anxaf 86-B 19107 1 ' / Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2014 https://archive.org/details/decorativeartofwOOdayl THE ART OF WILLIAM MORRIS Helcochromg. FLORA."— Sketch design for Tapestry executed by Morris & Co. Figure by Sir Edward Burne=Jones, Ornament by William Morris. 1886. LONDON: /.S.VIRTUE AND CoUMlTED " WILLIAM MORRIS AND HIS ART. ' Hammersmith * Carpet Weav- inir at Merton Abbey Works (pp. 5 and 2 J). NO one in the least interested in Decorative Art— and who is there does not profess that much ? — wants to be told at this time of day who William Morris was. His name is prominent among the few true poets of the age ; it heads the list of those who in our days have wrought and fought for the lesser arts — for art, that is to say, in the larger sense of the word. He it was snatched from the hand of Ruskin the torch which Pugin earlier in the century had kindled, and fired the love of beaiity in us. He was the staunchest defender of our ancient monuments. He stamped the mark of his personality upon the design of his generation. There seemed no limit to his enterprise, no end to his endeavour — but death, which came too soon. The very variety, however, of his activity, the many forms in which his vitality found vent, tend in a mea- sure to create confusion as to what he did precisely. Enquiry into the order of his work and the date at which it was done, goes far to dissipate such confusion, and to show, not only what he did, but how it was possible for him to do so much. The circumstances of his early youth do not seem to have been such as to implant or encourage in him any care for art. His old friend Mr. F. S. Ellis tells (in a paper read before the Society of Arts, May loth, 1898) how he went to the Exhibition of 1851— he was then seven- teen years old— and how he sat himself down on a seat, and steadily refused to go over the building, declining to see anything more wonderful in this wonder of the world than that it was " wonderfully ugly." He never got over that prejudice against the Great Fair, which he accused of giving the death-stroke to traditional design in this country. Nevertheless, he owed something, if not to that event, to the awakened interest in artistic production of which it was the outward and vis- ible sign. For Morris was born just at the right moment : the way was pre- pared for him. Walter Scott, with- out really appreciating Gothic art, had called popular attention to its romance, Rickman had long since "discriminated" the "styles of English Architecture," Pugin had published his "True Princi- ples of Gothic Architecture," and was designing all manner of me- dieeval furniture ; and, by the time he came to take any heed of art, Gothic architecture was the fash- ion. Winston had written his Essay on Stained Glass, Shaw and others had published books on mediaeval antiquities, and Viollet le Due his famous dictionary ; even Owen Jones, the orientalist, had cleared the ground, by creat- ing a reaction of taste against mere naturalism in pretending to be design. Fergusson, Freeman, Semper, Wornum, Digby Wyatt, and above all, Ruskin, had been writing about art until people were beginning to listen. Men like William Burges and E. W. God- win were hard at work already : there was reaction in the air : the times were ready for the man — and the man was William Morris. He seems to have gone to Ox- ford with a quite open mind on the subject of Art ; but there the spirit of Medifevalism was abroad, and he promptly cattght the infection. Ruskin was an influence there; it was later that Rossetti went down to decorate the walls of the Union, and there he became almost at once close friends with Edward Burne-Jones, his life-long fellow worker, who, by a strange coincidence, matriculated on the same day with himself. That was in 1852. But it was at litera- ture that he first began to work, establishing the " Oxford and Cambridge Magazine." Mr. Ellis tells us that for the year of its existence he found the necessary funds. That was an early instance of a liberality characteristic of him to the last. A short year in the ofiice of George Edmund Street when he left Oxford, in 1856, was enough to sicken him of professional architecture, which seemed at first, and was in those days thought to be, the entrance- gate to all the arts not claiming to be fine. He may at one I 1899. All designs herein are the froferly of Messrs. Morris Comfany, who hold all rights of reproduction 2 THE EASTER ART ANNUAL. Morris's Works at Merton Abbey, Surrey (p. 6). Vine pattern Wall-paper (pp. 18 and 21). Working draw- ing by William Morris. 