Master minds in art, science, & letters; a book for boys ..

Preface

In the following pages I have brought together three groups of English Worthies- — men who have distinguished themselves in the fields of Art, Science, and Letters — Reynolds, Constable, Turner, and Haydon ; Murchison, Faraday, and Darwin ; Sir Walter Scott and Charles Kingsley. I have endeavoured to tell the story of their lives with freedom and impartiality, elucidating the principal features of their character and the special distinctions of their work. In each instance I have been careful to consult the best and latest authorities, of which I have furnished a complete list for the benefit of the young reader, whom these biographical studies may stimulate to further and fuller investigation.

In selecting my subjects I have had three objects in view. First, that they should be interesting in themselves ; second, that they should deal with men of light and leading in their several departments ; and third, that they should also be instructive — that is, that the lessons conveyed should be such as might prove of particular service to the young, for whom this volume is primarily, though not exclusively, intended. And it would not be easy, I think, to present eleven lives more complete and

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PREFACE.

satisfactory from this last point of view. There is not one of them which is not rich in encouragement or warning, which is not useful in the way of inspiration or guidance. There is not one of them which the student can contemplate without feeling the better and the wiser for the truths it inculcates and enforces. There is not one of them which fails to emphasise the worth of honour and honesty, the worth of plain living and high thinking, the worth of a rigid devotion to duty, the worth of pure aspirations and generous sympathies. There is not one of them which does not teach that the best use we can make of our faculties is to employ them for the benefit of our fellow-men. And there is not one of them which does not convey the moral most needed by youth, that the higher the aim, the greater will be the success.

In the course of a long literary life I have written many books specially for the profit and advantage of the young. In adding another to the list I may be allowed to say that it has been written with exactly the same motive — with an earnest desire to assist them in the formation of character, and to recommend to them those principles of conduct which alone can make their lives useful, prosperous, and happy.

Contents

Preface , . . -

Book I.—artists

His early years — The ruling passion — His love of art — Settles in London — Studies the masterpieces of the great artists— Their influence upon him — ‘ He who would excel must labour ’ — Return to London — Growth of his reputation — Causes of his success — Golden words-r-‘ Thoroughness ’ the secret of successful work — Reynolds as a student of nature — Llis felicitous use of opportunities — His friends and friendships — ^Johnson, Burke, Garrick — His finest composition — Founds the Royal Academy — His Presidential Discourses — Letter to Barry — Advice for the young student — Goldsmith’s character of Reynolds^ — Sir Joshua and Dr. Johnson — Nathaniel Hone — Northcote’s anecdotes of Reynolds — Sir Joshua’s hospitality —

His admirable character — What Burke thought of him — An example for the student — Reynolds as a painter — Fanny Burney’s interviews with Reynolds — ‘The Tragic Muse’ — Death of Johnson — ‘The Infant Hercules’ — The great painter afflicted with partial blindness — Lord Carlisle’s poetical culogium — Reynolds’s letter to Gilpin —

His last years — His illness and death — His monument and epitaph - 19

JosEni Mallord William Turner, 1775— 1S51.

Birthplace of a great artist — Anecdotes of Turner’s childhood — His imperfect education — Early indications of artistic genius — Appren-

CONTENTS.

viii ticed to an architect — Enters the Royal Academy as a student — Out-of-doors study — His indefatigable application — ‘ Mens Sana in corpore sano’ — A physical sketch of a young artist — Sketching tours — Friendship with Girtin — Enters upon an independent career — Yorkshire scenery, and its influence on Turner’s genius— His careful and loving observation of Nature — Elected a Fellow of the Royal Academy — Ruskin on Turner’s characteristics as a landscape painter — Turner and his father— The Rev. Mr. Trimmer’s ‘ Reminiscences ’ — Turner’s industry a main element of his power — The ‘Liber Studiorum ’—Turner’s thoroughness — Sadness of Turner’s genius — His pictures enforce the truth, Omnia vanitas — Turner in Queen Anne Street — Particulars of his private life — His supposed meanness refuted — His picture of ‘ Cologne ’ — A fine action — Illustration of Turner’s benevolence — His struggles to express himself in poetic forms — ‘The Fallacies of Hope’ — Quotations — Turner’s ‘ twofold nature * — His failings and his merits — Lupton’s anecdotes of Turner — Cyrus Redding’s anecdotes — A coasting trip — Notices of some of Turner’s masterpieces — The ‘Cologne’ —

