286. Sir John Falstaff at Gad's Hill. _T. Stothard_, R.A. The
figure has not the fleshy rotundity of the Falstaff of Shakspeare; he is
like a half-stuffed actor in the part.
298. Portrait of the late King when Prince of Wales. _Lawrence._
The features at this period were remarkably handsome; and considering
the influence of pre-eminence in birth, the expression is not
over-tinged with _hauteur_. No persons have their portraits so
frequently painted as princes; and the artist who has the fortune to
paint them at all ages, as Lawrence did, must watch their personal
changes with reflective interest, though he may confine them to the
tablet of his memory. What an interval between the youthful vigour of
the above portrait of the Prince and the artist's last, fine
whole-length of the King, in dignified ease, on the sofa! Alas! lines
increase in our faces as they do in the imperfect maps of a
newly-discovered country.
313 and 228. Two Landscapes, by _Lawrence_, reminding us how
strongly the artist's genius was fettered by public taste in Kneller's
profitable glory of painting "the living."
In the _Water-colour Room_, are many interesting productions, and
some curiosities in their way. We have Paul Sandby and the quaintly
precise Capon beside Glover and Landseer--so that the drawings are as
motley as the paintings. Here also are Lawrence's inimitable chalk
portraits of his present Majesty and the Duke of Wellington, which show
us how much true genius can accomplish in a few lines.
* * * * *