in men and women for that comprehension of one another; for that sympathy in tastes, habits, and feelings; for that mental and moral approximation, without which, true companionship, oneness of life and being, is impossible? "It is," says Mrs. Jameson, in her Communion of Labor,' "a serious objection to present modes of education in both sexes, that nothing is done with the important aim of enabling them to understand each other, and work together harmoniously and trustfully in after-life.” We shall, at some future time, return to this subject, and endeavour to place before our readers the thoughts of our best writers upon it. The thought of one half century becomes the action of another; the mass grow up to the few. Let woman put her shoulder to the slowly revolving wheel of progression, and she need not fear to be left behind, nor to be refused the countenance of her fellow-worker, man. There is a strength in unity, which, as far as the male and female element is concerned, the world has yet to test.

XXXII-ROSA BONHEUR.

AN AUTHORISED MEMOIR.

Ar the southern end of the Rue d' Assas,-half made up of extensive gardens, the tops of whose trees alone are visible above their high stone walls,-just where this retired and quiet street, as it meets the Rue de Vaugirard, widens into a sort of irregular little square, surrounded by sleepy-looking old-fashioned houses, and looked down upon by the shining gray roofs and belfry of an ancient Carmelite Convent, is a green garden door, surmounted by the number" 32," which door, though not in itself distinguishable from hundreds of other green doors in Paris, is yet especially interesting to lovers of art, as giving admission to the pleasant precincts of the sanctum, from whose busy privacy have issued those chef d'œuvres, which have carried the name of the authoress of "The Horse Market," and "Haymaking," through the length and breadth of the civilised world, as the synonym of realistic vigour and poetic grace.

Our ring at the bell being answered by the friendly barkings of one or two dogs, and the opening of the door by the sober-suited serving-man whom they accompany, we find ourselves in a garden full of embowering trees; the house itself-a long, cosy, irregular building, standing at right angles with the street-being covered with vines, honeysuckles, and clematis, from one end to the other.

A part of the garden is laid out in flower-beds; but the greater portion of it-fenced off with a green paling, gravelled, and containing several sheds-is given up to the animals kept by the artist as her models; an honor shared at the present time by a horse, a

donkey, four or five goats and sheep of different breeds, ducks, cochin-chinas, and other denizens of the barn-yard, who live together in perfect amity and goodwill.

On fine days, one sometimes finds the artist, in a wide-awake or a sun-bonnet, seated on a rustic chair inside the paling, busily sketching some one of these animals; but more frequently,—if we have taken care to present ourselves on a Friday afternoon, the only time when it is possible to gain access to the divinity of the place, invisible to mortal eyes during the rest of the week-we are ushered through glass doors into the hall, with paintings on the walls, orange trees and oleanders standing in green tubs in the corners, and the floor (since the artist crossed the Channel!) covered with English oil-cloth. From this hall a few stairs, simply covered with thick grey drugget, bring us to the atelier, which on Fridays is turned into a reception-room.

This beautiful studio, one of the largest and most finely-proportioned in Paris, with its greenish-grey walls, and plain green curtains to lofty windows that never let in daylight—the room being lighted entirely from the ceiling-is one of the most charming apartments anywhere to be found. All the woodwork is of dark oak, as are also the bookcase, tables, chairs, and other articles of furniture-richly carved, but otherwise of most severe simplicitydistributed about the room. The walls are covered with paintings, sketches, casts, old armour, fishing-nets, rude baskets and pouches, poles, gnarled and twisted vine-branches, picturesque hats, cloaks and sandals collected by the artist in her wanderings among the peasants of various regions, nondescript draperies, bones and skins of animals, antlers and horns. The fine old bookcase contains fully as many casts, skeletons, and curiosities, as books, and is surmounted with as many busts, groups in plaster, shields, and other artistic booty, as its top can accommodate; and the great Gothiclooking stone at the upper end of the room is covered in the same way with little casts and bronzes. Paintings of all sizes, and in every stage of progress, are seen on easels at the lower end of the room; our artist always working at several at a time. Stands of portfolios, and stacks of canvas, line the sides of the studio; birds are chirping in cages of various dimensions, and a magnificent parrot eyes you suspiciously from the top of a lofty perch. Scattered over the floor-as bright as waxing can make it—are skins of tigers, oxen, leopards, and foxes; the only species of floor-covering admitted by the artist into her work-room. "They give me ideas" she says of these favorite appurtenances, "whereas the most costly and luxurious carpet is suggestive of nothing."

