Hampton Court ... Illustrated with forty-three drawings by Herbert ...

THE PICTURES 171
IV
Scott when he went to Hampton Court said in
1828 very truly of the pictures as a whole, " They are
not very excellent, but they are curious, which is as
interesting except to connoisseurs." It is impossible
here to consider all the pictures of notein any detail.
They will, therefore, best be treated in connection
with their historical associations. Thus viewed, they
fall into four groups. First, are the pictures andportraits
which belonged to, or which illustrate, the period
of the Tudor sovereigns. Next are the remains of
the collection formed by Charles I. Thirdly, the
pictures of the age of William III. and of Anne
form a group by themselves. And, lastly, come the
portraits of the Georgian period. Besides these are the
two special collections of "Beauties" already noticed.
The ceilings may be rapidly dismissed. Nobody now
admires Verrio's " sprawling saints," or is impressed
by Thornhill's ridiculous apotheoses. As decorations,
the farther off they are seen the better; as works of
art, they plead to be forgotten. Very different is the
ceiling in the " Confessionary," **
which recalls, says
Sir J. C. Robinson, " the celebrated ceilings of the
apartments of Isabella Gonzaga in the old palace at
Mantua... and might almost besupposed to havebeen
the work of the same artists." The panel pictures in
the same room are, says the same eminent authority,
1 See above,p. 10.