Art-Jottings In Art-Studios.

Ill what , once more , does Art consist ? Not the mere presenting to the eye the picture of that which strikes us as the beauty of form , but rather in the reading a lesson to our inner sense of sight whilst it shows us the counterfeit of perfection as near to life as human hand can fashion it . How has Art been given again to man ? He has , as one commonly says , discovered aud improved . Rough untutored man , savage may be , yet endued . with intelligence ,

has found a knotted piece of wood or rugged fragment of stone ; in it he has seen a slight resemblance to some thing of life ; a few touches of his knife or such rough tool has improved the likeness ; improvement begets practice , practice imju'ovenient ; till the work of his hand , rude enough at first , has become a closer imitation of his model . Practice , ever-increasing , grades his effort , and his work becomes more and more beautiful ; whilstas his hand becomes more skilfulhis mind becomes more cultivatedand as

, , , his representation approaches the true he attains to the beautiful , so too , as he produces the beautiful he begins to realise the true ; and from merely representing to the eye the likeness of the real , he gradually comes to picture to the mind the perfection of the ideal . And so the sculptured block becomes capable , in his hands , of passing beyond the presentment of the frailty of this present state to the picturing of the

perfection of the long-distant past and the ever-nearing future . The girl who traced her lover's shadow with the charcoal on the wall , strove to keep with her his presence in their parting , so the true Artist strives , and to a great extent succeeds in presenting to our view , the permanent resemblance of a beauty ancl a truth , of whose reaHty we have here but a fleeting , evanescent glimpse . Ampbion , wandering by the restless sea , picked up the hollow tortoise shell ; letting sbp , by accidentthe tightened cord by which he bore ita resonant note resulted ; here

, , was the foundation of music . Probably the note of the beating wave produced with that of the vibrating string a pleasing whole , whence might have resulted Harmony ; but how ? Could this one sounding note have taught man music ? Coidd this single chord have generated the gamut ? Is it not more feasible to suppose that man had within him some long dormant melody that this one stray taste of sweetness called into action , — some sleeping memory of heavenly songlong forgotten ancl laid asidethat this feeble

, , glimmer awoke to the full perception of the " concord of sweet sounds" ? Li short , was it not rather the Music within the man that became developed , than that the faculty was formed by the extraneous influence of the accidental sound ? Surely we have our great master of song with us when we recall his sweeping condemnation of the man within whose breast there is no innate trace of melody : —

" The man thatliath no music in himself . Nov is not mov'd with concord of sweet sounds , Is fit for treasons , stratagems , and spoils ; The motions of his spirit tire dull as night , And his affections dark as Erebus : Let no such man be trusted , " Such then isor at least seems to us to bethe oriin of Art—A heaven-born iftim

, , g . g , - planted in man ' s nature in the time of his innocence ; lost , or at best marred , in his fall , ancl overlaid by the savage ignorance into which he drifted : called again to bfe , however , by some chance touch , like melody awakened from the rusted string of the dis-used harpsichord by the passing breeze ; recognised by some intuitive quality of soul ; harboured and given a home in some cobwebbed corner of the mind ; appreciated , and fostered ancl nurtured by man ' s better nature , till the outcome is the beautiful and true .

Its work a reflective one , as well as a diffusive—like mercy , — ¦ " It is twice bless'd , It blesseth him that gives , and him that takes " : for it not onl y spreads its influence far ancl wide over a man ' s surroundings , but it acts and reacts upon himself . The soxd that has once arrived at a true conception of true