Extracts.

Lyttelton Times, Volume VIII, Issue 528, 25 November 1857, Page 3

Extracts.

(From tfie Juverpqqi Albion, August 10.)

The thermometer -is little over 60 degrees here to-day, in-the shade; and; as there is"nothing jbut; f sh^cle^it isn't;^a'sy for it to beyht6re;eisewhere,!^ unless .perhaps at Greenwich, wßere the :quicksilverc must be in a state of feverish nimbleness apd excitability; \ Why at -- Greeiiwicli ? fls there at^rn put, of the tars, these piping times of war, .when the man at the helm being a' 74, in a double sense, all the hulks, from the age of Noah dbwnwards/expect to be put in commission,.to fight to the last inch of the last plank, as that Cid of horse:marines and contemporary of :Rodney,"T. P.-Goalee; has if ? No, tha caloric at Greenwich arises from combustion of another kind. There is a row at the Grown and Sceptre. Quartermain and his waiters are'! af loggerheads/ 'The waiters will wait no longer, and Quartermain won't pay ithe quarter, which' threatens to be a half before it is over. The season at .that piscatorial hdstelrie l finishes, according to immemorial- usage, with %he ministerial fish dinner; but^ according to present appearances, that banquet, though rumoured to be in readiness for this day week>: and ,not at the Crown and Sceptre, but at the Trafalgar to please Wood's predilectibh:ftrWppflien walls and Nelson and all that, won't come off before Ghristmas, when white bait wilL have transmigrated into codlings, or mullet at the smallest, and lobsters will be as scarce as mermaids. Well, can't Ministers do without their fish ? What, with Palmerston at their head, whose recollection of these riverine junkettings at the tail of no end of sessions must present a bill of fare as long as the sea-serpent! Has he not picked the :fin of friendly turtle with a baker's dozen of prime ministers of every possible persuasion, arid laughed at them all in his sleeve, and shall he now forego the felicity of laughing outright at his "own appendages" in their very foolish and most ridiculous faces, seldom more ridiculous .than this morning, after last night's Divorce Bill discomfiture. No; whatever treasury fish there be to fry, eaten it must be one day in the year, though it should be the last day, within sight of the Isle of Dogs ;—ominous whereabouts for the British lion at this particular juncture. It is to be feared that the Taper and Tadpole appetite for the desiderated entertainment is considerably damped by the disastrous division aforesaid, doubly and trebly discomfiting to the amour propre of the underling's as it occurred in the absence of their chief; thus demonstrating, even in trifles, that the member for Tiverton not only carries the brains of his own cabinet, but has also to be the eyes and ears, the fingers and toes, of that most anomalous and non-corporated agglomeration of amicable atoms. Hayter collapsed into half his recent turkey-cock dimensions, after this tremendous rebuff on a matter his master had wished of all things to carry intact. As for Whip Number Two, poor Mulgrave, Liston never seemed half so facetiously disconsolate in Tristram Sappy, in "Deaf as a Post," as did the most uncourtly looking Treasurer of the Royal Household on listening to the exultant yells of the majority of 11. Lord John Manners in particular shouted as if he were leading a mprris-dance of capricornish clowns at Haddon Hall, to the tune of "All round the May pole, hop, hop!" in the manner of the old nobilitie in that happy time when curfew legislation kept down the inflammation in one's gas bills. Even the Caucasian, who rarely smiles at Christian revelry, condescended to simmer at the gymnastical cacchination of his Coningsbyized friend now; and this phenomenon was the most. terrible feature in the case; for well Hay ter knows that when that Hebraic visage is so illumined, there; must be something in the wind more portentous to the West [end] than any Asian mystery, of which hajfradozen new ones havfej list been imported %m Stajribpulj'sdying; npthiiig ibf arriving,"'per' Overland" mail; l forthightly these last few months.

