ART. XIV.-MINIATURE PAINTING.

I wonder what has become of my old friend Henry W――ns. I sometimes fear that his promising genius has been struck down, overturned and crushed, by the bright advancing car of modern Improvement.

Many years ago, I knew him at Braddocksfield. He and I were co-patriots and fellow-laborers on that classic ground. That there we fought, bled and were defeated, under General Braddock, I would by no means be understood to state. We date not so far back in antiquity. At that rate, if not mere shades, which would more likely be the case, but actual survivors of the carnage, my friend at present would be one hundred and twelve years of age, and myself one hundred and seventeen. We belong to a later era. We are no such Methuselahs. It is not more than fifteen years since he and I were quartered on that renowned battle ground. What a change had then come over the spirit of its dream! How unwarlike did look those quiet fields spread over the scene of its former struggle, sloping gently down from the steep woody hill above, to the broad meadows and primeval forests extended along the banks of the flavous river below! How grass-grown too and peaceful was the road, along which my friend and I often took our morning and evening walks, across the very scene of the bloody massacre! No sharp volley of musketry, no dying shriek of Briton, no exulting yell of Indian, saluted our ears. We heard only the gentle lowing of kine in the meadows below, the sweet voices of thrushes on the oaks around, or the merry laughter of maidens returning along the road in bevies to the brick mansion adjoining, which was then occupied as a female boarding school.

Military men then you cannot boast to have been yourselves, some wary reader will interpose, inasmuch as you say the ground had lost all its military character. Hangers on you must have been of that ladies' seminary. Instructors, no doubt you were, in the rudiments of the fine arts or of letters; thrummers on the piano or dabblers in water colors; or, mayhap, you taught the accidence or made experiments in the gases.

We do own to something of the sort. It was our humor sometimes, to indulge in these things. Of having applied our hand, however, to music or the gases, we plead not guilty. We dealt not in things so evanescent and volatile. My friend was a connoi

seur in paintings, an amateur artist. He amused himself often with delineations in oils. For my own part, I was more charmed with polite literature. It was our pleasure to tarry a year or two at Braddocksfield, on account of its rich historical associations and beautiful natural scenery. At the same time we did not grudge to bestow, for a proper consideration, some of our superfluous knowledge on the docile understandings of the far-gathered pupils of Edgeworth Seminary, then under the supervision of an English lady, the bland, accomplished, but now lamented Mrs. O.

My friend had a keen eye for the picturesque. In our walks he was always on the look-out for striking lights and shades. I was better pleased with picking up a grapeshot or an Indian arrow-head. My taste led me to seat myself of an evening, on that felled oak in the field, against which, when upright and vigorous, had been leaned the fallen General Braddock. My comrade was drawn by his dilections further abroad into more retired places.

By hunters and others, he has often been descried and recognized happily before any one of them had shot him for a panther, squatted. in broad daylight, half way up some rugged cliff, beside some clinging tree, with his Bristol board and crayon, sketching off the subtended landscape. Not that he bore any resemblance whatever to that ferocious animal-meek and gentle was he as a lamb-unless, mayhap, in the keenness of his vision. The delusion on one critical occasion, was more in the ear of the deceived one than in the eye. An unpropitious circumstance it was, at any rate, to the furtherance of the fine arts, and it spoke not well for advancement in letters, that in that section of country, among the common people, the name panther was always mispronounced painter. An old hunter, therefore, stealing along through the glen, was startled by the properly expressed, but incautious exclamation of his accompanying boy:-"O! father, see the painter!" In an instant his unerring rifle was at his eye and directed towards the object pointed out, my unfortunate friend, the abstracted artist engaged in his laudable vocation. Perhaps at that very moment, unconscious of danger, he had his eye fixed on the cruel marksman, thinking to appropriate him, in his couched attitude and with his presented muzzle, as a very peculiar and striking figure with which to set off his landscape. Providentially, however, on that occasion, the humane, peaceful, blue-coated form of my talented comrade was recognized befor the drawing of the trigger. By our being thrown together, I fan

we were both improved. From my always treating relics with that regard and affection which besuits their rust and antiquity, he began at length to see something of their worth. On my part too, I must acknowledge that, from his shrewd criticisms on nature, I received and do still retain a keener relish for what is romantic in scenery.

His favorite study, however, was heads. He was a passionate admirer of the "human face divine." Not to the mellowed likenesses of these depicted on canvas by ancient artists, did he confine his contemplations. He was better pleased with living subjects. A small man he was, compactly set, not above five feet in height, and his own classic head was thickly clustered over with richly vaving auburn locks. Methinks I can see him now, in his instructing room, standing in one of his favorite contemplative attitudes, his arms folded across his breast, after the manner of a tragedian, and his dark hazel eyes fixed with feasting admiration on the fair features of some pupil engaged in drawing. As

Proserpine

Gathering flowers, herself a fairer flower,

By gloomy Dis was plucked,

so she studying heads, herself a fairer head, by abstracted Wns was studied. Should she become aware, however, of his charmed position and fancy his gaze was perhaps too ardent, or mistake it for impertinence and therefore frown or flout at him from offended dignity, all unconscious of harm, the absorbed artist would only frown or flout at her in sympathy. Then drawing himself up for a while like Othello, he would regard her with brows dark and lowering, till suddenly a bright smile would flit over his expression from observing in her features the fine artistic effect. Nothing selfish was there in his hallucination. Passion it could hardly be called. Jealousies he had none. He never thought of courtship. How many admirers his Madonna might have, and which she preferred, he never cared. His only ambition was to make the valued head his own by transferring it, with all its life and expression, to his canvas.

Yet his portraits were never considered very striking. Some features of their originals you could discover in them, but the resemblances were far from being complete. Some parts were exquisitely touched, but as wholes they wanted keeping. Other artists and connoiseurs on looking at them would often shake their heads and tell me in confidence, that they feared my friend had mistaken his calling. Such fears they could never have entertained nor express

ed had they seen him as I in his private walks and recreations. Deficient to some extent, I admit he was in the mechanical execution on canvas, but the whole pictorial imagery must have been vivid in his imagination. He was possessed of all the marks and eccentricities of genius. Like Sir Joshua Reynolds, he was endowed even with that gentle deafness, which was not so obtuse as to cut him off entirely from social intercourse, but it sharpened his visual perceptions, preserved him from all untoward noises, and permitted him to feast at leisure on the quiet beauties of nature, undisturbed. What led to the dilection I cannot tell, but all at once he applied the brunt of his genius to miniature painting. He bestowed his whole attention to portraying the fairy likenesses of features on oval pieces of ivory. His efforts were crowned with complete success. His genius had found its proper outlet. After only a few weeks' practice, his pictures began to excite attention. Striking, delicate creations they were! By artists, connoiseurs and all, they were soon pronounced excellent,

He presently left the fields and took rooms in Pittsburg, where he was patronized by the rich and beautiful. Afterwards he visited the eastern cities with equal success. At length I heard of his having embarked for England. This was nothing strange in his case, as he was a native of Wales. In childhood he had been conveyed thence by his parents to this our Land of Promise. He had inhaled his first inspirations from the towering cliffs of that ruinous, romantic, time-hallowed country. No wonder then that he was drawn back towards its remembered scenery. In England too, the fine arts are more highly estimated than with us. The nobility are pleased with pictures and they bestow encouragement on worthy artists. I confess I was half afraid that my friend's genius would not stand the test of their scrutiny. I was apprehensive that his fairy pencilings would not be appreciated by their too fastidious fancies. I did them wrong, however. I soon heard that his talents were immediately acknowledged; that he had depicted some of their proudest faces; that he had been received into court; that the Queen herself had been one of his gratified sitters. What further honors would have been thrown around his brow, I cannot tell, had not an unforseen occurrence intervened. The tasteful world were suddenly thrown agog in another direction. Daguerre had discovered his wonderful art. Operators soon sprang up in all civilized countries. In every city and village, before some doors, their glittering pictures

were to be seen suspended as decoys. Likenesses by the aid of the sun were thrown off more expeditiously than dollars from the mint. Othello's occupation was gone. I have never heard of my young friend since. His profession had been stricken out of the fine arts. The obsequies of a deceased king are soon lost sight of in the splendor of his successor's coronation. The case of miniature painting, however, was far worse. Its departure was entirely overlooked on account of the loud eclat on the coming in of daguerreotypes. When at the close of the silver age the divine Astræa winged her final flight from earth and became a noted constellation, mankind, we are told, lamented; poets sang her praises; but in this iron age -certainly not golden, notwithstanding all California's boasted resources, at any rate so far as taste is concerned-one of the fine arts has disappeared from our midst "unwept, without a crime!" When the seventh Pleiad, in olden times, withdrew her twinkling light from among her sisters, the inhabitants of earth were discomforted, and various were the fabled reasons assigned by poets for her bewailed departure; but for that soft Grace, in modern times, which did hang over the painter's brow, not far off and gazing coldly on him, like a star, but close at hand and sympathizing with his brightest, kindliest conceptions, inspiring him to catch the living expression and impaint it on the ivory, when frightened by the din of progress she spread her tiny wings and sped aloft forever gone, no tears were shed, no plaint was uttered; unless perhaps in secret by the few, her gifted but now forlorn followers!

I would not have it supposed, however, that I am at all disaffected towards the present dynasty. I do not know indeed, but that on the whole I would prefer a daguerreotype likeness of a friend, to one in painting. These stamp acts of the sun, these dark impressions of light, possess a stern reality, a sober truthfulness, which is very gratifying to an observer. Posterity will thank us for them. What a treat it would be for us in these modern times, to have the privilege of looking on a daguerreotype likeness of Shakspeare or of Homer; of Queen Elizabeth or of Helen; of any of the ancient worthies or beauties! How I would like to see one of king Solo. mon! From the many illustrious heads with which antiquity abounds it is somewhat difficult to select, but admitted into the cabinet, I think among the first, I would open the casket containing, on a singl plate, the sweet, pastoral faces of Isaac and Rebekah. To a certain degree it would show us the true lineaments, the actual fashion of