[2] Mr. Ruskin himself was converted by the acquisition of the great Perugino (No. 288). In congratulating the Trustees on their acquisition of this "noble picture," he wrote: "It at once, to my mind, raises our National Gallery from a second-rate to a first-rate collection. I have always loved the master, and given much time to the study of his works; but this is the best I have ever seen" (_Notes on the Turner Gallery_, p. 89 _n._). [3] See, for instance, Nos. 10, 61, 193, 195, 479 and 498, 757, 790, 896, 1131, and 1171. [4] The exterior of the building is not generally considered an architectural success, and the ugliness of the dome is almost proverbial. But it should be remembered that the original design included the erection of suitable pieces of sculpture--such as may be seen in old engravings of the Gallery, made from the architect's drawings--on the still vacant pedestals. [5] The several extensions of the Gallery are shown in the plan on a later page. [6] The total number should thus be 28; but in the reconstruction four smaller rooms were thrown into two larger ones. The plan thus shows 25 numbered rooms and one called the "Dome." [7] This sum only includes amounts paid out of Parliamentary grants or other National Gallery funds or special contributions. [8] In 1894, however, an alteration was made in the Minute, and the responsibility for purchases was vested in the Director and the Trustees jointly. [9] Sir William Gregory relates in his _Autobiography_ the following story: "In 1884, when the Trustees were endeavouring to secure some of the pre-eminently fine Rubenses from the Duke of Marlborough, Alfred Rothschild met me in St. James's Street, and said, 'If you think the Blenheim Rubenses are more important than your Dutch pictures to the Gallery, and that you cannot get the money from the Government, I am prepared to give you £250,000 for the Peel pictures; and I will hold good to this offer till the day after to-morrow.'" [10] Of the 1170 pieces thus unaccounted for (the total number belonging to the Trustees being roughly 2870) the greater number are at Millbank. Others are on loan to provincial institutions (see App. II.). [11] With this object in view, several of them have been published with descriptive letterpress by Mr. Sydney Vacher. [12] These contrasts were worked out and illustrated by Mr. Grant Allen in his papers on "The Evolution of Italian Art" in the _Pall Mall Magazine_ for 1895. [13] See _Raphael's Madonnas_, by Karl Károly, 1894. [14] Ruskin's _Modern Painters_ is of course the great book on this subject. The evolution of "Landscape in Art" has been historically treated by Mr. Josiah Gilbert in a work thus entitled, which contains numerous illustrations from the National Gallery. GUIDE TO THE GALLERY AND INTRODUCTIONS TO THE SCHOOLS OF PAINTING