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rate for the parish of St. Anne, when he might be seen going about with an ink-bottle suspended from his buttonhole, collecting the money.

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At length Flaxman and his wife, having thriftily accumulated a sufficient store of savings, set out for Rome. Arrived there, he applied himself diligently to study, maintaining himself, like other poor artists, by making copies from the antique. English visitors sought his studio and gave him commissions; and it was then that he composed his beautiful designs, illustrative of Homer, Eschylus, and Dante. The price paid for them was moderate, only fifteen shillings apiece; but Flaxman worked for art as well as money, and the beauty of the designs brought him new friends and patrons. He executed Cupid and Aurora for the munificent Thomas Hope, and the Fury of Athamas for the Earl of Bristol. He then prepared to return to England, his taste improved and cultivated by careful study; but before he left Italy, the Academies of Florence and Carrara recognized his merit by electing him a member.

His fame had preceded him to England, and he soon found abundant lucrative employment. While at Rome, he had been commissioned to execute his famous monument in memory of Lord Mansfield, and it was erected in the north transept of Westminster Abbey shortly after his return. It stands there in majestic grandeur, a monument to the genius of Flaxman himself, calm, simple, and severe. No wonder that Banks, the sculptor, then in the heyday of his fame, exclaimed when he saw it, "This little man cuts us all out!"

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When the bigwigs of the Royal Academy heard of Flaxman's return, and especially when they had an opportunity of seeing and admiring his noble portrait-statue of Mansfield, they were eager to have him enrolled among their number. The Royal Academy has always had the art of running to the help of the strong; and when an artist has

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proved that he can achieve a reputation without the Academy, then is the Academy most willing to "patronize" him. He allowed his name to be proposed in the candidates' list of associates, and was immediately elected. His progress was now rapid, and he was constantly employed. Perseverance and study, which had matured his genius, had made him great, and he went on from triumph to triumph. But he appeared in yet a new character. The little boy who had begun his studies behind the poor plaster-cast seller's shop-counter in New Street, Covent Garden, was now a man of high intellect and recognized supremacy in art, to instruct aspiring students, in the character of Professor of Sculpture to the Royal Academy! And no man better deserved to fill that distinguished office; for none is so able to instruct others as he who, for himself and by his own almost unaided efforts, has learned to grapple with, and overcome difficulties. The caustic Fuseli used to talk of the lectures as "sermons by the Reverend John Flaxman"; for the sculptor was a religious man, which Fuseli was not. But Flaxman acquitted himself well in the professorial chair, as any one who reads his instructive "Lectures on Sculpture," now published, may ascertain for himself.

Flaxman's monuments are known nearly all over England. Their mute poetry beautifies most of the cathedrals, and many of the rural churches. Whatever work of this kind he executed, he threw a soul and meaning into it, embodying some high Christian idea of charity, of love, of resignation, of affection, or of kindness.

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RAPHAEL.

BY JOHN G. WHITTIER.

I

SHALL not soon forget that sight:

The glow of Autumn's westering day,

A hazy warmth, a dreamy light,

On Raphael's picture lay.

It was a simple print I saw,

The fair face of a musing boy; Yet while I gazed a sense of awe Seemed blending with my joy.

A simple print:- the graceful flow
Of boyhood's soft and wavy hair,
And fresh young lip and cheek, and brow
Unmarked and clear, were there.

Yet through its sweet and calm repose
I saw the inward spirit shine;

It was as if before me rose

The white veil of a shrine.

As if, as Gothland's sage has told,
The hidden life, the man within,
Dissevered from its frame and mould,
By mortal eye were seen.

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