er means to retouch it;--a
quite pure line engraving, by Mr. Charles Henry Jeens; (in calling it
pure line, I mean that there are no mixtures of mezzotint or any
mechanical tooling, but all is steady hand-work,) from a picture by Mr.
Armytage, which, without possessing any of the highest claims to
admiration, is yet free from the vulgar vices which disgrace most of our
popular religious art; and is so sweet in the fancy of it as to deserve,
better than many works of higher power, the pains of the engraver to
make it a common possession. It is meant to help us to imagine the
evening of the day when the father and mother of Christ had been seeking
Him through Jerusalem: they have come to a well where women are drawing
water; St. Joseph passes on,--but the tired Madonna, leaning on the
well's margin, asks wistfully of the women if they have seen such and
such a child astray. Now will you just look for a while into the lines
by which the expression of the weary and anxious face is rendered; see
how unerring they are,--how calm and clear; and think how many questions
have to be determined in drawing the most minute portion of any
one,--its curve,--its thickness,--its distance from the next,--its own
preparation for ending, invisibly, where it ends. Think what the
precision must be in these that trace the edge of the lip, and make it
look quivering with disappointment, or in these which have made the
eyelash heavy with restrained tears.

117. Or if, as must be the case with many of my audience, it is
impossible for you to conceive the difficulties here overcome, look
merely at the draperies, and other varied substances represented in the
plate; see how silk, and linen, and stone, and pottery, and flesh, are
all separated in texture, and gradated in light, by the most subtle
artifices and appliances of line,--of which artifices, and the nature of
the mechanical labor throughout, I must endeavor to give you to-day a
more distinct conception than you are in the habit of forming. But as I
shall have to blame some of these methods in their general result, and I
do not wish any word of general blame to be associated with this most
excellent and careful plate by Mr. Jeens, I will pass, for special
examination, to one already in your reference series, which for the rest
exhibits more various treatment in its combined landscape, background,
and figures; the Belle Jardiniere of Raphael, drawn and engraved by the
Baron Desnoyers.

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