Page:Letters from Abroad to Kindred at Home (Volume 1).djvu/43

40 with noble trees, that grow as Nature bids them; hothouses, with grapes and pines; and a lawn that for hundreds of years, probably, has had its grass cropped every week through the growing months.

The house is, I fancy, rather a favourable specimen of the residences of the English gentry, spacious, and arranged with comfort and elegance; but not surpassing, in these respects, the first class of gentlemen's country-houses in America. But there are luxuries here that we have not, and shall not have for many a day. The walls are painted by the master of the house with views on the Rhine, from sketches of his own, and very beautiful they are. This is, to be sure, attainable to us; for a taste, and a certain facility in painting, is common enough among us; but when shall we see on our wals an unquestionable Titian, or a Carlo Dolce, or. when, in a gentleman's country-house, an apartment filled with casts from the best antiques? Certainly not till our people cease to demand drapery for the chanting cherubs, and such like innocents!

Mrs. —— was a friend of Mrs. Siddons. She has a full-length picture of her by Lawrence, which represents a perfect woman in the maturity of her powers and charms, somewhat idealized, perhaps, as if the painter were infected by Mrs. ——'s enthusiasm, and to the fondness of a friend added the devotion of a worshipper. It is Mrs. Siddons; not a muse, queen, or goddess, though fit to be any or all of them. She is dressed in a very un-goddesslike