ic affections
were set to music; the father, as a dilettante complete, cultivated all
the harmonies whether of thought, form, or sound; the home was musical.

The family life composes into a placid, homelike picture. The parents,
though well to do, were far from affluent. The stipends of the busy
Burgomaster and Syndic were small, and he remained comparatively poor.
At the age of twenty-six he married a young widow with money and one
daughter, and domestic cares necessarily thickened with the birth of six
additional children, two daughters and four sons, of whom Frederick was
the youngest. The mother, we are told, was beloved and honoured, and in
addition to ordinary domestic duties, diligently assisted her children
in the preparation of their school lessons; moreover it is expressly
stated that her fortune contributed largely to the household expenses.
The would-be artist could not be considered unfortunate in his worldly
condition; he entered on life removed equally from the extremes of
riches or poverty; his parents were sufficiently well off to make it
possible for him to gratify his tastes in the choice of a profession,
while he was always under such pressure as to render it imperative that
he should put out his full powers. His education within the limits of a
provincial town was liberal; the father kept himself and his household
quiet, student-like, and sequestered from the dissipation of society,
and so all the better could be cultivated the budding faculties of his
offspring. When the children were sufficiently advanced he joined with
other parents in engaging a qualified tutor, and so formed a special
class or superior school. With affection was watched the inclination
towards art of the youngest son, and anxiety lessened as the faculty
strongly declared itself, for above all was dreaded "mediocrity as the
deadly sin of artists." The father held that for success in art as a
profession three conditions were essential; classic training, nobility
of mind, and technical skill. And so in each day the foremost place was
assigned to classic studies. As to the formation of character, religion
stood as the corner-stone, and the maxim for the daily life was "love in
a pure mind." This axiom sounds to me as the key-note to the painter's
lifelong art--an art loving in spirit and kept unspotted from the world.
But the father and son differed in this--that the one was eclectic, the
other exclusive. The father, with the wide