morning star, "L'Etoile du Matin," by M. Chaplain, either on its way to London or now exhibiting there, and an Eve, by Madame Frédérique O'Connell, whose name would indicate some such social position as Madame Henriette Browne, both alike excluded “ pour crime d'indécence," yet we are told by those who have seen them, that they are not a bit more reprehensible than the Eve by Clesinger; but then French artists and critics are alike exceedingly jealous and susceptible in regard to the functions of the jury of selection, and they are equally jealous of any known artist venturing into an unaccustomed path. They denounce, for example, the paintings of M. Clesinger and of M. Etex alike, both being sculptors of established reputation.

If we are to believe the same critics, there has been a great falling off in the established reputations this year. M. H. Flandrin is said to have been alone true to himself. Diaz had several pictures-"Venus et Adonis," "L'Education de l'Amour," "Galatée," "Mare aux Vipères," and others—but, carried away by his early successes, he is said to have made no attempts at improving himself, but to have painted away simply because his pictures sold, and now by dint of turning, like a horse in the arena, in that vicious circle of effects which he knew so well how to produce, he has arrived at a point where nothing is before him but retrogression and failure. This, alas! is the history of many modern artists in other countries besides France.

M. Eugène Delacroix had some imposing sketches, more particularly "Le Christ descendu au Tombeau," "Ovide exilé chez les Scythes," and "Saint Sébastien;" but, after all, they are mere sketches, unfinished paintings, with a predominant violet tone, but in which the master reveals himself in the exquisite delicacy of his touch and the harmony of his composition. M. Gérôme, an artist who obtained great celebrity last year by his "Duel des Pierrots," has been equally successful this year in a semi-historical line. His "César Mort" and "Cirque Romain" have given rise to many sharp criticisms in as far as the execution of details is concerned, but there seems to be no two opinions as to the effect produced. The same artist has treated a very difficult subject-" Le Roi Candaule,” the crowned fool of Lydia, who exposed his wife to his friend Gyges, and suffered in consequence-with so much skill that the picture, delicate as the subject was, was generally classed with Knauss's "Cinquantaine" as one of the pearls of the Salon. M. Muller took for subject "La Proscription des jeunes Irlandaises Catholiques en 1655," and he has been deservedly unsuccessful. Irish skies are not leaden, albeit sometimes grey and overcast. There is nothing metallic in nature that is not below the soil. Then, whilst the sea seems rough and angry at the fair burden it is about to receive, the damsels themselves tread the plank with as much dignified steadiness as if summoned into the presence of their hostile judges. M. Hébert's pictures, the "Cervarolles" and "Rosa Nera," albeit the works of a distinguished artist, also sin terribly against nature. Even the French critics, who are neither educated nor trained in the great basis of all art-the love of truth and simplicity-exclaim against "cette prodigalité de tons nacrés dans les rochers," and fretfully ask: "Pourquoi ces tons papillottés qui ne sont pas dans la nature, et qui nuisent à l'effet et au relief de l'action ?"

According to M. Louis Jourdan, there is no country where the taste

for works of art exists more than in France, and yet there is no country more utterly void of the sentiment of art. The French public is utterly guiltless of that instinct of the true and the good which reveals to the most ignorant the traces of genius. The crowd never stops before a good picture, unless its beauties have been proclaimed abroad; it invariably cumulates only where there is some common or terrific subject, worked up in glaring and screaming colours. We suspect this criticism does not apply to France only. The French ladies are also accused of preferring "les papillotages blancs et roses que M. Dubufe vermillonne pour le bonheur des femmes élégantes" to the simplicity and sobriety, the conscientious and serious portraits of MM. Ingres, M. H. Flandrin, Bonnegrâce, Ricard, Pérignon, and a few others, the works of the first two being chefs-d'œuvre. Is there not an equally invincible, albeit not openly avowed, inclination for that which is vulgar to be detected nearer home? It is not only "le monde parisien" that is attracted and caught by "le joli, le chatoyant et le papillotage!"

So long as this applies to the public, there is no great harm done, but when it is made to influence art, as will invariably happen-when, as in portrait-painting especially, the artist may prefer pleasing the public to the critics-it becomes a more serious thing. Among the new exhibitors of the year, for example, is M. James Tissot, who could do great things if he was not so anxious to make the sacrifices demanded by the vulgar exigencies of ladies' toilettes and "l'étalage d'un marchand de nouveautés." Another new man, on the contrary, M. Emeric de Tamagnon, exhibited a view of the Basilica of Sainte Marie Majeure at Rome, in which no sacrifice is made to the false gods; the qualities of the painting are more solid than brilliant.

French patronage of art has been agreeably shown in the eight panels exhibited by M. Paul Huet, and which were painted for the decoration of a private house. How pleasant for the eye to rest upon such well-painted landscapes, instead of upon the grotesquely unnatural designs so characteristic of paper-hangings! If pictures were painted on canvas of more limited dimensions, the sale would be better assured, and a better taste would at the same time be developed. Of such a class-that is to say, fitted for the private dwelling-were M. Lambinet's, and M. Auguste Bonheur's landscapes. The latter illustrates worthily the name he bears -that of his father Raymond and of his sister Rosa.

