The Report I am submitting to the Council on
the Conduct of the Students may admit of Some
Previous observations on the State of their studies;
Though to dwell on it at Large would be Super-
fluous as the different degrees of their progress
Are individually Laid before the Council; and the
Distribution of Premiums this Decr have enabled
Every Member of the Academy to form a probable
If not a decisive Idea of the Actual State of their
Powers on the whole: I say ‘not decisive’, because
I know that there are Several Students of consi-
derable Talent, Who from whatever Cause have not
Entered or declined Competition, and though I do
not pretend to assert & perhaps do not believe, that
the Youth at present under my tuition, Collectively
Or individually, offer the Same auspicious prospect
With Some former periods, when I had the honour
to Superintend the Studies of Some of the present
Members of the Academy _ Still I do not think
It too much to Say that the Specimens offered for
the Prizes from the Antique Academy in Crayon
 

and in Models, have been more than on a Level with those
produced from the Life, where the Same unfortunate
dereliction of the principles inforced above Stairs
Continues to prevail & to be lamented, by the respective
Visitors: the degrading Consequences of this has beyond
Contradiction been proved by the Paucity of Pictures
offered for the Supreme Premium & the rejection of those
that were presented; and if the golden pledge of Success
has been obtained by one Specimen of Composition in
Sculpture _ its Superiority over the rest is too irre:
levant to Let the Artists consider it in any other
Light than that of a Stimulus to his future exertion
I am unwilling to Suppose that the Establishment
of a School of Painting could have detrimentally
influenced the Studies of the Life Academy: I believe
however to have observed, that painting, at Night
from the Model below, has, Since its opening, gra=
dually decreased: if this be the fact, the Student per-
verts the purpose for which the Painting School was
opened, to wit, that of Comparing the works of Art, with
Nature herself in the most beautiful Light, &c
from a Pupil of Nature shrinks down into the Man-
nerist of Some particular Style.

On the Conduct of the Students in the Antique Ac^y
during the hours of their attendance, I can truly
Say that it is Orderly & attentive during my pre=
sence, & that Since the regulations of Council ha-
ve diminished the Number, contest for places has cea=
sed, and irregular Confabulation seldom breaks in
Upon the Silence necessary for Study, & if it here
& there occurs, is easily checked. This Subordina=
tion, which I can with Confidence assert of My own
Department, I have reason to believe, obtains
from what I have I have learned of the Visitors
& Keeper, among the Students of the other Schools,
& that, if Some irregularity of Conduct has Lately
been observed & checked in the Conduct of Some
Some Students in the Painting School, their With=
drawing themselves from the Academy altogether,
has Superseded the Necessity of recurring for a
Remedy to the Authority of the Council.
One grievance however, chiefly relating to My own
School, I cannot forbear Laying before the Council,
& requesting their Countenance to the remedy
I Mean to propose _ it is the want of respect
for the Casts, the objects of their Study _ by which
frequent Mutilations of extremities, ruptures
of Limbs & even graver injuries have taken
place _ As to prevent this, reprimand & expo-
stulation have been found without avail, be-
cause it is a Comon cause & no Culprit can

can be found where there is no informer _ I Submit
to the Council, whether a Notice, should not
by Their Authority, be fixed in the Hall, denouncing
their Serious intention, to punish, on proof,
by Expulsion or any other Means they May
think fit to adopt _ Not only the person or
Persons, who Shall be found carelessly or wantonly
to have injured a Cast, but those, who, being
privy to the Act, were hardy enough to Conceal
it.