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able sensation to one's imaginary teeth. The incautious epicure who plunges his teeth into "a painted snow-ball" in Italy (see Brydone's "Tour in Sicily and Malta") can hardly receive so jarring a balk to his gums as the bare apprehension of a bite at a stone peach. But the farther you go in a sculptor's shop the better. Many persons are not aware that there are show-rooms in these places, which are well worth getting a sight of by some small purchase. For the best artistical casts, the Italian shops, such as Papera's in Marylebone Street, Golden Square, are, we believe, the best. We can safely speak as to the pleasant attendance in that shop. Shont in Holborn seems to deal chiefly in modern things; but he has a room up-stairs, full of casts from the antique, large and small, that amounts to an exhibition. Of all the shop-pleasures that are "not inelegant,” an hour or two passed in a place of this kind is surely one of the most polite. Here are the gods and heroes of old, and the more beneficent philosophers, ancient and modern. You are looked upon, as you walk among them, by the paternal majesty of Jupiter, the force and decision of Minerva, the still more arresting gentleness of Venus, the budding compactness of Hebe, the breathing inspiration of Apollo. Here the celestial Venus, naked in heart and body, ties up her locks, her drapery hanging upon her lower limbs. Here the Belvidere Apollo, breathing forth his triumphant disdain, follows with an earnest eye the shaft that has killed the serpent. Here the Graces, linked in an affectionate group, meet you in the naked sincerity of their innocence and generosity, their hands "open as day," and two advancing for one receding. Here Hercules, like the building of a man, looks down from his propping club as if half disdaining even that repose. There Mercury, with his light limbs, seems just to touch the ground, ready to give a start with his foot and be off again. Bacchus, with his riper cheek, and his lazier hanging locks, appears to be eyeing one of his nymphs. The Vatican Apollo near him leans upon the stump of a tree, the hand which hangs upon it holding a bit of his lyre, the other

arm thrown up over his head, as if he felt the air upon his body, and heard it singing through the strings. In a corner, on another side, is the Couching Venus of John of Bologna, shrinking just before she steps into the bath. The Dancing Faun is not far off, with his mere animal spirits; and the Piping Faun, sedater, because he possesses an art more accomplished. Among the other divinities, we look up with veneration to old Homer's head, resembling an earthly Jupiter. Plato beholds us with a bland dignity,—a beauty unimpairable by years. How different from the brute impulse of Mars, the bloated self-will of Nero, or the dull and literal effeminacy of some of the other Emperors! We have before observed, that there is a sort of presence in sculpture, more than in any other representations of art. It is curious to see how instinctively people will fall into this sentiment when they come into a place with busts and statues in it, however common. They hush, as if the images could hear them. When we were in our boyhood, some of our most delightful holidays were spent in the gallery of the late Mr West, in Newman Street. It runs a good way back from the street, crossing a small garden, and opening into loftier rooms on the other side of it. We remember how the world used to seem shut out from us, the moment the street door was closed, and we began stepping down those long carpeted aisles of pictures, with statues in the angles where they turned. We had observed everybody walk down them in this way, like the mild possessor of the mansion; and we went so likewise. We have walked down them with him at night to his painting room, as he went in his white flannel gown with a lamp in his hand, which shot a lustrous twilight upon the pictured walls in passing; and everything looked so quiet and graceful, that we should have thought it sacrilege to hear a sound beyond the light tread of his footsteps. But it was the statues that impressed us, still more than the pictures. It seemed as if Venus and Apollo waited our turning at the corners; and there they were,-always the same, placid and intuitive, more human and bodily than the paintings, yet too

divine to be over-real. It is to that house, with the gallery in question, and the little green plot of ground surrounded with an arcade and busts, that we owe the greatest part of our love for what is Italian and belongs to the fine arts. And if this is a piece of private history with which the readers have little to do, they will excuse it for the sake of the greatest of all excuses; which is love.

[NOTE. "The Literary Pocket Book," mentioned in the first of these papers about Shops, was edited (and, I believe, projected) by Leigh Hunt himself, and published by my father. It did not last many years, though it contained some admirable writings by Hunt, Shelley, Cowden Clarke, my father, and others, and an immense deal of compendious information, with blank pages for diaries.-E. O.]

IF

TO ANY ONE WHOM BAD WEATHER

DEPRESSES.

you are melancholy for the first time, you will find upon a little inquiry that others have been melancholy many times, and yet are cheerful now. If you have been melancholy many times, recollect that you have got over all those times; and try if you cannot find out new means of getting over them better. Do not imagine that mind alone is concerned in your bad spirits. The body has a great deal to do with these matters. The mind may undoubtedly affect the body; but the body also affects the mind. There is a mutual reaction between them; and by lessening it on either side, you diminish the pain on both.

If you are melancholy, and know not why, be assured it must arise entirely from some physical weakness; and do your best to strengthen yourself. The blood of a melancholy man is thick and slow. The blood of a lively man is clear and quick. Endeavour, therefore, to put your blood in motion. Exercise is the best way to do it; but you may also help yourself, in moderation, with wine, or other excitements. Only you must take care so to proportion the use of any artificial stimulus, that it may not render the blood languid by over-exciting it at first; and that you may be able to keep up, by the natural stimulus only, the help you have given yourself by the artificial.

Regard the bad weather as somebody has advised us to

handle the nettle.

will make

you feel;

In proportion as you are delicate with it, it but

"Grasp it like a man of mettle,

And the rogue obeys you well."

Do not the less, however, on that account, take all reasonable precaution and arms against it,-your boots, &c., against wet feet, and your great-coat or umbrella against the rain. It is timidity and flight which are to be deprecated, not proper armour for the battle. The first will lay you open to defeat on the least attack. A proper use of the latter will only keep you strong for it. Plato had such a high opinion of exercise that he said it was a cure even for a wounded conscience. Nor is this opinion a dangerous one. For there is no system, even of superstition, however severe or cruel in other matters, that does not allow a wounded conscience to be curable by some means. Nature will work out its rights and its kindness some way or other, through the worst sophistications; and this is one of the instances in which she seems to raise herself above all contingencies. The conscience may have been wounded by artificial or by real guilt; but then she will tell it in those extremities that even the real guilt may have been produced by circumstances. It is her kindness alone which nothing can pull down from its predominance.

See fair play between cares and pastimes. Diminish your mere wants as much as possible, whether you are rich or poor; for the rich man's wants, increasing by indulgence, are apt to outweigh even the abundance of his means; and the poor man's diminution of them renders his means the greater. Do not want money, for instance, for money's sake. There is excitement in the pursuit; but it is dashed with more troubles than most others, and gets less happiness at last. On the other hand, increase all your natural and healthy enjoyments. Cultivate your afternoon fireside, the society of your friends, the company of agreeable children, music, theatres, amusing books, an urbane and generous gallantry. He who thinks any innocent

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