rices, and his pictures
fetch long prices because a handful of people who would soon have been
put under the great civic pump have been for years proclaiming his
mastery. And during those long years how has Degas lived? On the bounty
of the people who love all things beautiful, or on the intelligence and
discrimination of a few rich or richish patrons? In the great State you
will not be able to take your masters ready-made with years of
reputation behind them; you will have to pick them yourselves, and pick
them young.

Here you are, then, at the door of your annual exhibition of students'
work; you are come to choose two State pensioners, and pack the rest off
to clean the drains of Melbourne. They will be chosen by popular
vote--the only fair way of inducting a public entertainer to a snug
billet. But, unknown to you, I have placed amongst the exhibits two
drawings by Claude and one by Ingres; and at this exhibition there are
no names on the catalogue. Do you think my men will get a single vote?
Possibly; but dare one of you suggest that in competition with any
rubbishy sensation-monger either of them will stand a chance? "Oh, but,"
you say, "in the great new State everyone will be well educated." "Let
them," I reply, "be as well educated as the M.A.s of Oxford and
Cambridge who have been educated from six to six-and-twenty: and I
suggest that to do even that will come pretty dear. Well, then, submit
your anonymous collection of pictures to people qualified to elect
members of parliament for our two ancient universities, and you know
perfectly well that you will get no better result. So, don't be silly:
even private patronage is less fatal to art than public. Whatever else
you may get, you will never get an artist by popular election."

You say that the State will select through two or three highly sensitive
officials. In the first place you have got to catch your officials. And
remember, these, too, in the eyes of their fellow-workers, will be men
who have got hold of a soft thing. The considerations that govern the
selection of State-paid artists will control the election of State-paid
experts. By what sign shall the public recognise the man of sensibility,
always supposing that it is a man of sensibility the public wants? John
Jones, the broker's man, thinks himself quite as good a judge of art as
Mr. Fry, and apparently Mr. Asquith thinks the trustees of the National
Gallery better than either. Suppose you have b