accurate following out of architectural detail. With
his present modes of execution, farther fidelity is impossible, nor has
any other mode of execution yet obtained the same results; and though
much is unaccomplished by him in certain subjects, and something of
over-mannerism may be traced in his treatment of others, as especially
in his mode of expressing the decorative parts of Greek or Roman
architecture, yet in his own peculiar Gothic territory, where the spirit
of the subject itself is somewhat rude and grotesque, his abstract of
decoration has more of the spirit of the reality than far more laborious
imitation. The spirit of the Flemish Hotel de Ville and decorated street
architecture has never been even in the slightest degree felt or
conveyed except by him, and by him, to my mind, faultlessly and
absolutely; and though his interpretation of architecture that contains
more refined art in its details is far less satisfactory, still it is
impossible, while walking on his favorite angle of the Piazzetta at
Venice, either to think of any other artist than Prout or _not_ to think
of _him_.

Sec. 33. Modern architectural painting generally. G. Cattermole.

Many other dexterous and agreeable architectural artists we have of
various degrees of merit, but of all of whom, it may be generally said,
that they draw hats, faces, cloaks, and caps much better than Prout, but
figures not so well; that they draw walls and windows but not cities,
mouldings and buttresses but not cathedrals. Joseph Nash's work on the
architecture of the middle ages is, however, valuable, and I suppose
that Haghe's works may be depended on for fidelity. But it appears very
strange that a workman capable of producing the clever drawings he has,
from time to time, sent to the New Society of Painters in Water Colors,
should publish lithographs so conventional, forced, and lifeless.

It is not without hesitation, that I mention a name respecting which
the reader may already have been surprised at my silence, that of G.
Cattermole. There are signs in his works of very peculiar gifts, and
perhaps also of powerful genius; their deficiencies I should willingly
attribute to the advice of ill-judging friends, and to the applause of a
public satisfied with shallow efforts, if brilliant; yet I cannot but
think it one necessary characteristic of all true genius to be misled by
no such false fires. The Antiquarian feeling of Cattermole is pure,
earnest, and n