()34 Passages frmn the Life of Frederick Wellburg. [^Dec. 



some of his predecessors, and the almost reverence attached to the names 

 of those who had risen to the summit of their profession, a glow of emu- 

 lation would rise vip in his heart, and the proud thought would burst 

 forth, " Why may not I become as one of these ?" 



His efforts had not hitherto been altogether unsuccessful. He had 

 already found more than one to patronize him ; and possessed of 

 undoubted talents, aided by perseverance and industry, he had 

 succeeded in raising himself above that state of immediate dependence, 

 the consciousness of which has worn down the energies and depressed 

 the hearts of so many of his profession. His present work had been 

 undertaken at the request of the Count di "Venuto, whose gallery it was 

 intended to augment; and if its intrinsic merits, as a work of art, were 

 insufficient to secure it some portion of notice amongst the creations of 

 an inspired age, the beauty which it represented could scarcely fail to 

 preserve it from utter neglect. It was the portrait of a female, glowing 

 with the full radiance of youth and the beauty of her own sunny clime. 

 The form was slight — almost sylph-like ; yet an air of majesty, inextri- 

 cably mingled with its grace, redeemed it from the imputation of girlish- 

 ness. The face was that of a high-born maiden of Italy, in which the 

 beauty of mould was almost overlooked in the beauty of expression. 

 The chastened fire of the dark eye beamed with a mild lustre from 

 beneath the high, pale brow; whilst the smile which radiated every 

 feature seemed as if it strove vainly to soften the haughty expression of 

 the lip on which it played. To the casual observer this would have 

 conveyed little save the consciousness of triumphant beauty ; but one to 

 whom the meanings of the human countenance were familiar, would 

 have been able to trace there the indices of other and of deeper feelings. 

 He would have marked the wild enthusiasm of woman's nature, sup- 

 pressed only by a stern effort of the will ; and, in that one expression 

 which mingled with her smile, he would have recognized the upward 

 flashing of a slumbering passion, which seemed — like the sudden gleam 

 which breaks at times through the calm of a torrid sky — to warn him of 

 the frail tenure of its repose. 



Such was the painting upon which Wellburg was now engaged. He 

 had bestowed upon it the full power of an imagination excited almost to 

 passion by the continual presence of the fair being whose beauty it was 

 intended to perpetuate. He had wrought and felt, during its progress, 

 as one breathing a charmed air ; and, as it advanced nearer to perfec- 

 tion, on each succeeding day its completion became an object of more 

 absorbing interest to his mind, until at length — hke the sculptor of old — 

 he became almost enamoured of the creation of his own hand. At times 

 — in his solitary hours — his breast would thrill with the delightful con- 

 sciousness of triumphant art; and it was only when he gazed upon the 

 living form — when he listened to the rich melody of her tongue, and 

 watched the thousand flitting graces which human skill — even the 

 enthusiasm of genius — could never hope to pourtray — that his mind was 

 insensibly sobered down to a calmer and more humble feeling. He felt 

 then that Adeline di Venuto was the ethereal presence, of which his own 

 work was but a dumb and lifeless shadow. 



Wellburg was roused from the reverie into which he had unconsciously 

 fallen by a light tread in the passage leading to his chamber. The 

 intruder was habited in a short cloak, the connnon walking-dress of a. 



