The years 1862 and 1863 were, so far as the Exhibitions were concerned, significantly void of the fruits of Sir Edwin’s art. But 1864 brought good news and good work again; and we all rejoiced over the vigour which was apparent in “Man proposes, God disposes,” an Arctic incident suggested by the finding of the relics of Sir John Franklin. The scene is a piece of rugged ice, the coast-line of that remote land, broken by inlets of dark water. Over all is the greenish light of an Arctic noon; a purple veil of mist is drawn aside, as if a secret were displayed, and in order that we might see what had become of our long-lost countrymen. The veil gone, the rose tints of sunlight fall on the nearest and the highest points of rock-like ice, while light itself penetrates the sea-green blocks, and lurid shadows appear among the masses that strew the shore. Right across the front lies the mast of a boat, covered with brine as hard as a stone, and with a hoary fringe of icicles. A rag of tarpaulin--that may at one time have been the roof of a hut formed amongst the angular blocks--lies over this spar. Beneath this spar are a few planks, bleached in the long frost; and from below them peer a few bones--the rib bones of a man; above these lies a coat of navy blue. A huge white bear, her head on high, holds between cruel jaws a whitened bone. At the other side of the picture, and at the back of the so-called hut, sprawls the formless bulk of a larger bear, whose flattened head is laid along the ice, dragging between its jaws and from beneath the spar the ragged length of a piece of bunting, part of a Union Jack. This work now belongs to Mr. E. V. Coleman. With this painful picture we received that charming piece of manual dexterity, and keenest feeling for animal character, “A Piper and a Pair of Nutcrackers,” a bullfinch perched on a bough, just above the seat of a pair of squirrels. It is now in the possession of Mr. C. Booth. At the British Institution for this year (1864) we had “Well-bred Sitters, that never say they are bored,” a large painting of dogs, produced with all Sir Edwin’s dexterity although, it may be, not showing all his soundness of drawing, or that finish in which, of yore, he delighted. An enormous black dog sits, as if before an artist, a model of dignity and self-possession; in his mouth is a badger-hair brush, such as painters style a “softener.” By his side a fawn-coloured dog is posed with great elegance. In the foreground are several dead doves, a pheasant, a purple velvet cigar-case, the colour of which serves as a chromatic echo to that of the pheasant’s neck. This was a vigorous picture, showing all we were accustomed to find in Sir Edwin’s later works.