SIX MONTHS IN MEXICO. 



161 



war and insurrection have produced a de- 

 plorable change in the state of the Arts. 

 There is not now a single pupil in the Aca- 

 demy ; and though the venerable President 

 still lives, he is in a state of absolute indi- 

 gence, and nearly blind. Not one landscape 

 nor architectural painter remains in this 

 great city; their only artists being either 

 those who copy religious subjects for the 

 churches, or such as attempt portraits; 

 but both are deplorably bad. The prin- 

 cipal employment for the pencil seems to 

 be in the decorations of coach-bodies and 

 the heads of the wooden bedsteads. In the 

 metropolis, a few pictures of the Infant Savi- 

 our, the Virgin, Magdalen, St. Joseph, St. 

 Anthony, or St. Cuthbert, are the only pro- 

 ductions of modern painters which are to be 

 met with. Of the myriads of pictures with 

 which the churches, convents, cloisters, &c. 

 are crowded, I saw few worth the expense of 



VOL. I. M 



