THE NATIONAL GALLERY 409

being so much as breathed upon, which may, indeed, be done, and done easily.

3. Every stranger who enters our National Gallery, if he be a thoughtful person, must assuredly put to himself a curious question. Perceiving that certain pictures-namely, three Correggios, two Raphaels, and a John Bellini-are put under glass,¹ and that all the others are left exposed, as oil pictures are in general, he must ask himself,-“Is it an ascertained fact that glass preserves pictures; and are none of the pictures here thought worth a pane of glass but these five?² Or is it unascertained whether glass is beneficial or injurious, and have the Raphaels and Correggios been selected for the trial-‘Fiat experimentum in corpore vili?’ “ Some years ago it might have been difficult to answer him; now the answer is easy, though it be strange. The experiment has been made. The Raphaels and Correggios have been under glass for many years: they are as fresh and lovely as when they were first enclosed; they need no cleaning, and will need none for half a century to come; and it must be, therefore, that the rest of the pictures are left exposed to the London atmosphere and to the operations which its influence renders necessary, simply because they are not thought worth a pane of plate glass. No. There is yet one other possible answer,-that many of them are hung so high, or in such lights, that they could not be seen if they were glazed. Is it then absolutely necessary that they should be hung so high? We are about to build a new National Gallery;³ may it not be so arranged as that the pictures we place therein may at once be safe and visible?

¹ [See above, Introduction, p. lix.]

² [Apparently a misprint, as six pictures are mentioned.]

³ [The existing National Gallery was opened in 1838, but only six of the rooms were at first devoted to the collection, the remaining space being allotted to the Royal Academy of Arts (whose inscription may still be seen over a disused doorway). The enlargement or removal of the Gallery had for some years been mooted, and the Select Committee of 1853 suggested a site at Kensington. This recommendation, however, was not adopted. In 1860, 1876, and 1884 the Gallery was enlarged, and in 1869 the Royal Academy removed to Burlington House.]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]