WEST’S FIRST PICTURE.

When he was only eight years old, a merchant of Philadelphia, named Pennington, and a cousin of the Wests, was so much pleased with the sketches of little Benjamin, that he sent him a box of paints and pencils, with canvass prepared for the easel, and six engravings by Gribelin. The child was perfectly enraptured with his treasure; he carried the box about in his arms, and took it to his bedside, but could not sleep. He rose with the dawn, carried his canvass and colors to the garret, hung up the engravings, prepared a palette, and commenced work. So completely was he under this species of enchantment, that he absented himself from school, labored secretly and incessantly, and without interruption, for several days, when the anxious inquiries of his schoolmaster introduced his mother into his studio, with no pleasure in her looks. He had avoided copyism, and made a picture, composed from two of the engravings, telling a new story, and colored with a skill and effect which, to her eyes, appeared wonderful. Galt, who wrote West’s life, and had the story from the artist’s own lips, says, “She kissed him with transports of affection, and assured him that she would not only intercede with his father to pardon him for having absented himself from school, but would go herself to the master, and beg that he might not be punished. Sixty-seven years afterwards the writer of these memoirs had the gratification to see this piece, in the same room with the sublime painting of Christ Rejected (West’s brother had sent it to him from Springfield), on which occasion the painter declared to him that there were inventive touches of art in his first and juvenile essay, which, with all his subsequent knowledge and experience, he had not been able to surpass.” A similar story is told of Canova, who visited his native place towards the close of his brilliant career, and looking earnestly at his youthful performances, sorrowfully said, “I have been walking, but not climbing.”