1874. time have contemplated painting ; but the publication in 1858 of the " Defence of Guinevere " seems to show that for a while he devoted himself to poetry. And as a poet he first became known. It was, perhaps, the difficulty which he has told us he experienced in getting decent furniture and fittings for his own house, when he married in 1859, which irritated him into artistic activity once more. At all events, in 1861 he set to work in earnest to produce beautiful things for the house, and, with his friends, started busi- ness in Red I,ion Square. The idea of reviving art in everything about us was not entirely new. So long before as 1847 "Felix Summerly," to whom we owe South Kensington Museum, had organised a combination of artists, including Creswick, Dyce, Maclise (who ought to have been a designer), Mulready, Bell, and Westma- cott, for the production of "Art Manufactures." It is true they called them manufactures, and they did not do great things ; but it was set forth in the prospectus that " Beauty of Form and Colour and poetic invention were (once) associated with everything. So it ought to be still, and, we will say, shall be again." Morris put it better ; but that is in effect what he said ; and he man- aged to bring it about. The venture of the firm of Morris, Marshall, P'aulkner and Co., was itself a protest against what was already being done, and was resented accordingly by the trades. It was in 1866, I remember, that the name of the firm first came to my ears, and I asked an old hand at design who they were. The answer was: " A set of amateurs who are going to teach us our trade." Amateurs in a sense they were, no doubt ; that is to say, they set to work at many a trade about which they knew very little, and worried out the secret of it for themselves, distrust- ing the knowledge which was to be acquired from men who had served their apprenticeship to it ; but the won- derful thing is that they did teach the trade its business; and it was practically Morris who did it. Others before them had started with high artistic ideals, but had lacked the courage to go on, or had been drawn by hard circumstances, or driven perhaps by necessity, into the ways of trade ; he had not only convictions of his own and the courage of them, but was in a position to hold fast to them. He was in every sense of the word independent: his father was dead, and he could go his own way, and from the time of his coming of age he was what most of us would call well - olF. He never knew what it was to lack the means of livelihood or to fear for them. He was free to WILLIAM MORRIS AND HIS ART. 3 Merton Abbey Worka, from the bridge (p. 51. carry out his artistic ideal. He had no occasion to bow to the demands of trade or fashion. This gave him a splendid chance — and he took it. The earlier work of the firm was of course pronoun- cedly Gothic in style ; so much so that the medals awarded to them at the exhibition of 1862 were given for "exactness of imitation" of mediaeval work. The wording of the award may express more nearly the point of view of the judges than the aim of the exhibitors ; but it was inevitable that the new firm, starting when it did, and as it did, should begin by working very much in the old way. However, Morris soon made Gothic his own, and used it to express himself. His medisevalism was in the end distinctly modern ; but he boasted himself always a Goth. "The age is ugly," he said ; " if a man wants to do any- thing, he must just choose the epoch which suits him and identify himself with that ; he must be a thirteenth- century man, for instance." That is very much what he would fain have been — "intrepidly retrograde," asa French critic said. The logic of his argument is not convincing ; but his sympathies were all with medisevalism, and he harked back to the time when, as he was firmly per- suaded, art got off" the track. He did all he could to forget six centuries or so and make-believe we were living in the Middle Ages— a feat impossible for most of us, but all of a piece with the childlike simple-mind- edness of the man. So convinced was he of the good- ness of all things Gothic, and mainly of Gothic things, that if a thing seemed good to him, it almost followed that it was Gothic ; thus, appreciating the value of con- tinuous growth in pattern, he puts it down as a matter of course to the time "when young Gothic Art took the place of old Classic," quite forgetting that the ancients had ever perfected the continuous scroll, and that the only new departure of the Middle Ages was, to put scrolls of flowing ornament side by side and make "all-over" patterns of them. Rose pattern Wilton Pile Carpet (p. 22). First design and working draw- ing by William Morris. Ca. 1877. 4 THE EASTER ART ANNUAL. Peacock pat- tern (p. 22). Coarse Wool Hangings. Working draw- ing by William Morris. 