[Illustration: Cover art] -------------------------------------------------------------------- [Illustration: Portrait of Two Gentlemen] _Portrait of Two Gentlemen_ (_National Gallery_) This picture was given to the National Gallery in 1866. The figure on the left is the Rev Geo. Huddersford, who, before he took orders, studied art with Sir Joshua. The other figure, with violin in right hand, is J. C. W. Bamfylde. It is a representative picture enough, showing how closely the painter observed his sitters and how complete and skilful was his characterisation. -------------------------------------------------------------------- [Illustration: Title page] THE CHARM OF REYNOLDS By JAMES MASON _The Charm of Reynolds_ _Published by T. C. & E. C. Jack London and Edinburgh_ _List of Illustrations_ Portrait of Two Gentlemen ... _Frontispiece_ (_National Gallery_) Nelly O'Brien (_Wallace Collection_) Age of Innocence (_National Gallery_) Duchess of Devonshire and Child (_Chatsworth_) The Charm of Reynolds I. HIS ART AND CHARACTER Portraits painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds are a national asset, and appeal to the general public in this light almost as strongly as they appeal to the smaller section that takes a definite interest in pictures. The value of the portraits varies considerably; it is probable that the artist produced between four and five thousand in his time, sometimes completing three or four in a week for years on end, and even in his more leisured times producing six or seven per month, so it was of course inevitable that their value should not be equal. The very early work painted in Devonshire is of little worth. Italy opened the eyes of Joshua Reynolds as it has opened the eyes of so many British artists since his time. Fortunate in his life the painter was; in a certain sense, unfortunate in his art. The beauty he has committed to canvas had begun to pass before the artist's days were numbered, and many of his most successful works are to-day no more than a pale reflection of their former selves, a remnant most forlorn of what they were. One of his most painstaking biographers and soundest critics, Sir Walter Armstrong, has written, "Speaking roughly, Sir Joshua's early pictures darken, the works of his middle period fade, those of his late maturity crack." "Despite these drawbacks, the painter's position is unassailable, for it appeals alike to the historian, to the philosopher who looks to the outward semblance for reflection of the spirit behind the mask, and to the artist who finds so much to delight him in the point of achievement to which Reynolds raised portrait painting and can appreciate the larger aspect of work that is visible in some degree to everybody.