aining the admiration
of the world. Did poor Oliver, when he was at Leyden yonder, ever
think that he should paint a little picture which should secure him the
applause and pity of all Europe for a century after? He and Sterne drew
the twenty thousand prize of fame. The latter had splendid instalments
during his lifetime. The ladies pressed round him; the wits admired him,
the fashion hailed the successor of Rabelais. Goldsmith's little gem was
hardly so valued until later days. Their works still form the wonder and
delight of the lovers of English art; and the pictures of the Vicar and
Uncle Toby are among the masterpieces of our English school. Here in
the Hague Gallery is Paul Potter's pale, eager face, and yonder is the
magnificent work by which the young fellow achieved his fame. How did
you, so young, come to paint so well? What hidden power lay in that
weakly lad that enabled him to achieve such a wonderful victory? Could
little Mozart, when he was five years old, tell you how he came to play
those wonderful sonatas? Potter was gone out of the world before he was
thirty, but left this prodigy (and I know not how many more specimens of
his genius and skill) behind him. The details of this admirable picture
are as curious as the effect is admirable and complete. The weather
being unsettled, and clouds and sunshine in the gusty sky, we saw in our
little tour numberless Paul Potters--the meadows streaked with sunshine
and spotted with the cattle, the city twinkling in the distance, the
thunderclouds glooming overhead. Napoleon carried off the picture (vide
Murray) amongst the spoils of his bow and spear to decorate his triumph
of the Louvre. If I were a conquering prince, I would have this picture
certainly, and the Raphael "Madonna" from Dresden, and the Titian
"Assumption" from Venice, and that matchless Rembrandt of the
"Dissection." The prostrate nations would howl with rage as my gendarmes
took off the pictures, nicely packed, and addressed to "Mr. the Director
of my Imperial Palace of the Louvre, at Paris. This side uppermost." The
Austrians, Prussians, Saxons, Italians, &c., should be free to come and
visit my capital, and bleat with tears before the pictures torn from
their native cities. Their ambassadors would meekly remonstrate, and
with faded grins make allusions to the feeling of despair occasioned by
the absence of the beloved works of art. Bah! I would offer them a
pinch of snuff out of my box as I walke