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His first instructor was Quintin Varin, a painter of some merit; and at the age of eighteen he quitted the paternal roof, and, without assistance or friends, found his way to Paris, with the intention of following a profession which he felt to be replete with difficulties, but which he loved with enthusiasm.

On his arrival in the French capital, he was so fortunate as to form the acquaintance of a young nobleman, who, becoming much attached to him, received him into his house, and provided him with the means of obtaining further instruction.

He studied for a short time under Ferdinand Elle, who had some reputation as a portrait painter; and afterwards, for a month only, under L'Allemant; but Poussin soon discovered that neither of his instructors possessed those elevated ideas which he had conceived of the art. Some persons of science and taste now assisted him with their counsel, and lent him some engravings from the works of Raphael and Julio Romano, which he copied with great taste and correctness.

His patron, being summoned to Poitou, where his family resided, persuaded Poussin to accompany him thither, with the intention of employing him in painting at his chateau. Finding, however, that he was looked upon by his friend's relatives as a useless guest and an intruder, he determined to return to the metropolis, and abruptly quitted the house.

Having no money, he laboured hard at his art in the provinces, in order to defray the expenses of this long journey; but his exertions brought on illness, so that he was obliged to turn his steps homewards, and he remained with his friends until his health was restored. He then again repaired to Paris, where he renewed his studies with increased ardour.

His great ambition was to see Rome; accordingly he hastened to finish some pictures in which he was engaged, and commenced his journey; but he had not proceeded farther than Florence, when some circumstance-probably the want of money -compelled him to retrace his steps. Some time afterwards he made a second attempt to arrive at the goal of his anxious wishes, but again he met with obstacles which he could not overcome. He continued, therefore, to work with undiminished | energy at Paris, and at length attracted the notice of connoisseurs by the execution of six pictures in fresco, which he completed in eight days.

The Cavaliere Marino, an Italian poet, was then in Paris, and he invited Poussin to accompany him to Rome. Whether he acceded to this proposal appears to be uncertain; but we find that in 1622, or, according to some writers, in 1624, Poussin was at Rome, and was introduced to Cardinal Barberini by his friend the poet, of whom, however, he was shortly afterwards bereaved by the unexpected stroke of death; and the Cardinal was, at about the same time, obliged to leave Rome, on being appointed to an ecclesiastical legation.

These two events were great drawbacks to Poussin, who, being reduced to deep distress, was conpelled to sell his best works at very low prices. For a fine painting of a prophet he only obtained eight francs; and, strange to say, a young artist was paid four écus, or fourteen francs, for painting a copy of the same picture. Poussin, however, did not despond; he was calm in the midst of adversity, and derived consolation from the progress he was making in his art.

He does not appear to have coveted riches at any time, and throughout his life he preserved that simplicity of appearance and mode of living which he had originally adopted from necessity. Like Michael Angelo Buonaroti, Poussin worked in silence and solitude. François du Quesnoy, called François le Flamand, and Alexander Algarde, both excellent sculptors, were his only intimates, and in their conversations they dwelt chiefly on the beauty of the antique.

Poussin was much indebted to the judicious observations of those able artists; he also modelled some figures in relievo; and the three friends reaped great benefit from their united studies of the ancient statues.

Poussin deemed it more useful to contemplate the works of the great masters than to copy them; yet, during the first years of his residence at Rome, he painted several groups of children from Titian, whose colouring he admired. He also attentively studied the best of Raphael's and Domenichino's paintings, but he devoted most of his attention to the antique statues and bas-reliefs, which he thought more worthy of critical observation than the finest efforts of modern genius in the art of painting.

The colouring of Poussin was not equal to his other artistical powers; for although, at one period, he imitated Titian in that respect, yet, when he became an enthusiastic admirer of Raphael and of the antique, he entirely altered his tone of colour, and even his management of light and shade. His historical compositions are very correct, and the air and attitudes of his figures beautiful. His landscapes are particularly pleasing, on account of the novelty and variety of the objects he has introduced in them. He possessed in an eminent degree the qualifications of invention, design, and expression, and his perspective, and the architectural accessories in his pictures, are perfect.

