Raphael, who was a very Belgian Raphael, indeed; and a long gallery
of pictures of the very oldest school, that, doubtless, afford much
pleasure to the amateurs of ancient art. I confess that I am inclined
to believe in very little that existed before the time of Raphael.
There is, for instance, the Prince of Orange's picture by Perugino, very
pretty indeed, up to a certain point, but all the heads are repeated,
all the drawing is bad and affected; and this very badness and
affectation, is what the so-called Catholic school is always anxious to
imitate. Nothing can be more juvenile or paltry than the works of the
native Belgians here exhibited. Tin crowns are suspended over many
of them, showing that the pictures are prize compositions: and pretty
things, indeed, they are! Have you ever read an Oxford prize-poem! Well,
these pictures are worse even than the Oxford poems--an awful assertion
to make.

In the matter of eating, dear sir, which is the next subject of the fine
arts, a subject that, after many hours' walking, attracts a gentleman
very much, let me attempt to recall the transactions of this very day at
the table-d'-hote. 1, green pea-soup; 2, boiled salmon; 3, mussels; 4,
crimped skate; 5, roast-meat; 6, patties; 7, melons; 8, carp, stewed
with mushrooms and onions; 9, roast-turkey; 10, cauliflower and butter;
11, fillets of venison piques, with asafoetida sauce; 12, stewed
calf's-ear; 13, roast-veal; 14, roast-lamb; 15, stewed cherries;
16, rice-pudding; 17, Gruyere cheese, and about twenty-four cakes of
different kinds. Except 5, 13, and 14, I give you my word I ate of all
written down here, with three rolls of bread and a score of potatoes.
What is the meaning of it? How is the stomach of man to be brought to
desire and to receive all this quantity? Do not gastronomists complain
of heaviness in London after eating a couple of mutton-chops? Do not
respectable gentlemen fall asleep in their arm-chairs? Are they fit for