"This latter is a representation of an ornamental group of elephants' tusks, with feathers tied to the ends of them. Not the wildest imagination could ever conjure up in it the remotest resemblance to the bough of a tree. It might be the claws of a witch--the talons of an eagle--the horns of a fiend; but it is a full assemblage of every conceivable falsehood which can be told respecting foliage--a piece of work so barbarous in every way _that one glance at it ought to prove the complete charlatanism and trickery of the whole system of the old landscape-painters_.... I will say here at once, that such drawing as this is as ugly as it is childish, and as painful as it is false; and that the man who could tolerate, much more, who could deliberately set down such a thing on his canvass, _had neither eye nor feeling for one single attribute or excellence of God's works_. He might have drawn _the other stem_ in excusable ignorance, or under some false impression of being able to improve upon nature, but this is conclusive and unpardonable."--(P. 382.) The great redeeming quality of Mr Ruskin--and we wish to give it conspicuous and honourable mention--is his love of nature. Here lies the charm of his works; to this may be traced whatever virtue is in them, or whatever utility they may possess. They will send the painter more than ever to the study of nature, and perhaps they will have a still more beneficial effect on the art, by sending the critic of painting to the same school. It would be almost an insult to the landscape-painter to suppose that he needed this lesson; the very love of his art must lead him perpetually, one would think, to his great and delightful study amongst the fields, under the open skies, before the rivers and the hills. But the critic of the picture-gallery is often one who goes from picture to picture, and very little from nature to the painting. Consequently, where an artist succeeds in imitating some effect in nature which had not been before represented on the canvass, such a critic is more likely to be displeased than gratified; and the artist, having to paint for a conventional taste, is in danger of sacrificing to it his own higher aspirations. Now it is most true that no man should pretend to be a critic upon pictures unless he understands the art itself of painting; he ought, we suspect, to have handled the pencil or the brush himself; at all events, he ought in some way to have been initiated into the mysteries of the pallet and the easel. Otherwise, not knowing the difficulties to be overcome, nor the means at hand for encountering them, he cannot possibly estimate the degree of merit due to the artist for the production of this or that effect. He may be loud in applause where nothing has been displayed but the old traditions of the art. But still this is only one-half the knowledge he ought to possess.