1811.) 
For the Monthly Magazine. 
JOURNAL Of a recent VOYAGE tO CADIZ, 
(Continued from p. 319.) 
December 12, 1808. 
| WAS much gratified one evening by 
a visit to the academy of Painting, 
é&c. It is not attended in the day-time, 
but is open only at night, throughout the 
year, excepting a short vacation which 
iS just past. 
There are in it from three to four 
hundred pérsons, of all ALES, who study, 
under proper masters, writing and draw- 
ing; every article of pa iper, pens, pencils, 
&¢. is furnished by the institution, which 
has existed about thirty years, and is a 
national charge. 
‘be students are divided into classes, 
according to their abilities and progress ; 
it may with more propriety be called an 
academy for Drawing, because the brush 
is not introduced; and, when-a student 
wishes to perfect himself in painting, he 
is sent to Ltaly for instruction. 
The drawings are made from the best 
selected pieces that have been produced 
by former students. - In one room a num- 
ber of boys were writing, in another co- 
pying some simple part “of the body, in 
another the face, groups, &c. others were 
studying architecture; some copying the 
Venus de Medici, from a plaster cast: 
and in this reom were several casts from 
the antique; among the rest the cele- 
brated Laocoon, which it is unnecessary 
for me particularly to describe; I will 
therefore only quote Thomson’s deserip- 
tion of it: 
—— ‘¢ The miserable sire, 
Wrapt with his sons in Fate’s severest grasp, 
The serpents twisting round their stringent 
folds 
Inextricable tie. Such passion here ! 
Such agonies ! such bitterness of pain ! 
Seem so to tremble thro’ the tortur’d stone, 
That the touch’d heart engrosses all the 
hs sales: 
ittark’d the best proportions pass 
GEece beheld; and seen alone, 
> ‘th’ imperious passions seize ; 
ble pangs both for himself 
ie to Heaven his rueful 
OAT: ® 
using cast ; 
21 tion mixt, 
L 
More tender | 
sons 
All the so‘t rage of 4 
In a boy’s helpless fate 
While, unpierc’d, the f rig he 
His foot to steal out of the forr d 
uae book iy. aed 
‘Moxsnty Mas. No. 207, 
Journal of a recent Voyage to Cadiz. 
499 
The last room we entered was opened 
only to a few visitors; but, as the late mi- 
nister of state, Don Pedro Cevallos, in. 
spected. the institution while I was 
there, I accompanied the suite to this 
apartment, where an advanced pupil was 
studying from nature, The room was 
large, having a strong dead lamp. sus- 
pended in a shade, for the purpuse of 
casting the light on the ‘* living statue.’ 
The subject, f think, was Bet ol 
and the poor fellow seemed to convey to 
me his feelings, and excite pity, while he 
sat motionless in his pensive posture. 
{ had not room in my last to mention 
the new cathedral. It is now only the 
shell of an immense pile of building, the 
erection of which began about a century 
since, and,were it finished, would present 
a most elegant structure of modern archi- 
tecture. It was left in the present unfi- 
nished state about fifteen years ago, in 
consequence of the merchants having 
refused to pay any longer the contribution 
or tax, which had been levied on them 
towards its erection, It exhibits, in the 
midst of the riches that annually flow 
into Spain, the indifference of the ‘ go- 
vernment as well as of the people, to 
accomplish the undertaking. 
The gloomy unfinished state in which 
it now is, gives one the idea of a moun- 
tain turned inside outward. . It is now 
only a thoroughfare from one part of the 
city to another ; and no inhabitant would 
stop there to look around him, were not 
an image of the Virgin placed within an 
enclosed altar, having a solitary lamp, 
which sheds its rays on the passenger. 
The walls are in the form of a cross; 
the small part of the roof that is covered, 
is supported by beautifully-fluted columns 
of white marble; the pedestals are of 
variegated marble, and, with part of the 
columns, are cased val brick to preserve 
them from injury... The high altar was 
to be ornamented with the varieties of 
marble found in Spain; some of the pi- 
lasters, columns of porphyry, &c. 
just visible at the edges of the casing, 
give an idea of the grand elfect intended 
rolluced. ‘Tlie centre was to be 
ed by a dome, of which only 
pillars are erected on the 
Mesnot covered, the interior, 
spreserved from the eecis 
tit es of large bipeks of 
, in an unfinished state, 
in every diréction, and 
ethat so magnificent an un- 
hould not “be completed, 
3S Phe 
