The placing of these pictures at South Kensington is, however, only a temporary arrangement : suitable provision is to be made for the British pictures in "the new premises," which the government have undertaken to provide for the national collections. When that shall be done, we trust that eo opportune an occasion will not be let pass without undertaking the formation of a Gallery of British Art worthy of the name. It is a mortifying fact, that the Collection of British Pictures at Manchester was the first and the only opportunity English men have ever had of seeing at one view what the British school has done and is doing. That collection is dispersed, but the ex..mple remains. We have here, in the 70 pictures belonging to the National Gallery, and in the 150 of the Vernon collection, a good groundwork for a national collection. The Sheepshanks pictures were expressly given to assist iu the formation of a gallery of native art, but the gift was hampered with a clause as to the locality, which may render it unsuitable for that purpose. If that could he got over, they would be of the greatest value, and they would render tolerably complete the series of recent works of their class. The century of Turner scares are a specialty, and will in any gallery occupy their own apart , ment. But together we have thus 560 paintings by British artists, some 520 of them having been presented to the nation for the express purpose of assisting in the formation of a British gallery. In a few years Sir Francis Chantrey's bequest of above 20001. a-year for a like purpose will fall in. If such a gallery were really taken in hand with an evidently sincere desire of making it what it ought to be, there can be no doubt that other gifts and bequests would not be wanting. All that would be required of the authorities, in addition to a suitable building, would be to see that the great object was kept steadily in view of making a thoroughly comprehensive collection of characteristic works. To this end suitable early pictures, and pictures of a high class, should be sought out and purchased, and for the present. at least, purchases should be strictly confined to works which fairly illustrate the rise and progress of British art. And surely if it be desirable to secure "unsightly" early examples of the Italian and German schools "solely for their historical importance," it is at least as Important to Englishmen, oven in an historical pint of view, that they should possess a systematised chro nological collection of works of the British school, beginning at the very beginning, and including the very noblest of its productions.
Termer Piciferre.—During many of the last years of his life, the chrrished wish of our great landscape-painter was to bring together as many as possible of his best works as an offering to his country. For this purpose he not only refused to sell such of the pictures he then painted as he deemed most suited for a public gallery, and most illustrative of his style, but. whenever an opportunity presented itself, purchased such of his earlier paintings, having like fitness, as were offered for sale. At his death, in 1851, lie bequeathed to the nation those works, together with all his drawings and sketches, on condition that within ten years suitable accommodation should be provided for them. This princely gift—for, estimated merely at the money value according to the almost fabulous prices his pictures and drawings were then producing, the gift might without exaggeration be termed princely—comprised the extraordinary quantity of over a hundred finished paintings in oil, many of them of very large size, some hun dreds of finished water-colour drawings, and several thousand studies and sketches.
The oil paintings and some of the sketches are exhibited in the new rooms at South Kensington. Of their value as works of art, it would be superfluous if it were not out of place to speak here.
Alone, they would suffice to give the British school of landscape the foremost rank in respect of extent of range, comprehensiveness of subject. and poetic conception along with close observation of nature.
As illustrative of the genius of Turner, it is enough to say, that they were deliberately chosen by Turner himself as the works by which he wished his countrymen and the world to judge him. They range over almost the whole of his career, and exhibit almost every phase of his style, from the strictest and most literal representatioes, up to his most daring imaginations. If they needed to be supplemented by others, we have in the National Gallery, the Vernon, and the Sheep shanks collections, eleven more of his oil pictures. But they are autti tient in themselves. Of the works of no other Engl•sh painter are we ever likely to have anything like so large or so wonderful a gallery, or one so remarkably illustrating the progress of the mind of a great artist It is only to be regretted that the drawings are not to be exhibited to the public as well as the paintings These drawings, which when received by the trustees were in a very crushed and dis orderly condition, have been carefully examined and arranged, and 4110 of the most highly finished of them framed, and 12u0 more mounted by Mr. Ruskin, who voluntarily undertook that trouble some task. They are, with the exception of those exhibited at South Kensington, deposited in cabinets iu one of tho lower rooms of the National Gallery.
The Slurp:hanks Pirturee.—The noble example of Mr. Vernon was in 1857 nobly followed. On the 2nd of February of that year, Mr.
Sheepshanks, by a deed of gift, presented to the nation his valuable collection of paintings and drawings. The object of the gift, as stated in the deed, was the foundation of a " collection of pictures and other works of art fully representing British art." The gift was made on certain conditions, the most important of which was that " a well lighted and suitable gallery, to be called the 'National Gallery of British Art,' shall be at once erected by her Majesty's government, and be attached or near to the public buildings built or to be built for the Department of Science and Art on the estate purchased by her Majesty's Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851, or the public parks or gardens at Kensington." The collection is thus precluded from being united with that of Mr. Vernon and with the British pictures belonging to the National O illery. unless these should also be perma nently removed to Kensington. But Mr. Sheepshanks, so far from wiehaig his pictures to be kept apart from others, has expressly pro vided that they are to "be deposited in such gallery with any other pictures or other works of art that may be subsequently placed there by other contributors, as it is not my desire that may collection of pictui ea and drawings shall be kept apart or bear my name as s :ch." Further, Mr. Sheepshanks stipulates that " none of the said pictures or drawings shall ever be sold or exchanged," and he has placed them entirely beyond the control of the trustees of the National Gallery.