to allegorical figures without interest and with little of beauty. Many other examples of this kind are to be found in the Abbey.

To return to Bird, we have from him the semi-recumbent figure of Dr. Busby, and the semi-recumbent figure of Sir Cloudesley Shovel, 1717, depicted in Roman costume and a wig, a singular mixture, lying in the midst of an architectural structure, and as remote from one's conception of the gallant old admiral as could possibly be.

Of Grinling Gibbons we have but one monument in the AbbeyMrs. Beaufoy, a charming half figure supported by two allegorical figures; beyond this we have nothing in London of Gibbons's sculpture, except the two statues already alluded to. The exquisite woodcarving in the choir of St. Paul's was, however, from his chisel.

Of Roubiliac the Abbey has seven monuments, some of wide-world renown. That which appears to me the most pleasing is the monument to Sir Peter Warren, where Hercules has just placed the bust of the admiral on its pedestal, while Navigation, an allegorical personage, is ready to crown it with laurel. The bust of the admiral is excellent, and the female representing Navigation is a charming figure the monument reminds one of the work of Bernini. The well-known monument to the Duke of Argyll and Greenwich, where Fame is engaged in inscribing the name of the hero, and Eloquence is addressing the audience, scarcely needs description; it is a marvellous production of art, however little appropriate to a church. The figure of Eloquence has excited the greatest admiration of artists. Canova said of it that it was the noblest statue he had seen in England. The Nightingale monument is equally well known, and its terrible realism and splendid execution have made it famous. His statue of Handel in Poets' Corner is not worthy of either sculptor or subject.

Unquestionably the best work we have of Roubiliac is the statue of Sir Isaac Newton in Trinity College, Cambridge. His statue of Shakespeare in the British Museum is also a fine work, but of greatly inferior interest to that of Newton, as a statue of one who has been dead a hundred years must always draw upon the imagination, while in the statue of Newton we feel that we have before us the man himself. At the mature age of fifty Roubiliac visited Rome, and on his return is reported to have said on seeing again his own work in the Abbey, 'By God, my own work looks to me as meagre and starved as if made of nothing but tobacco pipes.'

Of his successor in popular favour, Rysbrack, the Abbey has at least twelve works, possibly more. Of these the two principal are those in the places of honour on either side of the entrance to the choir, Sir Isaac Newton and Earl Stanhope, two fine compositions where the principal figures are not lost in their allegorical surroundings. There is also the monument to Milton, a charming bust, deficient only in interest from having been modelled seventy years after the death of the poet, a very tardy recognition of so great a man; the monument

to Matthew Prior (1721), of which the beautiful bust by Coysevox was given by Louis the Fourteenth; and the monument to Admiral Vernon (1751), of the typical kind, a bust surrounded by allegorical figures.

His contemporary and successor, Scheemaker, is represented in the Abbey by an equal number of works. Most of them are of the allegorical type already alluded to. His Admiral Wager (1743) is the exact pendant to that of Admiral Vernon by Rysbrack, two allegorical figures bending over a bust. The two are placed on either side of the entrance to the north transept. The monuments to Lord Aubrey Beauclerk (1740), who was killed at Carthagena, under Vernon; Admiral Watson (1757); and Mr. H. Chamberlin (1728), the eminent accoucheur of his day, are of the same type-in all the busts are excellent. In the monument to Sir John Balchen (1744) the bust is wanting; the allegorical figures alone are there, and there is a bas-relief depicting an incident in the life of the hero.

The monument to Monk, Duke of Albemarle, 1720, erected fifty years after his death, under the will of his son Christopher, is a more ambitious performance, and of its kind is a striking work. The figure of Monk himself is fine. That of Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham, and his wife, 1721, is of the older type of recumbent figures on an altartomb with a sumptuous canopy. The Duke is in Roman armour, his wife in the ladies' dress of the period. The statue of Shakespeare is an imaginative work executed a hundred years after the death of the poet, and not equal to those of Roubiliac already referred to. The bust of Dryden, died 1700, on a monument long delayed, and erected by Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham, is one of the greatest gems of Poets' Corner. Generally the busts of this sculptor are of the first quality, and there are very few of the numerous busts which have been placed in the Abbey during the last twenty years which could compare favourably with those of Scheemaker.

