THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 929, 16 June 1877, Page 2

THE LOAFER IN THE STREET.

[from the “press.”] It is a long while since I read Utopia, but I remember 'Sir Tlios. More gets under weigh in a very striking manner. He commences, if my memory don’t deceive mo, by informing his readers that he was an ambassador to the Court of Holland. This at once apprises the reader that the author is a man of mark and position, and in consequence nine readers out of ten would read on. I know there is a lot in a commencement, and I should like to introduce this paper effectively because I am about to give you my experiences at the recent exhibition of art in the Museum. I shoidd like my introduction to be nice, because I’m by no means certain how I shall carry myself as an art and science critic, and I feel at the outset that unless I watch myself I shall, to use a racing simile, “never show prominently in the race,” and perhaps commit some cowardly onslaught on some gentleman who is not in a position to defend himself. I went to the conversazione as your ambassador at considerable personal inconvenience. Dress clothes or uniform were insisted upon. A modern author who writes society works, and knows what he is writing about, observes that if he wanted to know whether a man had been accustomed to hightoned people, he would give him ton minutes to dress for dinner, and see how he looked when time was called. What an old fraud that man would have thought me. I took over an hour; but you will not be surprised at this when I tell you that my plumes were very borrowed. My waistcoat had to be slit, up ; my coat, which belonged to a son of Anak, had to be’pinned up; and other portions of my raiment had to undergo important though temporary alterations. I acquaint you with these little facts because I trust they will bo considered when we settle up, and also for the benefit of others who may in time to come find themselves in a similar position. To such unfortunates I can only say that there is a lot of consolation in the fact that people don’t look at them half —a hundredth part —so much as they think. Snookford, my lad, I saw you at the Museum revel, resplendent,|but no one observed you. I saw an immense throng of mm who, from their appearance (I am obliged professionally to be observant), seemed as if they wore evening attire for the first time, but no one noticed this. Had they been of the fairer sex, it would have been quite another matter, because any lady with a proper sense of her duties to herself and friends would be able to pass a competitive examination a year hence in the costumes worn by every acquaintance she had in the room. But this is not hhdi art. Shortly after my entrance I found myself jambed between a volunteer and an obese lady, and as I couldn’t move further I studied, the lady excepted, the nearest curiosity to me. It was a whip, a verv badly made one, with, however, an appended history. This llagellator was called a. Gayl whip. I don’t know what a Gad is. but substituting another and very similar letter for the *G it would become an instrument which might be very serviceable here. Professor Bickcrton then demonstrated by means of a verv pretty experiment that the earth moved. It was really a beautiful ex-

