in whose company there is nothing to call forth a congeniality, a sympathy; and it is probable that Gainsborough felt as little disposed as Sir Joshua, to preserve, or even to seek, an intimacy.  Their final parting at the deathbed of Gainsborough was most honourable to them both; and the merit of seeking it was entirely Gainsborough’s.  It is singular that any facts should be so perverted, as to justify an insinuation that Reynolds, whose whole life exhibited the continued acts of a kind heart, was a cautious and cold calculator.  Good sense has ever a reserve of manner, the result of a habit of thinking—­and in one of a high aim, it is apt to acquire almost a stateliness; but even such stateliness is not inconsistent with modesty and with feeling; it is, in fact, the carriage of the mind, seen in the manner and the person.  We make these remarks under a disgust produced by the singularly illiberal Life of Reynolds by Allan Cunningham; we think we should not err in saying, that it is maliciously written.  We were reading this Life, and made many indignant remarks as we read, when the death of the author was announced in the newspapers.  We had determined, as far as our power might extend, to rescue the name and fame of Reynolds from the mischief which so popular a writer as Allan Cunningham was likely to inflict.  Death has its sanctity, and we hesitated; indeed, in regret for the loss of a man of talent, we felt for a time little disposed to think of the ill he may have done; nor was, on mature consideration, the regret less, that he could not, by our means, be called to review his own work—­his “Lives of the British Painters”—­in a more candid spirit than that in which they appear to have been written.  It is to be lamented that he did not revise it.  Its illiberality and untruth render it very unfit for a “Family Library,” for which it was composed.  Yet it must be confessed, that such regret was rather one of momentary feeling, than accompanied with any thing like conviction, or even hope, that our endeavour would have been successful.  There was no one better acquainted with the life of one of the painters in his work than ourselves.  His Life, too, was written in a most illiberal spirit, though purposely in praise of the artist.  But it was as untrue as it was illiberal.  In a paper in Blackwood, some years ago, we noticed some of the errors and mistatements.  This, we happen to know, was seen by the author of the “Lives;” for we were, in consequence, applied to upon the subject; and there being an intention expressed to bring out a new edition, we were invited to correct what was wrong.  We did not hesitate, and wrote some two or three letters for the purpose, and entertained but little doubt of their having been favourably received, and that they would be used, until we were surprised by a communication, that the author “was much obliged, but was perfectly satisfied with his own account.”  That is, that he was much obliged for an endeavour to mislead him by falsehood.