take them for all in all, better framed for the mingled and shifting circumstances of human action and suffering. If my way lay through a travelled country, I would put up with a Scotchman, or a worse man, as my guide over the exact roads-the true bridges and the right fords; but if my unprecedented journey was over a pathless desart, obstructed by quag

mires and quicksands, and fruitful of accidents, requiring sudden plans, and sudden changes of plans, I would choose for my leader an Irishman. A bull, it may be insinuated, would be an awkward matter in a bog-but I abide by my preference notwithstanding. The Irishman would blunder through with me, or I am mistaken. R. A.

their scattered gold was strongly contrasted with the dark green spiral shoots of the cedar trees that skirt the road; the sun shone faint and watery, as if smiling his last; Winter gently let go the hand of Summer, and the green fields, wet with the mist, anticipated the return of Spring. At the end of this beautiful little village, Dulwich College appeared in view, with modest state, yet mindful of the olden time, and the name of Allen and his compeers rushed full upon the memory! How many races of school-boys have played within its walls, or stammered out a lesson, or sauntered away their vacant hours in its shade: yet, not one Shakspeare is there to be found among them all! The boy is clothed and fed, and gets through his accidence: but no trace of his youthful learning, any more than of his saffron livery, is to be met with in the man. Genius is not to be "constrained by mastery." Nothing comes of these endowments and foundations for learning, you might as well make dirtpies, or build houses with cards. Yet something does come of them tooa retreat for age, a dream in youtha feeling in the air around them, the memory of the past, the hope of what will never be. Sweet are the studies of the school-boy, delicious his idle

hours! Fresh and gladsome is his waking, balmy are his slumbers, book-pillowed! He wears a green and yellow livery perhaps; but

green and yellow melancholy" comes not near him, or if it does, is tempered with youth and innocence! To thumb his Eutropius, or to knuckle down at taw, are to him equally delightful; for whatever stirs the blood, or inspires thought in him, quickens the pulse of life and joy. He has only to feel, in order to be happy; pain turns smiling from him, and sorrow is only a softer kind of pleasure. Each sensation is but an unfolding of his new being; care, age, sickness, are idle words; the musty records of antiquity look glossy in his sparkling eye, and he clasps immortality as his future bride! The coming years hurt him not-he hears their sound afar off, and is glad. See him there, the urchin, seated in the sun, with a book in his hand, and the wall at his back. He has a thicker wall before him-the wall that parts him from the future. He sees not the archers taking aim at his peace; he knows not the hands that are to mangle his bosom. He stirs not, he still pores upon his book, and, as he reads, a slight hectic flush passes over his cheek, for he sees the letters that compose the word FAME glitter on the page, and his eyes swim, and he thinks that he will one day write a book, and have his name repeated by thousands of readers, and assume a certain signature, and write Essays and Criticisms in the LONDON MAGAZINE, as a consummation of felicity scarcely to be believed. Come hither, thou poor little fellow, and let us change places with thee if

thou wilt; here, take the pen and finish this article, and sign what name you please to it; so that we may but change our dress for yours, and sit shivering in the sun, and con over our little task, and feed poor, and lie hard, and be contented and happy, and think what a fine thing it is to be an author, and dream of immortality, and sleep o'nights!

There is something affecting and monastic in the sight of this little nursery of learning, simple and retired as it stands, just on the verge of the metropolis and in the midst of modern improvements. There is a chapel, and a copy of Raphael's Transfiguration, by Julio Romano; but the great attraction to curiosity at present is the collection of pictures left to the College by the late Sir Francis Bourgeois, who is buried in a mausoleum close by. He once (it is said) spent an agreeable day here in company with the Masters of the College and some other friends, and he determined, in consequence, upon this singular mode of testifying his gratitude and his respect. Perhaps, also, some such idle thoughts as we have here recorded might have mingled with this resolution. The contemplation and the approach of death might have been softened to his mind by being associated with the hopes of childhood; and he might wish that his remains might repose, in monumental state, amidst "the innocence and simplicity of poor Charity boys!" Might it not have been so?