M. Lhuillier mystifies a subject far too much indulged in by continental artists-the procession of the Holy Eucharist. Who is that gentleman who precedes the procession as lautern bearer? It is manifestly the reminiscence of some sad domestic incident. M. René Menard's "Marche des Animaux" would alone have sufficed to establish a man's reputation. M. Jeanron's "Plaine avant l'Orage," although harsh and hard, earned great praise. It was even hinted" que Rembrandt ne le désavouerait pas." M. Louis de Kock's "Animaux dans un Bac" was another pretty picture; so also of M. Ernest Guillaume's "Sick going to Cauterets," only that he has made his landscape as pale as his patients. There was a piece of "dead nature" by M. Juglar-a chef-d'œuvre of its kind. If M. Leroux had half the same amount of vigour, his landscapes, otherwise meritorious, would be first-rate. His "Marais de Kramaseul" attested to the fact. It is the same with M. Dubuisson's "Relay of Horses on the Road from Lyons to Grenoble ;" there is great

care, and yet a manifest want of vigour. M. Coignard had also three good, but by no means faultless, landscapes. M. Comte took a pleasant subject, "Margaret of Scotland kissing the sleeping poet Alain Chartier," but, alas! the pitiless critics decided that "le sujet est gracieux, et il est disgracieusement traité !"

M. Courdouan has been more fortunate. His "Vue d'Evenos in the Gorges of Olioules," his "Route de Cargueiranne à Hyères," and "Les Pirates recevant la Chasse," are all admirably true to nature, and great as works of art. M. Compte Calix, with his marble staircases, vases, and statues, and female figures also like statues, in "Le Chant du Rossignol," is just the reverse-artificial to a degree. And what a moonlight! M. Michel announces in his work called "Vie universelle," that the moon, being the head-quarters of evil geniuses, is about to disappear, and that its place will be taken by more genial satellites. M. Compte Calix has anticipated the event. So also of the same artist's "Biches effrayées," the said "biches" being, by-the-by, bathing females. Even the French critics admit "qu'il y manque ce presque rien qui est tout: la vérité."

There were no less than two "Incendies de l'Austria" in the Salon. Both were egregious failures; one, by M. Isabey, well known for his "charmans papillotages," detestable in the eyes of all true artists, was neither more nor less than "une erreur monumentale;" the other, by M. Tanneur, was not worth mentioning. One of the admitted best marines in the Salon, "La Pèche aux Thons," by M. Suchet, was also good, but not exactly altogether true to nature.

M. de Tournemine brought some very pretty things from Syria and Asia Minor. The "Habitations près d'Adalia," the "Souvenir de Tyr," and the "Café en Asie-Mineure," were admirable in all points for truth as well as for excellence of execution. The very fault found with them by the critics, that they are silvery instead of golden, only shows the artist's correct appreciation of certain aspects of Syrian light and shade. But there ought to be nothing metallic, either silvery or golden, except in minerals or in works of art reproduced on canvas. M. Zeim goes to the extreme in the other way. His "Gallipoli,' 99.66 Damanhour," "Constantinople," and "L'Entrée des Eaux Douces," are "inondés de flots d'or "-flaming, in fact. Such pictures must be painted to suit the bourgeois idea of Oriental opulence of colour, not to imitate nature.

M. Bonnegrâce has some fine serious studies in "Saint François de Paul distribuant des Aumônes à la Porte de son Couvent," "Jésus Enfant enseignant les Docteurs," and "L'Amour et Psyché," all good works of the so-called "contemporaneous school." The excellence of the last can be best judged of when the critics cry out for "plus de soleil, plus de rayonnements lumineux autour de ces amants immortels." M. Bonnegrâce had too much taste to have recourse to such meretricious art. M. Bonnat's "Bon Samaritain" may also be noticed for the same high qualities, but in a more humble sphere.

It ought not to be omitted that there were no want of pictures which appealed to the feelings through the medium of subject, as well as more general themes reproduced on the canvas. M. Marchal's mother, for example, taking her child to the hospice, exposed cleverly one of the most grievous evils in the French social system. M. Antigua's episode of

the Vendean war was full of spirit and movement. Pity that the same artist should waste his energies over bathing nymphs who have not time to dress themselves. The Salon is always full of such. The critics were

very hard upon M. Baudry's "Madeleine." They declared that it was a

sick and repentant lady from the Mabile! Those who are familiar with the occasional affectation of French art will believe it. M. Baudry has also attempted a "Toilette de Vénus;" it is another mistake.

