orkmen employed there, till he found means to open a
communication with her and concert a plan of escape. He then furnished
her with male attire, and at last successfully carried her off on
horseback (though not without a severe wound from the brother of his
bride), to another bishopric, where they were married in virtue of the
Pope's bull. After residing for some time in Spain and Italy, however,
Vieira was commanded to return to Portugal, and appointed painter to the
king. Being the best artist in that kingdom, his talents soon
obliterated the remembrance of his somewhat irregular marriage, and
during forty years he painted with great reputation and success for the
royal palaces at Nafra and elsewhere, for the convents, and the
collections of the nobility. It will doubtless be pleasing to the fair
readers of these anecdotes, that all this long course of outward
prosperity was sweetened by the affection of his constant wife.

ESTEBAN MARCH'S STRANGE METHOD OF STUDY.

Esteban March, a distinguished Spanish painter of the 17th century, was
eccentric in character and violent in temperament. Battles being his
favorite subjects, his studio was hung round with pikes, cutlasses,
javelins, and other implements of war, which he used in a very peculiar
and boisterous manner. As the mild and saintly Joanes was wont to
prepare himself for his daily task by prayer and fasting, so his riotous
countryman used to excite his imagination to the proper creative pitch
by beating a drum, or blowing a trumpet, and then valiantly assaulting
the walls of his chamber with sword and buckler, laying about him, like
another Don Quixote, with a blind energy that told severely on the
plaster and furniture, and drove his terrified scholars or assistants to
seek safety in flight. Having thus lashed himself into sufficient
frenzy, he performed miracles, according to Palomino, in the field of
battle-pieces, throwing off many bold and spirited pictures of Pharaoh
and his host struggling in the angry waters, or mailed Christians
quelling the turbaned armies of the Crescent. Few will withhold from him
the praise of Bermudez, for brilliancy of coloring, and for the skill
with which the dust, smoke, and dense atmosphere of the combat are
depicted.

MARCH'S ADVENTURE OF THE FISH FRIED IN LINSEED OIL.

Palomino says that March had gone out one day, leaving neither meat nor
money in the house, and was absent till past midnight, when he retur