insomuch that when I have found the weather set in to be very bad, I have taken a whole day's journey to see a gallery that is furnished by the hands of great masters. By this means, when the heavens are filled with clouds, when the earth swims in rain, and all nature wears a lowering countenance, I withdraw myself from these uncomfortable scenes into the visionary worlds of art; where I meet with shining landscapes, gilded triumphs, beautiful faces, and all those other objects that fill the mind with gay ideas, and disperse that gloominess which is apt to hang upon it in those dark disconsolate seasons. I was some weeks ago in a course of these diversions; which had taken such an entire possession of my imagination, that they formed in it a short morning's dream, which I shall communicate to my reader, rather as the first sketch and outlines of a vision, than as a finished piece. I dreamt that I was admitted into a long spacious gallery, which had one side covered with pieces of all the famous painters who are now living, and the other with the works of the greatest masters that are dead. On the side of the living, I saw several persons busy in drawing, colouring, and designing; on the side of the dead painters, I could not discover more than one person at work, who was exceeding slow in his motions, and wonderfully nice in his touches. I was resolved to examine the several artists that stood before me, and accordingly applied myself to the side of the living. The first I observed at work in this part of the gallery was Vanity, with his hair tied behind him in a ribbon, and dressed like a Frenchman. All the faces he drew were very remarkable for their smiles, and a certain smirking air,which he bestowed indifferently on every age and degree of either sex. The toujours gai appeared even in his judges, bishops, and privy-counsellors: in a word, all his The men were petit maitres, and all his women coquettes. drapery of his figures was extremely well suited to his faces, and was made up of all the glaring colours that could be mixt toge ther; every part of the dress was in a flutter, and endeavoured to distinguish itself above the rest. On the left hand of Vanity stood a laborious workman, who I found was his humble admirer, and copied after him. He was dressed like a German, and had a very hard name that sounded something like Stupidity. The third artist that I looked over was Fantasque, dressed like a Venetian scaramouch. He had an excellent hand at Chimæra, and dealt very much in distortions and grimaces. He would sometimes affright himself with the phantoms that flowed from his pencil. In short, the most elaborate of his pieces was at best but a terrifying dream; and one could say nothing more of his finest figures, than that they were agreeable monsters. The fourth person I examined, was very remarkable for his hasty hand, which left his picture so unfinished, that the beauty in the picture (which was designed to continue as a monument of it to posterity) faded sooner than in the person after whom it was drawn. He made so much haste to dispatch his business, that he neither gave himself time to clean his pencils, nor mix his colours. The name of this expeditious workman was Avarice. Not far from this artist I saw another of a quite different nature, who was dressed in the habit of a Dutchman, and known by the name of Industry. His figures were wonderfully laboured if he drew the portraiture of a man, he did not omit a single hair in his face; if the figure of a ship, there was not a rope among the tackle that escaped him. He had likewise hung a great part of the wall with night-pieces, that seemed to shew themselves by Of it-i. e. of the beauty: a little careless and inaccurate.-H. the candles which were lighted up in several parts of them; and were so inflamed by the sunshine which accidentally fell upon them, that at first sight I could scarce forbear crying out, Fire. The five foregoing artists were the most considerable on this side the gallery; there were indeed several others whom I had not time to look into. One of them, however, I could not forbear observing, who was very busy in retouching the finest pieces, though he produced no originals of his own. His pencil aggravated every feature that was before over-charged, loaded every defect, and poisoned every colour it touched. Though this workman did so much mischief on this side of the living, he never turned his eye towards that of the dead. His name was Envy. Having taken a cursory view of one side of the gallery, I turned myself to that which was filled by the works of those great masters that were dead; when immediately I fancied myself standing before a multitude of spectators, and thousands of eyes looking upon me at once; for all before me appeared so like men and women, that I almost forgot they were pictures. Raphael's figures stood in one row, Titian's in another, Guido Rheni's in a a third. One part of the wall was peopled by Hannibal Carrache, another by Correggio, and another by Rubens. To be short, there was not a great master among the dead who had not contributed to the embellishment of this side of the gallery. The persons that owed their being to these several masters, appeared all of them to be real and alive, and differed among one another only in the variety of their shapes, complexions, and cloaths; so that they looked like different nations of the same species. Observing an old man (who was the same person I beforementioned, as the only artist that was at work on this side of the gallery) creeping up and down from one picture to another, and retouching all the fine pieces that stood before me, I could not but be very attentive to all his motions. I found his pencil was so very light, that it worked imperceptibly, and after a thousand touches, scarce produced any visible effect in the picture on which he was employed. However, as he busied himself incessantly, and repeated touch after touch without rest or intermission, he wore off insensibly every little disagreeable gloss that hung upon a figure he also added such a beautiful brown to the shades, and mellowness to the colours, that he made every picture appear more perfect than when it came fresh from the master's pencil. I could not forbear looking upon the face of this ancient workman, and immediately, by the long lock of hair upon his forehead, discovered him to be Time.1 Whether it were because the thread of my dream was at an end, I cannot tell, but upon my taking a survey of this imaginary old man, my sleep left me. C. 1 The received opinion that time improves the colouring of pictures is strongly controverted by Hogarth. See his Analysis of Beauty, 4to. 1753, p. 118, note.-C. Cole, a still higher authority, accepts the common opinion, and gives a reason for it: "Many old pictures have pleasing qualities which did not exist when fresh from the hand of the artist. We see in them a mellowness and lustre, a kind of inward light, which is the effect of the touchings of time and not of the pencil, that gave them their new being on the canvas. The cause of this highly valued quality appears to me extremely simple. It arises, evidently, from an artificial atmosphere, formed by particles of opaque matter gradually deposited upon the surface. This medium through which we see the picture is dark and negative, and the light that breaks through it has great value from the contrast." V. Noble's Life of Cole, pp. 116, 117.-G. NO. 85. THURSDAY, JUNE 7. Interdum speciosa locis, morataque recte Sometimes in rough and undigested plays, ROSCOMMON. Ir is the custom of the Mahometans, if they see any printed or written paper upon the ground, to take it up, and lay it aside carefully, as not knowing but it may contain some piece of their Alcoran.1 I must confess I have so much of the Mussulman in me, that I cannot forbear looking into every printed paper which comes in my way, under whatsoever despicable circumstances it may appear for as no mortal author," in the ordinary fate and vicissitude of things, knows to what use his works may, some time or other, be applied, a man may often meet with very celebrated names in a paper of tobacco. I have lighted my pipe 1 Or more correctly-the name of God-a trait which has been used by Voltaire to prove that no true Mussulman could have ordered the library of Alexandria to be burnt.-G. 2 "I forgot to tell you that two days ago I was in the House of Commons, when an English gentleman came to me, and told me that he had lately sent to a grocer's shop for a pound of raisins, which he received wrapt up in a paper that he showed me. How would you have turned pale at the sight! It was a leaf of your history, and the very character of Queen Elizabeth, which you had labored so finely, little thinking it would so soon come to so disgraceful an end." V. an humorous letter of Hume to Robertson, in Stewart's Account of the Life and Writings of Dr. Robertson; Stewart's Works, vol. vii. p. 108. Boston ed., 1829.—G. a No mortal author. The epithet "mortal," as applied, in this place, to "author," is very expressive. But the humour of the expression depends on knowing that, no mortal man is used, in familiar discourse, simply for "no man."-H. |