But Tthere was another" Lord John, who quite as keenly, if not iso denionstratively, enjoyed nhe: niischletous; sport "himself hail assisted lffiyfakk, ft^he ji one :,f*ftio. eleven: '''" Moreioveft j^Hf^ it, and had con^eipi^p^pd iip '^elishj^tij-an^ fpr that pjafpose 'put', pn a'; p^irT p'f' lilywhite *rQ^sem ferxthe; ifirst time ,thia» year,al- :- though the weather was suggestive pf overalls or spattei*dashes, as a much njiore :Reasonable*cQ^tunie,. t^g j^md; being

waterspottt, a#t*thr^%fe^of It ; Petersburg. Periiap^W^ potent n> i^a ducks/ m his year, : was to signalise hisienornious .ti|finipn over \ Jim• whd-Jwas "thef'imni&tfer^df:Russiai" i&cv, &c^ wthe Pacificdiperibd of jlism.^ mat^iumpli?^ t% triumph jot the British Plenipotentiary's :Con/erence Policy, to^ be^ure; Did'nt ' i? ri £ recommend, as a point worth fail the Four Points, that Muscovite pfetenisions- to sovereignty on the Circassian jcoast should bis-mostperemptorily' and {particularly- ignored and resisted ? Did'nt j^1-p^laim-'--;fliis':-:a*^h^-late London elecition> that he had ma dispatch ltd Clarendon, Which dispatch Mr. Birch's \" friend to law and order" and fair play •characteristically garotted—never let it see jthe light jet, and never will, till some subjterranean diablerie is to be clandestinely (accomplished by so doing. - Well, what of ;that? Why this of that:—Hera's news Ito hand that' Russia insists on the Porte (throwing, the Treaty of Paris overboard, ! and letting. squadrons of Calmuc threeIdeckers plough the Euxine and harrow the 'mountaineers, thus raking them fore and iaft, from the Black Sea on the one side, ;and the Caspian on the other. Oh, Sham, I Oh, Schamyl, has it come to this ? Was | it for this was enacted all that dreary disimal farce of "Longworth's noodle mission :to the hill tribes'and their prophet chiefs 1 ;—Prophet, indeed; for he foresaw the ! mockery of the whole mountebankery, and \ rode off from our ruack in a gallop at a jglance. .Longworth, however, discharged ;his real duty like a man and a Briton as jhe is:—he presented his bill and got paid; ) that is to say, he got paid first, and sent iin the bill afterwards, in the usual crab- ■ fashion of cormorants of the Circumlocujtion office, ever the most straightforward i and concise of created beings when their iown prey is before them ; a 'wrord and a igrab is their axiom, or rather grab, and ; not a word about it.

) But it doesn't follow that what Russia :asks Turkey will grant? Doesn't it, ; indeed ? Look at the Piccadilly; lord's •own particular print, and you'll find that jwhat Russia asks, Prussia asks, our nuptial £40,000 down, and £6,000 a-year to the contrary notwithstanding ;—that what Prussia asks, Sardinia asks; and lastly, : that what all three ask, a fourth asks, -France, to wit, the three insisting-on the 'object of the fourth in the Principalities, which means everywhere, wherever the iAmurath crescent confronts the Romanoff : cross. There's a dainty dish to lay before •: the Queen and her viceroy over her at OsI borne, Eugenic and L. N. B. sitting by, the latter's face the fac simile of the i sphinx's with thinkingthat his uncle once ioverran Egypt, and meant to run a little : farther, only for one Smith, whose wiseAcre straightforwardness circumvented the i cunning Corsican. We have a wiseacre I Smith now too, only he is Vernon instead :of Sydney, and the difference is that between a horse chesnut and a chesnut horse. iAll Vernon knows of Egypt is that there iare pyramids and crocodiles there; and ;as he is a member of the Anti-Cruelty to *Animals Society, and uses lavender on his j pocket-handkerchiefs, he couldn't think of {subjecting British soldiers to the fatigues of a sandy, march ;< and so good-naturedly •sends them in ; steady-going sailing* ships iby way of the Cape to India, where they iwill ari'ive as soon as can.be expected here, ;if somewhat more tardily ths^n could be idesired there. Vernon himself takes the ;matter, and all matters, perfectly cool, and jhe can't, for the life of him, understand •jwhy others should be in a flurry. Isn't ]he' Minister for Inciia l Isn't he a cousin :of a sis.ter-in-law of Lord Lansdowne's !daughter-in-law's aunt? What more j lean be required? True, there's Delhi. [But Delhi, confound it, was always there, kit least for some time;, probably as long, pr nearly as long^ as his noble relative's nojble seat at Bowoodl To be sure, he did'say, W cbiiple of months ago, that the place was itumibled out ofi the window^ and, the rubbish cjarried off in a couple of- wh^elbarirows,; or whatever isi the Sanscrit or Ethiopian : name the i)li^ckamo6rs. give ,'these . ithmgg iii that part,'of. .the, w.odd. '^telV'rj jhe,thpughtsbatithetime^buCt^qre was j bomje; Ijitcli in C^qm^andel^pr. Bom^wh^ere, j^it^ ':ss pegrap^i; ';iiJe ;idjdn?^exactlyh pchpy .^Hat^Vut-l^e'd t j;p ; |£og:g) or jMahgles, or some' of them about "it, and | jpejhapsb^.that ti^,-.Qelbi 'fould fall^f | $$$ MSw %idj W $ejs#m, kT^^ ,tji'e.hp»se. on.fi^^ Mmg ext^gu^slif d :of+ii^ pwn! )ipQPrd j, veriipn aaugH^iw g^ledjttbi^ss:?m4oy^aajoke;

