MOSES TRAMPLING ON THE CROWN OF PHARAOH.

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and, on his return to Paris, was elected a member of the academy of Painters; but the attraction which Rome possesses to artists, soon induced him to revisit that city, where he married a woman endowed with talents and virtue, and a mind congenial to his own. Some time after, he settled in Florence, where his wife died.-Gauffier, whose health had been long on the decline, was unable to sustain a shock so disastrous, and two months after, followed her to the tomb, being then only thirty-eight years old. His best works are at Paris, among which may be reckoned, his "Alexander recommending secresy to Hephaestion;" "The Ladies of Rome offering their Jewels and Ornaments for the Benefit of the State;" "Laban and Rachel;" &c.

MOSES TRAMPLING ON THE CROWN OF PHARAOH. (Painted by N. Poussin.)

To Josephus, the celebrated Jewish historian, is Poussin indebted for the subject of this picture. This author, zealous for the glory of his nation, has introduced in the life of the law-giver of the Jews, circumstances which had been transmitted to him by tradition, but which are not manifest in the Holy Scriptures. He relates that Thermutis, the daughter of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, after the preservation of Moses on the banks of the river, caused him to be suckled by her mother Jocabed, and became strongly attached to the child. She one day presented him to the king, observing that she had adopted him, and beheld in him already the successor of his house. The monarch, flattered with this idea, placed on the head of Moses his royal bandeau, when the infant indignantly tore it from his brow, and trampled it under foot.

The king is seated on a couch of the antique form, and betrays considerable astonishment at what he beholds. The princess, and several of her attendants, join in the surprise of the king, yet seem solicitous about the child. One of them snatches him in her arms, and is seen protecting the child from the enraged eunuch, who, with a dagger, is desirous of revenging the insult offered to his master. Three old men are near the king, absorbed in reflection on what they have observed, and appear to augur, from the action of Moses, the most sinister predictions. The scene is represented as passing in a rich apartment.

At a first glance the original picture has nothing in it attractive. The carnations through the ravage of time, present now only sombre or livid tints. The general effect is wholly destroyed, since certain colours, such as the red drapery of the king, and the yellow mantle of the old man, retain much vivacity, while others have more or less a dark appearance.

But when this first impression subsides, and the picture is examined with the attention befitting its merits, all those essential features of the art which placed Poussin in the rank of our first painters, may be easily recognised. The composition is masterly, each figure has a determined motive. The expressions are admirably just, and equally removed from insipidity and exaggeration. The design is uniformly correct, the heads are from the finest models, and the draperies admirably adjusted. In a word, in the general effect, as in the details and accessaries, that severe, pure, and refined taste, which pervades the compositions of Poussin, is in this picture eminently displayed.

ICHAEL AMERIGI ANGELO DA CARAVAGGIO was born at Caravaggio, a village in the Milanese, in 1569. He was the son of a mason, and was employed when a boy to prepare the plaster for the fresco painters at Milan. The habit of seeing them work inspired him with the ambition of becoming an artist; and without the instruction of any particular manner, he attached himself to a faithful imitation of nature, and formed for himself a style, which, from its singularity, and a striking effect of light and shadow, became extremely popular. For a few years he confined himself to painting fruit, flowers, and portraits, which were much admired for the fidelity of their resemblance. Such was his rigid adherence to the precise imitation of his model, that he copied nature even in her deformities, and he afterwards continued the same slavish mechanism in the higher department of historical painting. He passed the early part of his life at Venice, where he greatly improved his colouring by studying the works of Giorgione; and the pictures painted in his first manner are infinitely preferable in point of colour to his latter works. On leaving Venice he went to Rome, where his first performances were executed in conjunction with Cavilliere Guiseppe Cesari. The novelty of his manner both pleased and surprised, and his works soon became so generally the objects of public admiration, that some of the greatest artists then in Rome were induced to imitate, without approving, the new style of Michael Angelo. Guido and Domenichino, to gratify a corrupt public taste, were for some time under the necessity of abandoning their suavity and their grace, to follow the vulgar though vigorous trickery of Caravaggio. This infatuation did not, however, continue long; the attractions of the grand and the beautiful resumed their dominion over public opinion. The merit of Caravaggio is confined to colour, to an extraordinary effect, produced by a daring contrast of light and shadow; which only belongs to nature in abstracted situations. To give it veracity, we must suppose the light to proceed from a partial and prescribed aperture, which alone can sustain the illusion. He seldom ventured on works that required the arrangement of a grand composition, to which his want of academic study rendered him totally inadequate; he contented himself with