‘ Ulysses deriding Polyphemus’ — The ‘ Liber Fluviorum ’ — ‘ Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage ’ — ‘Lake Avernus’ — ‘Ancient Italy ’ — ‘ Modern Italy’ — ‘The Fighting Temeraire' — ‘A Snowstorm’ — Lessons to be drawn from Turner’s life — ‘The Slave Ship’ — His colour experiments— His later years — Gradual decay — Turner secludes himself in a lodging at Chelsea — A lonely death-bed — Turner and Mr. Ruskin — The critic upon Turner’s ‘colour,’ his ‘skies,’ his ‘mountains,’his ‘mystery’ — Anecdotes of Turner — His house in Queen Anne Street — List of the pictures which he bequeathed to the nation - - - - - - - - 53

Constable and English pastoral scenery — His birth and childhood —

His painting-room— ‘ He will be an artist !’ — ‘ Spring,’ as painted by Constable — Patience, a characteristic of the artistic genius — Constable’s assiduous application — A life of persevering work —

A letter of Constable’s — The inspiration of nature — Constable’s marriage — His steady progress as an artist — Constable at Brighton — Sunshine and shadow — Constable’s character and private habits —

His terse and judicious reflections — His criticisms on the great painters — Claude Lorraine — Salvator Rosa — Boucher — Rubens — Ruysdael — Wilson— Gainsborough ----- 106

CONTENTS.

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PAGE

How to avoid the misery of a wasted life — We must not attempt too much — The object aimed at must be proportioned to the means —

The value of self-knowledge — The secret of failure — Keats’ Sonnet to Haydon — Haydon’s life a failure — His ambition disproportioned to his capacity — His childhood — Early inclination for art — Resolves to become a great painter — Goes to London — Studies and attempts — His partiality for high art and large canvases — His picture, ‘ The Murder of Curius Dentatus ’ — His intense enthusiasm — His impatience of criticism — His picture of ‘Macbeth’ — His colossal self-esteem— His picture of ‘Solomon’s Judgment’ — ‘Christ’s Entry into Jerusalem ’ — Wordsworth’s sonnet — His pecuniary trials — Exhibits his pictures in public — Their general characteristics —

Mr. G. F. Watts on Haydon as a painter — His diary and its illustrations of his character — Warnings given by his career — His lack of patience, modesty, and self-control — Increasing pressure of pecuniary anxieties — His strange begging prayers — Tragic close of his career — The last page in the diary — The end of all - - - 121

His birth and childhood — His^ precocious talent — ‘ What book is that ?’

— The delight we feel in our early achievements — Flaxman’s juvenile ambition — Resolves to become a sculptor — Makes the acquaintance of Mrs, Mathew — Classic readings — Illustrations of Greek poetry — Promise and performance— Genius advances slowly and surely —

The Royal Academy — Flaxman wins the silver medal — Tries for the gold medal — Is defeated — The check stimulates him to fresh exertion — Is employed by Wedgwood to make designs for ^Wedgwood ware — Their variety and beauty — Flaxman’s marriage —

‘ Ruined for an artist !’ — A noble wife — Work and fortune — A lifedream fulfilled — Flaxman at Rome — Studies the antique art — His designs for the ‘Iliad,’ the ‘Odyssey,’ and the ‘Tragedies of ^schylus ’ — His remarks upon ancient art — His praise of Phidias —

His illustrations of Dante— Returns to England — Settles in Burlington Street, Fitzroy Square — His monument to the Earl of Mansfield— A poetic gift to a beloved wife — The allegory of the Knight of the Burning Cross — Elected a Member of the Royal Academy —

His principal sculptures — Flaxman’s home-life — Story of the casket — Prose and verse — Professor of Sculpture — His lectures — Death of Mrs. Flaxman — The Shield of Achilles — Allan Cunningham’s anecdotes — His illness and death — Lessons of his life - - H5

X

CONTENTS.

