with which the floor is strewn. A great simplicity in the
surroundings, and all the points of character insisted on, with the
view of awakening the spectator's curiosity. From first to last a
vicious desire to narrate an anecdote. It is strange that a man of Mr.
Orchardson's talent should participate so fully in the supreme vice of
modern art which believes a picture to be the same thing as a scene in
a play. The whole picture conceived and executed in that pale yellow
tint which seems to be the habitual colour of Mr. Orchardson's mind."
A pity, indeed it is that Mr. Orchardson should waste very real talent
in narratives, for he is a great portrait painter. I remember very
well that beautiful portrait of his wife and child, and will take this
opportunity to recall it. It is the finest thing he has done; finer
than the portrait of Mr. Gilbey. Here, in a few words, is the subject
of the picture. An old-fashioned cane sofa stretches right across the
canvas. A lady in black is seated on the right; she bends forward, her
left arm leaning over the back of the sofa; she holds in her hand a
Japanese hand-screen. The fine and graceful English profile is
modelled without vulgar roundness, _un beau modele a plat_; and the
black hair is heavy and loose, one lock slipping over the forehead.
The painter has told the exact character of the hair as he has told
the character of the hand, and the age of the hand and hair is
evident. She is a woman of five-and-thirty, she is interested in her
baby, her first baby, as a woman of that age would be. The baby lies
on a woollen rug and cushion, just beneath the mother's eyes; the
colour of both is a reddish yellow. He holds up his hands for the
hand-screen that the mother waves about him. The strip of background
about the yellow cane-work is grey-green; there is a vase of dried
ferns and grasses on the left, and the whole picture is filled and
penetrated with the affection and charm of English home-life, and
without being disfigured with any touch of vulgar or commonplace