The revival of the ancient and honourable post, of court painter and artist in ordinary to Her Majesty would be a radical support to the cause of art in England: for it would give prestige to a profession which, however cursorily encouraged by royal favour here and there, has for long received no direct recognition at Court like divinity, letters, and medicine,1

1 The position of 'historical painter ' to the Queen, now held by Mr. Sant, R. A., does not refute such an assertion. An historical painter, without continual occupation, or a definite effect on his age, is so far a dead letter.

The laureateship is, no doubt, an empty title, but it is an honourable one. Chaplaincy to Her Majesty is one equally honourable and equally empty. The former has, perhaps, less raison d'etre than any other similar post, for poems are not needful upon every occasion, and it is but a minute branch of letters.

But the Court artist, were his position at all a revival of the ancient one, would be never without employment. He should be more or less an all-round man, such as Sir F. Leighton or Alma-Tadema, not exclusively a painter or architect, for the honour should not be confined to one branch of art. He should be a designer - an artist: capable of painting a portrait, designing a monument, or a fine building, a stencil pattern or a presentation sword: and he should be an Englishman. Designs thus provided by a man of culture, and probably genius, would filter down and gradually come into the market bearing the Sovereign's name. This would encourage others, and nurse the buds of native talent in very diverse directions, which continually appear, and continually are crushed.

The post would be better without an emolument which would cause violent jealousies among artists, and it might be shared by several persons, like the chaplaincy; but the personal influence of royalty and the pleasure of working even nominally under a Sovereign singularly dear, would create a feeling about art which has long been chrysalided if not dead.

In the old days when artists were truly artists, and felt it their vocation and right to beautify, without invidious distinctions and conditions, work of high standard filled the channels it does not enter now.

I have earlier alluded to William the Florentine, Court painter to Henry III., and master of the works at Guildford Castle, supervising the wall decorations of Henry's palace, according to the old records, planning the drains, designing the stencils appropriate to various domestic events: such as 'borders well painted with images of our Lord and angels, with incense pots scattered over it'. I have spoken of William Torell, the goldsmith, who designed (probably hammered) Queen Eleanor's metal tomb, and may not improbably be the author of the sculptured crosses in her honour and the monument of Aylmar de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, in Westminster Abbey; and William Austin, of London, whom Flaxman praised so warmly. Who knows what plate, what rails, what caskets, and keys, and brazen fountains, as well as designs for other irrelevant things, were expected of Torell and Austin, and actually done by them? Many names, at least as great as any we have now, may be cited as men whose supreme talents were happily not confined to one little runlet of art, but rushed, or trickled, or flowed wheresoever the soil was ready for the stream.

May not these be taken as a precedent and support? Leonardo da Vinci fortified Florence, Holbein designed mansions and brooches, Giotto built the campanile of S. Maria del Fiore, besides painting pictures.

There is something very noble in this calling of an Artist as a beautifier, a mighty man - no mechanic bound by the petty fetters of trades-unionism.