KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



2G9 



from the other end of life ; toys please us, straws 

 offend us : we stumble at tlie same mole hills that 

 tripped up our infancy. 



Time rubs off from the score of memory what 

 experience had written; and when the sorrow- 

 ful soft gums have eaten their second pap, death 

 takes us sleepy up, and puts us quietly to bed. It 

 was twenty years ago, good youth, aye, that it 

 was, — and twenty years is one of those strange 

 jumps that are more wisely taken backwards than 

 forwards. 



When we read the foregoing, and call to 

 mind what we see passing around us day 

 after day, we think gleefully of our early 

 days, mournfully of our middle age, and 

 thoughtfully of what lies before us. Life is a 

 dream, — Death a reality. 



THE PAINTER'S REVELATION. 



" I CANNOT PAINT IT I" EXCLAIMED 



Duncan Weir, the artist, as he threw down 

 his pencil in despair. 



The portrait of a beautiful female rested 

 on his easel. The head was turned as if to 

 look into the painter's face, and an expres- 

 sion of delicious confidence and love was 

 playing about the half-parted mouth. A 

 mass of luxuriant hair, stirred by the posi- 

 tion, threw its shadow upon a shoulder that, 

 but for its transparency, you would have 

 given to Itys ; and the light from which the 

 face turned away, fell on the polished throat 

 with the rich mellowness of a moon-beam. 

 She was a brunette — her hair of a glossy 

 black, and the blood melting through the 

 clear brown of her cheek, and sleeping in 

 her lip, like color in the edge of a rose. 

 The eye was unfinished. He could not paint 

 it. Her low, expressive forehead, and the 

 light pencil of her eyebrows, and the long, 

 melancholy lashes were all perfect ; but he 

 had painted the eye a hundred times, and 

 a hundred times he had destroyed it, till at 

 the close of a long day, as his light failed 

 him, he threw down his pencil in despair, 

 and resting his head on his easel, gave 

 himself up to the contemplation of the 

 ideal picture of his fancy. 



We wish all our readers had painted a 

 portrait, the portrait of the face they best 

 love to look on — it would be such a chance 

 to thrill them with a description of the 

 painter's feelings ! There is nothing but the 

 first timid kiss that has half its delirium. 

 Why — think of it a moment ! To sit for 

 hours, gazing into the eyes you dream of! 

 To be set to steal away the tint of the 

 lip, and the glory of the brow you wor- 

 ship ! To have beauty come and sit down 

 before you, till its spirit is breathed into 

 your fancy, and you can turn away and 

 paint it ! To call up, like a rash enchanter, 



the smile that bewilders you, and have 

 power over the expression of a face, that, 

 meet you where it will, laps you in Ely- 

 sium ! — Make me a painter, Pythagoras ! 



A lover's picture of his mistress, painted 

 as she exists in his fancy, would never be re- 

 cognised. He would make little of features 

 and complexion. No, no — he has not been 

 an idolator for this. He has seen her as no 

 one else has seen her, with the illumination 

 of love, which, once in her life, makes every 

 woman under heaven an angel of light. He 

 knows her heart, too — its gentleness, its 

 fervor ; and when she comes up in his imagi- 

 nation, it is not her visible form passing be- 

 fore his mind's eye, but the apparition of her 

 invisible virtues, clothed in the tender recol- 

 lections of their discovery and development. 

 If he remembers her features at all, it is the 

 changing color of her cheek, or the droop of 

 her curved lashes, or the witchery of the 

 smile that welcomed him. And even then 

 he was intoxicated with her voice — always a 

 sweet instrument when the heart plays upon 

 it — and his eyes were good for nothing. No 

 — it is no matter what she may be to others 

 — she appears to him to be a bright and per 

 feet being, and he would as soon paint St. 

 Cecilia with a wart, as his mistress with an 

 imperfect feature. 



Duncan could not satisfy himself. He 

 painted with his heart on fire, and he 

 threw by canvass after canvass till his room 

 was like a gallery of angels. In perfect 

 despair, at last, he sat down and made a de- 

 liberate copy of her features — the exquisite 

 picture of which we have spoken. Still the 

 eye haunted him. He felt as if he would 

 redeem all, if he could give it the expres- 

 sion with which it looked back some of 

 his impassioned declarations. His skill 

 however was, as yet, baffled ; and it was 

 at the close of the third day of unsucces- 

 ful effort, that he relinquished it in despair, 

 and dropping his head upon his easel, 

 abandoned himself to his imagination. . . . 



Duncan entered the gallery with Helen 

 leaning on his arm. It was thronged with 

 visitors. Groups were collected before the 

 favored pictures, and the low hum of criticism 

 rose confusedly, varied now and then by the 

 exclamation of some enthusiastic spectator. 

 In a conspicuous part of the room hung, 

 11 The Mute Reply, by Duncan Weir:' A 

 crowd had gathered before it, and were 

 gazing on it with evident pleasure. Expres- 

 sions of surprise and admiration broke fre- 

 quently from the group, and as they fell on 

 the ear of Duncan, he felt an irresistible im- 

 i pulse to approach and look at his own 

 picture. What is like the affection of a 

 painter for the offspring of his genius ! It 

 seemed to him as if he had never before seen 

 it. There it hung like a new picture, and 



