On April 28, Cardinal Wiseman, at the Manchester Corn Exchange, delivered a
lecture "On the Relation of the Arts of Design to the Arts of Production."
It occupies thirteen columns of _The Tablet_ of May 7, which professes to
give it "from _The Manchester Examiner_, with corrections and additions." I
have read it with pleasure, and shall preserve it as one of the best
discourses on Art ever delivered; but there is a matter of fact, on which I
am not so well satisfied. In noticing Bernard Palissy, the cardinal is
reported to have said:
"For sixteen years he persevered in this way; and then was crowned with
success, and produced the first specimens of coloured and beautiful
pottery, such as are to this day sought by the curious; and _he
received a situation in the king's household, and ended his days in
comfort and respectability_."
In the review of "Morley's Life of Palissy the Potter," _Spectator_, Oct.
9, 1852, it is said:
"The period of the great potter's birth is uncertain. Mr. Morley fixes
it, on probable data, at 1509; but with a latitude of six years on
either side. _Palissy died in 1589 in the Bastile, where he had been
confined four years as a Hugenot; the king and his other friends could
defer his trial, but dared not grant him liberty._"
All the accounts which I have read agree with Mr. Morley and the
_Spectator_. Are they or the cardinal right, supposing him to be correctly
reported?