_p£ yptt.ti§ak t tWMj.°^e ?. : A©» -.-it. weuld; Va^oiTei^.it.weice, and no.laughing1 mati^f '^ujttier #£ notf J|ut 'it- is ia -focf^-. tij£ l^utfr. jp* it3J'|tta^dnesg, if !so plain ..a w.ord:. do V»ot ; &genfaeman so -very Q^rabtle,- member ,foV; N^hja^pt#n. I4st 4igit. |e^ight be se^{iqungm th^^ and njoped and^bla^f Bearing; and pcicasiohally an air of ferocity coming over his.vacuous physiognomy \as if he meant to spring up.and wove for the appointment ; of a deputy, to'save liim the trouble of receiving his £s,'pMa-year, which he thinks is the object Presidents of the Board of \ Control were originally invented for. Poor i Baines,.-.beside, whom he sat, had need of 4W his toitpise-Uke philosophy to endure the yawnings and-the fidgets of his Mantalinified neighbour, who,.at last, got up and flung himself into the Speaker's chair —the house being in committee. There dreamily listened to Bethel fining down Gladstone's refinements about adultery, till, between the two, one could hardly tell whether it would be a greater blessing to have a Mrs. Potiphar for a rib, for the pleasure of mangling her with the Government bill, or of incontinently putting up With her incontinence for the satisfaction of defeating the act and spiting the Attor-ney-Qeneral. This latter the member for the University of Oxford deems the primal duty of man at the present moment, arid of women and children, too, apparently. The new member of the City of Oxford, Cardwell, sits between these experienced brace of hair-splitters. But they haven't succeeded in splitting him yet; for he listens to both and sides with neither, looking, of course, temptingly ingenuous all the while, but with a more reynard mien than ever, as if he had eyes in the tips of his ears, and could peep out of each optic three ways at once. The individual who hone 3to catch the right honourable Edward asleep will have to remain out of bed all night for the purpose of being up betimes in the morning, devoted to that interesting experiment in search of somnolency under difficulties.

