and before we had well commenced the ascent, off went the Macintosh. I could not help thinking it must have been vastly agreeable to carry a soda-water bottle of brandy, and half the contents of a baker's shop, under his arm, up the side of Skiddaw. My companion talked of mists, precipices, and guides, by turns; and I had not then to learn, that he was just now less at ease than during his ride round Derwent Water in the morning, with a two-foot telescope under his arm and the Tourist's Guide in his hand. But, to proceed. We had not gone very far, when a fence presented itself; on reaching the other side of which, we found ourselves amongst long grass, or barley, or something of the kind. Halt was the word; and after holding a short council of war, or rather of route, we brought up our left shoulder, and by extraordinary good luck, after crossing another wall, struck again into the path, which we judged to be the right one, by the wall on the right hand, which the guide book had specially mentioned. Presently we got into a small plantation, and there being no moon, it was, of course, rather dark; but we were in the right track. Down sat my friend, declaring he must have a drop of brandy, and consider the propriety of going on. Bad luck to the soda-water bottle, thought I. However, I lost no time in assuring him, that arrive at what conclusion he might, I certainly had no other intention than to proceed. In about ten minutes he was ready to move on; and by half-past 2 A.M., and after more than one application to the soda-water bottle, we found ourselves well up on the shoulder of the mountain, when I, in my turn, voted for a biscuit and a little brandy and water. The water was soon found, but it needed something to qualify it; for it was nasty muddy-tasted stuff, standing in little pools here and there, in the swampy ground. By this time the morning began to loom, and we pursued our way, as we then thought, to the summit; and when we arrived there it was cutting cold. My companion protested he was so tired that he must sit down. I tried all in my power to dissuade him from so dangerous an experiment, but in vain; and down he sat, and in half a minute was fast asleep. "Here's a pretty kettle of fish, thought I: "if I let the fellow snoose on, he will, likely enough, never wake again." I accordingly shook him by the shoulder and tried to rouse him up, but it was useless; and I began to think, as I paced quickly up and down, with my Macintosh wrapped closely round me, what an ass I had been to get myself into such a precious fix; and most charitably wished that the bay pony had broken my companion's neck, before I had seen the shade of his countenance. A nice specimen of a mountain climber in the dark, and "without a guide": what pretty things tourist guide books are! I pictured the sleeper as far more in his element with a piece of nicely tapered mahogany in his hand, about three feet long, and dotted at intervals with little brass tacks. Well, what was to be done? It became colder and colder as the morning advanced, and I resolved I would wake him up; and so I did after an infinity of trouble, and I verily believe some little abuse into the bargain; however, he was a good-natured fellow, and took all as it was meant. I have heard of a man, under similar circumstances, giving his friend a thorough good basting, to evidence the love he bore him. When I got him once more fairly on his shivering legs, I proposed to build up a cairn of the large flat stones, with which the top of Skiddaw is covered in some places; and in a very short time we had raised a

conical pile, about five feet high, at which my companion worked manfully; and into this cairn I proposed to put our cards, which was accordingly done. I confess I felt a little curious to have a look at one of the said pasteboards, not having even learned the name of the gentleman who carried the soda-water bottle, neither had I the curiosity afterwards to enquire. Whilst engaged as just described, the morning, which had hitherto been clear, suddenly changed, and a dense mist came driving along from the south-east at a fearful rate. "Good-bye to a sunrise from the top of Skiddaw this morning," said I to myself; "and if this weather continues, we may pass more hours up here than are likely to be agreeable. At twenty minutes before four o'clock, the mist cleared sufficiently to enable us to discover that we were not yet on the highest point of the mountain, which appeared about the third of a mile to the north-west of our present position. Just at this time the dense vapour lifted considerably, and favoured us. I threw off my Macintosh, and away we both started for the summit, at as brisk a pace as the ascent in our front would admit of. But mountain climbing is deceptive work; and when we arrived at what a few minutes before we had supposed to be the highest elevation, another, and yet another rising ground presented itself. It was now a race against time-past four o'clock; and every now and then the driving mist would gather close around, leaving us in doubt whether or not we were going in a right direction. Presently, however, we descried the flag-staff, set up by a surveying party some time previous; and arrived at this point, our object, so far as regarded being on the highest point of the mountain, was accomplished, and in sufficient time to have witnessed the glorious sun emerge from the eastern horizon, had not the rolling mist shut out all hope of that truly magnificent sight; and it was not until after waiting nearly an hour, alternately pacing up and down, and taking shelter from the keen blast (rendered doubly sharp by the fog and dampness of the atmosphere) beneath a little stone-covered place, resembling a pigsty, at the foot of the flag-staff (which, I conclude, had been erected as a temporary shelter for the surveying party before mentioned), that we first descried the sun through the woolly vapour; but it had then attained an altitude at which the glorious splendour of the sunrise is past, even if the mist had entirely cleared off, which was, however, far from being the case. But before we left the top of the mountain, which we did soon after six o'clock, it had receded from the summits of the numerous mountains discernable from our elevated position, and hung in dense masses in the valleys beneath; and still we lingered, until the more powerful and resplendent rays of the sun dispersed these envious vapours, and opened to us a prospect on all sides sublimely grand; mountains and lakes (of which latter I think above twenty may be counted from the top of Skiddaw) stretch away as far as the eye can reach; and, to the north, the chaos of mountains which present themselves have a desolation and wildness of aspect almost fearful to behold. During the descent, which is particularly easy throughout its whole length (as may be supposed, when ladies ride on horseback up and down Skiddaw), we encountered several of the large flat stones which we had set up in our ascent as a precautionary measure, in case of the mists being out," as it is termed, on our return, when these landmarks would have proved most friendly in guiding our downward path. During our

