familiar tracts, in the Chinese language, descriptive of other portions of the globe. These have been sought for with avidity, and have created a demand for tracts upon religious and moral subjects; and thus it will probably happen, that the very points in the Chinese character which have opposed obstacles to their reception of Christianity, will hereafter be found the most easy avenues to conversion. Among other useful works, he is the chief editor of a monthly magazine in the Chinese language. Two numbers of this have come into our hands, and we have been enabled to discover that one contains a general geographical description of the old continent; the other a particular account of the Empire of Russia, which bounding on that of China for several thousand miles, must be an object of curiosity to the government, as well as the people of the Celestial Empire. In the pursuit of his sacred calling, he has made two voyages along the coast of China, the first in a junk, the second in an European vessel; exposing himself, in the former case, to hazards and inconveniencies of the most appalling character; and in the latter exerting himself in the most strenuous manner to procure an opening for commerce, under the protecting wing of which, he has had the good sense to see that religious impressions might be readily propagated.

ART. VI.-History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the United States. By WILLIAM DUNLAP, VicePresident of the National Academy of Design, Author of the History of the American Theatre, Biography of G. F. Cooke, &c. 2 vols. 8vo. New York: 1834.

THAT Mr. Dunlap has succeeded in compounding two very entertaining volumes, can scarcely be denied; but that he has been equally successful in accomplishing the object for which their appellation would indicate them to have been prepared, is not so sure. The "History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the United States," is a sounding title, and a sounding title is a dangerous affair. If the expectations which it arouses. are not sufficiently realized, the reader is little disposed to be blind to the faults, and overkind to the merits of the work. He remembers the passage of the old poet, in which a contrast is drawn between the vapouring scribbler who professed to sing "the fate of Priam and the noble war," and the inspired bard, who, commencing his immortal strains with an invocation to the muse, endeavours "to give not smoke from a blaze," but from the former to educe light; and he feels strongly tempted to repeat, in reference to

the writer who has excited the recollection, the contemptuous application to the pretender of the fable of the mountain and the mouse. Mr. Dunlap, however, need apprehend no such fate, although the aspect of his title-page is more imposing than the character of his work, for one especial reason. He contrives to keep his readers in such good humour, for the most part, by the amusement which his pages afford, that it would be almost impossible for them to deal severely with his authorship. The "goddess fair and free," yclept Euphrosyne in heaven, according to Milton, and on earth, heart easing mirth, is, after all, the lady who possesses the greatest attractions for the mass; and he who introduces us intimately to her acquaintance, is most likely to be rewarded with our kindliest feelings. The sternest pedagogue can scarcely inflict a merited castigation upon a waggish urchin, however mischievous or lazy; and the fiercest critic, with a heart at other times unknowing how to yield, becomes transformed into a paragon of indulgence, by the omnipotent power of a laugh.

It is nevertheless the fact, that Mr. Dunlap's execution of his task is by no means deserving of unqualified praise. Horace Walpole called his work on British art, "Anecdotes of Painting," and our author, in the same way, might have entitled his production "Anecdotes of Painters, Sculptors, Architects, and Engravers, and of any and every body who has had the remotest connexion with the Arts of Design in the United States." Such is unquestionably its true description. There is little of the dignity of history in its gossiping chapters, and much more information is communicated about the men than the artists. Greater pains are taken to amuse us with traits and eccentricities of personal character, than to acquaint us with professional peculiarities. The original critical portions are for the most part meagre and unsatisfactory, and almost altogether devoid of the chiaro-oscuro of criticism, if we may so speak. They are generally all light or all shade-all praise or all blame. The volumes, however, contain a great deal of valuable matter, calculated to render them admirable Mémoires pour servir, and Mr. Dunlap merits gratitude for the industry and perseverance with which he has sought information from the most authentic sources. Few living American artists of any note seem to have escaped his call for contribution to his pages. In most instances they have complied with his request, and those who refused, after being well belaboured for their modesty, are dragged into notoriety in their own despite. With these he must settle the matter as he may, though we do not believe they will be very much incensed, if there be truth in Peter Pindar's exclamation:

"What rage for fame attends both great and small!

Better be d-d than mentioned not at all.”

The first pioneer of the art mentioned by Mr. Dunlap, is John Watson, a Scotchman, who came to the American colonies in 1715, and settled in Perth Amboy, New Jersey, the native place of the author. He painted portraits with such success as to acquire a considerable share of the good things of this life, a circumstance which induced some of his relations to hearken to his solicitations to join him in the land of his adoption, "notwithstanding," says Mr. Dunlap, "that attachment to their soil which distinguishes his countrymen." If our author be right in attributing this characteristic so especially to the sons of the "land o' cakes," there is not so much truth as is imagined in the saying, that an Englishman is never happy but when he is miserable, an Irishman never at peace but when he is at war, and a Scotchman never at home but when he is abroad. It is usually supposed, we believe, that even the crania of our Yankee brethren do not exhibit so decided a development of the bump of peregrination, as those of the worthy inhabitants of the country in question, where, in the phrase of one of them assigning his reason for sojourning in foreign parts, "although every thing is unco plenty and cheap, the saxpences are unco scarce. Mr. Watson lived to the age of eighty-three, and must consequently have produced no small number of works, but none, either of them, or of the pictures which he brought into this country, can now be found. Mr. Dunlap nevertheless thinks that no one who has duly considered the subject of cause and effect will doubt, that he had and continues to have an influence on the progress of the arts in the United States. He is even inclined to ascribe the writing of the present work to the emigration of Mr. Watson, but the consideration that we have been enabled to give "to the subject of cause and effect," has not been adequate to satisfy our minds completely upon that point, and we therefore leave it to the cogitations of those who may deem it indispensable to be settled.