As far as one may judge from appearances, Gardwell is even more reserved than before, as if he didn't relish the rivalry implied by the late electoral contest with Titmarsh; or perhaps he is somewhat abashed at finding1 that the Thames is no nearer conflagration than before he produced what his candid friend, Lowe, so flatteringly called his "sawdust memoirs" of Peel, "it is to be hoped that that justest of epithets won't prove the epitaph of the embryo work of his brother Peelic editor, Stanhope, namely the Wellington Papers, which would be particularly apropos just now, for all sorts of reasons, Indian and otherwise, besides the timeliness in reference to the Monument, the £700 prize for the model of which has been awarded to-day to Marshall, whose charming and (from the. reduced copies) universally known Sabrina will incline the public to say upon trust "ditto" to the judgment. Not so the Solomons of the journals, of course, who will pour out a flood of gibberish, for the next month to come, sufficient to give Sabrina herself a cold in the head, were she alive, though she passed most of her time in a shower-bath, with a shell to her ear, and hadn't the smallest regard for crinoline or patent bodices. There has appeared to-day a document that should cure fine-art critics of their self-confident coarseness, if anything could; but, as nothing can, why there's no use in saying much about it for their sake, though there may be for that of the public. It is the evidence [accompanying the report, issued a. few days ago,], taken before the commission as to the site of the National Gallery. Medical men in , all ages have speculated as to pursuits most conducive to longevity; but, in our time, fine art would seem to be the veritable elixir vitse, only that the pursuer must be a patron, not a professor. Nobody lives to. such a verdantly green old; age as your matter-of-fact cultivator of the beau ideal. Look at Athenian Aberdeen; impervious to the tooth of time- as the very granite of his earldom. Why it is just on fifty years since his .alleged .Vandalism about., the ijlgin marbles was first lashed in the English bards;- and here he:is to-day, looking considerably ■ more adamantine than the Jhoney-combed crumbling1: sfcbne of Barry's |alre.^4y.->°^ B evr **Qy?£s P^sanl? nt iTjbJen^tjierey L^sdgW;^; ages stilL Jh^.tHQ^pre^daniite, Eu% all. because, off jhig' ofj.pld- inaste^ and of Imisteesse^ ";whp might [haVs-freea the sap nja?|ers' '^peati fifteen jdbzen Joif'generatipiis removed; tfie Marquis hai, iPhrynes, and "liaiaseis andlA^pwias^ aqad^so