Lord Lytton’s ‘ Dedicatory Epistle ’ to ‘ Zanoni’ — Its tribute of praise to Gibson — Distinctive features of the great sculptor’s character — His love of art — His singleness of purpose — His perseverance — His simplicity and childlikeness — His generous disposition and serene temper — Purity and beauty of Gibson’s life — The segreto esser felice — Gibson’s early years — Indebtedness to the teaching and example of his mother — His artistic faculty early manifests itself — His first drawing — Studies from print-shop windows — Removal to Liverpool — Goes to school — An amusing anecdote — ‘Yes, sir, I paint’ — A benevolent patron — Gibson apprenticed to a cabinet-maker — Employs his leisure in modelling — Relieves himself from his ap- • prenticeship — Works as a modeller — William Roscoe — A kind friend — Anecdotes — The young sculptor’s progress — His mother’s decease — Removal to London — Benjamin West — Gibson at Rome — Introduction to Canova— Becomes his pupil — Begins his independent career — Commission from the Duke of Devonshire — ‘Psyche and the Zephyrs ’ — Sir Watkin Williams Wynn — Gibson and the world of antique art — His study of Roman life — Passages from, a sculptor’s journal — Gibson’s love of his art — Anecdote of Earl Fitzwilliam — Limited province of sculpture — Gibson’s partiality for the legend of Psyche — His illustrations of it — Description of a storm — Statue of the Queen — Colouring the marble — Venus with the golden apple — Miss Hosmer — Gibson’s absentmindedness — His last days — His death and character - - - - - 172

Book Ii.-^men Of Science

His early years — An idle schoolboy — His daring exploits — Enters the army — Is sent to the Peninsula — Battle of Vimiera — Sicily — Ireland — How to misspend one’s life — Retires from the army — His marriage — Beneficial influence exercised by his wife — In quest of a career — Foreign travel — Interview with Canova — Mrs. Somerville — Returns to England— A fox-hunter’s pursuits — Dawn of intellectual activity — Begins the study of geology — An assiduous student — Professor Buckland — A field of exertion opened up — Murchison’s assiduity in his new pursuit— A geological tour— His first scientific xi paper— Brora coal — Professor Sedgwick- — Explorations in Wales —

The Siberian formations — A magmun optis — Murchison’s religious belief — His mental and moral growth — Geological researches in Russia — Interview with the Emperor Nicholas— Experiences of travel — President of the Geological Society — Literary labours — Travels in the Alps and Auvergne — The Royal Geographical Society —

A Government appointment — Hard work — Plonours bestowed upon him — Death of his wife — He himself is struck down by paralysis —

His last days — A peaceful ending — His character - - - 201

The power of diligence, illustrated by the life of Faraday — A noble life and its lessons — Faraday’s introduction to Sir Humphry Davy — Faraday’s mother — His imperfect education — Apprenticed to a Lookbinder — Hard experiences — Pursuit of knowledge under difficulties — Chemical experiments — Simple apparatus — ‘Watts on the Mind’

— Learning to think — Faraday studies perspective — Attends Davy’s lectures — Is engaged as assistant by the great chemist — Travels on the Continent — Observations on a glow-worm — The Carnival at Rome described — Ascent of Mount Vesuvius — Resumes work at the Royal Institution — Modesty of genius — Faraday’s self-culture —

His remarkable scientific progress — ‘Sounding flames ’ — A glimpse of Faraday’s home-life — Value of his scientific discoveries — His researches into magnetism and electricity — His discovery of magneto-electricity — Its different steps described — Its practical uses indicated — Illustrations of Faraday’s character — His arduous labours — A visit to Switzerland — Description of the Staubbach — The Grindelwald glacier — Lake of Brienz — Faraday’s love of nature — Returns to England — Important experiments — Discovery of the magnetization of light — Magnetic condition of matter — Atmospheric magnetism — Tyndall on ‘Faraday as a discoverer’ — Faraday’s disinterestedness— Correspondence between Faraday and Lord Melbourne— A pension bestowed upon him — His religious opinions —

His sermons — A devout life — Faraday’s love of truth — His blameless character — The happy old age of a good and great man — His latest labours — Physical decay — Death of Faraday - - - 220

Extensive influence acquired by Darwin — Darwinism not entirely new — Lamarck, the Apostle of Evolution — The principle of ‘ Natural Selection ’ combined with that of ‘ Descent with Modification ’ —

CONTENTS.

