William Bell Scott

“ Nothing can be more incorrect than this last as a reading of English history, yet we forget the inaccuracy in admiration of the treatment which represents Lady Jane, with bandaged sight, feeling for the block, her maids covering their faces, and none with their eyes visible among the many figures. On the other hand, “Strafford led to Execution,” when Laud stretches his lawn-covered arms out of the small high window of his cell to give him a blessing as he passes along the corridor, is perfect ”

“ We may add that his point of view of the historical characters which he treated is not always just. “Cromwell lifting the Coffin-lid and looking at the Body of Charles” is an incident only to be excused by an improbable tradition; but “The King in the Guard-Room,” with villainous roundhead soldiers blowing tobacco smoke in his patient face, is a libel on the Puritans; and “Queen Elizabeth dying on the Ground,” like a she-dragon no one dares to touch, is sensational ”

“ In 1837 Delaroche received the commission for the great picture, 27 mètres long, in the hemicycle of the lecture theatre of the École des Beaux Arts. This represents the great artists of the modern ages assembled in groups on either hand of a central elevation of white marble steps, on the topmost of which are three thrones filled by the architects and sculptors of the Parthenon. ”