But the suggestion of picturesque associations is not the only service occasionally rendered to the artist by these spoils of the fourfooted members of the animal kingdom. I remember going to call on her, one sultry Friday afternoon, two or three summers ago, rather earlier than her usual reception hour, and finding her lying

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fast asleep, under the long table at the upper end of the studio, on her favorite skin, that of a magnificent ox, with stuffed head and spreading horns, her head resting lovingly on that of the animal. She had come in very tired, from her weekly review of the classes at the School of Design, had thrown herself down on the skin under the shade of the table with the intention of resting there for a few minutes, and had fallen asleep. There was so much natural grace and simplicity in her attitude, such an evident innocence and peacefulness in her whole appearance, and so much of the startled child in her expression as-roused by the opening and shutting of the doɔr behind me—she suddenly awoke and started to her feet, that, sorry as I was to have broken in upon her pleasant nap, I could hardly regret the chance which had shown me so charming a little picture.

Such is the "whereabout" in which Rosa Bonheur receives her guests, with the frankness, kindness, and unaffected simplicity by which she is so eminently distinguished. She is small in person, rather under middle height, with a finely-formed head, and broad rather than high forehead; small, well defined, regular features, and good teeth; hazel eyes, very clear and bright; dark-brown hair, slightly wavy, parted on one side, and cut short in the neck; a compact, shapely figure; true artist's hands, small, delicate, and nervous; and extremely pretty little feet. She dresses very plainly, the only colors worn by her being black, brown, or grey; and her costume consisting invariably of a close-fitting jacket and skirt of simple materials. On the rare occasions when she goes into company-for she lives very retiredly, accepting but few of the inumerable invitations with which she is assailed-she appears in the same simple costume, of richer materials, with the addition merely of a lace collar. She wears none of the usual articles of feminine adornment; not from contempt of them, but simply because the elegant trifles so dear to womankind are so utterly foreign to her thoughts and occupations, that even to put them on, would be, to her, a forced and unnatural proceeding. When at her easel, she wears a sort of round pinafore or blouse of gray linen, that envelopes her from the neck to the feet.

Rosa Bonheur impresses you, at first sight, as a clear, honest, vigorous, independent nature; abrupt, yet kindly; original, selfcentred, and decided, without the least pretension or conceit; but it is only when you have seen her conversing earnestly and heartily, her enthusiasm roused by some topic connected with her art, or with the great humanitary questions of the day, when you have watched her kindling eyes, her smile, at once so sweet, so beaming, and so keen, her expressive features irradiated, as it were, with an inner light, that you begin to perceive how very beautiful she really is.

To know how upright and how truthful she is, how single-minded in her devotion to her art, how simple and unassuming, fully conscious of the dignity of her artistic power, but respecting it rather

as a talent committed to her keeping, than as a quality personal to herself, you must also have been admitted to something more than the ordinary courtesy of a reception day. While, if you would know how noble and self-sacrificing she has been, not only to every member of her own family, but to others possessing no claim on her kindness but such as that kindness gave them, you must learn it from those who have shared her bounty, for you will never know a word of it from herself.

