public would approve of paintings in water-colours without any pictures in oil. Some gentlemen replied hesitatingly; but the approbation of His Royal Highness the Duke of Gloucester, who was present, determined the question. Lord de Tabley gave the plan his instant and warm concurrence. Mr. Thomas Lister Parker, of Browsholme Hall, was equally prompt in his assent. The drawings were first displayed in an evening when the apartments were judicially illuminated. Mr. Fawkes issued cards of invitation for the private view only, and, notwithstanding that he was particularly select, the spacious suite of rooms was too small to receive the company. The effect was very striking. It was generally remarked that Grosvenor Place never before beheld such a blaze of beauty of fashion, or such a splendid assemblage of distinguished public characters, as on that evening, and on the subsequent days of exhibition.” The first and second rooms of the suite were filled with drawings by De Wint, J. C. Ibbetson, T. Heaphy, Glover, Havell, Robson, Hills, Prout, Atkinson, and Warwick Smith. The principal apartment, the largest in size and the last to be entered, was hung entirely with drawings by Turner. I will not venture to quote Carey’s rhapsodical description of these drawings. It is every whit as rapturous and enthusiastic as any of the purple patches penned by “A Graduate of Oxford” some fourteen or fifteen years later, but it has nothing of Ruskin’s eloquence or felicity of literary expression. Still the following remarks, from Carey’s useful book, are, I think, worth quoting: “Turner the enchanter, whose magic pencil had created the chief wonders of this temple, was frequently there. Nature, in endowing his mind, appears to have been indifferent to his person; but his brow is a page on which the traits of his high calling are stamped in capital letters, and his dark eyes sparkle with the fires of inspiration. He generally came alone; and while he leaned on the centre table in the great room, or slowly worked his rough way through the mass, he attracted every eye in the brilliant crowd, and seemed to me like a victorious Roman General, the principal figure in his own triumph. Perhaps no British artist ever retired from an exhibition of his works, with so much reason for unmixed satisfaction, or more genuine proofs of well-deserved admiration from the public.” Carey adds, “It is more than seven years since I saw this extraordinary exhibition; and even now the remembrance affects me....” And after a page or two of rather turgid bombast he winds up with the naïve remark, “I own I am an enthusiastic worshipper of Turner’s genius.”