xii

‘Survival of the fittest’ — Early ancestors of Man — Religion and science — Theory of evolution not necessarily hostile to religion — Theologians and physicists are often both at fault — Darwin’s family — Erasmus Darwin — Birth and education of Charles Darwin — At Edinburgh University — At Cambridge — Makes the acquaintance of Professor Henslow — Voyage round the world — Darwin’s scientific researches — Publishes his ‘Journal’ — The Galapagos Archipelago — Tameness of birds — Christian missions — Formation of coral reefs explained — Darwin’s marriage — His home-life — His scientific system gradually developed — Publication of ‘The Origin of Species’ — Its reception — ‘ Survival of the fittest ’ explained — Laws affecting the Animal Kingdom — Orchids and insects — Darwin’s second great work, ‘ The Descent of Man ’ — His later publications — His services to botanical science — His book on Earthworms and the Formation of Mould — Sudden illness and death — Authorities — List of Darwin’s works - - ’ -

BOOK IIL— MEN OF LETTERS.

Lessons of Scott’s life — His aims and objects unworthy of his genius — Scott greatest in adversity — His position as a novelist and a poet — General equality of his work — Characteristics of his genius — His treatment of the past — Genuineness of Scott — His ancestors — His parents — Birth and childhood of Scott — Anecdotes of his early years — His intellectual growth — Extracts from his autobiography — His love of reading — Percy’s ‘ Reliques of Ancient Poetry ’ — His love of Nature — Scott at Kelso — The Ballantynes — At Edinburgh University— Indications of his tastes and habits — His rural excursions — His defects of ear and eye — Raids into Liddesdale — ‘ The keg at last !’ — Devotion to ‘ wisdom ’ — Scott as a lawyer — His first love — Disappointment— ‘To a Violet’ — Becomes an advocate — Publishes translations from the German^ — His marriage — Settles at Lasswade — His ‘ Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border ’ — Its great and immediate popularity — ‘ The Lay of the Last Minstrel ’ — Scott grows famous — Removes to Ashestiel — Joins Ballantyne, the printer, in private partnership — ‘Marmion’ — ‘The Lady of the Lake’ — Scott as a poet — He removes to Abbotsford — His general literary work — Appearance of ‘ Waverley ’ — Its universal success — Rapid production of the Waverley Novels — Visit to London and the Continent — xiii

‘ Tales of my Landlord ^ ‘ The Bride of Lammermoor ’ — Sudden illness — Letter to his eldest son — ‘ Ivanhoe ’ — His daughter’s marriage — Building at Abbotsford — His mode of life — His hospitality— His conversational powers — Scott as a host — Visit of George HI. to Edinburgh — Scott’s enthusiastic loyalty — His later novels — His son’s marriage — Visit to Ireland — Miss Edgeworth — The English lakes — Commercial disasters — Failure of the Ballantynes — Scott undertakes to discharge the firm’s liabilities — A herculean labour — His immense diligence — Illness and death of Lady Scott — Extracts from his ‘ Diary ’ — A hero in adversity — His ‘ Life of Napoleon Bonaparte ’ — ‘ Tales of a Grandfather ’ — Splendid result of his exertions — Attack of paralysis — Perseveres with his literary work — Gradual failure of his powers — Second attack of paralysis — Visit to Italy and the Rhine — Complete decay of intellectual and physical faculties — The return home— Pathetic scenes — A last effort — Scott’s death — Authorities — Portraits — Chronological table of the novels . - . . - 279

His birth and parentage — A remarkable child — A four years old preacher^ — Specimen of his sermons — The child-poet — Stanza upon life— Winter evenings^ — Impression produced upon him by the fine scenery — Removal to Devonshire — His great love for the Devonshire scenery — Plis education — A thorough English boy — His daring achievements — Kingsley as a student — Kingsley as a poet at the age of sixteen — His ardent love of Nature and natural history — Kingsley at Cambridge — Meets with his future wife — The course of true love — Kingsley as a young man — Through shadows into sunshine — He takes Ploly Orders — Obtains a curacy at Eversley — Is preferred to the rectory — Marries — An active pastor — His great personal influence— Makes the acquaintance of Maurice — Its influence on him, mentally and morally — Takes up the social problems of his time —

His active sympathy with the poor — ‘Parson Lot’ — Christian Socialism — ‘The Saint’s Tragedy’ — Literary growth — An ‘Annus Mirabilis’ — His first work of fiction — ‘Yeast’ — General principles of Kingsley’s teaching — The cholera — Kingsley’s energy as a sanitary reformer — Reminiscences of Kingsley, by Mr. Kogan Paul —