1878. The early work of the firm embraced the greater part of what goes to house decoration, including the production of stained glass, painted tiles, embroidery, cabinet-work, and, presently, woven and printed stuffs ; and it may be gathered from the fact of its removal, in 1865, to Queen Square, that it soon began to flourish ; at all events, from that time it became generally known. A year later Morris had a chance of show- ing what he could do at South Kensington Museum, where he decorated the small dining- room known as the green room, a very typical example of his work at that time. The dis- tribution of the walls, their modelled surface (painted too !), the fruit and figure panels on a gold ground, the lively frieze, the colour scheme — all of which to-day do not much stir the curiosity of the casual diner — were new and rather start- ling innovations in decoration more than thirty j'ears ago. From that time he took up one branch of industry after another, his appetite for such work increasing, one may say, abnormally in eating. He did not make quite all the things he designed and brought out ; his wall-papers were printed, and con- tinue to be printed, by Mr. Metford Warner (better known as Jefi'rey and Co.); and his first chintzes were printed by Mr. (now Sir Thomas) Wardle. But, like all real workers, he preferred to do his own work, and would rather do it himself than be at the bother to tell someone else how it could be done ; and before long he was printing his own cotton stuff's, and weaving his own textiles; and, by the middle of the seventies, he was dyeing his own wools for weaving. You might have met him any day in the street with d}"e- stained hands ; for he was a born workman, never afraid of soiling their whiteness ; and he was far too much alive to stand by and see anyone bungling over what he him- self could do better, and not set to work to show him how to do better. In the midst of his artistic acti- vity, or in the lulls between, he found time to write the poems which soon made him famous. Of these it is not here the place, nor is the pre- sent writer the person, to speak, further than to point out how the poet helped naturally to make the artist known. The mere fact that a poet of repute, near friend of the pre-Raphaelite brotherhood, was de- voting himself to the lesser arts, made them of more account, in the eyes of the literate at all events. The jounger generation of artists and amateurs, accustomed to the fash- ionable gush about " arts and crafts," have no idea of what a very obscure WILLIAM MORRIS AND HIS ART. 5 person the decorative artist was a quarter of a century ago. The meanest craftsman is now ranked as an artist ; then the master of his craft, unless he painted pictures or carved statues, was put down as a mere artisan. The author of " The Earthly Paradise " could not be relegated to that position ; what such a man thought worth doing was clearly worth taking seriously ; and decorative art began to be taken at his valuation — that is to say, at something like its true worth, as the root and stock of all art, of which fine art is only the flower. His personal repute made it possible for him to pursue his ideal, and to fulfil it ; and in 1877 he opened the pre- mises still occupied by the firm of Morris and Co. in Oxford Street— sure sign of further prosperity— and by the year 1881 he had finally quitted the old quarters in Queen Square, and established his unique workshops at Merton Abbey. Morris himself would probably never have dreamt of turning the ruins of an old Norman monas- tery into workshops ; he would have preserved them piously, as ancient monuments, to be held in trust for posterity ; but he found manufacture already established there, and so long established (that is, since the Reforma- tion) that it was itself an institution worth preservation. And there he carried on the crafts he cared for, in the way he thought they should be carried on, the only way in which it seemed to him they were worth continuing, by the traditional methods of handicraft, with as little resort to machinery as possible, with a view always to the artistic worth of the thing done, and to the reasonable satisfaction of the workman in doing it. A visit to the works at Merton Abbey gives one a peep, as it were, into the past he loved so dearly he must needs continually fall out with the present, so far short of his ideal. The primitive methods of dyeing, printing and weaving, stillin workthere, justsuitedhisnotionof design, which was indeed shaped according to the traditions of craftsmanship. There is nothing of the modern "factory " about his "mills"; an old-world air clings to the place, an atmosphere of quiet, and of some leisure, in which the workers, not harried to death, have space to breathe, and to enjoy something of the repose and beauty of the Bird and Vinj pattern (p. 21). Wool Damask. Working draw- ing by William Morris. 