International studio (51.1913/1914)

Book Reviews

Of these, No. i survives
only in the first of Mr.
White’s two Achilles tap-
estries; Nos. 2 to 9 in both
sets of engravings men-
tioned above; Nos. 2,3, 5,
6, 8, 9 in the original small
paintings on wood owned
by Lord Barrymore and
often exhibited, notably at
the National Loan Exhi-
bition held in the Grafton
Galleries,London, 1909-10;
No. 6, in the second of Mr.
White’s two Achilles tap-
estries illustrated on the
opposite page; Nos. 2 and
3, and three others, in the
form of tapestries in the
Brussels Museum, illus-
trated here, but with bord-
ers that, as the illustration
shows, are different and
less interesting.
Several of the designs
also survive in the form of


Loaned by Mr. George R. White to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

ACHILLES AT THE ORACLE

copies painted by pupils of Rubens. G. L. H.

DThe Art of the Wallace Collec-
tion. By Henry C. Shelley. (L. C.
Page & Co., Boston.) $2.00.
The very mention of collection or museum or
gallery produces the fear of “minutes,” “direct-
ors’ meetings,” lengthy “catalogues,” “building
estimates” and such like uninteresting topics, but
such fear is quite unwarranted in the case of any
volume by Mr. Shelley, who knows how to write
very entertainingly of art collections, without
introducing the dull end. We are reassured by
the opening lines:
“On a July afternoon of the year 1774 the fash-
ionables of London who drove along Piccadilly on
their way to an airing in Hyde Park, saw the wit
of the day, George Selwyn, seated upon the steps
of my Lord March’s house, fondling a little girl.”
Nothing dull about that, in very truth. The
romance of Mie Mie is pleasantly recounted, and
how the treasures of Hertford House fell to Lady
Wallace and ultimately to the British nation. In
viewing the galleries the author advises the visitor
to select his quarry and pursue it. After due con-
sideration of the various pictures with a running

commentary of criticism and anecdote, Mr.
Shelley turns to other furnishings of Hertford
House and several chapters are devoted to furni-
ture, bronzes, marbles, porcelain, illuminations,
miniatures, arms and armor. Good illustrations
and a good index complete a very much-needed
book, for, strange to say, the bibliography on the
Wallace collection has so far been meagre, in spite
of the fact that for thirteen years this marvellous
assortment of artistic treasures has been made
over to the public view.
Japanese Colour-Prints and Their Design-
ers. By Frederick William Gookin. (The
Japan Society, New York.) $10.00.
The Japan Society has spared no expense in
publishing an edition de luxe of one thousand
copies, consisting of a lecture delivered before the
Society some two years ago by Mr. Gookin, to-
gether with a catalogue of Japanese color prints
exhibited the same year at the Fifth Avenue
Building. The volume is sumptuously treated in
type, paper and general get-up, while there are
twenty-four full-page prints in color, representing
the choicest exhibits of the Ukiyoe School, which
crystalized in the person of Moronobu and became
decrepit toward the middle of the nineteenth cen-
tury. Such names as Hokusai and Hiroshige have

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