The sleeping
Cleopatra cannot be looked at enough; always her sleep seems
sweeter and more graceful, always more wonderful the drapery.
A little Psyche, by a pupil of Bartolini, pleases us much thus
far. The forlorn sweetness with which she sits there, crouched
down like a bruised butterfly, and the languid tenacity of
her mood, are very touching. The Mercury and Ganymede with
the Eagle, by Thorwaldsen, are still as fine as on first
acquaintance. Thorwaldsen seems the grandest and simplest of
modern sculptors. There is a breadth in his thought, a freedom
in his design, we do not see elsewhere.
'A spaniel, by Gott, shows great talent, and knowledge of the
animal. The head is admirable; it is so full of playfulness
and of doggish knowingness.'
I am tempted, by my recollection of the pleasure it gave her, to
insert here a little poem, addressed to Margaret by one of her
friends, on the beautiful imaginative picture in the gallery of 1840,
called "The Dream."
"A youth, with gentle brow and tender cheek,
Dreams in a place so silent, that no bird,
No rustle of the leaves his slumbers break;
Only soft tinkling from the stream is heard,
As in bright little waves it comes to greet
The beauteous One, and play upon his feet.
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