at Hampton Court, and no
good man or woman can look at them without holding such beauty
detestable.

At Hampton Court also there are several of the eleven portraits of
Admirals whom Lely painted for James II, when Duke of York.

Antonio Canal, called Canaletto, incorrectly Canaletti, was born at
Venice in 1697. He was the son of a scene painter at the theatre. In his
youth he worked under his father; a little later he went to Rome, and
studied for some time there. Then he came to England, where he remained
only for two years. I have hesitated about placing his name among those
of the foreign painters resident in England, but so many of his works
are in this country that he seems to belong to it in an additional
sense. He is said to have 'made many pictures and much money.' He died
at Venice when he was seventy years of age, in 1768. As a painter he
was famous for his correctness of perspective and precision of outline
(in which it is alleged he aided himself by the use of the camera),
qualities specially valuable in the architectural subjects of which he
was fond, drawing them principally from his native Venice. But his very
excellence was mechanical, and he showed so little originality or, for
that matter, fidelity of genius, that he painted his landscapes in
invariable sunshine.

* * * * *

The great wood-carver Grinling Gibbons deserves mention among the
artists of this date. He was a native of Rotterdam, where he was born in
1648. He came to London with other carvers the year after the great fire
of London, and was introduced by Evelyn to Charles II., who took him
into his employment. 'Gibbons was appointed master carver in wood to
George I., with a salary of eighteen-pence a day.' He died at his house
in Bow Street in the sixty-third year of his age, in 1721. It is said
that no man before Gibbons 'gave to wood the lightness of flowers.' For
the great houses of Burghley, Petworth, and Chatsworth, Gibbons carved
exquisite work, in festoons for screens, and chimney-pieces, and panels
for pictures, of fruit, flowers, shells, and birds.

* * * * *

Sir Godfrey Kneller was born at Luebeck in 1646, and was the son of an
architect. He is said to have studied under Rembrandt; but if this be
true, it must have been in Kneller's early youth. It is more certain
that he travelled in Italy and returned to settle in Hamburg, but
changing his plans, he came to En