Unfortunately, the praise that is due to a work as beautiful as the “Saint George” cannot be given to the Clarence Memorial as a whole. Indeed, in its place, the effect of the statuette, instead of being heightened, is diminished. The instance is typical of the impression left by the complete work. Brilliantly imaginative as the general conception was, the original ideas have not fused into that grand unity which is the last test of the greatest works of art. Between the first conception of a great memorial—say the Medici Chapel, the Tomb of Maximilian, or the Clarence Memorial—and the final result, there is a great gulf fixed. More than imaginative craftsmanship is required to bridge this. The task calls for unswerving patience and not a little business tact. In one or another of these faculties, Gilbert seems to be lacking. The imagination and craftsmanship which produce a work like the “Saint George” flag before a commission of the first magnitude is completed. An artistic creed like Alfred Gilbert’s is a magnificent thing. But it needs to be allied with strength of character and a rigid self-criticism. Had the English sculptor added a measure of the nature of Michael Angelo to the strain of rich poetry and high artistic ideality with which he has been endowed, England would have been able to boast a genius of the first order. As things are, it can be grateful for—an Alfred Gilbert. [Illustration: ONSLOW FORD EGYPTIAN SINGER Tate Gallery, London] The sculptor who shared with Alfred Gilbert the honour of having been the earliest Englishman to express through marble and bronze the whole of a rich poetical philosophy was Onslow Ford. Born in 1852 and sending his first work of sculpture to the Academy in 1875, Onslow Ford received his early training as a painter. Indeed, he never had any systematic instruction as a sculptor. He came into notice by winning the “Rowland Hill” competition, the result being the statue which stands behind the Royal Exchange, within a stone’s-throw of Dalou’s charming bronze fountain, “Maternity.” Very shortly after he carved the magnificent marble “Henry Irving as Hamlet,” now at the Guildhall, the property of the Corporation of London. The “Henry Irving” is one of the most complete efforts in English art. The beauty of the design and the powerful modelling of the face and hands, place the statue in the very forefront of modern English sculpture. Added to this is the magnificent realism with which the sculptor has preserved the sense of theatrical portraiture. The figure is not Henry Irving; nor is it Hamlet. The imaginative insight of the artist has been able to reach an absolute fusion of the two ideas. It really is “Henry Irving as Hamlet.” No reference to the genius of Onslow Ford would be complete without a word as to his statuettes, particularly as “sculpture in little” may well prove to be the means whereby the English sculptor will regain the attention of the art-buyer in the near future.