probably find it the most available side-view for physiognomical inference; it is remarkably adapted to the burin, and has been once, at least, adequately engraved; it also has the melancholy attraction of being the last portrait of Washington taken from life.

One of Canova's fellow-workmen, in the first years of his artistic life, was a melancholy enthusiast, whose thirst for the ideal was deepened by a morbid tenacity of purpose and sensitiveness of heart;—a form of character peculiar to Italy; in its voluptuous phase illustrated by Petrarch, in its stoical by Alfieri, and in its combination of patriotic and tender sentiments by Foscolo's "Letters of Jacopo Ortis." The political confusion that reigned in Europe for a time, seriously interfered with the pursuit of art; and this was doubtless a great motive with GUISEPPE CERACCHI for visiting America; but not less inciting was the triumph of freedom, of which that land had recently become the scene-a triumph that so enlisted the sympathies and fired the imagination of the republican sculptor, that he designed a grand national monument, commemorative of American Independence, and sought the patronage of the newly organized government in its behalf. Washington, individually, favored his design, and the model of the proposed work received the warm approval of competent judges; but taste for art, especially for grand monumental statuary, was quite undeveloped on this side of the Atlantic, and the recipient of Papal orders found little encouragement in a young republic, too busy in laying the foundation of her civil polity, to give much thought to any memorials of her nascent glory. It was, however, but a question of time. His purpose is even now in the process of achievement. Washington's native State voluntarily undertook the enterprise for which the general government, in its youth, was inadequate; and it was auspiciously reserved for a native artist, and a single member of the original confederacy, to embody, in a style worthy of more than Italian genius, the grand conception of a representative monument, with Washington in a colossal equestrian statue as the centre, and the Virginia patriots and orators

of the Revolution, grouped around his majestic figure. Ceracchi, however, in aid of his elaborate project, executed the only series of marble portraitures from life of the renowned founders of the national government: his busts of Hamilton, Jay, Trumbull, and Governor George Clinton, were long the prominent ornaments of the Academy of Fine Arts, in New York; the latter, especially, was remarkable, both in regard to its resemblance to the original, and as a work of art. His most important achievement, however, was a bust of Washington, generally considered the most perfect representation of the man and the hero combined, after Stuart's and Houdon's master-pieces. It is in the heroic style, with a tiara. The fate of this valuable effigy was singular. It was purchased by the Spanish Ambassador, as a gift to the Prince of Peace, then at the height of his power at Madrid; before the bust reached Spain, Godoy was exiled, and the minister recalled, who, on his arrival, transferred it, unpacked, to Richard Meade, Esq., of Philadelphia, in whose family it remained until two years ago, when, at the administrators' sale of that gentleman's fine collection of paintings, it was purchased by Governeur Kemble, and can now be seen at his hospitable mansion, on the banks of the Hudson.

The zeal of Ceracchi in his cherished purpose, is indicated by the assurance he gave Dr. Hugh Williamson-the historian of North Carolina, and author of the earliest work on the American climate, and one of the first advocates of the canal policy—when inviting him to sit for his bust-that he did not pay him the compliment in order to secure his vote for the national monument, but only to perpetuate the "features of the American Cato." With characteristic emphasis, the honest Doctor declined, on the ground that posterity would not care for his lineaments; adding that, "if he were capable of being lured into the support of any scheme whatever, against his conviction of right, wood, and not stone, ought to be the material of his image."*

Baffled, as Ceracchi ultimately was, in the realization of hopes înspired alike by his ambition as a sculptor and his love of

* Dr. Hosack's Essays.

republican institutions, he carried to Europe the proud distinction of having taken the initiative in giving an enduring shape to the revered and then unfamiliar features of Washington. He executed two busts, one colossal, a cast of which was long in the New York Academy of Fine Arts. Impoverished, the darling scheme of his life frustrated in America, and his own patriotic hopes crushed by the victories of Bonaparte in Italy, and his rapid advances towards imperial sway, the enthusiastic artist brooded, with intense disappointment, over the contrast between the fresh and exuberant national life, of which he had partaken here, and the vassalage to which Europe was again reduced. Napoleon and Washington stood revealed, as it were, side by side the selfish aggrandizement of the one, who trampled on humanity under the prestige of military fame, and the magnanimity of the other, content to be the immaculate agent of a free people, after sacrificing all for their welfare. Imbued with the principles and a witness of the self-control which consummated our revolutionary triumph, Ceracchi beheld, with an impatience that caution only restrained, the steady and unscrupulous encroachment of Bonaparte on all that is sacred in nationality and freedom. Somewhat of the deep indignation and the sacrificial will that nerved the hand of Charlotte Corday, somewhat of the fanaticism that moved the student-assassin of Kotzebue, and, perhaps, a little of the vengeful ire of Ravaillac, at length kindled the Italian blood of the sculptor. He became one of the most determined secret conspirators against the now established usurper. The memoirs of the time speak of his "exaggerated notions," his disdain of life, of the profound gloom that often clouded his soul, of the tears he alternately shed of admiration at the brilliant exploits of the conqueror, and of grief at the wrongs inflicted on the beautiful land of his nativity. "This man," says one fair chronicler of those exciting times, "has a soul of fire." A plot, which is stigmatized as nefarious, and, according to rumor, was of the Fieschi stamp, aimed at the life of Bonaparte, when First Consul, was finally discovered, and Ceracchi became legally compromised as one of those pledged to its execution. He was