His knowledge of, and delight in, the external aspects of Nature — ‘Alton Locke’ — Carlyle’s criticism — ‘ Cheap Clothes and Nasty’ —

Song of ‘ The Three Fishers ’ — Kingsley’s poetry — The ‘ Andromeda ’ — Kingsley as a preacher — ‘Westward Ho!’ — Its special

CONTENTS.

kiv excellences — Kingsley’s descriptive power — ‘ Glaucus ’ — His intellectual activity — His ‘ Swallow Flights of Song’ — ‘ Ten Years Ago’

— ‘Hereward’ — Kingsley’s position with respect to his contemporaries— What Dean Stanley says — Lessons of his life — Professorship of Modern History at Cambridge — The Archbishop of Canterbury’s sketch of Kingsley — His lectures — Leading features of his character — His chivalry, his loyalty to his friends, his conversational powers, his love of books, and sympathy with Nature — Preferred to the Canonry of Chester — A voyage to the West Indies — Kingsley as a Churchman — Appointed to a Canonry at Westminster — Tour in the United States and Canada — Return to England — Illness of his wife — His last sermon at Westminster Abbey — Renewed illness of Mrs. Kingsley — His devotion to her — Is seized with inflammation of the lungs — Rapid progress of the disease — A Christian’s death-bed — Max Muller’s tribute to his friend — Last words — List of Kingsley’s writings 337

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PAGE

Sir Walter Scott - - _ - . Frontispiece jAjMEs Mallord William Turner - - - - 53

Venice— AFTER J. M. W. Turner ■ - - - 86

A Surrey Cornfield — after John Constable - - 116

CuRTius Leaping into the Gulf — after Benjamin Robert Haydon - - » - - . - - 121

Charity— AFTER John Flaxman ■ - - - - 161

BOOK L

ARTISTS.

SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

1723-1792.

I

IR JOSHUA REYNOLDS, one of the greatest of English artists, was born on the i6th of July, 1723, at Plympton Earl, in Devonshire, where his father, the Rev. Samuel Reynolds, was head-master of the Grammar School. It is alleged that the head-master, however attentive he may have been to his other pupils, somewhat neglected the education of his son ; but the charge is not well supported. What seems true is, that the boy took little interest in his regular studies, and devoted all the time he could make or spare to the gratification of his artistic tendencies. On one occasion, the head-master, discovering a perspective drawing on the back of a Latin exercise, wrote upon it, ‘Drawn by Joshua in school out of pure idleness;’ yet the ‘ idleness ’ had been turned to good account, and, at eight years old, the idler had acquired a fair knowledge of perspective. He began to study Pvichardson’s ‘ Treatise on Painting,’ at that time in great vogue as an authority; and to draw with a charred stick on the whitewashed wall of a long passage. He coj)ied the few prints which belonged to his father, and the engravings which he found in his father’s books. But what most delighted him was the ‘ Book of Emblems ’ by Jacob Cats, which his paternal grandmother, it is said, had brought with her from Holland. One of its eerie illustrations, a shepherd consulting a witch in her cave, where she sits surrounded by hideous objects, suggested to him in after life the idea of his picture of the caldron scene in ‘ Macbeth ;’ another, of a sorceress sitting at supper on a chair composed of a skeleton, may have

2 — 2

SIJ^ JOSHUA REYNOLDS, originated Hecate’s chair in that famous picture ; while from the same book seems to have been taken the hint for his portrait of Kitty Fisher as Cleopatra dissolving the pearl.

The approval of his father confirmed h;s natural love of art, and young Reynolds occupied all his leisure in the practice of it. His first attempt in “oils” was a portrait of the Rev. Thomas Smart ; it was painted in a boat-house at Cremyll beach, on a canvas which was part of a boat-sail, and with the common paint used in shipwrights’ painting-sheds. It was not without cleverness and character, though, of course, sufificiently rude and rough in execution. As the lad approached manhood, his father was much exercised in his mind with reference to his future profession, hesitating between medicine and painting ; but at length the lad’s strong bias towards the latter, and evident talents, inclined the scale, and in October, 1741, he was sent to London, and on the i8th, the day of St. Luke, the patron-saint of painters, was placed under the care of Mr. Hudson, then (for want of a better) the principal portrait-painter in England. A few months later, his father writes : ‘ As for Joshua, nobody, by his letters to me, was ever better pleased in his employment, in his master, in everything — “ While I am doing this I am the happiest creature alive ” is his expression. How he goes on (’tis plain he thinks he goes on very well) you’ll be better able to inform me.’ He went on very well indeed, for he passionately loved his art, and was assiduous in his application to it.

