s of coal, from
twigs and weeds in his painting-room? Vain idea! these were but the
_memoria technica_, that served to call up in his mind the thoughts he
had fed on in many a lonely walk and leisure moment, when they of common
clay plodded on and saw nothing--brooded on with a nature tuned to the
harmonies of colour and of form, organized in a high degree to receive
and retain impressions of beauty; and gifted with the power to place
vividly before us by his art objects which had so delighted and pleased
himself. Does any one think otherwise--let him try what can be got out
of stones and coals; let him try how his memory will aid him, with such
feeble helps as broken twigs and dry mosses, and then he may be able to
appreciate, in a degree, how this man had won the mastery of paint and
canvas and turned their dross into the fine gold of true Art.

But in the history of British Art, the great merit of Gainsborough is,
to have broken us entirely loose from old conventions. Wilson had turned
aside from Dutch art to ennoble landscape by selecting from the higher
qualities of Italian art; but Gainsborough early discarded all he had
learned from the bygone schools, and gave himself up wholly to Nature;
he was capable of delicate handling and minute execution, but he
resolutely cast them aside lest any idol should interfere between him
and his new religion. There may be traced a lingering likeness in his
landscapes to those of Rubens; but this arose more from his
generalization of details, his sinking the parts in the whole, than to
any imitation of the great Fleming. It is like the recollection of some
sweet melody which the musician weaves into his theme, all unconscious
that it is a memory and not a child of his own creation.

The pictures of Gainsborough, on the whole, stand better far than those
by Reynolds. "Landscape with Cattle," a picture belonging to the Marquis
of Lansdowne, is lovely for colour and freshness; it has been lined and
repaired, but evidently had parted widely in the lights. Could any
closeness of individual imitation give the truth, beauty of colour, and
luminous sunlight of this picture? It somewhat reminds one of
Zuccarelli, but how completely has Gainsborough sucked the honey and
left the comb of the master! Viewed near, this picture is somewhat loose
in texture, and hesitating in execution; the colour obtained by
semi-transparents, as yellow-ochre, terra-verte, and ultramarine; while
viewed at a p