Catholic priesthood passing to or from England, and a refuge for them while remaining in London. The house had formerly belonged to some canons regular.

Out of zeal for the Catholic faith, she proposed to Smith to set up a printing press in her house for printing Catholic works: but this was declined, on the ground that it would have been impossible to have kept it concealed in so large a household.

All this was in the Protestant reigns, but she appears to have suffered little molestation. Once, in the reign of Elizabeth, she was under examination before the archbishop of Canterbury, the pseudo-archiepiscopus Cantuariensis, as Smith describes him: and he says that she was the first illustrious person called in question under the law which imposed fines on those who absented themselves from their parish-church. But as a defence against such accusations she was favoured with a general protection from the council, dated April 19, 1607, on account of her age and her approved loyalty in every thing except her religion. She appears to have been treated with great respect and kindness by the public authorities of the time. This indeed was due to her rank, her virtues, and her conscientious conduct. What little she did suffer in consequence of her catholic predilections appears to have originated rather from some lowminded zealots in her neighbourhood, and this was not much.

It was hardly to be supposed that she would escape molestation in the time of the gunpowder treason. Information was given to the council that a person suspected, but falsely to have been engaged in that conspiracy had been seen to enter her house. A warrant was issued from the council to cause a strict search to be made; but no suspected person was found. Soon after this she was favoured with a second privilege by an order of the council, namely, that hereafter no person should be allowed to search any place of her residence but four, to be nominated by herself. When, in that time of dreadful alarm, she was warned by a friend of the danger of keeping any of the priesthood in her house, she paid no attention to the warning, but said, Recitemus Litanias, ac totam rem hanc Deo committamus. In the chapter on the wonderful providence of God towards her, we are told, that about the time of her marriage she fell into great trouble and sadness of mind on account of the ruin which she said was brought upon her family by the man in whom they had placed their hope of help. We suppose she alluded to the Duke of Norfolk, whose name is suppressed, as he was a martyr, in some sense, to the Catholic interest, and as he was represented by the Earl of Arundel when this book was written, who professed himself a Catholic. This trouble neither medicine nor friends could remove; but, such was the weak and

childish superstition of the times, that she is said to have been taught in a dream what she should do to free herself from it.

We come now to the chapter in which is described the happy passage of this lady to God. She had lived seventy years: she had seen thirty persons descended from her, all professors of the Catholic faith; when, in January, 1608, a time of great frost in England, so severe that men and horses might pass over the Thames, and there was feasting on the river, she was seized with a palsy, and died on the eighth of April following. During the whole progress of her disease she was patient and religious, often contemplating a crucifix of silver gilt which hung at the foot of the bed. This crucifix had belonged to her grandmother, the pious and celebrated Countess of Shrewsbury, who must have been the daughter of Lord Hastings, who was put to death by Richard III. She was buried at Midhurst, in the tomb of her husband; and we have the common conceit of the sweet odour issuing from her body.

Her death was much lamented. The arch-presbyter of England, Dr. George Birchede, wrote of her as a mother in Israel; her step-son, the Viscount Montacute, a zealous Catholic, on which account he had often been in prison, bore testimony of her great merits. Queen Elizabeth entertained a high opinion of her; but King James said of her, after she was dead, that she was vehemens Papista.

We have a minute description of her person, which must not be passed over. She was very tall, so that amongst women of the middle stature she appeared higher than the rest by the head and shoulders; and was very erect to the last. Her head was round, and it appeared small on account of the great size of her body. In her youth her hair was beautiful, her face fair and oblong, her forehead smooth, her eyes colore caprino and sharp; her nose straight and sharp, and rather small; her chin large; her whole countenance grave and venerable. Her eyes were so good that in her old age she could distinguish a tower at the distance of fifteen miles, and with perspiciliis, which we suppose means spectacles, she could see to cut the finest linen by a thread. In her walk she was full of majesty ; her genius was acute; her memory most happy; her judgment profound.

Such is the tribute paid, by one who knew her well, to the memory of a lady who sprung from the ancient nobility of England, and who was for so many years the wife of the first possessor of an eminent dignity amongst us. We have been the fuller in our notice of this work from a conviction that it is little known, and from a wish to extend the knowledge of the biographical notices contained in it. Those who are less curious

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about the minute circumstances of the lives of those who, in times long gone by, formed the illustrious body of the baronage of England, may yet find something to gratify them in the picture which is here exhibited of Catholic feeling and action, as well in the lady who is the subject of the work, as in the priest who has undertaken to do this justice to her memory. We see them both slaves to a childish and mischievous superstition we see in the priest an inveteracy of feeling towards the new system, and, generally, towards the land of his birth, fifty or sixty years after the fires of Smithfield had ceased to burn, which seem to excuse, if not to justify, the strong precautionary measures of the Protestant reigns. As we think that, in the point of puerile superstitions, there is little resemblance between the English Catholic priesthood of the present day, we therefore believe that they are not influenced by the same violent and vindictive spirit.

Anecdotes of Painting in England; with some Account of the principal Artists, and incidental Notes on other Arts: collected by the late Mr. Geo. Vertue; digested and published from his Original Manuscripts, by the Honourable Horace Walpole; with considerable Additions, by the Rev. James Dallaway. London: printed at the Shakspeare Press, by W. Nicoll, for John Major, Fleet-street. 1826-7. 4 vols. royal 8vo.