One day he went with Hudson to a sale of pictures. Presently there was a stir and bustle at the door, and a whisper ran through the room, ‘ Mr. Pope ! Mr. Pope !’ The crowd made way for the poet, and as he bowed to the company on either side, those nearest held out their hands for him to touch. With the enthusiasm so becoming in a young man, Reynolds, though not in the first row, extended his hand under the arm of a person who stood before him, and had the gratification of feeling it in the grasp of the author of ‘ The Rape of the Lock.’ Afterwards he described the poet as ‘about four feet six inches high ; very hump-backed and deformed. He wore a black coat, and, according to the fashion of that time, had on a little sword. He had a large and very fine eye, and a long, handsome nose : his mouth had those peculiar marks which are always found in the mouths of crooked persons, and the muscles

AS PORTRAIT PAINTER.

which ran across the cheek were so strongly marked that they seemed like small cords/

Years had passed by when Reynolds became possessed of the fan that Pope presented to Martha Blount, on which he had painted a design of his own, from the story of Cephalus and Procris, with the motto ‘ Aura Veris/ On being asked his opinion of it, Reynolds said it was ‘ such as might be expected from one who painted for his amusement alone ; like the performance of a child/ He continued, in words which embody the lesson of his life, and should be taken to heart by the young student, ‘ This must always be the case when the work is only taken up from idleness, and laid aside when it ceases to amuse. But those who are determined to excel must go to their work, whether willing or unwilling, morning, noon, and night ; and they will find it to be no play, but, on the contrary, very hard labour.’

Owing to a disagreement with Hudson, which apparently originated in his jealousy of the superior ability of his pupil, Reynolds remained only two instead of four years in his employment, and, in 1743, returned to Devonshire. Accompanied by his two youngest unmarried sisters, he took a house at Plymouth Dock, and started as portrait-painter on his own account. His success was considerable, though at this time he gave but few indications of the power and originality which was afterwards to entitle him to rank among the great masters. In January, 1744, it is recorded by his father that he had painted twenty portraits, among them that of ‘ the greatest man of the place, the Commissioner of the Dockyard.’ He also painted the beautiful Miss Chudleigh, afterwards notorious as the Duchess of Kingston, and Captain Hamilton, a member of the noble family of Abercorn. The latter picture was the first which brought him into notice. When, later in life, he again saw it, he was surprised to find it so well done, and, comparing it with his subsequent works, lamented that in sD many years he had made no greater progress in his art.

On Christmas Day, 1746, his father died. Reynolds was now twenty-three years old, and his reputation was slowly extending beyond the borders of his native county. He had gained the friendship and patronage of Lord Kdgcumbe. He had paid a second visit to London, where he lived for a time in the then artists’ quarter, St. Martin’s Lane, His growing fame acquired friends, whom his grace of manner and amiability of disposition did not fail to retain. For the next three years he lived chiefly in Devonshire, studying the portraits of Gandy of Exeter, which are notable for their breadth of treatment ; and painting the beautiful scenery of the Tamar, in order to acquire facility in dealing with landscape. Growing conscious of his power, he began to dream of a visit to Rome, without which no artist can be said to have completed his apprenticeship; and in the spring of 1749 was unexpectedly enabled to fulfil his desire. Captain (afterwards Admiral) Keppel, who had been appointed to the command in the Mediterranean, put into Plymouth that his ship might undergo repairs ; and while thus detained paid a visit to his friend Lord Edgcumbe. He was introduced to Reynolds, and so much pleased with him, that he offered him a passage to the Mediterranean. The young painter gladly accepted the invitation, and sailed on the nth of May for Lisbon, which he reached on the 24th. He was afterwards at Gibraltar and Algiers, and in August visited Minorca, where he was cordially welcomed by the Governor, General Blakeney, and provided with free quarters in the Government-house. After painting the portraits of almost all the officers in the garrison and on the station, he proceeded to Leghorn, and thence to Rome. Among the art-treasures of the Eternal City he spent two years, subjecting himself to a course of the most thorough self-education. The good sense which, scarcely less than his genius, was conspicuous in Reynolds, and an important factor in his success, is seen to advantage in the following remarks :