descent, we met a party of three ladies on ponies, and a couple of guides, going up the mountain. The morning was now (seven o'clock) clear and bright, giving promise of a splendid day, and between eight and nine we entered Keswick; and although, of course, a good deal disappointed at the result of the expedition, it by no means blunted the edge of an appetite, such as mountain air alone can give; and by ten o'clock I was contemplating the remains of a good breakfast, and preparing for another ramble, having dropped my friend at his hotel as we passed, and who doubtless congratulated himself not a little at the near prospect of again possessing himself of his watch and chain.

Friday, July 6th.-Hot day: started from Keswick, about 6 A.M., for Penrith seventeen miles: halted to breakfast on the road, and had some of the saltest mutton I ever ate in my life. About seven o'clock in the evening, I got on the top of the London mail, at Penrith. The night was squally, with heavy thunderstorms; and altogether the journey (a tedious one of six-and-thirty hours) proved, for the time of year, exceedingly cold and wet; but thanks to my well-tried Macintosh, I arrived at the Spread Eagle, in Gracechurch-street, on Sunday morning, the 8th, a little before six o'clock, none the worse for weather, having walked a distance of about 672 miles, above 300 of which I carried my knapsack; and travelled, in the whole, about 1,182 miles by land and sea, since quitting London in April. On my return to the modern Babylon, I again brought up at my old quarters in Maddox-street. When I quitted them three months before, it had been my intention to have crossed the Border-being provided with letters that would have insured me salmon-fishing and grouse-shooting throughout the Highlands-and visited some friends in the fine, but sombre, city of Glasgow, where I once was quartered for a fortnight; but whilst at Keswick I changed my mind; and instead of catching salmon and shooting grouse in "the land o'cakes," I found myself, towards the end of September, in Paris, having taken a look at our friends the Dutch and Belgians, en route.

THE EXHIBITIONS.

The chief feature again of the Exhibitions of this year is the confirmation obtained for rising talent. While many already-established celebrities do little more than maintain their positions—and some scarcely that— a few hitherto less-known men have produced works that promise well for their authors' reaching, at no very distant period, the very highest ranks of excellence. Rankley,* Phillips, Millais, and others, all proclaim their own progress, while they are welcomed onward with a keen feeling of relish for their style and subject that one rarely gives so readily to the repetitions of older friends.

Though the Sporting Reviewer cannot walk through the rooms with his eyes shut to all their varied attractions, he must still here keep his pen to the horse-and-hound theme that alone admits of his criticism.

* Everybody by this has seen and admired the "Innocence and Guilt," though we fancy too many missed an equally clever picture in its way by Mr. Rankley, in the British Institution. We dare do no more here than name it: it's subject is," Love in humble Life."

F

His opening, even in this somewhat confined branch of the art, will still apply equally well; for rapid progress distinguishes some of our animalpainters quite as much as it marks many of their brethren who seek other subjects for illustration. There is, however, this to be said that the still-rising men in our line have long been well and widely known, and, in the opinion of many of their admirers, no doubt, as it is, reached a perfection that it would be difficult to improve upon. When we name Ansdell and Herring as gentlemen making great progress in their pictures of this season, we do so not so much in confirmation of their abilities as in proof of their increasing determination to gain that rank they have long shown the signs of attaining to.

