282 The Letter-Bell. [MARCH, 



to the world without, and reminded me that I had a task to perform in it. 

 As to that landscape, methinks I see it now 



" The slow canal, the yellow-blossomed vale, 



The willow-tufted bank, the gliding sail." 



There was a windmill, too, with a poor low clay -built cottage beside it : 

 how delighted I was when I had made the tremulous, undulating 

 reflection in the water, and saw the dull canvas become a lucid mirror of 

 the commonest features of nature ! Certainly, painting gives one a strong 

 interest in nature and humanity (it is not the dandy-school of morals or 

 sentiment) 



" While with an eye made quiet by the power 



Of harmony and the deep power of joy, 



We see into the life of things." 



Perhaps there is no part of a painter's life (if we must tell ce the secrets 

 of the prison-house") in which he has more enjoyment of himself and his 

 art, than that in which after his work is over^ and with furtive sidelong 

 glances at what he has done, he is employed in washing his brushes 

 and cleaning his pallet for the day. Afterwards, when he gets a servant 

 in livery to do this for him, he may have other and more ostensible 

 sources of satisfaction greater splendour, wealth, or fame ; but he will 

 not be so wholly in his art, nor will his art have such a hold on him as 

 when he was too poor to transfer its meanest drudgery to others too 

 humble to despise aught that had to do. with the object of his glory and 

 his pride, with that on which all his projects of ambition or pleasure 

 were founded. " Entire affection scorneth nicer hands/' When the 

 professor is above this mechanical part of his business, it may have 

 become a stalking-horse to other worldly schemes, but is no longer his 

 hobby-horse and the delight of his inmost thoughts 



<f His shame in crowds, his solitary pride !" 



I used sometimes to hurry through this part of my occupation, while the 

 Letter-Bell (which was my dinner-bell) summoned me to the fraternal 

 board, where youth and hope 



" Made good digestion wait on appetite 

 And health on both" 



or oftener I. put it off till after dinner, that I might loiter longer and 

 with more luxurious indolence over it, and connect it with the thoughts 

 of my next day's labours. 



The clustman's-bell, with its heavy, monotonous noise, and the brisk, 

 lively tinkle of the muffin-bell, have something in them, but not much. 

 They will bear dilating upon with the utmost license of inventive prose. 

 All things are not alike conductors to the imagination. A learned Scotch 

 professor found fault with an ingenious friend and arch-critic for culti- 

 vating a rookery on his grounds : the professor declared " he would as 

 soon think of encouraging a froggery." This was barbarous as it was 

 senseless. Strange, that a country that has produced the Scotch Novels 

 and Gertrude of Wyoming should want sentiment ! 



The postman's double-knock at the door the next morning is " more 

 germain to the matter." How that knock often goes to the heart ! We 

 distinguish to a nicety the arrival of the Two-penny or the General Post. 

 The summons of the latter is louder and heavier, as bringing news from 

 a greater distance, and as, the longer it has been delayed, fraught with a 

 deeper interest. We catch the sound of what is to be paid eight-pence, 

 nine-pence, a shilling and our hopes generally rise with the postage. 

 How we are provoked at the delay in getting change at the servant 

 who does not hear the door ! Then if the postman passes, and we do 



