Reflections on the Eccentricities of Young Men of Genius with respect
to pecuniary matters.--The Death of the Artist's Mother.--The
Embodying of the Pennsylvanian Militia; an Anecdote of General
Wayne.--The Artist elected Commandant of a corps of Volunteer
boys.--The circumstances which occasioned the Search for the Bones of
Bradock's army.--The Search.--The Discovery of the Bones of the
Father and Brother of Sir Peter Halket.--The Artist proposed
afterwards to paint a Picture of the Discovery of the Bones of the
Halkets.--He commences regularly as a Painter.--He copies a St.
Ignatius.--He is induced to attempt Historical Portraiture.--His
Picture of the Trial of Susannah.--Of the merits of that Picture.

There is a regardless independence about minds of superior endowment,
which, in similar characters, manifests itself differently according to
the circumstances in which they happen to be placed. Devoted to the
contemplation of the means of future celebrity, the man of genius
frequently finds himself little disposed to set a proper value on the
common interests of of life. When bred in affluence, and exempted from
the necessity of considering the importance of money to the attainment of
his object, he is often found, to a blameful degree, negligent of
pecuniary concerns; and, on the contrary, when his situation is such that
he may only hope for distinction by the practice of the most parsimonious
frugality, he will as often appear in the social and propelling season of
youth enduring voluntary privations with an equanimity which the
ostentatious fanatic or contrite penitent would in vain attempt to
surpass. This peculiar feature of the self-sustained mind of genius has
often been misunderstood, and seldom valued as it ought to be. The
presumptuous weak who mistake the wish of distinction for the workings of
talent, admire the eccentricities of the gifted youth who is reared in
opulence, and, mistaking the prodigality which is only the effect of his