the work of their pupils. From their French training, many of the American artists have been charged with echoing Parisian art; and the charge is partly true. They have accepted French methods because they think them the best, but their subjects and motives are sufficiently original.
Under separate biographical headings a number of modern American artists are noticed. Some of the greatest Americans however can hardly be said to belong to any American school. James McNeill Whistler, though American-born, is an example of the modern man without a country. E. A. Abbey, John S. Sargent, Mark Fisher and J. J. Shannon are American only by birth. They became resident in London and must be regarded as cosmopolitan in their methods and themes. This may be said with equal truth of many painters resident in Paris and elsewhere on the Continent. However good as art it may be, there is nothing distinctively American about the work of W. T. Dannat, Alexander Harrison, George Hitchcock, Gari Melchers, C. S. Pearce, E. L. Weeks, J. L. Stewart and Walter Gay. If they owe allegiance to any centre or city, it is to Paris rather than to New York.
During the last quarter of the 19th century much effort and money were devoted to the establishment of institutions like the Metropolitan Museum in New York, the Carnegie Museum at Pittsburg, and the Art Institute in Chicago. Every city of importance in the United States now has its gallery of paintings. Schools of technical training and societies of artists likewise exist wherever there are important galleries. Exhibitions during the winter season and at great national expositions give abundant opportunity for rising talent to display itself; and, in addition, there has been a growing public patronage of painting, as shown by the extensive mural decorations in the Congressional Library building at Washington, in the Boston Public Library, in many colleges and churches, in courts of justice, in the reception-rooms of large hotels, in theatres and elsewhere. (J. C. van D.)
PAISIELLO (or Paesiello), GIOVANNI (1741–1816), Italian
musical composer, was born at Tarento on the 9th of May 1741.
The beauty of his voice attracted so much attention that in
1754 he was removed from the Jesuit college at Tarento to the
Conservatorio di S. Onofrio at Naples, where he studied under
Durante, and in process of time rose to the position of assistant
master. For the theatre of the Conservatorio, which he left
in 1763, he wrote some intermezzi, one of which attracted so
much notice that he was invited to write two operas, La Pupilla
and Il Mondo al Rovescio, for Bologna, and a third, Il Marchese
di Tulipano, for Rome. His reputation being now firmly
established, he settled for some years at Naples, where, notwithstanding
the popularity of Piccini, Cimarosa and Guglielmi,
of whose triumphs he was bitterly jealous, he produced a series
of highly successful operas, one of which, L’Idolo cinese, made
a deep impression upon the Neapolitan public. In 1772 he began
to write church music, and composed a requiem for Gennara
Borbone. In the same year he married Cecilia Pallini, with
whom he lived in continued happiness. In 1776 Paisiello was
invited by the empress Catherine II. to St Petersburg, where he
remained for eight years, producing, among other charming
works, his masterpiece, Il Barbiere di Siviglia, which soon
attained a European reputation. The fate of this delightful
opera marks an epoch in the history of Italian art; for with it
the gentle suavity cultivated by the masters of the 18th century
died out to make room for the dazzling brilliancy of a later period.
When, in 1816, Rossini set the same libretto to music, under the
title of Almaviva, it was hissed from the stage; but it made its
way, nevertheless, and under its changed title, Il Barbiere, is now
acknowledged as Rossini’s greatest work, while Paisiello’s opera is
consigned to oblivion—a strange instance of poetical vengeance,
since Paisiello himself had many years previously endeavoured
to eclipse the fame of Pergolesi by resetting the libretto of his
famous intermezzo. La Serva padrona.
Paisiello quitted Russia in 1784, and, after producing Il Re Teodoro at Vienna, entered the service of Ferdinand IV. at Naples, where he composed many of his best operas, including Nina and La Molinara. After many vicissitudes, resulting from political and dynastic changes, he was invited to Paris (1802) by Napoleon, whose favour he had won five years previously by a march composed for the funeral of General Hoche. Napoleon treated him munificently, while cruelly neglecting two far greater composers, Cherubini and Méhul, to whom the new favourite transferred the hatred he had formerly borne to Cimarosa, Guglielmi and Piccini. Paisiello conducted the music of the court in the Tuileries with a stipend of 10,000 francs and 4800 for lodging, but he entirely failed to conciliate the Parisian public, who received his opera Proserpine so coldly that, in 1803, he requested and with some difficulty obtained permission to return to Italy, upon the plea of his wife’s ill health. On his arrival at Naples Paisiello was reinstated in his former appointments by Joseph Bonaparte and Murat, but he had taxed his genius beyond its strength, and was unable to meet the demands now made upon it for new ideas. His prospects, too, were precarious. The power of the Bonaparte family was tottering to its fall; and Paisiello’s fortunes fell with it. The death of his wife in 1815 tried him severely. His health failed rapidly, and constitutional jealousy of the popularity of others was a source of worry and vexation. He died on the 5th of June 1816.
Paisiello’s operas (of which he is known to have composed 94) abound with melodies, the graceful beauty of which is still warmly appreciated. Perhaps the best known of these airs is the famous “Nel cor più” from La Molinara, immortalized by Beethoven’s delightful variations. His church music was very voluminous, comprising eight masses, besides many smaller works; he also produced fifty-one instrumental compositions and many detached pieces. MS. scores of many of his operas were presented to the library of the British Museum by Dragonetti.
The library of the Gerolamini at Naples possesses an interesting MS. compilation recording Paisiello’s opinions on contemporary composers, and exhibiting him as a somewhat severe critic, especially of the work of Pergolesi. His Life has been written by F. Schizze (Milan, 1833).
PAISLEY, CLAUD HAMILTON, Lord (c. 1543–1622), Scottish politician, was a younger son of the 2nd earl of Arran. In 1553 he received the lands of the abbey of Paisley, and in 1568 he aided Mary Queen of Scots to escape from Lochleven castle, afterwards fighting for her at the battle of Langside. His estates having been forfeited on account of these proceedings, Hamilton was concerned in the murder of the regent Murray in 1570, and also in that of the regent Lennox in the following
year; but in 1573 he recovered his estates. Then in 1579 the council decided to arrest Claud and his brother John (afterwards 1st marquess of Hamilton) and to punish them for their past
misdeeds; but the brothers escaped to England, where Elizabeth
used them as pawns in the diplomatic game, and later Claud lived for a short time in France. Returning to Scotland in 1586 and mixing again in politics, Hamilton sought to reconcile James VI. with his mother; he was in communication with Philip II. of Spain in the interests of Mary and the Roman Catholic religion, and neither the failure of Anthony Babington’s plot nor even the defeat of the Spanish Armada put an end to these intrigues. In 1589 some of his letters were seized and he suffered a short imprisonment, after which he practically disappeared from public life. Hamilton, who was created a Scottish baron as Lord Paisley in 1587, was insane during his concluding years. His eldest son James was created earl of Abercorn (q.v.) in 1606.
PAISLEY, a municipal and police burgh of Renfrewshire, Scotland, on the White Cart, 3 m. from its junction with the Clyde, 7 m. W. by S. of Glasgow by the Glasgow & South-Western and Caledonian railways. Pop. (1891), 66,425; (1901) 79,363. In 1791 the river, which bisects the town, was made navigable for vessels of 50 tons and further deepened a century later. It is crossed by several bridges—including the Abercorn, St James’s
and the Abbey Bridges—and two railway viaducts. The old
town, on the west bank of the stream, contains most of the principal warehouses and mills; the new town, begun towards the end of the 18th century, occupies much of the level ground
