choose, and still more, by which he would not
choose, to be represented for the benefit of
posterity. If a man have had two
photographs done of him, one of which, owing to
some unfortunate combination of lights and
shadows, makes him look like a murderer, while
the other shows him as a respectable and
amiable member of society, it would be hard if
he were obliged to submit to be represented
by the first of the two. It will be remembered
by most persons who have had much
experience of sitting for photographs, that
at least one of their portraits has been suggestive
of murderous tendencies in the original,
while another has conveyed the idea of a
simpering humbug. These unhappy results are
oftener attributable to our own misdoing than
we think. In sitting for our portraits we are
apt to begin by trying to look preternaturally
wise, and in making this attempt our features
assume a homicidal cast. Horrified at this
state of things, we smile, and behold the humbug
appears! These two phases passed through,
some of us, in the endeavour to steer clear of
both extremes, and to resemble neither
murderers nor hypocrites, are apt to fall into yet
another pitfall, in some respects more terrible
than the other two, and to contract an air of
chronic imbecility. Suppose a dozen different
portraits taken from the same original, each
will probably differ in so many respects from
all the others, that in some cases it might prove
desirable to have more than one portrait of a
single personage.

And the getting together of some such
collection of national photographic portraits should
by no means be put off as a thing which
may be delayed for an indefinite period, and
thought of "some of these days." Many
eminent persons have already died since the
art of photography came into existence, the
negatives of whose portraits are in private
hands—in the hands, that is, of professional
photographers—who are continually taking as
many impressions of them as they are able to
find a market for. Such negatives should at
once be sought out and bought up before it is
too late; and if it be the case that there is no
method by which they can be preserved, if it
be in their very nature to fade away and perish,
then would it not be well that before they do
so, fac-simile engravings should be made from
them, that they may be secured for ever?

As to this question of the durability of
photographic portraits, and of the negatives
from, which they are taken, there seems to be
diversity of opinion among professors. We all
know that the portraits themselves are apt to
fade. The private collections of these which
most of us possess include not a few specimens
which are but the ghosts of what they once were;
and year by year we see portraits to which we
attach the greatest value becoming more and
more indistinct. It is said that in Paris and
elsewhere certain discoveries have been made
—and that recently—which will remove this
great objection to photographic likenesses. It
may be so, or it may not. Time alone can prove.
Meanwhile, until we know certainly that an
imperishable photographic impression is an
attainable thing, it is to the negative from which
impressions can continually be obtained with
which to replace the old ones as they become
indistinct, that we naturally attach the greatest
value.

The general opinion among practical men.
seems to be that, accidents apart, these
negatives are not perishable. It seems probable
that there is nothing inherently perishable in
the thing itself. There is, however, nothing
more liable to accidental injuries than one of
these negatives. It is originally taken upon
glass, the frailest of all substances. Then again,
the composition with which the completed negative
is varnished, may be defective: in which case
the surface will crack, to the utter destruction of
the portrait. The smallest substance—what we
familiarly know as a piece of grit—brought into
contact with the delicate surface, may destroy
it in a moment; while if it should come to be
scratched or rubbed, there is an end of it.

Now, the case standing thus—the
photographic negative being, in itself and when
protected from external injury, as far as we
know, a durable thing, but being in a
pre-eminent degree liable to all sorts of accidents,
any one of which may render it worthless—it
seems to follow that, in cases where this negative
is a valuable piece of property, not to say a
treasure impossible to replace, it ought to enjoy
every chance that careful guardianship can give
it, of immunity from misadventure. Such
immunity it certainly does not enjoy when left to
encounter all the risks of the establishment of a
professional photographer. The artist cannot
attend to everything himself, but is compelled,
perforce, to entrust the keeping of even his most
valuable portraits to assistants and servants.
Accidents are happening continually, and
sometimes when he inquires for the negative
of an especially eminent person, it is
brought to him in two pieces, or with a great
scratch across its surface from end to end. Of
course we all know that by no system of human
organisation can accident be wholly guarded
against; but we also know that by the employment
of precaution the danger to be
apprehended from casualties may be reduced to a
minimum. It is mainly by use that the security
of negatives is endangered, as every time they
are handled there is undoubtedly some risk
of injury run. It follows that the less they are
used, the less likely are they to receive harm.
The negatives of any portraits included in a
national collection would be but seldom used.
It would be needful to take off some few
impressions at first starting for the portrait-gallery
itself, and also for preservation in public
establishments in our own country towns, or in the
colonies. These once supplied, the negative
would be put away in some specially safe place,
and no further use would be made of it until
new impressions were required, either by reason
of those originally taken being worn out, or in