THE SPIRIT OF LAN Of- CAPE. 55 



with such self-abandonment, as the writings of Ruskin 

 Indeed, the fourth volume of " Modern Painters " was the 

 last volume he perused, and from which he made extracts 

 into his commonplace book. Passages like the following, 

 and others which will hereafter occur, shew how early 

 thoughts had passed through his own mind akin to those 

 which from Turner's great idolater have since found fierce 

 and eloquent expression : — 



" Sept. 1 3. — Departing from Brissac after breakfast, I 

 returned to the French town of the same name, and having 

 arranged matters to our mutual satisfaction, I set out in a 

 neat char-a-banc with one strong athletic horse, under the 

 guidance of a Frenchman, who had had the honour of being- 

 one of Bonaparte's postilions during the Russian campaign. 

 We travelled along the banks of the Rhine, through a dis- 

 trict of finely varied aspect, sometimes close to the river, 

 at other times at some distance from it, and reached the 

 confines of Switzerland about sunset. It was a beautiful 

 calm evening, with a sky such as Claude would have 

 painted. All things lay in the still reposing beauty which 

 characterises the works of that famous artist, and subdued 

 and mellowed by the almost visible air which hung around 

 them. It is this aerial and transparent veil which, to my 

 mind, forms the pervading spirit of landscape, and the 

 difficulty of representing it, or its influence and effects, 

 may be one great cause of the rarity with which anything 



