ADVERTISEMENT. THE intention of the present work is to disseminate a love of the fine urts, and to introduce the general reader to a familiar acquaintance with ENGRAVED GEMS. These interesting productions of art are not yet universally known. They form the studies of the painter; they delight the amateur; they charm the poet with poetical allusions; and they instruct the antiquary and the philosopher with the portraits, the manners, and customs of various ages. It is not always, however, that the fashionable beauty and the elegant idler, who contemplate these classical designs, among the ornaments of their dress, and their furniture, know, that they are but copies of the precious remains of antiquity; that they constitute a particular study, and are a perpetual source of curious information, and many-coloured amuse ment. An humble individual (the ingenious artist of the present work) has, at once, with the timidity of modesty, and the resolution of enterprize, attempted to fill a department which in our country has been rarely occupied. The private collections that have been engraved are costly and scarce; to none are illustrations subjoined; and the public have, as yet, only the works of foreigners on these subjects. The gentlemen who have cheerfully assisted the well-meant endeavours of the artist, have tasked their own industry, in collecting literary a materials, which, it is presumed, contain some information, and greater entertainment on many curious topics. The selection, drawing, and engraving, have proved an arduous undertaking, and claim indulgence for the imperfections which necessarily attend most works of art, and particularly those which require the fostering warmth of public encouragement. But on a comparison with what has hitherto been given, the artist is not without a hope to realise those fruits of public favour, of which, in the reception of his early Numbers, he has gathered the blossoms. |