[J] In Memoriam, ci.
[K] I am not quite sure of this, not having studied with any care the forms of mediæval shipping; but in all the MSS. I have examined the sails of the shipping represented are square.
[L] It is not a little strange that in all the innumerable paintings of Venice, old and modern, no notice whatever had been taken of these sails, though they are exactly the most striking features of the marine scenery around the city, until Turner fastened upon them, painting one important picture, "The Sun of Venice," entirely in their illustration.
[M] Thomas Hood.
[N] As in the very beautiful picture of this year's Academy, "The Abandoned."
[O] The catenary and other curves of tension which a sail assumes under the united influence of the wind, its own weight, and the particular tensions of the various ropes by which it is attached, or against which it presses, show at any moment complexities of arrangement to which fidelity, except after the study of a lifetime, is impossible.
[P] "The town of Lyons, seated upon a chariot drawn by two lions, lifts its eyes towards heaven, and admires there—'les nouveaux Epoux,'—represented in the character of Jupiter and Juno."—Notice des Tableaux du Musée Impérial, 2nde partie, Paris, 1854, p. 235.
"The Queen upon her throne holds with one hand the scepter, in the other the balance. Minerva and Cupid are at her sides. Abundance and Prosperity distribute metals, laurels, 'et d'autres récompenses,' to the Genii of the Fine Arts. Time, crowned with the productions of the seasons, leads France to the—Age of Gold!"—p. 239.
So thought the Queen, and Rubens, and the Court. Time himself, "crowned with the productions of the seasons," was, meanwhile, as Thomas Carlyle would have told us, "quite of another opinion."
With view of arrival at Golden Age all the sooner, the Court determine to go by water; "and Marie de Medicis gives to her son the government of the state, under the emblem of a vessel, of which he holds the rudder."