FLAXMAN’S TRIBUTE TO BANKS.

That Flaxman appreciated and honored Banks’ genius, he was ever ready to give strong proof.—“We have had a sculptor,” he says in one of his lectures, “in the late Mr. Banks, whose works have eclipsed the most, if not all his continental cotemporaries.” On another occasion—that of the sale of the sculptor’s models—Mrs. Siddons and Flaxman were seated together, when the auctioneer began to expatiate upon the beauty of an antique figure, saying, “Behold where the deceased artist found some of his beauties.” “Sir,” exclaimed Flaxman, more warmly than was his wont, “you do Mr. Banks much wrong, he wanted no assistance.”

Banks died in 1805. In Westminster Abbey a tablet is erected with this inscription, “In memory of Thomas Banks, Esq., R. A., Sculptor, whose superior abilities in the profession added a lustre to the arts of his country, and whose character as a man reflected honor on human nature.”