Whilst Mr. Watson was transferring the faces of the Perth Amboyites to his glowing canvass, another of Scotland's offspring was performing a similar service for the good people of New England. This was John Smybert, who came to Rhode Island in 1728 with Bishop Berkeley, when this genuine specimen of episcopal excellence, in whom shone "every virtue under heaven," was upon his philanthropic expedition for establishing an American university. Here Mr. Dunlap favours us with several pages of extracts from different sources in relation to the illustrious bishop, which do not seem to throw any particular light upon the history of the Arts of Design, any further than that the artist by whom he was accompanied, painted a picture of him and his family, now in the possession of Yale College, which is eulogized in lofty terms. Smybert, according to a good authority, was not

an artist of the first rank; but the best portraits of the eminent magistrates and divines of New England and New York, who lived between 1725 and 1751, are from his pencil. His influence upon the arts in this country is affirmed to be powerful and lasting, and to have especially operated upon Copley, Trumbull, and Allston. The last named gentleman expresses his gratitude in a letter to a friend, for the instruction which he derived from a copy by Smybert in the college library, Cambridge, of the head of Cardinal Bentivoglio by Vandyke, which he obtained permission to take, one winter vacation. At that time, he says, Smybert's work seemed perfection to him, but he adds that he had to alter his notions of perfection when he saw the original, some years afterwards. Well he might, for a copy that should convey a perfect idea of that splendid production, must be executed by the hand of a kindred genius. Technical skill might counterfeit the features, and even reproduce the enchantment of the colouring, but "the mind, the music breathing from the face," demand the inspiration which no labour can acquire. Well do we recollect that exquisite "mocking of the life," if it be not derogatory so to entitle what might be mistaken for life itself. Few of the master-pieces of portraiture which it has been our good fortune to behold, excited more pleasure and admiration at the moment of witnessing it, and left a more vivid impression.

Smybert died in Boston in 1751, leaving two children, one of whom, Nathaniel, gave flattering promise of excellence in his father's art, which was destroyed by a premature death.

Other painters are mentioned by Mr. Dunlap as contemporaries of the aforesaid artists, in different portions of the country, whom, perhaps, it may be as well for their reputations to forget as to remember. One of them, however, named Williams, an Englishman, who was settled in Philadelphia, possesses an adventitious claim to recollection, from the circumstance of his having afforded assistance and instruction to the first native American artist of celebrity in point of time, and certainly not the last in point of merit. We mean Benjamin West.

The details of the career of this remarkable man must be so familiar to our readers, as to render it a work of supererogation to record them here, even if we had space for the purpose. His humble birth, in an obscure settlement, where civilization had advanced scarcely farther than the threshold; the singular precocity of his imitative talent; the irresistible strength of his vocation, which overcame every impediment, even the uncompromising spirit of sectarian prejudice; the kind friends whom he was so fortunate as to encounter, who fostered his genius and contributed the means of enabling him to cultivate it to the utmost in the richest school of art; the sensation which he excited

in Italy, both by the anomaly at that period of a young American's repairing thither to acquire excellence with the pencil, and the merit of the works which he produced; his subsequent success in England, where he elevated himself to a friendly communion with royalty, and what was a far more honourable testimony to his character, was raised by his fellow-artists to the loftiest station amongst them, the Presidential chair of their academy, and where he died, full of honours and of years—all this might almost be called one of our school-boy lessons, so proud do we naturally and properly feel that our Temple of Fame should so soon have had one of its most eminent niches filled in a department which, in the progress of other nations, has generally been long unoc cupied; and so inspiriting is the lesson which it inculcates, of the admirable results of industry and virtue and perseverance, no matter what the obstacles through which they may be obliged to force their way.

Worthy, however, of honour and panegyric as we consider West to be, we cannot subscribe to all the eulogies heaped upon him by Mr. Dunlap, with undiscriminating profusion. One might imagine, from the pages before us, that the artist in question was a condensation, as it were, of all the various and noblest attributes of the painters of ancient and modern times a sort of focus to which all the brightest rays of art had been drawn, emitting a warmth and light such as never had been imparted before. The biography is a perfect glorification, as far, at least, as respects our author's share of it, which, to be sure, is not the largest. The whole, in fact, resembles a piece of Mosaic work, not very cunningly managed, much more than a harmonious portrait on canvass,-extracts without stint from other books, communications from individuals, and original observations, tumbling over one another in most delightful confusion.

The merits of West seem to us to be better calculated to attract the artist than the mere amateur. In the excellence of his composition and the correctness of his design, there is much that the former must love to contemplate, for purposes both of gratification and instruction; but admirable as those qualities are, they cannot be duly appreciated and enjoyed by the unscientific, when not befriended in just proportion by one or another of the two requisites most essential for communicating general delight, in which he was deficient-expression and colouring. He neither enthrals the mind, nor fascinates the eye. His is not the magic pencil around which the passions throng, nor that which is dipped in the hues of the rainbow. He rarely if ever "gloriously offends," or snatches a grace which uninspired art may not reach. Soul is wanting there, and the most attractive quality, upon canvass, of body likewise. Take, for instance, his celebrated work belonging to the Hospital of Philadelphia, Christ