ter of the art. In beholding close by us the picture itself, we know not how to cease gazing upon it; it is finished as if it had been worked for a study; every hair is distinct, every tint graduated with the highest art, each contour marked out with a wonderful variety and grace. But amid all this diligence, there is expressed, at the same time, an ease and facility, which makes all appear as if it were natural and spontaneous.

At the Poggio of Cajano there is a representation of Cæsar, seated conspicuously in a place ornamented with statues, and presented as in tribute of his victories, with eastern birds and beasts of chase ;—a picture quite in the antique taste, and sufficient of itself to render Andrea highly eminent as a perspective painter. The order to embellish this villa was from Leo the Tenth, and Andrea, whose competitors there were Franciabigio and Pontormo, made every effort to please the great supporter of the art, and to excel his rivals. But it appears that neither he nor they were encouraged to continue their labours in that place, for it is known that the great hall was some years afterwards finished by Alessandro Allori. Of Andrea's pictures in oil, the Sovereign Palace (Palazzo Pitti) is adorned with many. Besides the paintings of St Francis, the Assumption, the History of Joseph, and the other works collected by the family of the Medici, the Grand Duke Leopold purchased from the monks of Lugo a most beautiful Piety, and placed it in the Tribune, to sustain the character of the School. The Saints Peter and Paul being there represented together, contrary to the history, was not the fault of the painter who imagined them with such beauty, but of him who commissioned the picture. In the Dead Christ, the skilful have noted some defects, such as his appearing too much as if self-supported, and having the veins more highly relieved than is found in death. But what is that to the rest of the picture, designed, coloured, disposed in so as

tonishing a manner? The Supper of our Lord, in the Monastery of St Salvi, would be no less admired, were it not so shut up and concealed. Assuredly it was admired by the soldiers who besieged Florence in 1529, and destroyed the suburbs of the city. Having demolished the belfry, the church, and a part of the monastery itself, on seeing the picture, they remained, as it were, immoveable, and had no heart to proceed further in their work of destruction-thus imitating that Demetrius, who, having conquered Rhodes, shewed respect, it is said, only to a picture of Protogenes.

As Andrea painted a great number of pictures, he is well known also beyond his own country. His best work in the hand of strangers * is, perhaps, that which passed into a palace of Genoa, from the church of the Dominicans of Sarzana, who still have a fine copy of it. It is composed much in the taste of Fra Bartolommeo; and, besides the saints placed around the Virgin, and upon the steps, there are in front of the picture, and rising from its lower plane, two pretty large figures, seen only as far as the knees. I know that this division is not satisfactory to the critics, but it certainly there assists in placing variously so many figures, and renders more apparent the distance between the nearest and the furthest removed, by which the theatre appears to increase, and there is consequently a triumph of art. There is no scarcity of his Holy Families in the best collections. There are two in the possession of the Marchese Rinuccini at Florence, and others in the possession of Roman princes, all differing from each other, with this exception, perhaps, that the likeness of the Virgin, which Andrea was in the habit of drawing from his own wife, are almost always the same. have also seen many in the cities subject to Rome and Florence, and not a few in Lombardy, besides those which one reads of in the Catalogues of the Ultramontane Cabinets. †

I

With so much genius, he certainly

deserved to be happy; yet, if a book were compiled from the calamities of painters, as has been done in the history of men of literature, no one would excite our compassion more than hę. The poverty of Coreggio was rather exaggerated than true; the misery of Dominichino knew its bounds; the Caracci, though poorly paid, lived beyond scarcity; but Andrea, from the ill-fated day on which he married a certain woman named Lucrezia del Fede, remained in grief to his last sigh. Vasari, in his first edition, says, that, for having married this woman he was despised by his friends, and abandoned by his employers; so much was he the slave of her will, that he was obliged to leave off succouring his own father and mother; and that, on account of her arrogance and ungovernable temper, no scholar of Andrea's could remain with him for any time. In the second edition, Vasari has either repented of what he had told, or been appeased; for he is comparatively silent in such reproaches, though he does not deny that she was to her husband the source of perpetual sorrow. He relates, in addition, that Andrea was called to the Court of Francis the First of France, where, approved and pensioned, he might have raised the envy of every artist, had he not, induced by the womanly lamentations of Lucrezia, returned to Florence; and, breaking the faith which he had pledged by oath to the king, he unwisely preferred remaining in his own country. Repenting of this rash step, and desirous to re-enter into his for

