and at none of these repositories are the attendants permitted to lay any contributions on the visitants.  The gallery of the Louvre was built by Henry IV. to join that palace with the Tuilleries, from which it was formerly separated, by the walls which surrounded Paris.  This vast gallery is two hundred toises in length (not a great deal short of a quarter of an English mile); the collection of works of art here in without any parallel, as in this place are assembled most of the finest paintings and statues in the world, which the most indifferent must survey with admiration.  But at the same time, it is impossible not to feel a portion of regret at the causes which have robbed Italy of those monuments, which its inhabitants so well knew how to appreciate, and for many of which they entertained a religious veneration, as the ornaments of their churches.

The French, as far as I am able to judge, do not (in general) possess any such feeling of sensibility, and merely value these chefs d’oeuvre because their merit is allowed to be incontestable, and because their vanity is flattered, in seeing them thus collected by their victories as an additional attraction for strangers to visit their capital.

But Italy, although thus despoiled of so many of her ornaments, will still have many and great attractions for the man of taste; her buildings exhibit the finest specimens of art that are any where remaining; and those possessed of a classic genius will always behold with delight the scenes celebrated by a Horace or a Virgil.  The paintings in this gallery exceed 1200 in number; they are divided into three classes, the first contains the French school, the second the German, and the third the Italian.  Catalogues and descriptions of the paintings may be had at the doors.  I often visited this gallery, and always with increased admiration.  I shall not attempt to enter into any details as to the respective excellence of the different paintings.  Volumes have been written on the subject, and my testimony could add nothing to excellence which is acknowledged by all—­by those who have not seen, on the reports of those who have visited this splendid assemblage, who, having seen, have not failed to admire, and to give currency to their admiration.  The following lines on Raphael, will be readily admitted as just by those who have seen some of his sublime pictures: 

    Hic ille est Raphael, timuit quo sospite vinci,
    Rerum magna parens, et moriente mori.

    Here Raphael lies, who could with nature vie,
    To him she feared to yield, with him to die.

Although I thought my admiration had been so largely called forth by the pictures I had just visited, as to have been almost exhausted, yet the distinguished excellence of the statues did not fail to rekindle it; and indeed it is impossible it should have been otherwise, when surrounded by such admirable specimens of art.—­The number bears its due proportion to that of the pictures, and the same reasons which induced me to say little of them, will prevent my dilating on the excellence of the statues—­