Florence. Indeed, as we
view these marbles it is not difficult to see whence the Renaissance
sprang and to what we owe the various forms of Renaissance art. The
frieze of the Muses, each of whom wears in her hair a feather plucked
from the wings of the vanquished sirens, is extremely fine; there is a
lovely little bas-relief of two cupids racing in chariots; and the frieze
of recumbent Amazons has some splendid qualities of design. A frieze of
children playing with the armour of the god Mars should also be
mentioned. It is full of fancy and delicate humour.

On the whole, Sir Charles Newton and Mr. Murray are warmly to be
congratulated on the success of the new room. We hope, however, that
some more of the hidden treasures will shortly be catalogued and shown.
In the vaults at present there is a very remarkable bas-relief of the
marriage of Cupid and Psyche, and another representing the professional
mourners weeping over the body of the dead. The fine cast of the Lion of
Chaeronea should also be brought up, and so should the stele with the
marvellous portrait of the Roman slave. Economy is an excellent public
virtue, but the parsimony that allows valuable works of art to remain in
the grime and gloom of a damp cellar is little short of a detestable
public vice.

THE UNITY OF THE ARTS: A LECTURE AND A FIVE O'CLOCK

(Pall Mall Gazette, December 12, 1887.)

Last Saturday afternoon, at Willis's Rooms, Mr. Selwyn Image delivered
the first of a series of four lectures on Modern Art before a select and
distinguished audience. The chief point on which he dwelt was the
absolute unity of all the arts and, in order to convey this idea, he
framed a definition wide enough to include Shakespeare's King Lear and
Michael Angelo's Creation, Paul Veronese's picture of Alexander and
Darius, and Gibbon's description of the entry of Heliogabalus into Rome.
All these he regarded as so many expressions of man's thoughts and
emotions on fine things, conveyed through visible or audible modes; and
starting from this point he approached the question of the true relation
of literature to painting, always keeping in view the central motive of
his creed, Credo in unam artem multipartitam, indivisibilem, and dwelling
on resemblances rather than differences. The result at which he
ultimately arrived was this: the Impressionists, with their frank
artistic acceptance of form and colour as things absolutely satisfying in
themselves,