which a good painter could be paid. To give him his bread and cheese,
and so much a day, and say, Here are such and such things we want you to
do, is, I believe, the healthiest, simplest, and happiest way in which
great work can be produced. But whether it is compatible with our
present system I cannot say, nor whether every man would not run away as
soon as he found he could get two or three thousand pounds by painting a
catching picture. I think your best men would not.

You would be in favor of those fellowships?--Yes.

190. I gather that you are in favor of the encouragement of mural
decoration, fresco painting, and so forth. The system that prevails
abroad, in France, for instance, is for painters to employ pupils to
work under them. It was in that way that Delaroche painted his hemicycle
at the Academie des Beaux-Arts, employing four pupils, who worked for
him, and who from his small sketch drew the full-sized picture on the
walls, which was subsequently corrected by him. They then colored it up
to his sketch, after which he shut himself up again, and completed it.
On the other hand, if you go to the Victoria Gallery in the House of
Lords, you find Mr. Maclise at work on a space of wall forty-eight feet
long, painting the Death of Nelson on the deck of the "Victory," every
figure being life size, the deck of the ship and the ropes and
everything being the actual size, and you see him painting with his own
hand each little bit of rope and the minutest detail. Which of the two
systems do you think is the soundest and most calculated to produce
great and noble work?--The first is the best for the pupils, the other
is the best for the public. But unquestionably not only can a great work
be executed as Mr. Maclise is executing his, but no really great work
was executed otherwise, for in all mighty work, whether in fresco or
oil, every touch and hue of color to the last corner has been put on
lovingly by the painter's own hand, not leaving to a pupil to paint so
much as a pebble under a horse's foot.

191. Do you believe that most of the works of the great masters in Italy
were so executed?--No; because the pupils were nearly as mighty as the
masters. Great men took such an interest in their work, and they were so
modest and simple that they were repeatedly sacrificing themselves to
the interests of their religion or of the society they were working for;
and when a thing was to be done in a certain time it could only