Several of his works painted at Rome were sent to France, some of them for Cardinal de Richelieu, minister of Louis XIII. The subjects were treated in so masterly a manner, bearing the stamp of study of the poetry and artistical superiority of the ancients, that the King of France desired M. Desnoyers, Secretary of State, to write to Poussin, making suitable offers to induce him to return to France, as one of those great artists whom the King was desirous to engage to contribute towards the perfection of the arts in his kingdom. But Poussin was reluctant to quit Rome, and it was not until Louis XIII. wrote him an autograph letter, appointing him one of his Majesty's painters in ordinary, with emoluments and advantages corresponding to that rank, that he made up his mind to leave Rome, which he promised to do in the autumn of 1639; but about the middle of December in that year he wrote to the French minister, stating that his health would not admit of his undertaking the journey at that moment; he even intimated his wish to be absolved from his engagement to go to France. But his journey was only delayed, for he took his departure from Rome after the lapse of a twelvemonth; that is to say, at the end of the year 1640; having first stipulated that he should not be bound to hold the appointment which the King of France had conferred on him beyond the period of five years.

On Poussin's arrival at Paris he was presented to Cardinal de Richelieu, who received him in the

warmest manner; and three days afterwards he was summoned to St. Germain by the King, who gave him a gracious reception, and conversed for a long time with him.

A delightful residence in the garden of the Tuileries was provided beforehand for him by the King's order; and Poussin, in a letter to his friend Carlo Antonio del Pozzo, Archbishop of Pisa, describes it as follows:

"It is a little palace, for thus it deserves to be called, and is situated in the middle of the garden of the Tuileries. It is three storeys high, and there are nine rooms, besides the offices, which are separate from the house, and consist of a kitchen, the porter's lodge, a stable, a conservatory, &c. There is, besides, a fine large garden, well-stocked with fruit-trees, beautiful flowers, herbs and vegetables. There are also three small fountains, a well, and a handsome court-yard, in which there are also some fruit-trees. I enjoy fine views on all sides, and in summer I think it must be quite a Paradise.

"On entering I found the first-floor arranged and furnished nobly, and supplied with all kinds of provisions; there was even a large stock of firewood, and a cask of good old wine."

Poussin had already commenced his works for the gallery of the Louvre, when he found that a longer residence in Paris would be intolerable, owing to the continual cabals of his numerous rivals. He languished to return to Rome, where he had enjoyed tranquillity and freedom, and his final decision to do so was brought about by the following circumstance:

Le Mercier, architect to the King, had commenced the compartments in the ceiling of the gallery of the Louvre, when Poussin, finding them too massive and heavy for the paintings with which he intended to embellish them, ordered that those compartments should be altered. This gave great offence to Le Mercier, and the rival painters joined him in exclaiming against whatever Poussin did. In this painful state of affairs Poussin solicited and obtained the King's permission to go to Rome, in order to settle his affairs in that city, and bring his wife to France. He left Paris about the end of September, 1642, having resided there nearly two

years.

Soon after his return to Rome news arrived of the death of Cardinal de Richelieu; and Louis XIII. did not long survive his minister. Under these circumstances Poussin resolved to remain at Rome, and he firmly resisted the entreaties that were made, and the inducements which were urgently held out to him, to return to France.

He had now resided, altogether, nearly twenty years in Rome, and he lived there twenty years more in the uninterrupted exercise of his favourite art, admired by men of learning and taste, and beloved and esteemed by those whose intimacy with him enabled them to appreciate the candour and liberality of his mind.

He died on the 19th of November, 1665, in his seventy-second year, and was buried in the church of San Lorenzo, in which parish he resided. All the painters of the Academy of St. Luke, and great numbers of high personages and admirers of the arts, were present at his funeral, and a monument, with an appropriate Latin inscription, was erected to his memory by his friend, the Abbé Nicaise, a canon of the cathedral of Dijon, in France, who happened to be at Rome at the time of his death.

