ABSTRACT
Portrait painting has never reached even a tolerable state of excellence in India. By strict Muhammadans it is considered sinful to sit for, or portray a likeness. Copyists, who have acquired a wonderful skill in transferring to ivory the lineaments of a photograph, or an oil painting, are to be found in Delhi and other cities, but to paint from life is a talent rarely met with. In Dacca there is a Muhammadan family, who by birth are painters, but their pictures, wanting in animation and individuality, bear nevertheless a fair but formal likeness of the person delineated.
