FINE ARTS.

THE CAT RAPHAEL.

Gottfried Mind was born at Bern, in the year 1768. His father, but a short time before, had come in the capacity of joiner and form-cutter into Switzerland from Lipsich, in Upper Hungary, and had fixed his abode at Warblaufen, a village near Bern, where he was chiefly employed for the paper-manufactory of one Herr Gruner, and soon after his arrival purchased the freedom of Pizif, in the Waadtland. Young Mind, on account of his weak constitution of body, was in great measure left to himself, perhaps in the hope of making him healthier and stronger by the cheap and easy means of idle running about. Herr Gruner was a lover of art; during summer he had a German artist, named Legel, in his house, a talented and active man, who often, in country excursions, drew buildings and cattle from nature. This excited the attention of young Mind in some of his idle rambles: he followed Legel every where, and watched him while he worked. Legel, touched with compassion for the poor boy, showed him what he was engaged with, or what he had already finished; and, in the end, would take him along with him in his walks, or amuse him in his own apartment with exhibitions of prints. In particular, he allowed the boy, as often as he liked, to turn over Ridinger's Animals, of which Herr Gruner had a collection; and some of these Mind was not long in trying to imitate with the lead pencil, preferring above all lions, which continued long his favourite animals. These attempts Legel from time to time corrected, and, from less to more, the youngster at length ventured to copy from nature, like his master, and to draw some sheep, goats, and cats.

His father, the joiner, however, thought that to draw on paper was nothing, and wood was the only material on which it was worth one's pains to work. Accordingly, whenever the boy asked paper for drawing, he threw him a bit of wood; so that Gottfried was fain to try also cutting animals in wood, an art in which he speedily attained such dexterity, that, by degrees, his wooden sheep and goats came to ornament all the presses and mantel-pieces in the village. Occasionally, too, he tried drawing likenesses of some peasant boys of Worblaufen, or carving them in wood; and these attempts were not unsuccessful.

It is unknown on whose recommendation Mind, in his eighth year, was placed at the academy for poor children, which Pestalozzi had previously instituted at Neuenhof, near Bern, Aargau; but, in the year 1778, we find, in the authentic account of that institution, published by the Economic Society of Bern, the following short and somewhat clumsily expressed notice:—"Friedly Mynth of Bossi (Mind of Pizy), of the bailliwick of Aubonne, resident in Worblaufen, very weak, incapable of hard work, full of talent for drawing, a strange creature, full of artist-caprices, along with a certain roguishness: drawing is his whole employment: a year and a half here: ten years old." Neither do we know how long he remained at this academy; somewhere between the years 1780 and 1785, he came to the painter, Sigmund Hendenberger, at Bern, a man who had formed himself mostly at Paris in the Boucher school, but afterwards rather inclined to Greuze's style, and who, by his painting of Swiss family pieces, had acquired a considerable sum of money, and a reputation not undeserved. With this person Mind learnt his art of drawing, and colouring with water-colours, &c. but nothing more; in all the other branches of human knowledge he remained at the lowest grade; for he could with difficulty be made to write his name, and he had not the slightest idea of arithmetic. Thus, for example:—once, when he had to pay the postman six kreuzers for a letter, and Madame Freudenberger gave him the money in two silver pieces, he positively refused to take them and carry them down, affirming that two pieces were not enough; and, though his mistress assured him that these were equal in value to six kreuzers, still he persisted in his refusal, and went on grumbling until the six kreuzers, one by one, were counted into his hand. This ignorance and helplessness his master was not slow to take advantage of, so that poor Mind never once thought of looking about him for a better place. From his entrance into Freudenberger's house up to the time of his death, there is nothing to tell of him except that he spent his whole life on the selfsame stool, busied in colouring Freudenberger's sheets so long as he was alive, and, after his death, in drawing and painting, after his own fancy, bears, cats, and children at play, for the benefit of the widow, with the same pitiful day's wages which he had formerly received from his master. Many artists, after Freudenberger's death, would gladly have taken poor Mind into their service, but, like his beloved cats, he was so attached to the house, to his corner and its appurtenances, that he constantly turned a deaf ear to such proposals; and, at last, when Madame Freudenberger began to notice that the people wished to buy away her Friedli from her, she would not let them come near him; and only at rare times, and by way of special favour, allowed a few acquaintances, whom she could depend on, to visit him in her presence. She used, for the most part, to sit beside him herself, with her knitting implements, spurring him on to work. When he had to copy any of his drawings, he usually sketched the outline of them against the glass of the window; and if, on these occasions, it chanced that some boy, cat, dog, or other street passenger he might think worth looking at, withdrew his eye for a moment from the work, his taskmistress failed not to squall forth—"Gaping out again! Not a bit of work done all day! Sit down with thee! Mind thy paper, and give over spying!" How meanly he was kept in regard to clothing—how he had to sleep, for his life long, in a child's bed, far too short for him, for want of a straw mattress—and how, under such continual toil and miserable constraint, he at last sank, and died of water in the chest, it is now needless to say or to lament. We turn, rather, to the more pleasing contemplation of what Mind, in this most unfavourable situation, nevertheless succeeded in performing, and rendering himself as an artist.