In Joseph Wilton we find a sculptor of the same school. His principal work is the immense monumental piece in honour of General Wolfe, 1759, in which the wounded General is depicted lying without clothes (in order that the artist, it is said, might show his anatomical knowledge) in the arms of a fully equipped Sergeant, and receiving a wreath from Victory. The bronze bas-relief beneath the figures is by Capitsoldi, and is an excellent representation of the landing of the British troops and the ascent of the Heights of Abraham. The monument is interesting as showing the struggle between the classical and allegorical school and the more natural school that was soon to supersede it. Nothing can be more real than the figure of the sergeant; on the other hand, the figure of Wolfe in semi-nudity, though real in one sense, is untrue, and the Victory is a survival from the allegorical school. The monument may be com pared with West's well-known picture of the same event, in which

the figures are given in their soldier's uniform, and where the artist was almost universally blamed at the time for not representing them in Roman costume. In the monument to Admiral Holmes, 1761, the hero is represented as a Roman general with the usual allegorical attendants.

Of Nollekens, considering his great vogue and his long life, during which he amassed a large fortune by his chisel, and executed an enormous multitude of statues and busts, there are comparatively few works in the Abbey. The immense monumental piece to the three captains killed in Rodney's action, already alluded to, where the allegorical devices have reached their climax, and have extinguished the subject-matter of the monument, and the medallion of Oliver Goldsmith, 1744, are among these few. He is handed down to memory by Dr. Johnson, who, upon hearing a discussion as to the merits of various sculptors, said, 'Well, I think, sir, my friend Nollekens can chop out a head with any one of them.' Mr. Pitt declined to sit for his bust to him, but after the death of the statesman the sculptor avenged himself by getting a cast of his face, out of which he realised 15,000l. He obtained an order from Trinity College, Cambridge, for a statue at the price of 4,000l.; he sold seventy-four busts, for which he received a hundred and twenty guineas each, and which were executed for him by some inferior artist for twenty-four guineas each, and he also sold six hundred casts at six pounds apiece.*

Probably the worst of all the sculptors of this school and era whose works have found a place in the Abbey was Read, a pupil of Roubiliac, the author of the atrocious monument to Admiral Tyrell, 1766, a prodigious mass of rocks, clouds, sea, and ships, where the admiral, who died peacefully on shore, but was buried at sea, is represented as rising to heaven out of the sea. Roubiliac is reported to have said of this monument, 'That figure of Read's of Admiral Tyrell going to heaven out of the sea, looks for all the world as if he were hanging from a gallows with a rope round his neck.' This monument confirmed the prophecy which the same great artist is said to have made of his pupil when the latter boasted that some day, when out of his articles, the world would see what he could do, Ven you do de monument,' said Roubiliac, den de varld vill see vot von d-d ting you vill make.' 5 Another contemporary of Nollekens, and of whose works there are many examples in the Abbey and St. Paul's, was John Bacon (1740– 1799). No sculptor has ever had a greater number of subjects of the first importance committed to him. The monument to Chatham in the Abbey, that to the same statesman in the Guildhall, Howard the philanthropist, Warren Hastings, Dr. Johnson, what subjects for a sculptor!

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The monument to Chatham in the Abbey is excellent work of its kind. The figure of Chatham itself is good, but it is placed too high, 4 Life of Nollekens, vol. ii. p. 43. 5 Ibid. vol. ii. p. 95.

and in subordination too much to the gigantic allegorical figures below, which would appear to be the main object of the composition. There is the same fault in the great monument in the Guildhall. The author appears to have outwitted his rivals in obtaining an order for the Chatham monument in the Abbey, for, while the members of the Royal Academy were considering the terms of a competition, he went direct to the King, who said to him,' Bacon, Bacon, you shall make Chatham's monument and no one else.' The monument was much approved at the time, and is referred to by Cowper in the lines:

Bacon there

Gives more than female beauty to a stone,
And Chatham's eloquence to marble lips,
Nor does the chisel occupy alone

The powers of eloquence, but the styles as much.

