mountains in the distance, seen on the one side, over woods and wilds full of satyrs and nymphs, and, in the other, a magnificent landscape of temples and towers, rising calmly out of solemn and orderly groves, such as we might imagine to have given shelter to the Platos and the Ciceros. A modern painter would probably have confined himself, in handling such a subject, to some merely plastic groupe, in which form would have been almost every thing-expression little -and accompaniment nothing.

Above all Scottish artists with whose works I am acquainted, I should like to see Mr Allan deserting the narrow field of modern art, and merely vulgar interest-and attempting once more to paint Scripture subjects as they deserve to be painted. The gentle and delicate character of his genius, seems not unworthy of being applied to the divinely benevolent allegories of our faith-or, if these be too much for him, to the simple, beautiful, unfailing situations of actual life, which the Bible history presents in such overflowing abundance. Should he be afraid of venturing so far from the ordinary themes in which spectators are now accustomed to find interest-the history of his country affords a fine field, which may be looked upon as intermediate

between that on which he has as yet trodden, and that on which I would fain have him feel the ambition to tread. In taking hold of religi ous subjects in Scotland, he would undoubtedly have to contend (over and above the prejudices of which I have already spoken,) with another set of prejudices scarcely less difficult to be overcome-those, I mean, of a nation among whom Religion is commonly regarded in a way by far too speculative, and too little imbued with pure and beautiful feeling. It was worthy only of the savage soul of Knox, to banish all the most delightful of the arts from the house of God-to degrade for ever those arts from their proper purpose and destination, among the people whose Faith and Worship he reformed, only becausé his own rude (though masculine) mind wanted grace to comprehend what their true purposes, and destinations, and capacities are. This was indeed the triumph of a bigot, who had neither an eye nor a heart for Beauty. The light of the man's virtues should not be forgotten; but why should an enlightened nation continue to punish themselves by walking in the cold shadow of his prejudices?

But the old history of Scotland abounds in scenes of the most romantic and poetic interest;

and the self-love of the nation, debarred from any exclusive pride in atchievements of later days, atones for this to itself by a more accurate knowledge of the national past, and a more fervent interest in the men and actions the national history discloses, than are commonly to be found among nations whose independent existence has continued unbroken down to the present day. Here then is a rich field, to which Mr Allan may turn not only without prejudices to encounter, but with the whole prejudices of his nation eminently interested in his endeavours, and, if he succeed, (as why should he not ?) eminently and enthusiastically delighted in his success. I hope the Murder of Archbishop Sharpe is designed as the first of a great and magnificent series of Scottish Paintings; but I think it would have been better to choose, as the subject of the first of such a series, some scene which the whole of the Scottish nation might have been more likely to contemplate with the same species of emotions.

P. M.

276

LETTER L.

TO THE SAME.

THE length to which I have extended my remarks on Mr Allan's pictures, may perhaps appear a little extravagant; but I think, upon the whole, that these pictures, and this artist, form one of the most interesting subjects which can at the present time attract the attention of a traveller in Scotland, and therefore I do not repent of the lengthiness of my observations. I wish I had been able to treat the subject more as it deserves to be treated in some other respects.

The truth is that till Wilkie and Allan arose, it can scarcely be said Scotland had ever given any promise of expressing her national thoughts and feelings, by means of the pencil, with any degree of power and felicity at all approaching to that in which she has already often made use

of the vehicle of words or even to that which she had displayed in her early music. Before this time, the poverty of Scotland, and the extreme difficulty of pictorial education, as contrasted with the extreme facility of almost every other kind of education, had been sufficient to prevent the field of art from ever attracting the sympathies and ambition of the young men of genius in this country; and the only exceptions to this rule are such as cannot fail to illustrate, in a very striking way, the general influence of its authority. Neither can I be persuaded to think, that the only exceptions which did exist were at all very splendid ones. The only two Scottish painters of former times, of whom any .of the Scotch connoisseurs, with whom I have conversed, seem to speak with much exultation, are Gavin Hamilton and Runciman. The latter, although he was far inferior in the practice of art-although he knew nothing of colouring, and very little of drawing-yet, in my opinion, possessed much more of the true soul of a painter than the former. There is about his often miserably drawn figures, and as often miserably arranged groupes, a certain rude character of grandeur, a certain indescribable majesty and

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