Beschreibung:

DE QUINCEY, THOMAS. Autograph manuscript of the essay "Picture-cleaners." [N.p., n.d.]. 3 pages, 4to, on the rectos of three leaves, some staining, incomplete with the text breaking off at the foot of the third page and evidently continuing on another leaf now missing, a working draft with extensive revisions. The essay, an attack on the picture-cleaning techniques and other policies at the National Gallery, begins: "The nation hears with horror, and at the same time with indignation, that this faction of conspirators against Art in its highest regions has again been unchained upon the National Gallery. One might fancy that some fatally existed against the ordinary chances for success on the part of England whenever she undertakes nationally any work for promoting the Fine Arts. The Gallery itself (the building I mean) was mismanaged architecturally at starting: neither time enough, nor labor of thought enough, was applied to a problem so essentially grand. A barrack, or a Poor-House, a kennel for hounds, has often received more elaborate attention. The pictures again were bought capriciously..." Apparently unpublished.