1S81. 1899 THE EASTER ART ANNUAL. Cotton Printing at Merton Abbey Works (p. 6). world. Imagine, by the Wandle's side, an old walled garden. On the banks, long, low-roofed worksheds, and a waterwheel revolving at its ease; long strips of printed cotton a-rinsingin the stream; great hanks of yarn, fresh from the indigo vat, hung drying in the air ; dyers and printers moving quietly about — in all, a sunlit picture of most peaceful work. Morris expected work of his workpeople : work was no hardship to him ; and he did to his workmen always as he would have been done by. At Merton he began carpet- weaving and there presently he set up his tapestry looms, having first mastered the craft for himself. It was characteristic of him that he should have put up a loom in his bedroom at home, and there taught him- self tapestry weaving in the early hours of the morn- ing, when the rest of the household were abed — you see the workman there. Each separate enterprise on which he entered seems, for a time, to have moved him to extraordinary energy. He thought it out, installed it, set it going, designed for it, trained men and women in the work to be done ; and then, by degrees, as things began to run smoothly and could be trusted to go on without him, his interest became less active; a new idea germinated in his mind, or an old one burst into bud, and his energies broke out afresh in some new doing. He had attended less and less to the business in Oxford Street whilst he was organising experimental industries at Merton. When these were flourishing, he left them, as he had left the shop, very much to his partners, furnishing such designs as were required of him, or as occurred to him, and satisfying himself that the work was being done as he would wish, but making his visits to the works rarer and rarer as he became more deeply absorbed in the subject of typo- graphy and printing. It was in 1891 that the first volume was issued from the Kelmscott Press, and from that time he became very much the master-printer, his invention finding fresh scope in the design of title- pages, initials, borders, and book ornaments innumer- able, superficially in one mediaeval style of his own, but showing in their detail all the fancy and resourceful- ness which belonged to him to the last. Had he but lived another ten years, he would certainly have made himself master of yet a craft or two before he died. It is interesting, in connection with his type printing, to remember, that in his youth he illuminated for his wife and friends precious volumes of poetry, penned by his own hand. The pages which, a little further on, by Lady Burne-Jones's great kindness we are enabled to illus- trate, show him to have been no less careful as a calligrapher than cunning as a designer, and expert as a painter in miniature. The current of his poetical writing, which all his life long never ran dry, flowed in his later years into the channel of prose stories told in beautiful, if somewhat archaic, language of his own, not unrelated to the me- diaevalism pervading his design. But the writings which concern us are his writings upon art. It is often said that an artist should say what he has to say in his art, and not talk about it. That is an admirable theory — for the inarticulate ; but there are many things an artist may wish to say which cannot properly be expressed in his art, and which he may well want to put into words, more especially if he chance to be, as Morris was, a master of words also. He is a standing protest against any narrow dictum which would gag an artist. He had more to say than could be put into ornament, or even into poetry; and he said it not merely admirably, but with a delight- ful sincerity, straight from his heart. It was in 1877 that he first set forth the Principles of the Society for the WILLIAM MORRIS AND HIS ART. 7 Protection of Ancient Buildings, of which society he was a foremost founder and a bulwark to the last ; and between that time and i88i he de- livered every year at least a lecture or two upon art. Five of these were printed under the title of "Hopes and Fears for Art." Others live only in newspaper reports. Strictly speaking, he did not often write about art, but printed his lectures— just as he gave them ; and you read the accent into them as you peruse the book ; you seem to hear him speak ; and in his speech there was none of the deliberate artificiality of his prose story-telling; he was as simple as could