company with three or four small pictures, a large picture of Gaston de Foix after the Battle of Ravenna.  It was a sombre picture, painted with that lavish use of pigment and that unrestrained freedom which distinguished the innovators of that day.  The new school were in raptures, and claimed Scheffer as belonging to them.  The public judged less favorably; “they admired the noble head of Gaston de Foix, but, uninterested in the remainder of the picture, they turned off to look at ‘The Soldier’s Widow.’” Scheffer did not listen to his flatterers; but, remembering Michel Angelo’s words to the young sculptor, “The light of the public square will test its value,” he believed in the verdict of the people, and never again painted in the same manner.  It was one of his peculiar merits, that, although open to conviction, and ready to try a new path which seemed to offer itself, he was also ready to turn from it when he found it leading him astray.  “Les Femmes Suliotes” did not seem to have been designed by the same hand or with the same pencil as the “Gaston de Foix.”  The first sketch was particularly pleasing,—­already clear and harmonious in color, although rather low in tone.  Many counselled him to leave the picture, thus.  “No,” said Scheffer, “I did not take a large canvas merely to increase the size of my figures and to paint large in water-colors, but to give greater truth and thoroughness to my forms.”  In 1827 this picture was exhibited with ample success, and the critics were forced to acknowledge the great improvement in his style, although he had not entirely escaped from the influence of his companions, and some violent contrasts of color mar the general effect.  The picture is now in the Luxembourg Gallery.

M. Vitet divides Scheffer’s artistic life into three portions:  that in which he painted subjects from simple life; that devoted to poetic subjects; and the last, or distinctively religious period.  These divisions cannot, of course, be very sharply drawn, but may help us to understand the progress of his mind; and “Les Femmes Suliotes” will mark the transition from the first to the second period.  Turning from the simple scenes of domestic sorrow, he now sought inspiration in literature.  The vigorous and hearty Northern Muse especially won his favor; yet the greatest Italian poet was also his earnest study.  Goethe, Schiller, Byron, Dante, all furnished subjects for his pencil.  The story of Faust and Margaret took such hold of his imagination that it pursued him for nearly thirty years.  Their forms appeared before him in new attitudes and situations almost to his last hour, so that, in the midst of his labors on religious pictures, he seized his pencils to paint yet another Faust, another Margaret.  Nor can we wonder at this absorbing interest, when we reflect on the profound significance and touching pathos of this theme, which may wear a hundred faces, and touch every chord of the human heart.  It is intellect and passion, in contrast with innocence