Poussin left his property, which did not amount to more than about fifty thousand francs, ortwo thousand pounds sterling, to be divided amongst his own and his deceased wife's relatives. He might have amassed riches by the product of the number and excellence of his works, but he was so disinterested, that having once fixed a reasonable price for painting his pictures, he invariably declined to accept the additional sums which were pressed upon him after their completion, as marks of the high satisfaction of those who had engaged him to paint them. It may therefore be truly said of Poussin, that he loved painting for itself, more than for the renown and the profit which he derived from it. His wife had no fortune; he married her from affection, and gratitude for her kindness towards him during a severe illness, by which he was attacked whilst lodging in her father's house, in France. They had no children, and they always lived happily together, without any display. Poussin had a decided objection to keeping a number of servants, and the following anecdote is related by his biographers.

On

Cardinal Massini having called upon him one day, the time passed so rapidly in conversation, that the visitor remained until after dark. taking his leave there was no one to conduct him to the door but Poussin himself, who carried a light. The cardinal said that he pitied him, because he had no man-servant.

“And I,” replied Poussin, "pity you, my Lord, much more, because you have so many domes

tics."

Although Poussin's paintings may be estimated at more than three hundred in number, he was not assisted in the execution of any of them. Amongst his most celebrated pictures, we may mention Germanicus, The taking of Jerusalem, Rebecca at the Well, Moses striking the Rock, The Adoration of the Golden Calf, The Conversion of St. Paul, The Will of Endamidas, numerous landscapes, which he enriched with historical subjects, and four pictures representing the Seasons, each containing a scriptural subject. Spring represents Adam and Eve in Paradise; Summer, Ruth in the fields of Boaz; Autumn, the two Israelites who went by order of Moses to " spy out the land of Canaan,” returning with a vine branch laden with an enormous cluster of grapes, which they carry on a staff resting on their shoulders; and Winter is designated by the Deluge. The latter was the last picture painted by Poussin, and, although his powerful genius is manifested in the grandeur of the general effect, some marks of the feebleness of his hand are also visible.

His brother-in-law, Gaspar Poussin, was his only pupil. The real name of the latter was Gaspar Dughet, and he was born in France in 1600. He was induced to travel to Rome, partly from a strong desire to see his sister, who was married to Poussin, and partly from a love for the art of painting, for which he had a great genius. Whilst at Rome he changed his name for that of his kind instructor, and he is known by no other name than that of Gaspar Poussin. His landscapes are beautiful, but his figures are but indifferently designed; of this he was so conscious, that he frequently prevailed upon his brother-in-law to paint his figures for him.'

THE CHRISTMAS CAROL.1

"Then came the merry maskers in,
And carols roared with blithesome din ;
If unmelodious was the song,
It was a hearty note and strong."

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

THE word "carol" is said to be derived from the Latin cantare, to sing, and rola, an interjection of joy. By some writers, however, it is supposed to be of Italian, and by others of French, extraction; its meaning is, generally, a song of mirth and exultation, especially of religious joy. The "Christmas Carol," in particular, is a song in celebration of our blessed LORD's nativity. This kind of pious ballad is undoubtedly of very remote origin. Bishop Jeremy Taylor, in his Great Exemplar, fancifully remarks that the first Christmas carol was the Hymn of the Angels to the Shepherds in the plains of Bethlehem :-"Glory to GOD in the highest, on earth peace, good will to men." Milton also, in Paradise Lost, thus mentions the same anthem:

"His place of birth a solemn angel tells

To simple shepherds keeping watch by night;
They gladly thither haste, and by a quire
Of squadron'd angels hear His carol sung."