The pictures are 356 in number, and are hung on the walls of a large gallery, built for the purpose, and divided into five compartments. They certainly looked better in their old places, at the house of Mr. Desenfans (the original collector), where they were distributed into a number of small rooms, and seen separately and close to the eye. They are mostly cabinet-pictures; and not only does the height, at which many of them are necessarily hung to cover a large space, lessen the effect, but the number distracts and deadens the attention. Besides, the sky-lights are so contrived as to "shed a dim," though not a "religious light" upon them. At our entrance, we were first struck by our old friends the Cuyps; and just beyond, caught

a glimpse of that fine female head by Carlo Maratti, giving us a welcome with cordial glances. May we not exclaim

What a delicious breath painting sends forth! The violet-bed's not sweeter.

A fine gallery of pictures is a sort of illustration of Berkeley's Theory of Matter and Spirit. It is like a palace of thought-another universe, built of air, of shadows, of colours. Every thing seems "palpable to feeling as to sight." Substances turn to shadows by the painter's arch-chemic touch; shadows harden into substances. "The eye is made the fool of the other senses, or else worth all the rest." The material is in some sense embodied in the immaterial; or, at least, we see all things in a sort of intellectual mirror. The world of art is a deception. We discover distance in a glazed surface; a province is contained in a foot of canvas; a thin, evanescent tint gives the form and pressure of rocks and trees; an inert shape has life and motion in it. Time stands still, and the dead re-appear, by means of this "so potent art!" Look at the Cuyp next the door (No. 3). It is woven of ethereal hues. A soft mist is on it, a veil of subtle air. The tender green of the valleys beyond the gleaming lake, the purple light of the hills is like the down on an unripe nectarine. You may lay your finger on the canvas, but miles of dewy vapour and sunshine are between you and the objects you survey. It is almost needless to point out that the cattle and figures in the foreground, like dark, transparent spots, give an immense relief to the perspective. This is, we think, the finest Cuyp, perhaps, in the world. The landscape opposite to it (in the the same room) by Albert Cuyp, has a richer colouring and a stronger contrast of light and shade, but it has not that tender bloom of a spring morning (so delicate, yet so powerful in its effect) which the other possesses. Two Horses, by Cuyp (No. 74), is another admirable specimen of this excellent painter. It is hard to say, which is most true to nature -the sleek, well-fed look of the bayhorse, or the bone and spirit of the dappled iron-grey one, or the face of

the man who is busy fastening a girth. Nature is scarcely more faith ful to itself, than this delightfully unmannered, unaffected picture is to it. In the same room, there are several good Teniers's, and a small Head of an Old Man, by Rembrandt, which is as smoothly finished as a miniature. No. 10, Interior of an Ale-house, by Adrian Brouwer, almost gives one a sick head-ache; particularly the face and figure of the man leaning against the door, overcome with "potations pottle deep." Brouwer united the depth and richness of Ostade to the spirit and felicity of Teniers. No. 12, Sleeping Nymph and Satyr, and 59, Nymph and Satyr, by Polemberg, are not pictures to our taste. Why should any one make it a rule never to paint any thing but this one subject? Was it to please himself or others? The one shows bad taste; the other wrong judgment. The grossness of the selection is hardly more offensive than the finicalness of the execution. No. 49, a Mater Dolorosa, by Carlo Dolci, is a very good specimen of this master; but the expression has too great a mixture of piety and pauperism in It is not altogether spiritual. No. 51, A School with Girls at work, by Crespi, is a most rubbishly performance, and has the look of a modern picture. It was, no doubt, painted in the fashion of the time, and is now old-fashioned. Every thing has this modern, or rather uncouth and obsolete look, which, besides the temporary and local circumstances, has not the free look of nature. Dress a figure in what costume you please (however fantastic, however barbarous), but add the expression which is common to all faces, the properties that are common to all drapery in its elementary principles, and the picture will belong to all times and places. It is not the addition of individual circumstances, but the omission of general truth, that makes the little, the deformed, and the short-lived, in art. No 183, Religion in the Desart, a sketch by Sir Francis Bourgeois, is a proof of this remark. There are no details, nor any appearance of permanence or stability. It seems to have been painted yesterday, and to labour under premature decay. It has a look of being half done, and

it.

you have no wish to see it finished. No. 52, Interior of a Cathedral, by Sanadram, is curious and fine. From one end of the perspective to the other and back again-would make a morning's walk.

