-
aggerated depth of shadow, giving
gloom which is actual blackness in many
places, and that at a distance of many
hundred yards from the spectator, where
Nature's shadows are shadowy, indeed,
but are not black; clumps of trees in
middle distance, in which there is noth-
ig like foliage or growth or lightness
or ramiification, but heavy, spungy
masses of vigorous green; isolated trees,
which are in no way individual in clhar-
acter, but stand about in scores, all
alike, radiating brush strokes below and
spuingy masses above; nearer trees in
foreground, which are absolutely con-
ventional, and as like copies from Hard-
ing's drawing book as a practised out-
of-door workman could make them:
are the worst of the separate evils which
make up the unsuccessful, unbeautiful,
untruthful foreground.
Not foolish or meaningless work,
observe. Work that would not be pos-
sible to any but an able and a practised,
painter, but uintrue, untrue to Nature,
both in detail and a fortiori in general
effect. A going astray not to be ac-
counted for except, perhaps, by the
comparison with this of much other
work contemporary with it, which this
exhibition does not afford us the oppor-
tunity to make.
[Dec.,