This hymn was introduced at an early period into the services of the Church, being sung either at Morning Prayer, or in the Communion Office, or before the Lessons on Christmas Day. In process of time, other hymns of the same kind appear to have been formed after its example; and it is stated by the celebrated ritualist Durandus, that anciently bishops were accustomed, on the above festival, to " sing carols among their clergy" in the cathedrals.

In a Latin poem, written about the middle of the fifteenth century, and soon after translated into English, the following allusion to the practice of carolling in church at Christmas occurs:

-"a wooden child is on the altar set, About the which both boys and girls do dance and trimly jet; And carols sing in praise of CHRIST, and for to help them here The organs answer every verse with sweet and solemn cheer."

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The "Christmas carol," however, was not confined to the Church offices in medieval times. "It has been the custom," says a modern writer, "for the common people of England for many centuries to go about in bands, at an early hour on Christmas morn, serenading their neighbours with what are called 'carols." Such also was the usage in other parts of Christendom. During the season of Advent," remarks Mr. Digby, "the waits, while other men took their rest, wandered, singing hymns in the streets; and on the blessed night, every one kept watch like the shepherds, while minstrels chanted Christmas carols." In these ancient poems the inhabitants of each town and village used to be represented making the offering of whatever best object they possessed to the infant SAVIOUR and the blessed Mother. These ditties even gladdened the festivals of royalty. Henry VII., in the third year of his reign, kept his Christmas at Greenwich: on the twelfth night, after high mass, the king went to the hall, and kept his estate at the table; in the middle sat the dean and those of the king's chapel, who, immediately after his majesty's first course, "sang a carall." The earliest collection of Christmas carols supposed to have been published, is only known from the last leaf of a volume, printed by Wynkyn de Worde in 1521. "These," says Brand, " were festal chansons for enlivening the merriments of the Christmas celebrity; and not such religious songs as are current at this day with the common people, under the same title, and which were substituted by

(1) This paper is intended to form part of a volume on Christ

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those enemies of innocent and useful mirth, the Puritans." We differ from the above antiquary in reference to the puritanical origin of the "religious" Christmas carols current at this day." Many of them appear to be even of earlier date than the Reformation; and, since the Precisians, as is well known, hated Christmas Day as Popish and anti-christian, and abolished its observance wherever their influence extended, it is most improbable that they should have composed songs for its celebration. Be this as it may, the majority of the medieval Christmas carols were " religious." Some of these, in a more or less interpolated and modernized state, have been handed down to us, and though, perhaps, wanting in interest to a refined mind, are sometimes admirable for their simplicity and tenderness. Take for example the ensuing stanzas from that quaint old ditty, beginning,

"Joseph was an old man, an old man was he, And he married Mary, Queen of Galilee," which was sung by companies of little children at Christmas, and which "brings fairly before us the paintings of the old masters, where Joseph is always represented as so old a man, and Mary sits in the oxen's stall with her crown on her head."

"As Joseph was a walking, he heard an angel sing—

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This night shall be born our heavenly king;

He neither shall be born in housen nor in hall,
Nor in the place of Paradise, but in an ox's stall;
He neither shall be clothed in purple nor in pall,
But all in fine linen, as were babies all;

Hle neither shall be rock'd in silver nor in gold,
But in a wooden cradle that rocks on the mould;

He neither shall be christen'd in white wine or in red, But with the spring water with which we were christened."" How sweet, again, are the following lines, which enrich another antique carol:

"O fair, O fair Jerusalem! when shall I come to thee, When shall our griefs be at an end? Thy joys when shall we see ?

The fields were green as green might be, when, from His glorious seat,

The LORD our GOD IIe watered us with His heavenly dew So sweet."

These words could only have been written by one fully conversant with the ritual of the Western Church. They are adapted from her Advent service. Very melodious to our ears is the rhythm of the carol beginning with-I saw three ships come sailing on," and containing the verses which follow:

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"And all the bells on earth shall ring,

On Christmas-day, on Christmas-day;
And all the bells on earth shall ring,
On Christmas-day in the morning.
And all the angels in heaven shall sing,

On Christmas-day, on Christmas-day;
And all the angels in heaven shall sing,
On Christmas-day in the morning.
And all the souls on earth shall sing,

On Christmas-day, on Christmas-day;
And all the souls on earth shall sing,

On Christmas-day in the morning."