be, as frank and as downright, so obviously convinced of the un- answerable truth of what he said, that he car- ried conviction with him — at least for the while you heard him. We all of us think vi^e are in the right, Morris knew he was— even when he was most mistaken. His logic, as a great French critic said aj)roI>os of a bro*-V;er critic, was " ar- dently combative." He had a way of talking and writing as if he were opposing some one, and must bear his adversary down. The fact is, probably, that he felt himself so much in oppo- sition to the normal habit of philistine thought, that he looked for resistance, and made haste to get in the first blow. The second series of his lectures, which ap- peared in 1888 under the title of "Signs of Change," were confessedly " Socialist "—he de- voted, about this time and before, an enormous amount of his time and energy to socialistic vsrork — but some of them at least deal directly with things artistic, which, as he thought, and as Ruskin, his friend and master, as he called him, thought, cannot be separated from social life ; Pugin thought it bound up with religious life. Many of us recognise, of course, the inti- mate relationship of art to life, without arguing from that the necessity of socialism. Morris did; and there is no shadow of doubt as to his sincerity and enthusiasm. Those who, agreeing in the main with his diagnosis of the social anemia of the century- end, have no very great faith in his remedy, are tempted to regret the precious time he gave to the diffusion of the socialistic idea. There is some consolation in the reflection that most of his lectures, having been delivered with a pur- pose more or less socialistic, he might very possibly, but for " the cause," never have deli- vered himself upon the subject on which we wanted him to speak. In his last years he naturally delivered himself oftener on the sub- ject most on his mind, printing, woodcuts, " the Ideal Book" — to which he more nearly than any modern printer himself attained. There is probably no one of the various branches of art which he in turn took up, on which he did not say his say ; and, so outspoken was he, that no serious student of his work could fail to understand just what he meant to do, even if he had not succeeded in doing it, which he almost invariably did. Morris was inspired by a passionate love of beauty, and had a corresponding hatred of the ugliness he saw about him. He set himself to mend that state of things. Impossible ! they said. No matter, he Painted Decora- tion of soffits of arches on stair- case in St. James's Palace (p. 27). Designed by William Morris. 1881. Would try. But he did not covet beauty for his own selfish enjoyment merely, least of all did he desire it at the 8 THE EASTER ART ANNUAL. Washing the Cloth at Merton Abbey Works (p. 6). expense of others. He protested vehemently against the supposition that art was for the privileged few, for the "upper classes," whom he would have liked to abolish, and who, curiously enough, bought his work and gave him his repute. Art, he said, was meant to raise man's life above the daily tangle of small things that weary him ; and he adopted, without reserve, the theory that the first step to- wards art worth having was to make the life of the worker worth living. " Let me say it, that either I have erred in the aim of my whole life, or that the welfare of these lesser arts involves the question of the content and self-respect of all craftsmen." He believed that if only life were easier, and men had time to look about them, they would learn to love art. Whether that be so or not, it was a noble thought of his ; and noble thoughts go to make great art possible. The converse certainly is true, that mean and sordid surroundings deaden the sense of beauty, and degrade alike the poor folk who make ugly things and the rich ones who live amidst them. He was never weary of protesting against the ugliness of life. Life should be beautiful ! For himself he was in a po- sition to shape things about him as he would have them ; but that was not enough for him, was nothing to him. Hungry as he was for beauty, he had no stomach for a feast of art whilst others were starving ; rather coarse food which all could share, than dainties denied to them. It is seldom that a high ideal is so perfectly ex- pressed as his aspiration towards "an art made by the ■people, and for t/ie people, as a. happiness to the maker and user." If it seems to us that his splendid ideal is impractical, his hope never to be realised — and it is to be feared it does — that is perhaps because we are less nobly minded ; it takes a big man to have great hopes, tne least of us can reach pessimism. The sight of