mer fortune, he was unable to obtain it. Thus, between jealousies, and the narrowness of his domestic circumstances, he daily pined away, till at last, struck by contagion, and abandoned both by his wife, and others, he died in 1530, in the 42d year of his age, and was buried with the most obscure obsequies.

The artists who came nearest to Andrea in their style of painting, were Marc Antonio Francia Bigi, called Baldinucci, or Franciabigio, and Pontormo. The first was scholar, for some months, of Albertinelli, and afterwards, it appears, formed himself upon the best models of the school; nor, according to Vasari, were there many equal to him in the anatomy, in perspective, in the daily exercise of drawing from the naked, or in his exquisite diligence in every labour. There was already, by him, in the church of St Pier Maggiore, an Annunciation, the figures small, and of the highest finish, the architecture beautiful, yet the picture was not wholly free from the old dryness. Andrea, with whom he had contracted a friendship, and formed a companionship in study, raised him to a higher style. Francia, (as he is called by Vasari,) from an associate became an ardent imitator; and, if not inferior in talent, yet he never could add dispositions so sweet, effects so true, or so much native grace to his figures. There is in the cloisters of the Annunziata, a Lunette picture of the Marriage of the Virgin, close by the works of Andrea; and we there

perceive in what manner one painter strove to arrive, by effort, at the same degree of excellence which another had attained by his genius. This work is not yet completed, because, having been examined by the monks before due time, the painter felt so vexed, that he gave it several blows with his hammer, in order to destroy it, and could never be again prevailed upon to give it the last finish, nor did any one else dare to do so. In the painting of the Scalzo he also competed with Andrea; and he there executed two Histories, which certainly suffer little from the comparison. Thus, too, at the Poggio Cajano, in the same spirit of friendly rivalry, he undertook to represent the return of Marcus Tullius from exile; and although that work was left unfinished (in tronco,) it exhibits great merit. It is the chief praise of Franciabigio's pencil, to have so often coped with Andrea, and to have kept alive in him that emulation and industry, as if he had feared the possibility of being overcome.

Jacopo Carruchi, from the name of his birth-place, called Pontormo, was a man of rare genius, and admired, even in his earliest works, by Raphael and Michael Angelo. He had received a few lessons from Da Vinci, afterwards from Albertinetti, and was somewhat advanced in the art by Pier de Cosimo; finally, he gave himself as a scholar to Andrea del Sarto. Having raised the jealousy of his master, and been treated uncourteously, he was induced to take his leave, and soon became rather a competitor than an imitator in many labours. In the Visitation at the cloisters of the Servi, in the picture of various saints in the Church of St Michelino, in the two histories of Joseph, in a cabinet of the Great Gallery, one clearly sees how he follows his master without fatigue, and is guided almost in the same path rather by a resemblance in natural genius, than through any principle of imitation. It is an error to regard him as a copyist, like the settarii, of mere forms and faces. He has always an originality by which he may be distinguished. I have seen one of his sacred families in the house of the Marquis Carboni Pucci, along with others by Baccio, Rossi, and del Sarto; and however much he may have resembled or imitated these, he yet possesses a well-defined character of his own.

