"It was impossible to think of such a genius in captivity, without
mysterious associations of the sky, the sea, the rock, and the
solitude with which he was enveloped, I never imagined him but as if
musing at dawn, or melancholy at sun-set, listening at midnight to the
beating and roaring of the Atlantic, or meditating as the stars gazed
and the moon shone on him: in short Napoleon never appeared to me but
at those moments of silence and twilight, when nature seems to
sympathize with the fallen and when if there be moments fit, in this
turbulent earth, for celestial intercourse, one must imagine these
would be the moments immortal spirits might select to descend within
the sphere of mortality, to soothe and comfort, to inspire and support
the afflicted.
"Under such impressions the present picture was produced,--I imagined
him standing on the brow of an impending cliff and musing on his past
fortunes,--imagined sea birds screaming at his feet,--the sun just
down,--the sails of his guard ship glittering on the horizon, and the
Atlantic, calm, silent, awfully deep, and endlessly extensive.
"I tried it in a small sketch, and it was instantly purchased,--I
published a print and the demand is now and has been incessant; a
commission for a picture the full size of life, from one well known as
the friend of artists and patron of art followed, and thus I have
ventured to think a conception so unexpectedly popular might, on this
enlarged scale, not be uninteresting to the public.
Pages:
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27