A recent visit to Philadelphia afforded us an opportunity to visit its public galleries. Among the additions lately made to that of the Art-Union is one of the finest compositions of Mr. Cropsey, in which the characteristics of the scenery of Italy are combined with remarkable effect. From a bold and vigorously executed foreground, marked by chesnut and cypress tress, the eye is attracted by groves and streams, and convents and palaces, and ruined temples and aqueducts, reposing under such a sky as bends over that land alone, away to shining and sleeping waters that seem to reach close to the gates of paradise. _The Coast of Greece_, by Paul Weber of Philadelphia, is in the grand and imposing style of Achenbach. There is a breadth and massiveness and solemn grandeur in this picture which clearly indicate that the artist, who has hitherto given his attention altogether to landscapes, has in such efforts his true vocation. _Hagar and Ishmael in the Desert_, by A. Woodside, is a cabinet picture which would be regarded as good beside any of the many great productions which illustrate the same subject. In color and composition it is excellent. Mr. Woodside is the painter of a large and attractive picture, _The Introduction of Christianity into Britain_, which was among the prizes of the last distribution of the American Art-Union. _Lager Beer_, by C. Schnessele, is a genre picture, illustrative of German character in Philadelphia at the present day. The scene is an interior of a large beer saloon, by gaslight, in which a dozen or fifteen persons with brimming cups are gathered round a table where a trio are singing songs of the fatherland. The drawing, grouping, light and shade, are highly effective. Mr. Schnessele is a Frenchman, a pupil of Delaroche, and has been in the United States about three years. His works exhibit that skill in detail and general execution which is a result of a cultivation very rare among American painters. _Waiting the Ferry_, by W. T. Van Starkenburgh, is a landscape with cattle and human figures, with some of the best qualities conspicuous in Backhuysen's works of a similar character. _Cattskill Creek_, by G. N. T. Van Starkenburgh,--a brother of the last mentioned painter,--is full of the beauty of that condition of nature which soothes the restless spirit of man, when She glides Into his darker musings, with a mild And healing sympathy, that steals away Their sharpness, ere he is aware. Mr. Winner has some vigorous heads of old men, and other artists whom our limits will not suffer us to mention particularly are represented by various creditable works. As the plan of the Philadelphia Art-Union is essentially different from that of any other in this country, we quote from a circular in its last "Reporter" an explanatory paragraph: