sen with his parents, and divided
his time between the study of art and assisting his father. The
Academy's lesser gold was then the prize to be obtained for sculpture.
Our artist was now twenty years of age; his friends knew his abilities
better than himself, and they compelled him to enter on the task. The
subject proposed was, "Heliodorus Driven out of the Temple."

We are now in Charlottenburg; but the little chamber in which
Thorwaldsen lately sat to make his sketch is empty, and he, chased by
the demons of fear and distrust, hastens down the narrow back-stairs
with the intention not to return. Nothing is accidental in the life of
a great genius; an apparent insignificance is a God's guiding finger.
Thorwaldsen was to complete his task. Who is it that stops him on the
dark stairs? One of the professors just comes that way, speaks to him,
questions, admonishes him. He returns, and in four hours the sketch is
finished, and the gold medal won. This was on August 15, 1791.

Count Ditlew de Reventlow, minister of state, saw the young artist's
work, and became his protector; he placed his own name at the head of
a subscription that enabled Thorwaldsen to devote his time to the
study of his art. Two years afterward the large gold medal was to be
contended for at the Academy, the successful candidate thereby gaining
the right to a travelling _stipendium_. Thorwaldsen was again the
first; but before he entered on his travels, it was deemed necessary
to extend that knowledge which an indifferent education at school had
left him in want of. He read, studied, and the Academy gave him its
support; acknowledgment smiled on him, a greater and more spiritual
sphere lay open to him.

A portrait figure stands now before us; it is that of a Dane, the
learned and severe Zoega, to whom the young artist is specially
recommended, but who only sees in him a common talent; whose words are
only those of censure, and whose eye sees only a servile imitation of
the antique in his works. Strictly honest in his judgment, according
to his own ideas, is this man, who should be Thorwaldsen's guide.

We let three years glide away after the arrival of Thorwaldsen, and
ask Zoega what he now says of Albert, or, as the Italians call him,
Alberto, and the severe man shakes his head and says: "There is much
to blame, little to be satisfied with, and diligent he is not!" Yet he
was diligent in a high degree; but genius is foreign to a foreign
mind. "Th