public, he attempted at once to labor on a more ambitious scale. He
broadened his canvases, and increased the size of his figures and
landscapes, and where he was before sweet and inviting, became strong
and impressive, yet still holding all his former qualities. The first
year of his new residence in Boston saw the production of The Dandelion
Girl, a light-hearted, careless creature, full of a life that had no
touch of responsibility, and descriptive of a joyous and ephemeral mood.
A long step forward was taken in The Romany Girl, which immediately
followed,--a work full of fire and freedom, strongly personal in
suggestion, and marked by a wild and impatient individuality which
revealed in the girl the impression of a lawless ancestry, that somehow
and somewhere had felt the action of a finer strain of blood. The next
year Fuller reached the highest point of his inspiration and power in
The Quadroon, a work which is likely to be held for all time as his
masterpiece, so far as strength of idea, importance of motive, and vivid
force of description are concerned. Without violence, even without
expression of action, but simply by a pair of haunting eyes, a
beautiful, despairing face, and a form confessing utter weariness and
abandonment of hope, he revealed all the national shame of slavery, and
its degradation of body and soul. Every American cannot but blush to
look upon it, so simple and dignified is its rebuke of the nation's long
perversity and guilt. The artist's next important effort was the famous
Winifred Dysart, as far removed in purpose from The Quadroon as it could
well be, yet akin to it by its added testimony to the painter's constant
sympathy with weak and beseeching things, and worthy to stand at an
equal height with the picture of the slave by virtue of its beauty of
conception, loveliness of character, and pathetic appeal to the
interest. It was in all respects as typical and comprehensive as The
Quadroon itself, holding within its face and figure all the sweetness
and innocence of New-England girlhood, yet with the shadow of an