such a man spending his great gifts and wondrous energies in holding forth to a dozen or so of " comrades " leagues away from any right understanding of him, was grotesque enough almost to make one doubt his sense of humour. In reality he had a keen sense of fun, as no one who ever heard him read " Brer Rabbit " could doubt ; but his mind was too sternly fixed upon one serious end for him to see things as onlookers saw them, or in their true proportion. Nevertheless, the least sympathetic of his audience could hardly see him on the platform and not be impressed by his wonderful personality ; he looked the man he was, powerfully built, thickset, stalwart and sturdy, without any swagger, but with the air of a conqueror as he stood up to speak ; an open face of fresh complexion, unshaven and rather rugged beard ; his hair, grizzled and curly, upstanding like a mane from his broad forehead in a way that gave him the look of a lion ; good grey eyes which could twinkle with merriment, light up with enthusiasm, or flash with indignation ; a voice that deepened as he spoke ; action and speech so sudden, it seemed it must be spontaneous. To see him was to know him for a rebel born. He was inclined, at times at all events, to divide men into two classes, flunkies and rebels ; and he was not content to be a rebel himself, but professed his desire to stir up rebel- lion in others against what to him was intolerable. The law ? What law ? Who made it law ? Conformity, to him, was slavery. He would follow no custom. Usage ? that was a reason for not doing likewise. His behaviour WILLIAM MORRIS AWD HIS ART. 9 Honeysuckle pattern printed on Linen (p. 20). Workinft drawing by William Morris. 1833. lO THE EASTER ART ANNUAL. " The Straw- berry Thief" pattern. Cotton print (p. 20). Working drawing by William Morris. 1883. was individualistic, absolutely ; he dressed, spoke, did, as pleased himself, and had nothing but contempt for orthodoxy of whatever kind. And with all this he was a socialist, and a militant one, con- vinced that he saw in socialism a way out of the degradation unto which society, and modern art and workmanship accordingly, had fallen. He never seemed to suspect that socialism (as understood by his political brethren) would leave less room than ever for the free action of a man — of a man, that is to say, as distinguished from a sheep ! Some stress is here laid upon Morris's socialism because it so greatly influenced his art. He would not, for the worker's sake, have made things by machinery even had he found it serviceable to art ; he hated and distrusted it too much to make the best of it, or, for that matter, of science. He produced things which are indeed a happiness to the user, and were a happiness to the maker— if he was an artist (which not all workmen are), and things which were made by the people : that they were made for the people can hardly be contended, since it is not possible for any but the very few to pay the price for handwork in these days. Employing, as he did, handwork, or the simplest and most pri- mitive of mechanical aids to handwork, he was free to design as it pleased him. That suited him best. The fight then was between him and the material; and he was a fighter by instinct, never so happy as in the thick of the strife. I have heard him say he liked being heckled ; and he looked like it : he was at home on the platform. And in art, it was as much as anything the fight which interested him, the pleasure of attacking a problem, the joy of solving it. In that way his career ex- plains itself. The mystery of his wonderful versatility is cleared up. It was won- derful indeed, but it was not versatility — rather the re- verse, steadfastness in one progressive purpose. He did not veer about, but moved straight on in quick steps, each step a craft. Impatient, he plunged into work and fought his way through. Once he had mastered it, he ceased to be passionately in- terested in it ; but, though his ardour was assuaged, it had not burnt itself out. At the first contact with some new difiiculty it burst out anew, fiery as ever, to be quenched only by accom- plishment. No! not quenched, but smothered, presently to flare up at the breath of some fresh oppo- sition, at the hint of some new work to do; /ii.>irr ^B.i f -Nvfiy cricf^-f-'t/rotv-go c«/j'fe.r t^^c», ^c/-t"o(^5f- ,: fici«.- cleovv t-lja-t *>>cii<)^i (^cvc(y (^ee.^ cfcryj,c ctf, ft-rjl P" .''