common between them, but that they were the portraits of two very good-natured men. I think, but am not sure, that I finished this portrait (or another afterwards) on the same day that the news of the battle of Austerlitz came; I walked out in the afternoon, and, as I returned, saw the evening star set over a poor man's cottage with other thoughts and feelings than I shall ever have again. Oh for the revolution of the great Platonic year, that those times might come over again! I could sleep out the three hundred and sixty-five thousand intervening years very contentedly!-The picture is left: the table, the chair, the window where I learned to construe Livy, the chapel where my father preached, remain where they were; but he himself is gone to rest, full of years, of faith, of hope, and charity! ESSAY II. THE SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED. THE painter not only takes a delight in nature, he has a new and exquisite source of pleasure opened to him in the study and contemplation of works of art "Whate'er Lorraine light touch'd with soft'ning hue, Or savage Rosa dash'd, or learned Poussin drew." He turns aside to view a country-gentleman's seat with eager looks, thinking it may contain some of the rich products of art. There is an air round Lord Radnor's park, for there hang the two Claudes, the Morning and Evening of the Roman Empire-round Wilton-house, for there is Vandyke's picture of the Pembroke family-round Blenheim, for there is his picture of the Duke of Buckingham's children, and the most magnificent collection of Rubenses in the world-at Knowsley, for there is Rembrandt's Hand-writing on the Wall-and at Burleigh, for there are some of Guido's angelic heads. |