would hardly have needed further mention
here; but the relation between the committee
and the Government is a remarkable one,
likely to come under public notice in another
form, before this sheet is many weeks old.
Indeed, as John Bull is a party very nearly
concerned, the more he knows about it the
better. The committee was formed about
the end of July, eighteen hundred and
fifty-six; the subscribers, about eighty in
number, appointed three of their body,
managers, to make the purchase, and to
collect, pro rata, from the subscribers money
enough for that purpose; the managers are
empowered to deposit and exhibit the collection
where they may deem best; and the
Government, during such time of exhibition,
is to be at liberty to purchase the collection,
at such price as will defray all expenses, but
without leaving any profit to the subscribers.
This latter clause takes the matter out of the
category of mere trading speculations. If the
Government, however, refuse to be smitten
with the charms of these articles of virtù,
and remain obdurate until the middle of the
year eighteen hundred and fifty-eight, the
managers are in that case empowered to sell
the collection by auction or otherwise, for the
benefit of the subscribers. If, when the
collection is sold, and the day for winding up
affairs arrives, the enterprise results in a loss,
the amount of this loss is to be borne pro
rata by the subscribers; but, if any profit
accrue, it is not to pass into the purses of the
subscribers; the managers being authorised
to apply the surplus in furtherance of some
object or objects connected with art. Thus,
the spirit that pervades the undertaking is
throughout artistic, not trading; generous,
not selfish. The managers— Mr. Marjoribanks,
Mr. Uzielli, and Mr. Henry Cole— negotiated
with M. Soulages, purchased the collection,
paid for it, and brought it to this country.

We are queer people in all that concerns
national collections. Where to put
treasures of art, we know not. How or where
to build new structures to contain them, we
discuss, but decide not. If a donor present
us with valuable pictures, we stow them in
vaults and passages and dark rooms, lacking
better accommodation. Gore House, and
Marlborough House, and Burlington House,
and Kensington Palace, and the National
Gallery, and the British Museum, and the
Jermyn Street Museum— all are in bewilderment;
all claim to be museums of Art in one
form or other, and yet all are in a doubtful,
changing, dislocated state. Thus it arose
that, when the Soulages collection was placed
temporarily at the disposal of the Government,
nothing could be done with it, except
by displacing something else. The Board of
Trade, becoming for a time the custodien of
the treasures, looked around for empty rooms;
finding none, they took brooms and swept
out three uncomfortable rooms at Marlborough
House. There, in a dismal building
never adapted or intended for anything of the
kind, are now crowded the Soulages collection,
the Bernal collection, and the Vernon
collection, and the Turner collection; and
the public are invited to solve the optical
problem of seeing them, if they can.

The managers, who have thus placed the
Soulages collection at the disposal of the
Government, for temporary exhibition, and
with no other purpose than that of advancing
instruction in Art, invite the public to pass
its own judgment, and to afford the Government
sound evidence for its guidance. They
say: " It will probably rest in great measure
with the public to decide whether or not the
Soulages collection shall become the property
of the nation."

The public, then— not only the connoisseurs
and virtuosi, but Simmonds, Clutterbuck,
Jones, ourselves, and the rest— must become
critics of this collection. It will probably
appear to Simmonds and his plain
companions, that the collection is more curious
than beautiful. Watch the visitors, and
listen to their comments. You will find
that the raptures come from the connoisseurs.
Simmonds, willing to learn, but not
yet initiated, looks at the Majolica
service, and wonders how it happens that a
plate or a dish is worth twenty or fifty
guineas. Here is a large plateau, bordered
with a pattern of cherubs' heads, eagles'
heads, and serpents, all very bright, and upon
a very bright ground. Here is a still larger
plateau, with a saint, two dogs, serpents,
amorini or little loves, an eel; and there are
fine female busts. Here is a fruttiera or fruit-
plate, with a representation of the Gathering
of the Manna, in which the manna and the
gatherers are very showy indeed. Here is a
large plate, whereon are depicted coronets,
dragons, interlaced serpents, masks, sphinxes,
military and musical trophies, garlands and
cartouches, all intensely red and yellow and
blue. Simmonds finds this to be considered
a most precious specimen, and he marvels.
Here is another plate, with Minerva and the
Muses; the Muses very plump damsels, and
Minerva with blue stockings, proper enough
in a learned lady, a goddess of wisdom, but
pictorially comical nevertheless. In short,
Simmonds observes that the colours are
brilliant, the lustre dazzling, but the drawing
often defective, and the perspective set at
nought. He may not be so irreverent as to
compare those Majolica pictures with the
penny coloured prints he bought as a boy
from the theatrical print-seller, but still the
estimated value startles him.

The truth is, such articles are valued by
the virtuosi principally for their form, and
for the technical skill with which colour has
been combined in the manufacture. Majolica,
or Raffaelle, or Faenza ware was the mediaeval
Italian pottery, made by potters contemporary
with the great Italian painters. The
decorative pottery introduced by the Arabs into