forth, who were standing- in brass.ere the I jTiber had a wooden bridge across it. Then !tKereisLyndhurst,son of Copley,and possessing an; hereditary as well as acquired partiality Jor pictures;—aetat 86 ; and as like|ly tp live to be 96 as he was ten years ago ftp be alive how. When he does go off it ;will probably be in the middle of an haranIgue in the House of Lords, it la Chatham, iwhose dramatic and melo-dramatic exit is 'the chef'cFceuvre of his papa's pencil. So ; with Rogers, whom Bantings, the undertakers in St. James's-street, were once on jthe point of clapping into a coffin, and enjtpmbing by main force, on the ground that : it was a grave offence for a human being •trying to be immortal, as the antediluvian jbard was clearly attempting, till he got inear a hundred, when he left off, and time' jtoo. Then there is Wellington, who used jto say that the sight of Canova's colossal i Napoleon in the hall of Apsley-house was lequal to a couple of cratches in helping ;him up stairs ; and he lived in an atmosjphere of art, for .which, according to Hayjdon, the F.M. had a subtle appreciation. jßut the most curious illustration of the jas yet invisible point aimed at in these remarks is, that the chairman of the commis- | jsion we have been talking of is none other ■than Cam-Hobhouse. Of. all. our yoxrag jold men, Hobhoiise is the youngest in mind jandbody. Palmerston, Brougham, Campbell, all exhibit some falling off; but the iLord Broughton de Gyfford Broughton is rjust the man he was precisely when he ;used to play Sancho Panza to Quixote ißurdett on the Covent Garden hustings, ages ago; and there is not a doubt that he could, if necessary, deliver tomorrow as rattling a revolutionary speech as the one which Byron immortalized as having caused his friend to " flare up a patriot and subside into Newgate." His chairmanship of this committee was of course volunteered, being labour of love; and rare love of labour he must have had, as well as capacity to go through it, for such a motley and medley of conflicting doctrines about that which, to an ordinary eye, would admit of a very easy solution, never was probably brought together. Let us illustrate a solitary point. Sir 0. Eastlake states that the smoke and dust of London are highly injurious to pictures, but that the injury is not direct; the deposit, in time, obscures the picture, and then the danger of injury in cleaning arises. Mulreadj^, Knight, Cooke, Parris, Denning, Lewis, and others of Sir Charles's artistic brethren are of the same opinion, which is shared also by Ruskin, and some experienced restorers. On the other hand, Barry and Wyatt, architects, Landseer and Warren, artists, and Bentley and Farrer, no lass experienced restorers of pictures, are of .the contrary opinion. Bentley says that a picture will become obscured, as a consequence of smoke and dust, in course of time, whether it is kept in town or country, and would not require cleaning sooner in one situation than another, if due care be taken. The main question, therefore, is not so much th 3 extent to which works of art are liable to be soiled in course of time by atmospheric influences, as the practicability of restoring them, when th:y become so obscured, to their pristine beauty. But upon this point, also, opinions differ. Ruskin believes that a picture which becomes dirty is ruined^ because the process of cleaning must, to a greater or less extent, destroy the surface. W. E. Cooke is of the same opinion; the varnish changes colour, and cannot be got off without injury. Landseer says that it is almost as "difficult to clean a high class picture, a Correggio or a Raffaelle, as to paint one; and that some of the most beautiful tints are often removed by cleaning, while the operator fancies he has improved the appearance of the picture, because he has changed its general tone. Mulready speaks of picturecleaning' as a very delicate operation, ■requiring great judgment and a knowledge of the technicalities of art; but his evidence shows. the process to be necessary, after the lapse of a certain number of years, on account of the varnish becoming yellow. ;Eastiake concurs with Mulready in regardjng cleanings'as an operation attended'with irisk, but states that it is quite possible fo xjlean. a picture which lias become very .dirty-, the substance not being injured by ithe deposit upon it; so that all required is ;tp remoVe the latter with as much care as Ipo^sibier. Knight appears' to be the only jollier artifi^jwhp regards" cleaning■ #ispsa jlitjtfe ap^M^li^i %vi th?; cleaners;"atid jrestoyeiss ar^of cftiitse, unanimous in mairijtaining tha,t a. picture can be^ washed^ jsoraped, ctrid re-yarnish6d without su-ffer-jihg'injury^ anc^ to its great imprpyement. Be^itleyi howeVe?, a^crifeesi1 the necessity

of cleaning to the use of boiled oil and copal varnishes, and states that a picture covered with mastic varnish would last for centuries without requiring to be cleaned, even in the atmosphere of London. This g-entleman employs a chemical process, concerning which Professor Faraday displayed no small amount of curio ;ity, natural in a fasan, but which the wiln3ss declared to be a secret kroivn only to himself. He had restored two of Turner's picture?, which had been so neglected that they were mildewed with damp, and the brilliant white in portions of the skies had become absolutely black. This transformation he ascribes to the quantity of sugar of lead which Turner mixed with" his white lead, and which became affected by the action of damp. In this case it was not the surface alone that wa"s discoloured; a change had been effected which extended deeper, and the black had to be extracted. The pictures are now in the state Turner left them. Farrer, another famous cleaner, who acknowledges, despite his occupation, that picture cleaners have done a great deal of injury to art, says that the removal of the varnish can be accomplished by expjerienced operators without injury to the : picture, and that there is not a single pics-.-. :ture in the collection of the late S^JK^ .. ;Peel which has not been cleaned, and thos&S pictures are in a beautiful condition-^; Despite these differences of opinion, how- '^ ever, two things may be considered to be established; Ist, that damp injures pictures to a far greater extent than dust or even sulphuretted hydrogen; and, 2ndly, that deterioration is often the result of chemical changes in the character of the pigments used by the artist. Colours of an inferior quality have sometimes been used for economy, as by Sir J. Reynolds; but Turner used the purest ultra-marine for his magical skies, and yet suffered them to be turned black by exposure to damp. These indeed be nuts to crack for the cognoscenti who write authoritative guide books for Manchesterian Art-Treasures, and have a rule of their own for the admeasurement of all men and things therein included.