The Innocents Abroad


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done; sustain Thou Thy servant!'"  
The reader can see the picture in any drawing-room; it can be easily  
recognized: the Virgin (the only young and really beautiful Virgin that  
was ever painted by one of the old masters, some of us think,) stands in  
the crescent of the new moon, with a multitude of cherubs hovering about  
her, and more coming; her hands are crossed upon her breast, and upon  
her  
uplifted countenance falls a glory out of the heavens. The reader may  
amuse himself, if he chooses, in trying to determine which of these  
gentlemen read the Virgin's "expression" aright, or if either of them did  
it.  
Any one who is acquainted with the old masters will comprehend how much  
"
The Last Supper" is damaged when I say that the spectator can not really  
tell, now, whether the disciples are Hebrews or Italians. These ancient  
painters never succeeded in denationalizing themselves. The Italian  
artists painted Italian Virgins, the Dutch painted Dutch Virgins, the  
Virgins of the French painters were Frenchwomen--none of them ever put  
into the face of the Madonna that indescribable something which proclaims  
the Jewess, whether you find her in New York, in Constantinople, in  
Paris, Jerusalem, or in the empire of Morocco. I saw in the Sandwich  
Islands, once, a picture copied by a talented German artist from an  
engraving in one of the American illustrated papers. It was an allegory,  
representing Mr. Davis in the act of signing a secession act or some such  
document. Over him hovered the ghost of Washington in warning attitude,  
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