SAMUEL PKOUT, ARTIST. 
281 
been somewhat flurried ; but he went. He returned between ten 
and eleven, and said to his wife, " I Ve had such a happy, joyous 
evening ! The letter from Venice was capital." He then went up 
to his studio, and shortly before midnight engaged in those acts of 
devotion with which he began and closed every day. He had but 
just risen from his knees, when he fell in a lit of apoplexy, and in 
less than an hour his spirit passed away. 
Peace to thy shade, and endless rest ; 
Blessed in thy genius ; in thy love how blessed ! 
And blessed that, timely, from these scenes removed, 
Thy sonl enjoys more beauty than on earth it loved. 
He was sixty-eight years of age. 
As may be gathered from one or two expressions I have made 
use of, Samuel Prout was a religious man. Eeligion indeed formed 
such an important element of his character, and is supposed to 
have influenced his artistic life so much, that I make no apology 
for mentioning it on this occasion, or for adding a few words more 
on this view of the subject. His mind was of the meditative and 
contemplative order. 
"There never," say his children, "was a brighter or happier 
Christian." When at Hastings his parish church was St. Mary's 
(where, by-the-by, in the Sacrarium Prout's arrangement of colour 
is still kept up). He regularly went to that church, and the vicar 
(the Eev. Mr. Yores) used to say, " I always wait for Prout to 
come in to light up my church." 
He loved simple and sincere piety wherever he saw it, and he 
witnessed very many expressions of it. In the picturesque streets 
on the Continent, at the sound of the Angelus, at the passing of 
the Host, at the statue of the Madonna, his emotion was touched 
(and to some extent his sympathy) by the unaffected homage of 
the poor peasants and children ; but abroad or at home, in his 
hotel or in his studio, his constant companions were his English 
Bible and Prayer Book ; and with them he was satisfied. 
All the subjects of his pictures point upwards — the lovely street 
scenes terminating in the tall tower, or the divine spire. 
The doves hover about the highest ridges of his roofs, and the 
loftiest pinnacles of his towers. 
He had the most implicit faith in the Anal article of the Nicene 
Creed — " I believe in the life of the world to come " — and his own 
