appreciating copies," from which the beginner, in collecting, may take some useful hints. He repeats the well-known anecdote of the copy from Raffaelle by Andrea del Sarto, which Julio Romano, who had worked upon the picture, believed to be the original, though assured beforehand by Vasari that it was a copy. With regard to Rubens, by far the greater number of pictures said to be by him, are by the hands of his scholars, to whom he gave the design and outline merely, sometimes touching up the pictures with his own hand. This has been a common and a justifiable practice with great painters, both ancient and modern, or it would have been impossible for any one pair of hands to have done the works which bear the names of some well-employed painters. The few pictures entirely by the hand of Rubens confirm the suspicion as to others, by their superiority. Contemporary copies he considers in a very different light from more modern, because the modern being from the old after they had deepened, deepen still more, and in a few years scarcely resemble in tone the originals. It is from such copies that an ill name has been given to all copies. We have very little feeling for amateurs in their annoyances and embarrassments, who discover that they have only purchased a copy; for they did not judge according to the merits of the picture, but the name under which it was admitted. The sixth chapter, upon "The manner of analysing and describing pictures," furnishes some good hints to catalogue-makers and auctioneers. The examples are ingeniously worded, and with no little precision. The number given is but a selection from about 240 pages. Whoever will try his hand at a descriptive catalogue, will find it not so easy a task as he imagined. We should have perhaps entertained a higher opinion of the author's judgment, though not a higher of his descriptive power, supposing it to have been exercised as a disciple of the noted Mr Puff, who took a double first in those arts, had the translator kindly omitted an outline of a picture by Poelemburg--_The Adoration of the Shepherds_. It is certainly well described in generality and detail; but never was any thing more like Mr Puff's style than the following:--"Poelemburg has here surpassed himself by the exactness of the design, and the fine form of the figures. He has carried to the highest degree their gracious and simple expression. The picture is not less distinguished for the attractive effect of light well distributed, for harmony and the clear obscure, for the agreeable and sweet tone of the proper colours, and for that truth," &c. &c. &c.--but alas! the outline! "Look on this picture and on this." It may have been a pretty picture, though the subject is much above Poelemburg; but--shall we pronounce it?--the design is wretched--we cannot help it, and would spare it if we could. Strange are the blunders made in descriptive catalogues. An instance is given--an amusing specimen from a well-established manufactory.