tion of Milton and Shakspeare, there is more poetry in the works of
the writers of the last fifty years than in all the rest together. Well,
these are my surmises for the present; but one thing I am determined--as
my admiration is nothing to any body but myself, I will keep some likes
and dislikes of my own, and will not get up any raptures that do not
arise of themselves. I am entirely willing to be conquered by any
picture that has the power. I will be a non-resistant, but that is all.

May 5. Well, we saw the Dulwich Gallery; five rooms filled with old
masters, Murillos, Claudes, Rubens, Salvator Rosas, Titians, Cuyps,
Vandykes, and all the rest of them; probably not the best specimens of
any one of them, but good enough to begin with. C. and I took different
courses. I said to him, "Now choose nine pictures simply by your eye,
and see how far its untaught guidance will bring you within the canons
of criticism." When he had gone through all the rooms and marked his
pictures, we found he had selected two by Rubens, two by Vandyke, one by
Salvator Rosa, three by Murillo, and one by Titian. Pretty successful
that, was it not, for a first essay? We then took the catalogue, and
selected all the pictures of each artist one after another, in order to
get an idea of the style of each. I had a great curiosity to see Claude
Lorraine's, remembering the poetical things that had been said and sung
of him. I thought I would see if I could distinguish them by my eye
without looking at the catalogue I found I could do so. I knew them by a
certain misty quality in the atmosphere. I was disappointed in them,
very much. Certainly, they were good paintings; I had nothing to object
to them, but I profanely thought I had seen pictures by modern landscape
painters as far excelling them as a brilliant morning excels a cool,
gray day. Very likely the fault was all in me, but I could not help it;
so I tried the Murillos. There was a Virgin and Child, with clouds
around them. The virgin was a very pretty girl, such as you may see by
the dozen in any boarding school, and the child was a pretty child. Call
it the young mother and son, and it is a very pretty picture; but call
it Mary and the infant Jesus, and it is an utter failure. Not such was
the Jewish princess, the inspired poetess and priestess, the chosen of
God among all women.

It seems to me that painting is poetry expressing itself by lines and
colors instead of words; therefore there