. A _Christ bearing his Cross_, by Polemburg; is a little
piece of high finish and considerable merit; an _Ecce Homo_, by Mignard,
is excellent; and a _St. Francis in Extasy_, by Annibal Caracci, is a
good illustration of the true character of the Bolognese school: it is a
fine and dignified picture, depending for its excellence upon a grand
character of expression and drawing, and light and shade, and not at all
on bright or varied coloring, to which it makes no pretension.

As local curiosities, the attention of the amateur should be devoted to
the productions of the painters to whom Rouen has given birth, Restout,
Lemonnier, Deshays, Leger, Houel, Letellier, and Sacquespee, artists,
not of the first class, but of sufficient merit to do great credit to
the exhibition of a provincial metropolis.

From these recent specimens, you would turn with the more pleasure to a
picture by Van Eyck, the inventor, as it is generally supposed, of oil
painting. Let us respect these fathers of the art. Let us pardon the
stiffness of their composition, the formality of their figures, the
inelegance of their draperies, the hardness of their outlines, and the
want of chiaroscuro;--for, in spite of all these failings, there is a
truth to nature, and a richness of coloring, which always attract and
win. The picture in question is the _Virgin Mother in her Domestic
Retirement_, surrounded by her family, a comely party of young females
in splendid attire, some of them wearing the bridal crown. It is
altogether a curiosity, partaking, indeed, of the general bad taste of
the times, but painted with great attention to nature in the minutiae,
and resembling Lionardo da Vinci in many particulars, especially in the
high finishing, the coloring of the carnations, and the grace, and
beauty of some of the heads. The draperies, too, are rich and brilliant.

This museum is a recent erection: most, if not all, of the departments
of France, possess similar establishments in their principal towns. The
basis of the collection is founded upon the plunder of the suppressed
monasteries; but M. Descamps told us that, in the course of a journey to
Italy, he had been the means of adding to this, at Rouen, its principal
ornaments. He had the greater merit of preserving it entire, when orders
were transmitted from Paris to send off its best pictures, to replace
those taken from the Louvre by the allies; for on all occasions, whether
great or small, the interests