Gratian.—Master Curate, do you not read—“Before honour cometh humility?”
Aquilius.—I agree with you, Gratian. I quite love his pictures: they are wonderfully executed, with surprising truth, and in general his subjects, if not high, are pleasing. Yet I hardly know how to say, in general: there are so many exceptions. I could wish he were a little less cruel.
Lydia.—Cruel! how can that be? his pet dogs, his generous dogs, and horses, and that macaw, and the familiar monkey, and that dear begging dog. The most gentle-minded lady I am acquainted with is working it in tambour—and has been a twelve-month about it!
Gratian.—And has he not a high poetic feeling? Can you object to the “Sanctuary,” and the “Combat,”—I believe that is the title of the picture—where the stag is waiting for his rival?
Aquilius.—They are most beautiful, they are poetical; there is not an inch of canvass in either that you could say should have a touch more or less. The scenery sympathises with the creatures; it is their wild domain, and they are left to their own instincts. There is no exhibition of man’s craft there, let them enjoy their freedom. Even in the more doubtful “Sanctuary,” we have the assurance that it is a “Sanctuary;” but I see, Gratian, that your memory is giving you a hint of some exception. What think you of the fox—not hunted as you would have him painted, wherein “the field” would be the sport—but just entering the steel trap, where you see the dead rabbit, and think the fox will be overmatched by man’s cruel cunning?
Gratian.—Why, I had rather hunt him in open field, and give him a chance than trap him.
Curate.—Even Reynard might say with Ajax, if man must be his enemy—
“Εν δε φαει και ολεσσον.”
Gratian.—I give up that picture; it is not a pleasing subject.
Lydia.—I am sure you must like his “Bolton Abbey in the Olden Time.”