Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 9.djvu/219

Rh teacher of his art, by opening a school of painting in his own house, where he had for his pupils many who have since distinguished themselves in different departments of pictorial excellence. Among these may be mentioned his own family of sons and daughters, all of whom were more or less imbued with his spirit, particularly his eldest son, Peter, who died before him, whose paintings now take their place among those of our foremost British artists. In this way the days of Alexander Nasmyth were spent, until first one generation of artists, and then another had passed away; but although more than eighty years had now whitened his head and wrinkled his brow, he still pursued his beloved occupation, as if death alone could arrest the labours of his pencil. And that all the ardour as well as skill of his former life continued unabated, was shown in his last work but one, "The Bridge of Augustus," which he sent to the exhibition of the Royal Scottish Academy. At length the hoary veteran died, and died at his post. A melancholy interest is attached to his final effort. A few days before his last illness, he expressed to his daughter Jane, herself an artist of no ordinary excellence, his wish to ^paint something, but his difficulty in finding a subject. After some deliberation and rejection, he said he would paint a little picture, which he would call "Going Home." The subject was an old labourer wending homeward at evening, when his day of labour had ended. The sombre evening sky reposes upon the neighbouring hills; on the foreground is an ancient oak, the patriarch of the forest, but now in the last stage of decay, with one of its arms drooping over a brisk stream that stream of time which will still flow onward as merrily when the whole forest itself has passed away. The old labourer, with the slow step of age, is crossing a broken rustic bridge, and supporting himself by its slender railing, while his faithful dog, who accompanies him, seems impatient to reach home, a lonely cottage at a distance in the middle ground, where the smoke curling from the roof announces that supper is in readiness. It was the artist's own silent requiem. His last illness, which continued five weeks, was soothed by the solicitude of his family, to whom he declared that he had lived long enough, and could not die better than when surrounded by such dutiful, affectionate children. He died of natural decay, at his house, 47, York Place, Edinburgh, on the 10th of April, 1840, at the advanced age of eighty-two.

Alexander Nasmyth, soon after his return from Italy, married the sister of Sir James Foulis of Woodhall, Colinton, who survived him, and by whom he had a numerous family, distinguished for talent and success in their several departments of life. Seldom, indeed, is paternal care so well rewarded, or paternal genius so perpetuated.

NASMYTH,, was the son of Alexander Nasmyth, the subject of the preceding notice, and was born in Edinburgh in 1786. In his earliest boyhood Peter showed that love for painting by which his family, of whom he was the eldest son, were distinguished. So wholly, indeed, were his affections devoted to this pursuit, that he made no progress in the ordinary branches of a school- boy's education, and neither the allurements of duxship, nor the compulsion of the tawse, could suffice to make him even a tolerable scholar. The school-room itself was abandoned whenever a bright sunshine announced that nature could be seen at its best; and on these occasions the truant boy was to be found in the fields or among the hedges, pencil in hand, taking sketches of the flowers and trees. Another proof of his enthusiastic devotedness to the art is yet more remarkable. While still very young, he was engaged to accompany his father