His style may be said to have been somewhat estranged from the natural, and he too easily became dissatisfied with one manner in order to attempt what he conceived as a better, though frequently with an unfortunate result. So it happened likewise to Napi, the Milanese, and to Sacchi, the Roman, and indeed to every one else, who, at too mature an age, has attempted to change his taste. The Certosa of Florence possesses a picture by Pontormo, from which the learned have deduced the three manners ascribed to him. The first is correct in the design, and powerful in the colouring, and may be regarded as the most allied to Andrea. The second is also good in the design, but the colouring is rather languid; it was this which seems to have served as an example to Bronzino, and others of an after period. The third is a true imitation of Albert Durer, not merely in the invention, but even in the heads and attitudes, a manner most truly unworthy of so beautiful a commencement. Of this style it is, however, difficult to find examples, except some histories of the Passion in the cloister of the monastery of Certosa, seemingly copied from the engravings of Albert, and from the effects of which he afterwards spent some years in endeavouring to free himself. We might have added a fourth manner if the great works at St Lorenzo with which he was engaged for eleven years, called the Flood, and the Universal Judgment, had been still in existence. were his last labour, and afterwards white-washed for some ordinary purpose, without either regret or remonstrance on the part of the artificers. He had then wished to imitate Michael Angelo, and to leave some examples of what has been called the anatomical style, which in Florence was now about to be esteemed beyond every other. But the effect produced was very different from the object aimed at, and he only taught posterity how vain and fruitless it is for a man advanced in years to affect to follow the varying fashion of the day.

They

It was a custom of Andrea del Sarto, in common with Raffael, and others of the age, to conduct his works with the aid of painters practised in his style, who were either his scholars or his friends. This notice is not without use to those who, in studying his pictures, may sometimes detect the

touch of another brush. It is known that he put the finishing hand to some paintings of Pontormo, and that he kept in his company Jacone and Domenico Puligo, two men born for the art, quick and docile in imitation, although desirous of more substantial rewards than those of honour. A highly commendable work of Jacone, is on the front of the noble Casa Buon delmonte, done in chiar' oscuro, with a beautiful design (in regard to which he was excellent) and entirely after the manner of Andrea; besides the painting in oil which he executed at Cortona, and of which Vasari talks with praise. Puligo, on the other hand, excelled less in design than in colour ing. His style was mild, harmonious, and clear, though not without an idea of concealing the contours, and thus freeing himself from the obligation of rendering them more perfect. The character of his style of painting may be discovered in some Madonnas, and other pictures, which, probably designed by Andrea, appear at first sight as if they were also painted by him. Another intimate friend and scholar of Andrea was Dominico Conti, who became heir to his collection of drawings, and whose memory is eulogized under a bust erected to his honour beside the immortal works of the Annunziata. Vasari makes mention of another follower of Andrea, called Pierfrancesco di Jacopo di Sandro, by

whom there are three pictures in the Church of St Spirito. He also makes honourable mention of two others who lived much in France, Nannoccia and Andrea Sguazzella, both of whom held a style allied to that of Del Sarto.

From the hands of the above-named painters more than from any other, proceeded the many beautiful copies which, in Florence and elsewhere, so frequently are made to pass for originals; but it does not appear credible that Andrea should have repeated so often or so punctually his own inventions, or should have himself reduced them from the great to the small proportions. I have seen one of his holy families, the Saint Elizabeth of which may be found in more than ten cabinets; and other figures painted by him may be found repeated in three or four houses. I have observed the picture of St Lorenzo, with other saints, which is in the Pitti, also in the Gallery of Albani, and the Visitation of our Lord, in the Palazzo Giustiniani; the Birth of our Lady, as painted at the Serri, is also in the house of Signor Pirri at Rome, all most beautified pictures, of a small size, by an ancient hand, and usually assigned to Andrea del Sarto. To me it appears not improbable that the best of so great a number were at least painted in his study, and retouched by himself, as was the occasional custom of Titian and Raffael.