In the SECOND ROOM, No. 90, a Sea Storm, by Backhuysen, and No. 93, A Calm, by W. Vandervelde, are equally excellent, the one for its gloomy turbulence, and the other for its glassy smoothness. 92, Landscape with Cattle and Figures, is by Both, who is, we confess, no great favourite of ours. We do not like his straggling branches of trees without masses of foliage, continually running up into the sky, merely to let in the landscape beyond. No. 96, Blowing Hot and Cold, by Jordaens, is as fine a picture as need be painted. It is full of character, of life, and colour. It is rich, and not gross. 98, Portrait of a Lady, said in the printed Catalogue to be by Andrea Sacchi, is surely by Carlo Maratti, to whom it used to be given. It has great beauty, great elegance, great expression, and great brilliancy of execution; but every thing in it belongs to a somewhat later era of the art than Andrea Sacchi. Be this as it may, it is one of the most perfect pictures in the collection. Of the portraits of known individuals in this room we wish to say little, for we can say nothing good. That of Mr. Kemble, by Beechey, is perhaps the most direct and manly. In this room is Rubens's Sampson and Dalilah, a coarse daub-at least, it looks so between two pictures by Vandyke, Charity, and a Madonna and Infant Christ. This painter probably never produced any thing more complete than these two compositions. They have the softness of air, the solidity of marble: the pencil appears to float and glide over the features of the face, the folds of the drapery, with easy volubility, but to mark every thing with a precision, a force, a grace indescribable. Truth seems to hold the pencil, and elegance to guide it. The attitudes are exquisite, and the expression all but divine. It is not like Raphael's, it is truebut whose else was? Vandyke was born in Holland, and lived most of his time in England!—There are several capital pictures of horses, &c. by

Wouvermans, in this room, particularly the one with a hay-cart loading on the top of a rising ground. The composition is as striking and pleasing as the execution is delicate. There is immense knowledge and character in Wouvermans' horsesan ear, an eye turned round, a cropped tail give you their history and thoughts-but from the want of a little arrangement, they look too often like spots on a dark ground. When they are properly relieved and disentangled from the rest of the composition, there is an appearance of great life and bustle in his pictures. His horses, however, have too much of the manége in them-he seldom gets beyond the camp or the riding school. This room is rich in master pieces. Here is the Jacob's Dream, by Rembrandt, with that sleeping figure, thrown like a bundle of clothes in one corner of the picture, by the side of some stunted bushes, and with those winged shapes, not human, not angelical, but bird-like, dreamlike, treading on clouds, ascending, descending through the realms of endless light, that loses itself in the infinite space! No one else could ever grapple with this subject, or stamp it on the willing canvas in its gorgeous obscurity but Rembrandt! Here also is the St. Barbara, of Rubens, fleeing from her persecutors; a noble design, as if she were scaling the steps of some high overhanging turret, moving majestically on, with Fear before her, Death behind her, and Martyrdom crowning her:-and here is an eloquent landscape by the same master-hand, the subject of which is, a shepherd piping his flock homewards through a narrow defile, with a graceful group of autumnal trees waving on the edge of the declivity above, and the rosy evening light streaming through the clouds on the green moist landscape in the still lengthening distance. Here (to pass from one kind of excellence to another with kindly interchange) is a clear sparkling Waterfall, by Ruysdael, and Hobbima's Water-Mill, with the wheels in motion, and the ducks paddling in the restless stream. Is not this a sad anti-climax from Jacob's Dream to a picture of a Water-Mill? We do not know; and we should care as little, could we but paint either of the pictures.

Entire affection scorneth nicer hands.

If a picture is admirable in its kind, we do not give ourselves much trouble about the subject. Could we paint as well as Hobbima, we should not envy Rembrandt: nay, even as it is, while we can relish both, we envy neither!

The CENTRE ROOM Commences with a Girl at a Window, by Rembrandt. The picture is known by the print of it, and is one of the most remarkable and pleasing in the collection. For clearness, for breadth, for a lively, ruddy look of healthy nature, it cannot be surpassed. The execution of the drapery is masterly. There is a story told of its being his servant-maid looking out of a window, but it is evidently the portrait of a mere child.-A Farrier shoeing an Ass, by Berchem, is in his usual manner. There is truth of character and delicate finishing; but the fault of all Berchem's pictures is, that he continues to finish after he has done looking at nature, and his last touches are different from hers. Hence comes that resemblance to tea-board painting, which even his best works are chargeable with. We find here one or two small Claudes of no great value; and two very clever specimens of the court-painter, Watteau, the Gainsborough of France. They are marked as Nos. 184 and 194, Fête Champêtre, and Le Bal Champêtre. There is something exceedingly light, agreeable, and characteristic, in this artist's productions. He might almost be said to breathe his figures and his flowers on the canvas-so fragile is their texture, so evanescent is his touch. He unites the court and the country at a sort of salient pointyou would fancy yourself with Count Grammont and the beauties of Charles II. in their gay retreat at Tunbridge Wells. His trees have a drawingroom air with them, an appearance of gentility and etiquette, and nod gracefully over-head; while the figures below, thin as air, and vegetably clad, in the midst of all their affectation and grimace, seem to have just sprung out of the ground, or to be the fairy inhabitants of the scene in masquerade. They are the Oreads and Dryads of the Luxembourg! Quaint association, happily effected by the pencil of Watteau! In the