(^otv or-'t- C3COI iecT t'(yoti^(r^'1;p(Ttott cC-tXii^ y^x>t al'vJi^^^ ^ -tiy ci t I bciuof/'\/eT->'»i l^ncC ^- Gi^^ W^Tvei^ c^l^ 1^ fviC- cTt'd' giVc {A\e. g^y ^irc^'5 vn-ect-^^ ^^i?' 30 THE EASTER ART ANNUAL. Part of a page from "Icelandic Stories " (p. 28). Translated and engrossed by- William Morris. By permission of Lady Burne- Jones. i8 HE STORY OF THE lih seginning to the end. Easy to follow, well arranged, and extremely concise . . . Mr. Day knows what to say and how to say it." The Pall Mall Gazette says : — " Mr. Day is an excellent teacher of ' the arts not fine,' and bis small volume, which is capitally illustrated, can be thoroughly recommended as a good handbook to the appreciation of decorative art." THE ANATOMY OP PATTERN. Fourth Edition, revised, with 41 full- page illustrations. THE PLANNING OP ORNAMENT. Fourth Edition, further revised, with 41 full-page illustrations, many re-drawn. THE APPLICATION OP ORNAMENT. Fourth Edition, further revised, with 48 full-page illustrations, and 7 illustrations in the Text. ORNAMENTAL DESIGN: comprising the above Three Works, handsomely bound in one volume, cloth gilt, gilt top, price los. 6d. B. T. BATSFORD, 94, High Holborn, London. ART SCHOOLS, GALLERIES, cJc. IN LONDON. FOR LADIES. Principal - - Mr. W, J. Donne. In the " Gilbert" Metropolitan Art Schools Competition, November, 1898, the Grosvknor SiuDio received the following awards : — [8t Prize for Figure; 2nd Prize for Design ; Hon. Hen. for Landscape. APPLY TO SECRETARY. GROSVENOR STUDIO,' VAUXHALL BRIDGE, S.W. THE RICHMOND SGHOOLoF LANDSCAPE PAINTING CARRINGTON LODGE, 33, Sheen Road, Richmond. Principals: Mr. C. E. JOHNSON, R.I., and Mr. R. HUGHES. Course of Study— Composition ; Theory and Practice of Colour ; Dcvc-lopmoit of tho Finished Picture from Student's own Sketch. Sketching from Nature. Students may Join at any time. Address:— Mr. R. HUGHES. The NEW GALLERY, 121, Regent Street. EXHIBITION OF WORKS BY SIR . . . EDWARD BURNE-JONES, BART NOW OPEN, 10 to 6. Admission 1/- . . . List of Photographs of Works by Sir E. Burne-Jones, D. G. Rossetti, G. F. Watts. . Sent on application to Secretary The Permanent Gallery of Decoralive Art, «; HARllINGTON KOAD, 80UTH KENSINGTON, Is now Open Daily, from 10 to 6, for the Display and Sale of Decorative Designs, Artistic Furniture, Metal Work, Stained Glass, Pottery, &c. Admission Free. Artists and Craftsmen wishing to Exhibit may do so at any date on application to the Secretary. Agents: BOURLET AND SONS. SAMPSON LOW, MABSTOW & COMPANY'S POBLIOATIONS IMPORTANT ART WORKS FOR PRESENTATION. ' S CRIBNER'S MAGAZINE Rome. By Eeinhold Schoener. Edited and Condensed by Mrs. Ai TiHTR Bell (N. D'Anvers), Author of " The Elementary History of Art," da. With 290 Illustrations after Original Drawings by well-known Italian Artiste. One handfome volume, demy 4to, unique binding case. Two Guineas net. " Magnificent in binding, and sumptuous in paper, typography, and pictorial illush-ations is 'Eome.' . . . Rome as it is is certainly brought most vividly before us." — Globk. " A briglit and most attractive book. . . . The illustrations make the volume contrast irost favourably with any other publication of the kind." — Scotsjian. The beautiful illus' rations in this costly volume speak tor themselves, and the names of their aitists are a guarantee of excellence. They form an art-epitome of the History of Rome, for they include not only e.xquisite reproductions of the masterpieces of antiquity and of the Middle Ages, but bright and truthful scenes from the everyday life of the Romans of the present time. The scholarly letterpress, written with that exhaustive thoroughness characteristic of German work, has been condensed, edited, and supplemented from English sources by Mrs. Arthur Bell. Dutch Painters of the Nineteenth Century. Edited by Max Roo^ES, Curator of the Plautin-Moretus Museum, Antwerp. Translated byF. Knowles. With Biographical Notices. The Text contains over 200 Hlustrations, besides Six Etchings by Philip Zilcken, Six Photogravure Plates, and Twelve Half- tone Full-page Plates. One handsome quarto volume, cloth extra. Two Guineas net. In this volume is given some account of the life and work of twelve representative Dutch painters of the nineteenth century, with reproductions of their pictuies from originals selected by the artists themselves for the purpose. *' A magnificent production." — TutJTii. " Over^iOO examples of the Dutch tchool enrich the pages of this superb volume. . . . This profusely and beautifully illustrated work."— Daily Telegeaph. " It is a pltafeure to give this book welcome, and to do our part towards speeding it along a prosperous way."— Sta.ndard. The Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ. With 380 Water-Colour Drawings, 150 Pen-and-ink Sketches, and numerous Explanatory Notes. By James Tissot (dedicated by permission to the Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone). Two vols, large imperial 4to cloth. Twelve Guineas net; leather. Thirteen Guineas net; or in 12 Monthly t^ections, 21s. eich. Other special bindings on application. Illustrated Prospectus sent on application. " A beautiful work of art . . . full of beautiful drawings admirably repro .'uced."