LOVE'S MEINIE 



"II etoit tout couvert d'oisiaulx." 



ROMAl^CE OF THE ROSK. 



LECTUEE I. 



THE KOBIN. 



1. Among the more splendid pictures m the Exhibition of 

 the Old Masters, this year, you cannot but remember the 

 Vandyke portraits of the two sons of the Duke of Lennox. 

 I think you cannot but remember it, because it would be 

 difficult to find, even among the works of Vandyke, a 

 more striking representation of the youth of our English 

 noblesse ; nor one in which the painter had more exerted 

 himself, or with better success, in rendering the decorous 

 pride and natural grace of honourable aristocracy. 



Vandyke is, however, inferior to Titian and Velasquez, 

 in that his effort to show this noblesse of air and persons 

 may always be detected ; also the aristocracy of Van- 

 d^die's day were already so far fearful of their own posi- 

 tion as to feel anxiety that it should be immediately rec- 

 ognized. And the effect of the painter's conscious defer- 