Our space will not admit of our giving to our readers any more specimens of the simple Christmas carols We will now offer a few remarks on those early "festewhich animated the devotion of our pious ancestors. chansons" which were merely intended to be incitements to Christmas revelry. Perhaps the most interesting of those extant is an Anglo-Norman carol of the thirteenth century. It is too long for insertion here, but it gives a very interesting picture of the gaiety and

mas and Christmas Carols, with Engravings, just publishing by kindly feeling which the festival of the Nativity appears to have excited among all classes, and dwells with much

Mr. Sharpe, the publisher of this Magazine.

satisfaction on the long list of Christmas dainties, and the profusion of rich wines. Another of these secular carols was discovered in a MS. of the time of Henry VI. The song itself, however, from the style and spelling, may be assigned to a century earlier. "It seems," says Miss Lawrence, "to be sung in the week before Christmas, when the household maidens all busied themselves with dressing up the halls and chambers with evergreens. The great hostility expressed towards ivy may be accounted for by the circumstance of its being used at funerals." A few lines of this carol in modern orthography may not be uninteresting here:

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The Reformation did not impair the popularity of the Christmas carol in England. A writer in 1631, in his description of a good and hospitable housekeeper, has left the following picture of Christmas festivities: Suppose," he says, "Christmas now approaching; the evergreen ivy trimming and adorning the portals and parteloses of so frequented a building; the usual carols, to observe antiquity, cheerfully sounding; and that which is the complement of his inferior comforts, his neighbours, whoni he tenders as members of his own family, join with him in this consort of mirth and melody." At the end of a "Miscellany of Epigrams, &c." published about the same period, is a "Christmas carol," which contains a recital of the pastimes in vogue at that season. This, and similar compositions of the seventeenth century, make, however, no pretension to any religious character; but, in the mean time, others also, of a devotional strain, were in general use. Wharton mentions a license, granted to one Tysdale in 1562, for printing "certain goodly carols to be sung to the glory of GoD;" and again, "Christmas carols authorized by my lord of London." Bishop Andrewes, in one of his sermons on the Nativity, preached on the twentyfifth of December, 1619, celebrates the day as glorious in all places, as well at home with carols as in the church with anthems." From the time of the famous prelate just mentioned to our own, the practice of singing Christmas carols in this kingdom has been preserved; "varying probably in circumstances and degree, but dispersed, more or less, over the different parts of the country.” In Heath's Account of the Scilly Islands, he says that it is usual there to sing carols on Christmas Day at church. Dr. Goldsmith, in his Vicar of Wakefield, writing about 1763, and " 'laying the scene of his narrative at a small cure in the north of England," relates that, among other customs which they retained, the inhabitants "kept up the Christmas carol." Brand, in 1795, remarks, that little troops of boys and girls, at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and other places in the north of England, "go from house to house, knocking at the doors, singing their Christmas carols, and wishing a happy new-year." A writer in 1811, describing the manner in which the inhabitants of the North Riding of Yorkshire celebrate Christmas, observes, "About six o'clock on Christmas day I was awakened by a sweet singing under my window; surprised at a visit so early and unexpected, I arose; and looking out of the window, I beheld six young women and four men, welcoming with sweet music the blessed morn. "Carols," writes Mr. Hone, in 1825, "begin to be spoken

of as not belonging to this century, and few perhaps are aware of the number of these now printed." He adds that he possesses "upwards of ninety, all at this time published annually." Mr. Howitt, in 1838, remarks, that the Christmas carols which were sung about from door to door, for a week at least, not twenty years ago, are rarely heard now in the midland counties. More northward, from the hills of Derbyshire, and the bordering ones of Staffordshire, up through Lancashire, Yorkshire, Northumberland, and Durham, you may frequently meet with them. The custom of Christmas carolling prevails in Ireland to the present time. In Scotland it is unknown. In Wales it is still preserved, to a greater extent, perhaps, than in England. After the turn of midnight on Christmas-eve, Divine service is celebrated, followed by the singing of carols to the harp; and they are similarly sung in the houses during the continuance of the Christmas holidays.

