of great advantage to the Academy, and heartily devoted to its interests. He was active in establishing its schools and equipping them with models, libraries, and conveniences for study; he gave much attention to its exhibitions, and founded the famous Academy dinners, at which men of rank and genius were brought together in such a way as to render these occasions the most remarkable gatherings in the United Kingdom. From time to time he also delivered his well-known "Discourses on Art," which are notable alike for the good judgment in the selection of the subjects treated, and for the literary skill with which they are written.

About 1770, Sir Joshua built a villa at Richmond Hill. In the same year, he spent a month in Plympton, and at that time also, he brought to his home his niece, Theophila Palmer, who remained with him until her marriage, eleven years later. She was very beautiful, and is known to all the world as the "Offy" of the famous "Strawberry Girl." Other pictures of her which Sir Joshua painted also became famous.

With the exception of the trip with Commodore Keppel Sir Joshua spent little time out of England. In 1768 he visited Paris, and in 1780 he passed two months in Holland and Germany. When absent from London, he was usually at the house of some friend in the country, or at his old home, of which he was always fond.

COPY OF A PORTRAIT BY SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

Few men have been so much admired by such a diversity of people as was Sir Joshua Reynolds. The testimony of his friends presents him to us as a man of admirable character. Perhaps no one knew him more intimately than James Northcote, who was received into his family as a poor Devonshire lad; he remained with Sir Joshua five years, and left him a prosperous painter. Northcote found him kindly, modest, and lovable in every way. He thus describes him personally: "In his stature, Sir Joshua Reynolds was rather under the middle size, of a florid complexion, roundish, blunt features, and a lively aspect; not corpulent, though somewhat inclined to it, but extremely active; with manners uncommonly polished and agreeable. In conversation, his manner was perfectly natural, simple, and unassuming. He most heartily enjoyed his profession, in which he was both famous and illustrious; and I agree with Mr. Malone, who says he appeared to him to be the happiest man he had ever known."

In 1789, Sir Joshua lost the sight of his left eye, and though this changed his whole life, he retained his calm cheerfulness, and occupied his mind with the exciting topics of the time; for it happened that the storming of the Bastille occurred in the very week in which he gave up his pencil. He still used his brush a very little to finish or retouch works which were still on his hands, but he sadly said: "There is now an end of pursuit; the race is over, whether it is lost or won."

In 1790, troubles arose in the Academy, and Sir Joshua felt himself so badly used that he resigned his presidency and his membership of the institution. The King requested him to return, but he refused until the Academy publicly apologized to him. He then resumed his office, and in December delivered his final discourse.

THE LADIES WALDEGRAVE. (FROM A PAINTING BY SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.)

The remainder of his life was a gradual decline; his sight grew weaker, and his strength less, until February 23, 1792, when he died easily, never having suffered much pain. The King directed that his body should lie in state in the Academy rooms in Somerset House. The funeral was grand and solemn; the pall-bearers were dukes, marquises, earls, and lords; ninety-one carriages followed the hearse, in which were the first nobles, scholars, and prelates of the realm, with all the members and students of the Academy. He was buried near Sir Christopher Wren, in St. Paul's Cathedral, where Vandyck had already been laid, and where, in later years, a goodly number of painters have been buried around him. In 1813, a statue, by Flaxman, was erected to his memory near the choir of the cathedral, and a Latin inscription recounts the talents and virtues of the great man whom it commemorates.

Having thus traced the story of Sir Joshua's life, it now remains to speak of him more especially as an artist.

His highest fame is as a portrait painter, and as such he was a great genius. He had the power to reproduce the personal peculiarities of his subjects with great exactness; he was also able to perceive their qualities of temper, mind, and character, and he made his portraits so vivid with these attributes that they were likenesses of the minds as well as of the persons of his subjects. In his portrait of Goldsmith, self-esteem is as prominent as the nose; passion and energy are in every line of Burke's face and figure; and whenever his subject possessed any individual characteristics, they were plainly shown in Reynolds's portraits. So many of these pictures are famous that we can not speak of them in detail. Perhaps no one portrait is better known than that of the famous actress, Mrs. Sarah Siddons, as the Tragic Muse. It is a noble example of an idealized portrait, and it is said that the "Isaiah" of Michael Angelo suggested the manner in which it is painted. Sir Thomas Lawrence declared this to be the finest portrait of a women in the world, and it is certain that this one picture would have made any painter famous. Sir Joshua inscribed his name on the border of the robe, and courteously explained to the lady, "I could not lose the honor this opportunity afforded me of going down to posterity on the hem of your garment."

The original of this work is said to be that in the gallery of the Duke of Westminster; a second is in the Dulwich Gallery. In speaking of Sir Joshua as a portrait painter, Mr. Ruskin says: "Considered as a painter of individuality in the human form and mind, I think him the prince of portrait painters. Titian paints nobler pictures, and Vandyck had nobler subjects, but neither of them entered so subtly as Sir Joshua did into the minor varieties of heart and temper."

His portraits of simply beautiful women can scarcely be equaled in the world. He perfectly reproduced the delicate grace and beauty of some of his sitters and the brilliant, dazzling charms of others. He loved to paint richly hued velvets in contrast with rare laces, ermine, feathers, and jewels. It is a regret that so many of his works are faded, but after all we must agree with Sir George Beaumont, when he said: "Even a faded picture from him will be the finest thing you can have."

The most attractive of his works are his pictures of children. It is true that they too are portraits, but they are often represented in some fancy part, such as the "Strawberry Girl,"[1] a portrait of his niece Offy; Muscipula, who holds a mouse-trap; the Little Marchioness; the Girl with a Mob-cap, and many others. He loved to paint pictures of boys in all sorts of characters, street-peddlers, gipsies, cherubs, and so on. He often picked up boy models in the street and painted from them in his spare hours, between his appointments with sitters. Sometimes he scarcely hustled a beggar boy out of his chair in time for some grand lady to seat herself in it. It is said that one day one of