We have no hesitation in saying, that this is by far the best book which has ever been written by any British traveller on the subject of North America; and we are quite sure it must not only attract a great deal of notice now, but retain its place hereafter, in every considerable library, both on this and on the other side of the Atlantic. It is written, as we are informed, by a very young man; but this is what nobody would be likely to guess from the style either of its opinions, or of its language: for it displays enthusiasm, without any trace of the green; and in the midst of

much ornament, we have been able to discover nothing either of superfluity or of vanity. In short, it seems to contain a faithful and unaffected transcript of the workings of a mind alike active, reflective, fervid, imaginative, shrewd, upright, and generous. Mr Howison is entitled, by this effort alone, to claim no undistinguished rank among the English writers of his time; but nobody who reads his book, can doubt that it remains with himself to demand and obtain, by future exertions, such a high and eminent place, as it is probable his own modesty may have

hitherto prevented him from conceiving to be within his reach.

The subject of Emigration is perhaps the most important to which the attention of British politicians has lately been directed; and we earnestly recommend this book to the notice of all who love their country, and their country's welfare, because we believe more practically useful hints in regard to this great subject, may be gathered from its unpretending pages, than from all the treatises and travels that have appeared within the last twenty years. Totally free from the prejudices which have so offensively characterized the greater part of those who went before him-totally free, as it appears to us, from all prejudices, except a few, from which we hope English gentlemen will never be quite emancipated-Mr Howison writes like a man who loves his country, and respects her religion, but displays not the least trace of bigotry, either political or religious. He has not gone through a new region wilfully blinded. He has seen the good and the evil, and he has told what he has seen with the calmness of one who has thought too much of human life, either to expect extravagantly, or to judge uncharitably. His sagacity has not chilled his feelings, nor has his warm-heartedness unnerved his judgment. Our literature, in a word, has not for a long time witnessed a debut every way so promising, as this of Mr Howison.

It does not appear with what particular views or purposes Mr Howison crossed the Atlantic; though, from various passages in his book, we should be inclined to suppose he did not travel purely for amusement, but rather that he had entertained some thoughts of settling either in Canada or in the United States, in some professional situation. That he has received a medical education, we think highly probable, particularly from the excellent style in which he satirizes some of the transatlantic practitioners, and the felicity with which he occasionally discusses topics of chemical, mineralogical, and zoological inquiry; but with Mr Howison's personal views, we have nothing to do: It is sufficiently evident, that in the pursuit of them, he sought and obtained very extensive opportunities of observing the state of society, manners, and commerce, in all

the districts through which he travelled.

Being a Scotsman, and of course acquainted with the actual state of his country, it was to be expected that Mr Howison should consider the subject of emigration, with a particular regard to the habits and necessities of those unfortunate countrymen of his own, who, in consequence of many untoward circumstances, are every day compelled to think of seeking the means of existence at a distance from their native land; and we shall not affect to conceal, that to our view the chief interest and value of his book consist in the admirable manner in which he has thrown together the result of inquiries instituted and pursued from the most patriotic of motives. This is not the place nor the time for investigating the short-sighted and heartless behaviour of certain great proprietors, whose miserable selfishness has been the chief origin of the necessity of emigration from the mountainous districts of Scotland. The day will come, and that full surely, when these persons, or their descendants, shall be compelled to repent in bitterness and vexation of spirit, of the policy which drives away a virtuous and devoted peasantry, for the sake of rearing a different species of farm-stock, and thereby increasing (perhaps precariously enough) the rental of a few overgrown estates. The whole of this subject is, we are well informed, about to be treated in the fullest and most masterly manner, by one whose name will afford the highest pledge, both for the accuracy of his statements, and the liberality of his views-and, therefore, we for the present shall be silent. It is sufficient to know, that a necessity for emigration does exist among Highlanders of Scotland, and it is most consolatory to be assured by such a man as Mr Howison, that by emigrating to Upper Canada, it is in the power of any industrious man to purchase, by the labour of three or four years, the certainty of a comfortable subsistence for himself and the whole of his family, during all the rest of their days. Mr Howison's precis of the result of his observations on this head, is too valuable not to be given as it stands in his own words:

the

"Emigrants ought to embark in vessels bound for Quebec or Montreal. If they