Studied three statues half an hour
each--the Venus Victrix, Polyhymnia, and Gladiateur Combattant. The
first is mutilated; but if _disarmed_ she conquers all hearts,
what would she achieve in full panoply? As to the Gladiator, I noted
as follows on my catalogue: A pugilist; antique, brown with age;
attitude, leaning forward; left hand raised on guard, right hand
thrown out back, ready to strike a side blow; right leg bent; straight
line from the head to the toe of left foot; muscles and veins most
vividly revealed in intense development; a wonderful _petrifaction,_ as
if he had been smitten to stone at the instant of striking.
Here are antique mosaics, in which colored stones seem liquefied,
realizing the most beautiful effects of painting--quadrigae, warriors,
arms, armor, vases, streams, all lifelike. Ascending to the hall of
French paintings I spent an hour in studying one picture--La Meduse,
by Gericault. It is a shipwrecked crew upon a raft in mid ocean. I
gazed until all surrounding objects disappeared, and I was alone upon
the wide Atlantic. Those transparent emerald waves are no fiction;
they leap madly, hungering for their prey.
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