tried, boldly acknowledged his murderous intention, and was condemned to death, but this punishment was subsequently remitted to imprisonment; and the earnest liberal, the vindictive patriot, the gifted artist, and sculptor of Washington, ended his career in an obscure dungeon of France. Some accounts, however, award him a more sanguinary fate. "At a tumult in Rome," says a late memoir of Prince Eugene de Beauharnais, "he (the Prince) struck several times the man Ceracchi, who was afterwards executed for an attempt on the life of the First Consul."

His bust gives Washington a Roman look, but has been declared to exhibit more truly the expression of the mouth than any other work. Those of Hamilton and Governor Clinton, by this artist, are deemed, by their respective families, as correct as portraits, as they are superior as pieces of statuary. And this is presumptive evidence in favor of the belief that Ceracchi's attachment to the heroic style did not seriously interfere with the general truth of his portraiture.

The design of a statue was, therefore, only realized on the arrival of HOUDON. The history of this sculptor is a striking contrast to that of Ceracchi. A native of Versailles, he flourished at an epoch remarkably prolific of original characters in all departments of letters and art. Many of these, especially his own countrymen, have been represented by his chisel. He enjoyed a long and prosperous existence, having survived the taste he initiated, and the friends of his youth, but maintaining a most creditable reputation to his death, which occurred in his eighty-eighth year. He rose to distinction by a new style, which appears to have exhibited, according to the subject, a remarkable simplicity on the one hand, and elaboration on the other. An over-estimate of the effect of details marred his more labored creations; but he had a faculty of catching the air, and a taste in generalizing the conception, both of a real and fanciful subject, which manifested unusual genius. There was an individuality about his best works that won attention and established his fame. Of the ideal kind, two were the subjects of much

critical remark, though for different reasons. One of them was intended to exhibit the effect of cold-an idea almost too melodramatic and physical for sculpture, but quite in character for a Frenchman, aiming, even in his severe and limited art, at theatrical effect. The other was a statue of Diana-the object of numerous bon mots, first, because it was ordered by Catharine of Russia, who, it was generally thought, had no special affinity with the chaste goddess; and, secondly, on account of the voluptuous character given it by the artist, which procured for his Diana the name of Venus. Houdon's bust of Voltaire gained him renown at once in this department of his pursuit, and is a memorable example of his success. How various the characters whose similitudes are perpetuated by his chisel-Gluck and Buffon, Rousseau and D'Alembert, Mirabeau and Washington! Jefferson, in behalf of the State of Virginia, arranged with Houdon at Paris, to undertake the latter commission; and he accompanied Dr. Franklin to the United States. He remained at Mount Vernon long enough to execute a model of Washington's head, and familiarize himself with every detail of his features and the traits of his natural language; but that implicit fidelity, now evident in the busts of our own leading sculptors, was not then in vogue, and the artists of the day were rather adepts in idealizing than in precise imitation of nature; therefore, the result of Houdon's labors, though, in general, satisfactory, cannot be used with the mathematical exactitude, as a guide, which greater attention to minutiæ would have secured. There is a sketch by Stuart indicating some minute errors in the outline of Houdon's bust. On leaving, he presented Washington with the bas-relief which used to hang over his chair in the library at Mount Vernon. He completed the statue after his return to Paris, and in the diary of Gouverneur Morris, is an entry noting his attendance at the artist's studio, to stand for the figure of his illustrious friend, whom, before he became corpulent, he is said to have resembled. He alludes to the circumstance as "being the humble employment of a mannikin;" and adds, "this is literally taking the advice of St. Paul, to be all things to all men." The original