believe, where we looked at a great many water-color and crayon drawings
of scenes in Italy, Greece, and Switzerland. The artist was a quiet,
respectable, somewhat heavy-looking old gentleman, from whose aspect one
would expect a plodding pertinacity of character rather than quickness of
sensibility. He must have united both these qualities, however, to
produce such pictures as these, such faithful transcripts of whatever
Nature has most beautiful to show, and which she shows only to those who
love her deeply and patiently. They are wonderful pictures, compressing
plains, seas, and mountains, with miles and miles of distance, into the
space of a foot or two, without crowding anything or leaving out a
feature, and diffusing the free, blue atmosphere throughout. The works
of the English watercolor artists which I saw at the Manchester
Exhibition seemed to me nowise equal to these. Now, here are three
artists, Mr. Brown, Mr. Wilde, and Mr. Mueller, who have smitten me with
vast admiration within these few days past, while I am continually
turning away disappointed from the landscapes of the most famous among
the old masters, unable to find any charm or illusion in them. Yet I
suppose Claude, Poussin, and Salvator Rosa must have won their renown by
real achievements. But the glory of a picture fades like that of a
flower.

Contiguous to Mr. Mueller's studio was that of a young German artist, not
long resident in Rome, and Mr. Akers proposed that we should go in there,
as a matter of kindness to the young man, who is scarcely known at all,
and seldom has a visitor to look at his pictures. His studio comprised
his whole establishment; for there was his little bed, with its white
drapery, in a corner of the small room, and his dressing-table, with its
brushes and combs, while the easel and the few sketches of Italian scenes
and figures occupied the foreground. I did not like his pictures very
well, but would gladly have bought them all if I could have afforded it,