ture of their subject could otherwise admit.

The pictures of Teniers, Ostade, and Gerard Dow, possess these merits,
and are distinguished by this character in the highest degree; but their
qualities are so well known in this country, as to render any
observation on them superfluous. There is a very great collection here
preserved of the works of Rembrandt, and their design and effect bear,
in general, a higher character than belongs to most of the works of this
celebrated master.

In one respect, the collection in the Louvre is altogether
unrivalled--in the number and beauty of the _Wouvermans_ which are there
to be met with; nor is it possible, without having seen it, to
appreciate, with any degree of justice, the variety of design, the
accuracy of drawing, or delicacy of finishing, which distinguish his
works from those of any other painter of a similar description. There
are 38 of his pieces there assembled, all in the finest state of
preservation, and all displaying the same unrivalled beauty of colouring
and execution. In their design, however, they widely differ; and they
exhibit, in the most striking manner, the real object to which painting
should be applied, and the causes of the errors in which its composition
has been involved. His works, for the most part, are crowded with
figures; his subjects are in general battle-pieces, or spectacles of
military pomp, or the animated scenes which the chace presents; and he
seems to have exhausted all the efforts of his genius, in the variety of
incident and richness of execution, which these subjects are fitted to
afford. From the confused and indeterminate expression, however, which
the multitude of their objects exhibit, we turn with delight to those
simpler scenes in which his mind seems to have reposed, after the
fatigues which it had undergone: to the representation of a single
incident, or the delineation of a certain occurrence--to the rest of the
traveller after the fatigues of the day--to the repose of the horse in
the intermission of labour--to the return of the soldier after the
dangers of the campaign;--scenes, in which every thing combines for the
uniform character, and where the genius of the artist has been able to
give to the rudest occupations of men, and even to the objects of animal
life, the expression of general poetical feeling.

The pictures of _Vandyke_ and _Rubens_ belong to a much higher school
than that which rose out of the wealth and the l