Groove Romney, a history- and portrait-painter of this period, is another artist of considerable ability whose unstable character prevented the attain ment of the results of which he gave promise at the outset of his career. Romney was born at Dalton-in-Furness in 1734. His father was able to give him some advantages. As apprentice to a cabinet-maker the youth acquired considerable skill in wood-carving and designing. The advent of an itinerant artist awoke artistic aspirations in young who abandoned his home and followed this artist for two years, gathering from him the rudiments of painting. He married in haste, forsook his wife and children, roved about the country painting portraits at two guineas a head, and finally settled in 1762 in London but poorly equipped in educa tion and character to encounter a public accustomed to the courtly man ners of Benjamin \Vest and the superb canvases of Sir Joshua Reynolds. Nevertheless, that very year he won the premium of the Society of Arts for his painting, The Death of Wolfe, and he won the premium a second time three years later for his Death of King Edward.
As a portrait-painter Romney succeeded so rapidly that he soon realized an income of twelve hundred pounds a year from this source; some years later he made four thousand pounds a year from portraits, and was considered by many as the rival of Reynolds in that department. During this period he was also continuing his historical compositions, including a painting of the Shipwreck from the " Tempest " for Boydell's " Shakespeare." Afilton dictating to his Daughters is another important composition. Emma Lyon, the beautiful model who afterward became the wife of Sir William Hamilton and the mistress of Lord Nelson, fre quently posed for Romney, and undoubtedly inspired some of the femi nine grace and beauty for which his works are celebrated.
But Romney was of a morose and eccentric disposition, impulsive and timid by turns, irritable and unstable, shunning his fellow-artists, and never exhibiting at the Academy, which prevented his election to mem bership. After twenty years of varied fortunes he abandoned his art, retired to Hampstead, sent for his family, and died in 1802, after his mind had become entirely broken down. Defective in drawing and unskilled in producing luminous effects with pigments, Romney was yet able to impart to his paintings a winning beauty which accounts for their popu larity during his lifetime and entitles him to a respectable position among the British artists of the eighteenth century.
William Blake, one of the most eccentric characters in the history of English art, although chiefly known as a mystic poet, designer, and engraver, is entitled to mention among English painters of the eigh teenth century. He exhibited at the Royal 'Academy a number of paint ings which displayed marked originality and genius. He was born in London in 1757 and died there in 1828. His entire career was one of great struggle and privation, which he patiently endured under the influ ence of the hallucinations of his imagination and the cheering company of his devoted wife. His illustrations, especially those of the book of Job, are of the most extraordinary character, to the last degree mysterious and sublime. Of his oil-paintings, one of the most remarkable is his Canterbury Pilgrims ; the style is dry, but the types of character are well individualized and the composition is spirited.
Afarth Angelica English school also has a certain right to claim the celebrated Angelica Kanffmann, a history- and portrait painter, as one of its members, if it can claim Cipriani and Zoffanv, for much of her art-life was passed and many of her honors were gained in London, Angelica Kanffmann was born at Chur, in Switzerland, in 7741.
She was precocious in displaying a talent for music and painting, and drew portraits at the tender age of ten years. Her father took her, in boy's clothes, to the school of art, and at fifteen she painted the portraits of eminent Venetians. At nineteen she was a proficient in vocal and instru mental music and spoke the German, French, English, and Italian Ian gihiges. In 1765 she was induced by the wife of the English ambassador at Venice to visit London. Her elegant manners and person, combined with such accomplishments, attracted wide attention, and the queen gave her a gracious reception.
A still greater compliment awaited this talented woman, for she was nominated one of the founders of the Royal Academy in 1769; and she contributed classic subjects and portraits to every exhibition while she con tinued in England. An unfortunate marriage to an impostor who passed himself off as Count de Horn threw a cloud over her life, although she was soon divorced from him. In 1779 she decorated a room for the queen at with groups of flowers. In 1781 she married Signor Antonio Zucchi, a Venetian painter, and in 7782 finally removed to Italy, where she resided, with her husband and her father, until her death in 1807.
Angelica Kauffmann executed a large number of portraits and com positions founded on classic and sacred subjects ; many of these are well known on account of the engravings made from them. Her beautiful painting called the Sibyl continues to be one of the most popular prints, and numerous colored copies of it also exist. While there is no doubt that the personal attractions and virtues of this artist contributed to her popularity, yet she cannot be denied credit for a good degree of talent. Her style is often weak, inclining to insipidity, and has much sameness, and her scheme of color was undoubtedly suggested by that of Raphael (q. v.). Nevertheless, there was a solid basis for the fame achieved by almost the only woman besides Madame lc Brun who attained celebrity in the fine arts during the eighteenth century.
Conchtsion.—Such, in brief, was the progress made in the art of paint ing by the British school during what was practically the first century of its existence. We note two or three points that occur in such a resum6 of its growth. It was, in the first place, dependent to a large degree for its instruction on the influence of Italian art; few English artists of this period were able to emancipate themselves from the idea of drawing inspiration from classic subjects and Italian colors instead of going directly to Nature. As in all imitations, it was impossible to equal the merit of the original; the few exceptions we discover here and there only emphasize the general truth of this statement. We find, fur thermore, that imagination was not a prominent quality of English art at this time, except in a few isolated cases, while portrait-painting was pursued width considerable originality, and with a success which has never been surpassed in the history of English art. At this period, also, we dis cern hints of the brilliant results achieved at a later day by English painters in landscape and genre. It is a little singular that several of the English painters of the eighteenth century displayed a feeling for color which has since been equalled by few artists of the English school. The most import ant event in this period appears to be the establishment of the Royal Academy, whose influence has been of incalculable advantage to British art. Whatever may be alleged against its present management, it is idle to deny the very great weight such an institution carries in the early strug gles of a national school.