We have spent hundreds of thousands, or more probably of millions, on
national art collections, schools of art, preliminary training and
academicism, without wanting anything in particular, but when the nation
did at last try all it knew to design a sixpence, it failed. {136} The
other coins are all very well in their way, and so are the stamps—the
letters get carried, and the money passes; but both stamps and coins
would have been just as good, and very likely better, if there had not
been an art-school in the country. [1888.]