EAGLES AND ART. 239 



a sign of thought or feeling more significant far than our im- 

 perfect articulation. Shakspeare seems to have the same 

 idea when describing one of his god-like men : 



" What a mental power 



This eye shoots forth ! how big imagination 

 Moves this lip! to the dumbness of the gesture 

 One might interpret " 



Images and metaphors constantly recurring in the common 

 parlance of mankind, show how universally the peculiar sig- 

 nificance of this dumb speech is recognized. The intenser 

 expressions of passion and the more awful presence of the 

 spiritual in man, cannot be translated by the spoken language, 

 but must be conveyed by attitudes and looks. This leads, 

 of a necessity, to picture-writing, as the true mode of per- 

 petuating emotion and thought and painting is also said to 

 be the written language of the angels. Who knows but that 

 painting or picture-writing may be the natural and higher 

 language of a developed humanity ? 



It looks very much as if there might be some truth in such 

 a conjecture, when we consider what has just been said, 

 in connexion with the tendency of these times toward an 

 illustrated literature. The advance of this taste has been so 

 gradual, yet swift, that we are scarcely prepared to realize 

 its amazing extent at the present hour ; yet observe, almost 

 everything issued by the press now, of whatever grade, is in 

 some style illustrated. 



Then what an immense stride in the character of illustra- 

 tion, which is becoming popularized, is exhibited in a con- 

 trast of such pictures as this of the Eose-Breasted Grosbeak 

 articulate of joy and song, which we give as a modern 

 specimen of this dumb speech, in special, among our others 

 and the rude wood-cuts of that child's book of fables, 

 dating thirty years back ! It may be among the many rev- 

 olutions in the midst of which our age moves on, that this, 



