Mr. Bird’s picture of _The Entombment of Christ_, is, we conceive, very inferior to his picture last year of _Job and his Friends_. The colouring is equally bad, and the composition is not equally good. There is one pretty figure of a girl, but her prettiness is not an advantage to the subject. In all things, ‘It is place which lessens and sets off.’ Mr. Bird constantly introduces the extremities of the hands and feet into his pictures, only to show how ill he can paint them. The picture of _The Surrender of Calais_ has been already before the public. Among the historical pictures, we suppose from its name, we must rank that of the _Prophet Ezra_, by G. Hayter, though it does not appear to us to belong to the class. It is a fine, rich, and strongly painted picture of a man reading a book. The being able to copy nature with truth and effect is not history, though we think it is the first step to it. In this picture, which we believe is a first essay, Mr. Hayter has not redeemed the pledge he gave in his miniatures. If we could paint such miniatures as he does, we would do nothing but paint miniatures always; and laugh at the advertisements of great historical pictures in the newspapers. The _St. Bernard_, by the same artist, is very indifferent. Mr. Harlowe’s _Hubert and Arthur_ is the greatest piece of coxcombry and absurdity we remember to have seen. We do not think that any one who pleases has a right to paint a libel on Shakspeare. The generality of the historical pictures in the gallery are such as have been always painted, and as will always be painted, in spite of all that can be said to the contrary, and therefore it is as well to say nothing about them. Miss Jackson’s _Mars subdued by Peace_ is a very pleasing composition. Both the face and expression of the figure of _Peace_ are those of a very beautiful and interesting girl, though from the tender pensiveness of the features she seems rather as if sending _Mars_ out to battle than disarming him; and as to the God of War himself, he does not look like one whom ‘deep scars of thunder have intrenched,’ but as if he had been kept a long time at home in a lady’s chamber. The Cupids (when Ladies imagine Cupids, what can they be less?) are very nice, little, chubby fellows. There are two pictures of _The Sick Pigeon_ and _The Favourite Kitten_ by Miss Geddes, both of which we like, gallantry out of the question. The kitten in the last is exquisitely painted. You may almost hear it _purring_. Among the foreign contributors to this department we ought to mention _Music_, by M. Messora, in the manner of the early Italian masters, and _Devotion_, a small picture by J. Laschallas, which is hung almost out of sight, and which, if it were hung a little lower, we suspect, would be found to be ‘a good picture and a true.’