SYMPATHY FOR THE POOR.

J. F. R.

THE delicacies of food and clothing are enjoyed with little concern for those to whom the necessaries of life are scarcely attainable; and it has thus passed into a proverb, that one half of the world knows not what becomes of the other. One of our first moral writers has been pleased to speak in a manner somewhat disrespectful of those moralists and poets, like Thomson, who have noticed and lamented this disposition in the human mind to enjoy its own blessings rather than disquiet itself with the calamities of others. I allude to Adam Smith. But was he well employed on this occasion? It is the province of sympathy to render us alive to the evils of those around us. This he would admit. So is it equally the province of reason and good sense to save the mind from too deep an interest in afflictions which we can neither prevent nor remedy. This we concede on our part. No doubt, therefore, it is the perfection of the human character to be at once equal to its own happiness, and yet sensible to those miseries of our fellowcreatures which its exertions can alleviate. But surely it remains to be remarked, that it is not in any deficiengy to ourselves that human nature offends. This is not the weakness of mankind, or the aspect under which they need be regarded by a moralist with any pain. If there be sometimes found those who are formed of a finer clay, so as really to have the comforts of their own existence diminished and interrupted by sympathizing too long and too quickly with the calamities of those around them, such may surely be considered as exceptions, to be set apart from their fellow-mortals, as those more amiable beings, who are not likely by their example to injure the general cause of reasonable enjoyment in the world; and whom the more natural prevalence of careless selfishness renders it not easy often to find, and surely not very possible long to censure.-Smith's Lectures on History.

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No. 62.]

London Magazine:

A JOURNAL OF ENTERTAINMENT AND INSTRUCTION

FOR GENERAL READING.

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"THE moonlight fell like pity o'er the walls
And broken arches, which the conqueror, Time,
Had rode unto destruction; the grey moss,
A silver cloak, hung lightly o'er the ruins;
And nothing came upon the soul but soft
Sad images. And this was once a palace,
Where the rich viol answered to the lute,
And maidens flung the flowers from their hair
Till the halls swam with perfume: here the dance
Kept time with light harps, and yet lighter feet;
And here the beautiful Mary kept her court,
Where sighs and smiles made her regality,
And dreamed not of the long and many years
When the heart was to waste itself away
In hope, whose anxiousness was as a curse:
Here, royal in her beauty and her power,
The prison and the scaffold, could they be
But things whose very name was not for her?
And this now fallen sanctuary, how oft
Have hymns and incense made it holiness!
How oft, perhaps, at the low midnight hour,
Its once fair mistress may have stolen to pour
At its pure altar, thoughts which have no vent

But deep and silent prayer; when the heart finds
That it may not suffice unto itself,

But seeks communion with that other state,
Whose mystery to it is as a shroud

In which it may conceal its strife of thought,
And find repose.

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But it is utterly changed:
No incense rises, save some chance wild flower
Breathes grateful to the air; no hymn is heard,
No sound, but the bat's melancholy wings;
And all is desolate and solitude.

And thus it is with links of destiny
Clay fastens on with gold, and none may tell
What the chain's next unravelling will be.
Alas! the mockeries in which Fate delights!
Alas! for time-still more,-alas for change!"
LE. L.; in the Literary Gazette.

HOLYROOD, or the Abbey of Holyrood House, is the patriarchal antiquarian pile of Edinburgh. It was, however, founded some three centuries subsequent to the fair city. Simeon of Durham mentions the town of Edwinesburch as existing in the middle of the eighth century; and, in the charter of the foundation of the

VOL. III.

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