Union system of doing things—­Hopkins to praise for one reason, Popkins to censure for another—­and as PUNCH has been poking his nose into numberless unseen corners, and, notwithstanding its indisputable dimensions, has managed to screen it from observation, he has thereby smelt out several pretty little affairs, which shall in due time be exhibited and explained in front of his proscenium, for special amusement.  In the mean time, to prove that PUNCH is tolerably well up in this line of pseudo-criticism, he has prepared the following description of the private view of either the Royal Academy or the Suffolk-street Gallery, or the British Institution, for 1842, for the lovers of this very light style of reading; and to make it as truly applicable to the various specimens of art forming the collection or collections alluded to, he has done it after the peculiar manner practised by the talented conductor of a journal purporting to be exclusively set apart to that effort.  To illustrate with what strict attention to the nature of the subject chosen, and what an intimate knowledge of technicalities the writer above alluded to displays, and with what consummate skill he blends those peculiarities, the reader will have the kindness to attach the criticism to either of the works (hereunder catalogued) most agreeably to his fancy.  It will be, moreover, shown that this is a thoroughly impartial way of performing the operation of soft anointment.

THE UNERRING FOR PORTRAITS ONLY: 

Portrait of the miscreant who          \
attempted to assassinate Mr. Macreath.  |
VALENTINE VERMILION.  |
|
Portrait of His Majesty the             | The head is extremely
King of Hanover.                        | well painted, and the light
BY THE SAME.  | and shade distributed with
| the artist’s usual judgement. 
Portrait of the boy who got into        |
Buckingham Palace.                      |
GEOFFERY GLAZEM.  |       OR THUS: 
|
Portrait of Lord John Russell.          |
BY THE SAME.  | An admirable likeness of
\ the original, and executed
Portrait of W. Grumbletone, Esq.,       / with that breadth and clearness
in the character of Joseph Surface.     | so apparent in this clever
PETER PALETTE.  | painter’s works.
|
Portrait of Sir Robert Peel.            |
BY THE SAME.  |       OR THUS: 
|
Portrait of the Empress of Russia.      |
VANDYKE BROWN.  | A well-drawn and brilliantly
| painted portrait, calculated
Portrait of the infant Princess.        | to sustain the fame already
BY THE SAME.  | gained by this our favourite
| painter. 
Portrait of Mary Mumblegums,            |
aged 170 years.                         |
BY THE SAME. /

THE UNERRING FOR EVERY SUBJECT: 

The Death of Abel.                     \
MICHAEL McGUELP.  |
|
Dead Game.                              |
THOMAS TICKLEPENCIL.  |
|
Vesuvius in Eruption.                   | This picture is well arranged,
CHARLES CARMINE, R.A.  | and coloured with much truth
| to nature; the chiaro-scuro