MM. Fauvelet, Plassau, Fichel, and Chavet are the most distinguished of the satellites that move in the orbit of Meissonnier, but they have by no means attained the perfection of their master. To number the satellites of different orders that glimmer in that vast Salon, would indeed be almost to number the stars that glitter in the firmament. Some force themselves upon the attention, as M. Glaize in his "Trahison de Dalila," for example, only to annoy; others, again, are small and humble "pochades," as they are called on the Continent, and yet pleasing, witness M. Boulanger's "Message," and a host of others. Some are mere mannerists, as M. Ed. Frère, in his numerous "tableaux de genre ;" others are indifferent to their olden repute, as M. Français; and others, again, are tripping up the steps of their predecessors, as M. Cabat, in his only picture "L'Etang des Bois." Others have actually died since the colours were laid on the canvas-Benouville, for example, whose "Jeanne d'Arc" was so full of promise. The same artist had also a curious unfinished picture, "Sainte Claire recevant le Corps de Saint François d'Assise," representing Madame Benouville and her two children. Every year's Salon is, indeed, a history. If an artist has travelled, his pictures will tell you where he has been; if he has been in trouble, it will come out in some way or another, if only in the dull, Clichy tone of one or more of his pictures; if he is in love, it will idealise all his female figures; and if he is married, his better-half is sure to appear on canvas. Strange, that if he should die his body should also lie at the feet of his wife and children, as in the instance of Benouville's picture.

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The fault found of the French artists by their own countrymen is that, "aux prises avec les nécessités de l'existence," they live from day to day; do not read, study, or travel sufficiently; are insensible to the great social questions and movements of the epoch; live in their studios, where they the time in futile discussions, pass as if they were encamped in the midst of us, strangers to what takes place around them, and indifferent to the future." The criticism is, no doubt, correct in many cases. Financial resources are as requisite to variety and success in art as in literature and science. But still the French, considering the general paucity of their means, are the least of all nations exposed to the rebuke of want of enterprise. The true artists-and there are many of them-travel far and wide in search of subjects, as every successive Salon will tell. Upon the whole, the Exhibition of 1859 has been looked upon as a comparative failure. There is no great or triumphant progress. Art, we are told, "is sick, but not dead." Art," again, it is added, "is not a thing without or apart from the social condition. It is either nothing, or it is the idealised expression of the feelings, the fears, the hopes, the joys, and the sorrows that animate the masses. Art is all that it can be in the present day it reflects our indecisions, our aspirations, our doubts." If so, it may indeed well be sick!

SOCIAL LIFE IN BERLIN.

Ir has been for some time growing more and more the fashion for authors to write special works about certain cities and towns, and laboriously exhume all the social unpleasantnesses which our fathers, wiser in their generation, overlooked. We find a pleasant amalgam of statistical information and would-be funny writing to gild the arithmetical pill, and, altogether, such a book serves the real purpose of a book in the present fast age; you skim through it over a pipe, pick out one or two smart sayings, and an hour after you have reached the last page you forget what it was all about. And this is certainly a wise provision of nature for were a much-enduring critic necessitated to remember all he reads in this prolific age, he would speedily become a candidate for Hanwell.

The peculiar class of book to which we refer has remained for many years a species of specialty of Englishmen; and the Cockney school of writers have made great use of their researches down Whitechapel way, or in the unctuous purlieus of the docks. Now and then an adventurous scribe has invaded Paris, and given us accounts of La Californie and the Barrière du Mont Parnasse, but the Circean capital has hitherto been the ultima Thule of Mr. Dickens's acolytes, and we may search in vain for any books which will give us such Asmodean views of Berlin or Vienna. The only other European capital which, to our knowledge, has been successfully invaded, and the spoils laid before a British audience, is St. Petersburg, of which city "A Journey due North" gave us a very full and apparently truthful account. Under these circumstances it does not surprise us to find that Herr Kossak, a "fast" contributor to the Prussian press (were such a thing possible), should have taken up his pen on behalf of his father city, and favoured his countrymen with some gaslight and daylight scenes from the German Athens.* Having performed the pipe process over this little volume, we will hasten to transcribe such passages as struck us most, ere they fade away from the daguerreotypeplate of memory.

The very first sketch shows us with amazement the similarity existing between the feminine minds of England and Germany: for does not the Frau Regierungsräthin insist on keeping a little foot-page, because her husband has just had a rise in his office? The tribulations she endures read like a page from All the Year Round. First, there is her husband opposed to the scheme: thoughts of the new livery remind him with lively horror of his tailor's account current; but, of course, lovely woman gets the best of the engagement. The advertisement is sent off to the paper representing the Times (with a difference) in Berlin, and Clara is happy. Bright visions float across her mind of a many-buttoned uniform walking nobly behind her as she goes to shop, and, oh, won't the Frau Commerzienräthin be jealous, that's all! Unfortunately, all that's bright must fade, and Clara's bright visions are sicklied over with a pale cast when the expected pages make their appearance. The first has

* Berliner Federzeichnungen. Von E. Kossak. Berlin: Otto Janke.