The latter of these-Mr. Herring-has been remarkable for the fervour and engrossing nature of his attachments-so long as they last. Year after year, and day after day, he painted away at the English race-horse-a noble study, too, mind-till nobody else could paint one like him, and he himself could paint nothing else—at least, so people began to say. If you did catch his name on the walls of the Academy-and he certainly was never too proud of its being there—as a certain sequitur, it was attached to cap-and-jacket celebrity, or the careful arrangement of a Newmarket interior. Herring was the racehorse painter, just as Lawrence was the portrait-painter or Wilkie the character-painter-not the man of his day, but the man of his age. And then, lo! just when no House would publish a winner without Herring painted him, and no proud and happy owner would have his crack painted without Herring painted him, the capricious artist laid down his brush, and would paint him no more! No; he felt his study here had been sufficient, and so, hastily shutting the door of the box after him, he tucks up his trousers, and walks out of the stable into the farm-yard.

Here, again, his new love rages quite as fiercely as ever his first did. Mark how he hangs and dallies over it! how in some fresh light he continually finds fresh beauties! how group after group and face after face will come up, and will not be comforted till he has tried his hand on it. The ragged, dishevelled heads over the straw-rack, grinding away so soberly and yet so contentedly at their meagre meal, with a pigeon or two impudently taking tithe in any tit-bit that may be turned up-then, again, a whole family of ducks and ducklings, that were sketched, no doubt, at the grey horse's heel; or old Nannie-that ploughboy's pet-monopolizing the stable-doorway, and looking as solemn as only such a court-fool could look; further on, at another angle of the yard, a mass of "nearly ready" porkers, packed head and tail together, in all the "happiness" of full bellies and easy consciences. Off they come, one after another, in those little oval-framed realities. Winter, spring, summer-it was still the farm-yard in detachments, till, with one mighty grasp, he embraced them all in that famous production, "The Market Gardeners." This picture, with its cart-horses, pigeons, ducks, and wonderful detail of homestead addenda, gives the sum-up of Mr. Herring's second grand study. Leave it he never should; but might we suggest a little variety for next season? Without that, the progress cannot continue; with it--with a change, say now-and-then to some perhaps higher and more elaborate subject-it would be difficult to say where such progress is to end.

Mr. Herring's works-all in the Exhibition of the Society of British Artists-include "The Market Gardeners," already widely, though not fairly, known by a very middling engraving after it; a partial reproduction of the same picture in "The Farm Stubble-yard;" a Study of Horses' Heads (iterumque), another of Young Greyhounds, and a third of Pigs ("Happiness"). He has also a Goat and another Farmyard Group in illustration of " Winter," in which the coat of the creamcoloured horse lies, surely, too smooth and silky for the season the artist has in other respects so truly transferred to his canvass.

Like Herring, Mr. Ansdell takes long to tire of a favourite subject ; and we still find him engaged on the deer and deer-hound with all that heart and energy he has ever given to the Highlands. More and more, too, we are glad to say, do his pictures become his own in thought and work, his full-sized figures and grand treatment giving an individuality there is now no disputing. His best efforts this year are a pair of deer-stalking subjects, in the British Institution, Pall Mall. As usual, they occupy a great space; and from that cause will, we fancy, be always seen to much greater advantage in the baronial halls of the Scottish Chief they will ultimately reach than on the confined and erowded walls of an exhibition-room. Perhaps there never was anything finer painted than the hill-man in the "Bringing a Stag from the Hill-top." The attitude of the "Wolf-slayer" at the Royal Academy is more animated; but, as a whole, we think neither this nor the "Death of Gelert" are so thoroughly successful as the companion pictures in Pall Mall. The more action, generally, with Mr. Ansdell, the more effect; though this time we fancy it the other way. It is but fair to add that the last-named picture, the "Death of Gelert," is most infamously hung at the Academy. No man, however, can better afford such a manifest injustice than Mr. Ansdell; he has a power within himself that must clear his own way, despite any comparatively little difficulties that may now impede it. Beyond the works we have enumerated, he has "An Old Intruder"—a small picture of a sheltie robbing a cornfield at the British Institution.

Having so far "reported progress," let us turn now to an established authority or two, and begin with him with whom nearly all the world make a point of beginuing-Edwin Landseer, who has five pictures in the Royal Academy. His grand effort-one as great as grand-is "The Dead Lion," upon which common opinion seems here to follow that of the dandy guardsman who pronounced everything "d-d fine." And "d-d fine" it certainly is; but there is no getting beyond that. The dead lion is very truly painted, the listless, vapid passiveness of the figure being well backed by the air of desolation and sterility in which it is found. Still, it is not an attractive picture, for all that; and we fear there is more of fashion than that of the genuine enjoyment with which people usually contemplate and come again to Landseer's works. With how much more relish one reaches and acknowledges his "Forester's Family," or "The Free Church"--both very happy specimens of Landseer's own.' The former is a study of a large family of fawns grouped round a keeper's daughter, who is distributing their morning meal. The deer are painted with a life-like softness and delicacy that is wonderfully effective; while the girl-a fine woman, by the way-contrasts well with her adopted family. Though so generally

27