Wherever there is a genius like his own, a germ of the finest fruit still hidden beneath the soil, the "_Chante pauvre petit_" of Béranger shall strike, like a sunbeam, and give it force to emerge, and wherever there is the true Crusade,--for the spirit, not the tomb of Christ,--shall be felt an echo of the "_Que tes armes soient benis jeune soldat_" of La Mennais.
FRANCE AND HER ARTISTIC EXCELLENCE.--THE PICTURES OF HORACE VERNET.--DE LA ROCHE.--LEOPOLD ROBERT.--CONTRAST BETWEEN THE FRENCH AND ENGLISH SCHOOLS OF ART.--THE GENERAL APPRECIATION OF TURNER'S PICTURES.--BOTANICAL MODELS IN WAX.--MUSIC.--THE OPERA.--DUPREZ.-- LABLACHE.--RONCONI.--GRISI.--PERSIANA.--"SEMIRAMIDE" AS PERFORMED BY THE NEW YORK AND PARIS OPERAS.--MARIO.--COLETTI.--GARDINI.-- "DON GIOVANNI."--THE WRITER'S TRIAL OF THE "LETHEON."--ITS EFFECTS.
It needs not to speak in this cursory manner of the treasures of Art, pictures, sculptures, engravings, and the other riches which France lays open so freely to the stranger in her Musées. Any examination worth writing of such objects, or account of the thoughts they inspire, demands a place by itself, and an ample field in which to expatiate. The American, first introduced to some good pictures by the truly great geniuses of the religious period in Art, must, if capable at all of mental approximation to the life therein embodied, be too deeply affected, too full of thoughts, to be in haste to say anything, and for me, I bide my time.
No such great crisis, however, is to be apprehended from acquaintance with the productions of the modern French school. They are, indeed, full of talent and of vigor, but also melodramatic and exaggerated to a degree that seems to give the nightmare passage through the fresh and cheerful day. They sound no depth of soul, and are marked with the signet of a degenerate age.
Thus speak I generally. To the pictures of Horace Vernet one cannot but turn a gracious eye, they are so faithful a transcript of the life which circulates around us in the present state of things, and we are willing to see his nobles and generals mounted on such excellent horses. De la Roche gives me pleasure; there is in his pictures a simple and natural poesy; he is a man who has in his own heart a well of good water, whence he draws for himself when the streams are mixed with strange soil and bear offensive marks of the bloody battles of life.