Bal Champêtre we see Louis XIV. himself dancing, looking so like an old beau, his face flushed and puckered up with gay anxiety; but then the satin of his slashed doublet is made of the softest leaves of the water-lily; Zephyr plays wanton with the curls of his wig! We have nobody who could produce a companion to this picture now: nor do we very devoutly wish it. The Louis the Fourteenths are extinct, and we suspect their revival would hardly be compensated even by the re-appearance of a Watteau.-No. 187, the Death of Cardinal Beaufort, by Sir Joshua Reynolds, is a very indifferent and rather unpleasant sketch of a very fine picture. One of the most delightful things in this delightful collection is the Portrait (195) of the Prince of the Asturias, by Velasquez. The easy lightness of the childish Prince contrasts delightfully with the unwieldy figure of the horse, which has evidently been brought all the way from the Low Countries for the amusement of his rider. Velasquez was as fine a portrait-painter as any now living-almost as fiue as any that ever lived! In the Centre Room also is the Meeting of Jacob and Rachel, by Murillo -a sweet picture with a fresh green landscape, and the heart of Love in the midst of it.-There are several heads by Holbein scattered up and down the different compartments. We need hardly observe that they all have character in the extreme, so that we may be said to be acquainted with the people they represent; but then they give nothing but character, and only one part of that, viz. the dry, the literal, the concrete, and fixed. They want the inspiration of passion and beauty; but they are the finest caput mortuums of expression that ever were made. Hans Holbein had none of the volatile essence of genius in his composition. If portrait-painting is the prose of the art, his pictures are the prose of portrait-painting. Yet he is "a reverend name" in art, and one of the benefactors of the human mind. He has left faces behind him that we would give the world to have seen, and there they are-stamped on his canvas for ever! Art is Time's Telescope. Who, in reading over certain names, does not feel a yearning in

his breast to know their features and their lineaments? We look through a small frame, and lo! at the distance of three centuries, we have before us the figures of Anne Boleyn, of the virtuous Cranmer, the bigotted Queen Mary, the noble Surrey-as if we had seen them in their life-time, not perhaps in their best moods or happiest attitudes, but as they sometimes looked, no doubt. We know at least what sort of looking-people they were: our minds are made easy on that score; the "body and limbs" are there, and we may "add what flourishes" of grace or ornament we please. Holbein's heads are to the finest portraits what state-papers are to history.

The first picture in the FOURth Room is the Prophet Samuel, by Sir Joshua. It is not the Prophet Samuel, but a very charming picture of a little child saying its prayers. The second is, The Education of Bacchus, by Nicolas Poussin. This picture makes one thirsty to look at it-the colouring even is dry and adust. It is true history in the technical phrase, that is to say, true poetry in the vulgate. The figure of the infant Bacchus seems as if he would drink up a vintage-he drinks with his mouth, his hands, his belly, and his whole body. Garagantua was nothing to him. In the Education of Jupiter, in like manner, we are thrown back into the infancy of mythologic lore. The little Jupiter, suckled by a shegoat, is beautifully conceived and expressed; and the dignity and ascendancy given to these animals in the picture is wonderfully happy. They have a very imposing air of gravity indeed, and seem to be by prescription "grand caterers and wet-nurses of the state" of Heaven! Apollo giving a Poet a Cup of Water to drink is elegant and classical; and The Flight into Egypt instantly takes the tone of Scripture-history. This is strange, but so it is. All things are possible to the imagination. All things, about which we have a feeling, may be expressed by true genius. A dark landscape (by the same hand) in a corner of the room is a proof of this. There are trees in the fore-ground, with a paved road and buildings in the distance. The Genius of antiquity might walk here, and feel itself at home. The large