There is a story that when Bacon was re-touching the statue in the Abbey, a clerical gentleman, who was a stranger to him, tapped him on the shoulder and said, in allusion to the story of Zeuxis, 'Take care what you are doing, you work for eternity.' The reverend gentleman then mounted the pulpit, and began to preach. When the sermon was over, Bacon touched his arm and said, 'Take care what you do, you work for eternity.'6

Most people in the present day will prefer Bacon's statues of single figures standing alone without the allegorical accompaniments considered so necessary in those days, such as Howard the philanthropist and Dr. Johnson, both at St. Paul's, and very fine examples of his work.

It should here be stated that about this time St. Paul's began to vie with the Abbey for the bodies of the great and their monuments. The first admitted to St. Paul's was Howard, next Sir Joshua Reynolds, and thirdly Sir William Jones. Dr. Johnson was buried at the Abbey, but his monument was erected in St. Paul's.

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Another contemporary both of Nollekens and Bacon was Banks, of whom men of his own generation formed the highest opinion. Flaxman said of him that his works had eclipsed the most if not all of his continental contemporaries.' Of his work, we have in the Abbey the monument of Sir Eyre Coote, one of the least attractive of the allegorical monuments in the building; and at St. Paul's there are the monuments of Captain Burgess, killed in the naval battle off Camperdown, and of Captain Westcott, killed at Aboukir; both have the same idea and the same faults. In the former Victory is presenting a sword to the hero, who is represented without clothes. In the latter Victory is supporting the dying hero, who is dressed in a Roman toga. They are unpleasing works, and alone would in no way account for the reputation of this artist among his contemporaries. Following the three last-named sculptors at a distance of twenty 6 Allan Cunningham's Lives of British Sculptors, p. 243.

years, but surviving Nollekens only by three years, was Flaxman (1755-1826), one of the most gifted artists this country has produced; a man possessed of high imaginative qualities and the purest taste, regulated and cultivated by a long study of Greek art. There are several of his works in the Abbey and St. Paul's; the best is the monument to Lord Mansfield, which he produced immediately on his return from Rome, where he had spent seven years. It raised him at once to the highest position among sculptors. Banks said of it, 'This little man will cut us all out.' The figure of Lord Mansfield is a noble one, simple in its attitude and severe in its look. The two allegorical figures, Wisdom and Justice, do not eclipse the main figure, and are properly subordinated to it. There is also a monument of his in the Abbey to Captain Montague, and an interesting bust of Paoli. His works in St. Paul's are of inferior order. seems to have been carried away by the fashion for allegory. In the monument to Nelson, Britannia directs the attention of two young seamen to the figure of the Admiral; in that to Lord Howe, History writes in letters of gold the names of the battles in which he had fought, while Britannia and her lions are at his feet. The figure of Nelson is powerful. The statue of Sir Joshua Reynolds is also excellent, and shows the sculptor at his best.

He

Sir R. Westmacott was the sculptor most in favour after those just named; born in 1775, he lived till 1855 and contributed a number of works to the Abbey and St. Paul's. In the Abbey are his monuments of Pitt and Fox, near to one another, as are their graves in another part of the Abbey; of Addison, Spencer Perceval, and Tierney; and of the Duc de Montpensier; while in St. Paul's are those of Lord Collingwood, Lord Duncan, Sir R. Abercrombie, and others. His three statues of Canning, Duke of Bedford, and C. J. Fox have already been alluded to. It cannot be said that in any of these he reached a high level. His monumental works have all the defects of the dying school of abstract personification and allegorical groups, while his single statues are ponderous and without expression. The monument of Fox in the Abbey is specially illconceived. Fox is represented half recumbent and half naked. The monument to Spencer Perceval is one of the most awkward and unpleasing in the Abbey. With Westmacott we reach the close of the allegorical group; whether the public was surfeited of them, or whether the artists felt unable to invent any fresh combination of them, or whether the growth of better taste rejected such designs, we find that they came to a timely end.

5. The last group consists of single statues and busts. Chantrey, 1782-1842, was the first to abandon altogether the allegorical compositions, and to content himself with single figures. I have already alluded to his statues in the open air. In the Abbey we have numerous examples of his work-the statues of George Canning, of