On Sundays and winter nights, Mind, by way of pastime, used, out of dried, wild chestnuts, to carve little cats, bears, and other beasts, and this with so much art that these little dainty toys were shortly in no less request than his drawings. It is a pity that insects, such as frequently exist in the interior of chestnuts, have already destroyed so many of these carvings.

At the Barengraben (bear-yard) in Bern, where a few live bears are always to be seen, Mind passed many a happy hour; and, between the beasts and him there seemed to prevail a singularly confidential feeling. The moment Friedli—such was the name Mind was best known by in Bern—made his appearance, the bears hastened towards him with friendly grumbling, stationed themselves on their hind feet, and received, impartially, each a piece of bread or an apple out of his pocket. For this reason, bears, next to cats, were a favourite subject of his art; and he reckoned himself, not unjustly, better able to delineate these animals than even celebrated painters have been. Moreover, next to his intercourse with living cats and bears, Mind's greatest joy was in looking at objects of art, especially copper-plates, in which, too, animal figures gave him most satisfaction.

Herr Sigmund Wagner, of Bern, who possesses a choice collection of copper-plates, frequently invited Mind, on winter Sunday evenings, to his house, and would then show him his volumes. While Herr Wagner might be writing, reading, or drawing, Mind, grumbled to himself half-aloud, made his remarks on each sheet, and frequently gave a true, stubborn, rugged judgment even on the most celebrated masters, especially on pictures of animals; for, among these, nothing pleased him but the lions of Rubens, of Rembrandt, and Potter, and the stags of Kidinger; the other animals of the latter he declared to be falsely drawn. Even the most applauded cats of Cornelius Vischer and Wenzel Hollar could not obtain his approbation. After such picture-reviewing he used to drink tea with Herr Wagner; and it seemed as if the baked ware presented therewith was somewhat to his taste. Such evenings were, to a certain extent, his heaven upon earth; nevertheless, he sometimes replied to Herr Wagner's invitation with a "could not come—his Busi (puss) was sick—he must stay with her." Another time he signified "that Busi was like to have kittens to-day, and so it was impossible to leave her."

Mind seldom drew from Nature; at most he did it with a few strokes. His conception was so strong, that whatever he had once strictly observed, stamped itself so firmly in his memory that, on his return home, and often a considerable time afterwards, he could represent it with entire fidelity. On such occasions he would look now and then, as it were, into himself; and when at these moments, he lifted his head, his eyes had something dreamy in them.

An increasing disorder in the breast had put him past all exertion for the space of a year; and, on the 17th of November, 1814, a paroxysm of his malady carried him off, in the 46th year of his age.

Foreign Review.

THE COLISEUM, REGENT'S PARK,

Will be opened in about four months. Our readers are aware that it will present a Panoramic View of London, taken from the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral, and imitated in a bungling manner in a recent pantomime at Covent Garden Theatre. The picture covers 40,000 square feet, or nearly an acre of canvass; the dome of the building on which the sky is painted, is 30 feet more in diameter than the cupola of St. Paul's; and the circumference of the horizon visible from the point of view, is nearly 130 miles. "The Coliseum" is evidently a misnomer, since the building is very similar to the Pantheon at Rome; but we perceive by a letter from the proprietor, that its proper designation is the "Colosseum."

MR. HAYDON

Has just finished a companion to his admirable picture of the Mock Election in the King's Bench, viz. the Chairing of the Members. The first-mentioned is now in the king's collection at Windsor.