— Guardian. " A great picture book. . . . Sumptuous pages and excellent colour printing." — Daily Ghuohiclic. Bibiiog^raphy of the Eigfhteenth Century Art and illustrated Books. Being a Guide to Collectors of Illustrated Works in English and French. Compiled by J. Lewine. With 3.5 Full- page Plates, Ordinary Edition, royal 8vo. 1,000 copies only, Three Guineas net. Edition de Lu.xe, imperinl 8vo, 100 copies, Four Guineas net. " Mr. Lewine's comprehensive and carefully compiled work. . . . Admirably arranged. A number of rare plates have been reproduced to illustrate the book. . . . Deserves a hearty welcome from collectorB, librarians, and book-lovers generally." — Scotsman. SOIMtB FROIVimENT FCATURES OF THE 1899 NITMBERS. COLONEL THEODORE ROOSEVELT ON THE WAR. Illustrated by Drawings and Photographs. On the en' ire subject of the Spanish- American War, betjre, during, and after hostililies Col. Roosevelt will write for Scribner's exclusively. The picturesque story of the Rough Riders, from the inception of the original idea to tire mustering out of the famous regiment, is to be told in seri.il form (occiipying five or i-ix numbers). The organiser and commander of the regiment happens to be an experienced writer as well as fighter, and was already wcU-known as a depicter of picturesque adven- tures before he became famous as a soldiei'. ROBiiRT LOUIS STEVENSOWS LETTERS. Edited by Sidney Colvin. Many of the letters are to Edmund Gosse, William Archer, Henry James, W. E. Henley, and his other British correspondents. Some of the best of all are ad dressed to J. M. B.anie though the two men never saw each other. A good share of them are to his American friends. SENATOR HOAR'S REMINISCENCES. Illustrated from Portraits, and Facsimiles. These will be the political and personal memoirs of one of the fathers of the Senate, dealing with the great public men and events of the past half-century. GEORGE W. CABLE'S "THE ENTOMOLOGIST." Illustrated by Alukkt He.vtee. This short serial love-story of New Orleans is the fii>t fiction the author of " Old Creole Days" has written for a long time, and in it he returns to the scenes of his earlier books. JOEL CHANDLER HARRIS'S NEW STORIES, illustrated by A. B. Feost. These four short stories are cilled "The Chronicle of Aunt Minervy Ann," but each is a separate tale in itself, just as the different stories of Uncle Remus are. Aunt Minervy Ann, an old-fashioned negro mammy, is as individual a character as Uncle Remus. MRS. JOHN DREW'S REMINISCENCES. With fcn lutroduction by her Son, John Drew. Mrs. Drew probably knew more anecdotes of Macready, the elder Booth, the elder Jeffer.-on, of Fanny Kemble, of the Old Bowery Theatre, the Old Park Theatre, as well as of forgotten players and forgotten play-houses of the early days of the American stage, than any one else The Reminiscences are full of the attractive flavour of the stage. THE SLAVE-TRADE IN AMERICA. By John R. Speaes. Illustrated By Walter Appletox Clark. ROBERT GRANT'S SEARCH-LIGHT LETTERS. These essays on modern human topics are replies to the various letters to Mr. Grant in consequence of his celebrated " Reflections of a Married Man " and " The Opinions of a Philosopher'" A SHORT SERIAL STORY BY "ft." Mr. Quiller-Couch has contributed for 1899 the first long story he has -written since " The Blue Pavilion." It is a story of love and adventure, and will run about half the year. MUSICAL IMPRESSIONS from the LETTERS OF SIDNEY LA.NIER. These letters are descriptions of the late poet's ideas and feelings while listening to various sorts of music on various occasions— something that music-lovers have often wanted to tell, but only a poet who was also a musician could tell, &c., &c. Price ONE SHILLING Monthly. Annual Sujiscription, 15:- Post Free. London : SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON & COMPANY, Limited, St. Dun,stan's House, Fetter Lane, Fleet Street, E.G. 6 THE EASTER ANNUAL ADVERTISER. ALL PRODUCTIONS MANUFACTURED BY MORRIS & COMPANY FROM THE DESIGNS OF THE LATE WILLIAM MORRIS ARE TO BE OBTAINED ONLY FROM 449, OXFORD STREET, LONDON, W. (Or their Authorized Agents). ARRAS TAPESTRY PAINTED GLASS CARPETS EMBROIDERY FURNITURE WORKS— MERTON ABBEY, SURREY. PRINTED COTTONS PRINTED VELVETS WALL PAPERS SILK DAMASKS WOOL DAMASKS THE EASTER ANNUAL ADVERTISER. 105, 106, NEW BOND STREET, (Late of 300, 302, Oxford Street. LONDON, W. DECORATIVE, HERALDIC, AND ECCLESIASTICAL EMBROIDERERS. New JEdition. Demy 81^0^ pajjer Covers^ Pi' Ice B