periment, but I can’t believe that it was perlormcd for the first time in the colony, because I know men, many men, who have made practical experiments on this matter for years past—men who at certain times, generally in the evening, find the earth moves a lot, so much so as to rise and hit them in the face. The Professor also weighed the earth. I don’t recollect what its weight was, but I’m not particular in things like this to a pound. It’s not like when you go buying beef steak. I wandered awhile among the specimens of ceramic art. Some of thorn were very beautiful, as were also some Argons close by, but I always think ceramics and cups too appear to greater advantage witli something in or on them. Close to the ceramics was a group of grizzly bears lunching off an antelope. The scene is laid in the Rocky Mountains, and on the lofty summit of a dizzy peak a wild cat is dividing his time between preserving his equilibrium and breaking the tenth clause of the Decalogue. A companion group to the above is opposite. It consists of some capercailzie perched in attitudes of deep reflection, two chamois, two Alpine hares, one of which lias apparently broken down badly in the pastern, and an eagle on her nest. There were cases and cases of medallions, seals, bronzes, carvings, and of these it is enough to say — “ Amazed I pass From glass to glass, Delighted I survey ’em ; Fresh wondthers grows Before me nose In this sublime Musayum.” There was a lot of scientific apparatus about. A friend of mine who knows about science kindly volunteered to explain things, but ho never turned up in the science room. I observed him leaning for three-quarters of an hour over a case of specimens of anthracite. He was talking to a youthlet of the opposite sex. Probably he was explaining things to her. I never saw a' young woman take so much interest in coal before. The spectroscopes were good. One of them illustrated the combustion of silver under an electric spark. We often find silver combust in an electric style, particularly when we haven’t much in our pockets. There was a mirror in the Science room. It commanded probably more attention than any other exhibited article in the whole museum. Most of the ladies seemed to find that mirror out as if by instinct, and on a subsequent afternoon when I visited the same room I saw one young woman work up to it eight times. This was the more to be wondered at because a photograph of her would have frightened a starving wolf from a loin of pork. During the evening we were treated to some music and singing, of what kind I am unable to inform you, because the audience talked all the time. In this particular instance I suppose this was more or less unavoidable, but in any case it’s always correct here to talk and make a row when there’s music or singing going on, otherwise your neighbours would never know that you had ever heard better before. By the way, talking of music and science, I am reminded of a paragraph I observed a few days since in an advertisement. Here it is:—“ The harmoniums, of which 108 have been made, the purchasers have returned unsolicited testimonials; and finding here as elsewhere a great many pianos in such wretched condition, has given him encouragement to accede to their request.” If the harmoniums are only constructed on equally scientific principles with the above sentence I should think one—not more—out of the 108 should have found a place at the Museum conversazione. Some of the pictures were very good—some were far otherwise. In some cases the artists were represented as unknown, a circumstance those artists can never be sufficiently grateful for. There were a number of family portraits. Unless a F.P. is painted by Yandyke or Lely or some photographer of equal merit I can’t see much in it, and Charles Surface, throughout the whole play of which he is the leading character, never so entirely commanded my sympathies as when he sold off his progenitors in big lots. A family portrait don’t interest the promiscuous visitor. There were' many paintings of (Tame. In fact I observed more game at the Museum than I’ve seen afield all through the season. On a future occasion I fancy the committee would do well to hang the good pictures on one side and the —let us say indifferent ones —on the other. It would save time. It does not fall to every man to go to Corinth, and it is not every one’s luck to bo an art critic. During the few strolls 1 have had through the art gallery, it has been my painful lot to hear many people admire pictures which a high class sign-board painter would be ashamed of. It is humiliating for a human being who fancies himself on art to find out he has been pointing out the beauties of a picture which is not the one he thought it was. I observed with thankfulness that there were few works by the Old Masters. There was a Rembrandt which was different in many respects from paintings by this artist I have seen before. Rembrandt is coarse. I’m afraid he drank a lot. He is as strong on public house scenes as Wouverraan is on depicting grey horses. Also there was a Cuyp. This was a lady and a cavalier, the former with a pillow on her head—the coloring and chiaroscuro of the pillow is good. A picture of Christchurch in 1877 is very lifelike. It’s a bit high colored, but the likeness of Mr Millett, with a jibbing four-in-hand, is excellent, and the drunken man against the lamp post is realistic to a degree. Close to this picture are a curious pair of orphans in the rain. This picture requires study, being in an entirely new style. Beneath it is a young woman weeping, probably from the fact of her being hung in such company, but the fore-shortening of her second tear is excellent. Further on is a representation of a Farm Yard. The Farm Yard consists of a horse, and reminds me of a salmi of fowl I had the otlior day, which consisted of 19 parts of salmi and one of fowl. There are many pictures by Hew Zealand artists. Some very good ; others with plenty of faults—faults the numerous friends of the artists will have told them of long ere this. There were some charming water-colors by English artists; but now I come to think of it the best of these were thoroughly criticised in your columns at the time of Messrs Walker and Griffith's sales. There were some rare prints, “ On ivory bright, On paper white, On silver and in copper; And some in zinc, And some —I think— That wasn’t over proper.”

There were very few sculps. In fact I only saw one. That was Egeria. Old Numa was about the wisest king the Romans had according to all accounts. Egeria used to coach him in science. I don’t wonder at Numa becoming wise under such a teacher. The photographs were pumeroue and, mostly good. Michael

Angelo always said a good photograph was infinitely superior to a bad painting, and if you bring down some of the pictures from the gallery of the Museum and compare them with some of the photographs, say of Mr Cherrill for instance, you will agree with Mick, On the stairs, by the way, are two works of art in worsted. I don’t know much about tapestry. I don’t want to. Thus I’m unable to inform you whether these are in the Gobelins style or whether the artist has taken the Bayeux tapestry for a model. I should say neither or both. The smaller one was a representation of John Anderson of lyric celebrity and his wife. To the cursory observer John seems as if he had been drinking, but the other and larger work of tapestriment is the most fetching. It is apparently a scriptural subject. I fancy it is intended for Laban thoughtfully concocting the swindle in his own mind of passing off Leah on his intelligent nephew instead of Rachel. The lady in tire foreground rather bears this out, as even allowing for uncertain stitching she is a bit tender about the eyes. After going around the pictures in the Museum, does it not strike you that a yearly exhibition of the kind would be a good thing PJ It would give the promoters a lot of trouble, and the trouble ‘would, as in the present instance, fall on the shoulders of a few. It may be, 100, that thc’owners of pictures might in some instances object to lending them as a regular thing, but the immense attendance of the public throughout the week sufficiently shows that they appreciate an exhibition of the kind, and the fact of having afforded pleasure to so many would probably more than repay the owners for the trouble attendant on exhibiting their pictures.