BARON CUVIER. 147 



in his hands, and, putting it before me, said, " Permit me 

 to enter the company of your friends : choose any two of 

 these pages, and I will cut them out for you. I amused 

 myself with drawing these figures when I was a student at 

 Stuttgardt ; and if I were to draw them now, I could not 

 make them with greater accuracy." This same facility for 

 designing continued throughout life ; and it is scarcely pos- 

 sible to do justice by words to his anatomical drawings, in 

 which he had a manner peculiar to himself ^.expressing 

 the cellular tissue. His delineations of quadrupeds were 

 equally extraordinary ; and, when lecturing he would turn 

 to the black board behind him, with the chalk in his hand, 

 and, speaking all the time, he would rapidly sketch the sub- 

 ject of his discourse, sometimes beginning even at the tail, 

 proportioning every part with admirable precision, and pre- 

 serving the character to such a degree, that even the species 

 could be immediately pronounced. The taste for drawings 

 of natural history extended to all branches of the art, and 

 it was his delight to visit every collection or exhibition of 

 the kind. During his last visit to England he went to 

 Hampton Court, and it was with difficulty he could tear 

 himself away from the cartoons of Raflfaelle, in order to keep 

 a dinner appointment. The admiration he felt for this most 

 wonderful of all painters amounted to a species of worship ; 

 and no one, whether an artist or not, ever comprehended or 

 delighted in the beauties of RafTaelle more than did M. Cu- 

 vier. His long stay in Italy had refined and confirmed his 

 judgment ; and when he was accused of want of proper 

 curiosity for not extending his route as far as Naples, dur- 

 ing either of his journeys to Rome, he deemed it sufficient 

 to reply, "At Naples I should not have found the Vatican !" 

 He was very sensible to the merits of our great Lawrence, 

 to whom he was personally attached, and who had con- 

 stantly sent him the engravings from his works; and also 

 to the conception and genius of our Martin, whose engrav- 

 ings had always excited his attention in Paris, and whose 

 gallery he visited when last in London. Woe, however, to 

 the artist who committed a fault in anatomy or perspective ; 

 his quick eye immediately fastened on it, even in the midst 

 of the praises excited by colouring or expression. To view 

 the exhibitions of the works of our celebrated portrait pain- 