FEW people have reflected on the difficulty of writing the history of an art. The progress of science is marked by steps which are easily recorded; and the acts of men afford tangible subjects to the narrator: but how shall the historian display the successive stages of an art? If he aims at describing them by resolving its practice at different epochs into different sets of rules, he will compose a technical history, which can only be understood by proficients in the art, and which, while it may tend to the instruction of the future, throws but little light on the results of the past. If he would aim at conveying an idea of that which has already been done by characterizing in general terms the productions of different ages, his work would be almost unintelligible, and certainly uninteresting. In the history of all arts there is a certain progression from stiffness to ease, from inaccurate to accurate imitation, which may be either described technically or critically; and in either case might nearly as well be let alone for all general purposes of utility. In painting, for instance, the manual operations of the rude painter may be described; the superiority of the next, whose style became more polished, may be pointed out; the difference between him and his successor

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may be appreciated, and thus the exertions of each performer be successively analyzed. On the other hand, a writer may trace the progress of the art of painting by its effects upon the spectator. He must here appeal to his individual feelings, which form but an uncertain criterion: that which may affect him in one way may prove to affect another differently; and a collection of such experience would, after all, give a very vague and unimpressive notion of the progress of the art, or its actual state at any particular period. These difficulties have been seldom overcome; and in the history of painting, most writers have converted their task into the much easier undertaking of a history of painters. The world is glad to hear of the incidents that have befallen men who are eminent in any thing, and has in this instance, as in others, mistaken the natural feelings of humanity for the love of a particular art. The mistake is an innocent one. A genuine history of painting would interest painters alone: while anecdotes of both the art, its professors, and their productions, are easily understood; are of a character to rouse the attention, and, in the minds of the intelligent, actually subside into a virtual history, of which they are in truth the real materials. Horace Walpole was too clear-sighted a man to mistake the substance for the essence; and too little of a quack to attempt to deceive others. Perhaps he wanted the industry to put that crust of phraseology about his facts which is alone sufficient to give the world assurance of history. A little more form, and his Anecdotes might have assumed a more imposing title: for in truth they are not wanting in the distinguishing traits which mark the works of a true historian. There is no want of philosophical remark; no want of general deduction from particular premises; no dulness in discriminating between the characteristics of different men and different periods; neither is there any deficiency of enlarged knowledge, or marks of a taste which has not been cultivated by the study of the best examples; and we are, in every page, convinced of the presence of the enlivening power of the imagination, by the cheerful rapidity with which the mind receives and retains the contents of his pages.

We conceive the world has not done justice to the reputation of Horace Walpole. The publication of his Letters forced it to read, to laugh, and admire: and the respect which the public always entertains, virtually if not nominally, for its entertainers, has lately raised him to a high level in one character. But his serious claims as a writer of judgment, of originality, and perspicacity, still remain unsettled or lowly estimated: while accusations of meanness, of pride, and affectation, mixed up with depreciatory notions of his pursuits, have altogether served, not to blacken, but to fritter away a well-merited reputation. If,

indeed, a man may be said to merit that which he does not seek, or hold in much estimation, Horace Walpole wrote to satisfy himself, without labouring for the good opinion of his contemporaries, or even of posterity. Had not severe motives urged on the genius of others, much of what now attracts the admiration of mankind would remain uncreated. The pain of labour soon balances the pleasure of production in those cases where a man simply writes from the satisfaction of registering his experience. Where, indeed, the faculties are uncommonly vigorous, and the senses peculiarly lively, this pleasure rises into a motive of great force; and great deeds may prove the result. Walpole was, however, somewhat phlegmatic, and very fastidious, by constitution; so that it required the sterner excitements of necessity to rouse him to the performance of acts, the capability for which, we have no doubt, was formed by nature. But born to the enjoyment of rank, and wealth, and consideration, he must remain content for the present with the reputation he has acquired: a dilettante, a lover of virtu, and an amateur of literature.

The materials of the Anecdotes of Painters and Painting in England were supplied by the memoranda of Vertue, who had long been employed upon collecting the facts for a history of painting in this country. Walpole acknowledges and explains the extent of his obligations to these papers with more than candour. We know not what spirit Vertue might have infused into his dry collections; but we cannot be mistaken in pronouncing that all the mind and taste now perceivable in this work is manifestly Walpole's.

The original work, as published by Walpole, is now become, not scarce, but rare; and as the reading world has so extended, a demand for a work deserving of the honour of being accounted classical was felt by all lovers of the arts. A mere reprint would have been acceptable; but we are now presented with an edition so sumptuous, so splendid, and so complete in every respect, that the author himself, had it had the charm of being privately printed, would have considered it as one of the choicest ornaments of his cabinet. But so much better a patron is the public than an amateur, and so much more powerful is a publisher who merely lends his money to a work, sometimes but on slender security, than a private lover of the arts and literature who sinks his fortune in a hobby, that the stepfather of this work, a plain bookseller in Fleet-street, is able to do ten times more for the child of his adoption than the Hon. Horace Walpole, with a purse and a life dedicated to the pursuit of virtu. Beautiful printing and exquisite paper are in the present age to be procured merely by willingness to go to the expense: it is not so with plates; they do