MANCHESTER AT SCHOOL.
I'm Manchester exhibition will not be limited to pictures ; the Museum of Decorative and Useful Arts will not be swamped in paint and canvass. A kind of response has been made to our expression of doubt on this point, by a sufficiently specific recapitu- lation of that which is intended to be done in. the approaching exhibition. We are told that the exhibition of ancient and me- dimval decorative works, opened to the public by the Society of Arts in 1850 at the suggestion of Prince Albert, will be repeated on a much larger scale. Historically, the collection will include subjects of art from the Roman and Byzantine period to the present day. There will be sculpture in marble, wood, stone, &c. ; metal works " in the three divisions of military, ecclesiastical, and domes- tic " ; jewellery, Damascene work, enamels, ceramic works, glass, furniture, marqueterie, leather, ivories, bone, horn, glyptus, &c. Yes, this is exactly what we supposed from the first description of the project. But what struck us as remarkable was the enormous ascertained development of the picture department, while the other part of the collection remained in the stage of project. In this new official recapitulation we do not observe any statement that positive steps have been taken to send down the goods, except in the ease of armour from the Meyriok collection and the Tower. This alone appears to be positive, and as to the rest the recapitu- lation only prophesies- " In a future notice we shall be able to tell our readers more of this in- teresting section of the exhibition, by announcing the contributions re- ceived; and it is to be hoped that the possessors of valuable works of art suitable to such a collection will come forward to offer their contributions as freely as have the owners of ancient and modern pictures."
The recapitulation, especially a paragraph about Louis Quatorze, Renaissance, &e., looks to us very much as if it were taken from the preface to the Society of Arts catalogue of mediaeval collec- tions. This notice, therefore, is a useful reminiscence of the ori- design ; but, saving the promises from the Tower and from Colonel and Lady Laura Meyriek, it is no more.
By what has fallen lately from speakers at public meetings, who have alluded. to the plan of education contemplated for pro vinces by the Society of Arts, we should suppose that the design
which is now revived would be guaranteed by the whole authority of the leading art teachers in the Metropolis. We do not know whither there is any local jealousy in Manchester, instigating the people there to depart from the central design and to divert the exhibition to another purpose ; we should hope not. Certainly, a simple spread of canvass could not be half so useful for a manu- facturing community as the collection first intended ; and we shall not lose sight of that original design.
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