In the amplest biography of a living celebrity, much that would show the nobleness of a character in the most striking light can not, for obvious reasons, be given to the public; and in the case of the artist, of whose life the present sketch will offer a brief outline, her rooted dislike to being written about will continue to prevent many interesting particulars from becoming known, which might otherwise have fallen under the pens of industrious biographers. But should the intention of writing, for publication after her death, a memoir that shall really set forth the inner personal life of the artist, be carried into execution by, perhaps the only person who from her position, and her long and intimate connexion with the minutest details of the artist's life, is competent to do justice to the subject, those who come after us will learn, from the instructive lessons of a life replete with noble teachings, that the great painter, whose fame will go down to coming ages as one of the brightest glories of the present, was as admirable a woman as she was gifted as an artist, and that her moral worth was no less transcendant than her genius.

Rosalie Bonheur, as she is styled in her acte de naissance, was born in Bordeaux, on the 16th of March, 1822. Her father, Oscar Raymond Bonheur, a young painter of great promise, who had several times carried off the highest honours at the exhibitions of his native town, but whose talent and good looks formed his only patrimony, devoted part of his time to giving drawing lessons in several families of the place, as a means of supporting his aged parents, who were entirely dependent on his exertions for support. Among his pupils was Mademoiselle Sophie Marquès, a beautiful, accomplished, and amiable girl, between whom and the handsome young drawing-master, there soon sprang up a mutual attachment, which though opposed by the young lady's family on account of his poverty-resulted in their marriage. But the lady's family proved inexorable, and the young couple were thrown entirely on their own resources. Four children-Rosalie, Auguste, Isidore, and Julietta -followed this union, and Raymond Bonheur, who had produced some pictures that had attracted attention in Paris, was compelled to sacrifice his dreams of fame to the humbler necessity of providing bread for his family, and abandoning the higher labors of his art, devoted himself, almost exclusively, for eight years, to the teaching of drawing.

At this period, Rosalie, or as she has always called herself, Rosa Bonheur, was a wild, active, impetuous child, impatient of every

species of confinement or constraint, always in motion, and who, could she have had her own way, would have been always in the open air. From her earliest years, she was remarkable for her affectionate and generous disposition, but she abhorred her lessons, and was a prodigious time in acquiring even the elements of reading and writing. When not in the fields she was sure to be in the garden; and one of her earliest remembrances is that of a grey parrot, a household pet belonging to her grandfather, who would frequently call out "Rosa! Rosa!" in a voice so exactly like her mother's, that the child, who always slipped off into the garden. when she thought her mother was going to make her repeat her catechism, would return to the house, supposing that her mother had called her. The mother, seeing the truant arrive, would seize the opportunity of making her go through with the unwelcome recital; and Rosa, as soon as the lesson was over, would scold the bird angrily for the trick it had played her, and threaten it with direful vengeance if it ever took her in again. But if Rosa hated her books, she dearly loved all natural objects, and was the happiest of creatures when rambling in wood or meadow, watching the clouds, luxuriating in the sunshine and breeze, and gathering posies as big as herself. At that time her complexion, now so browned by the sun, was extremely fair, and her cheeks were as red as roses; her hair, of a light, reddish brown, curled naturally all over her head; and she was so plump that the Spanish poet, Moratia, who then resided in Bordeaux, and generally spent his evenings at Raymond Bonheur's, used to call her "Ma boule ronde." The celebrated poet, who had been the intimate friend of the last great Spanish painter, Gaya, had been banished by the government of Madrid for having chaunted the praises of the French invasion in 1808.

He

had conceived a great affection for Raymond Bonheur and his family, the "round ball" being his particular favourite; and he would romp with the merry and vigorous child for hours together, enjoying her frolics, and laughing over the rude figures which she was fond of cutting out of paper with her scissors. Rosa's childish activities prompting her to endeavour to imitate whatever she saw going on around her, her fondness for cutting out these figures, and the delight she took in amusing herself with the objects in father's. studio-drawing rough outlines on the walls, or burying her little fat hands in the clay, and making grotesque attempts at modelling -attracted no special attention, but were regarded by her family as being one of the many issues through which her restless desire of doing found vent. But there was nothing of the precocious genius. about her; the old poet augured much from the boldness, vigour, and originality of her nature, and frequently prophecied that his. little favorite would turn out to be, in some way or other, a remarkable woman."

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The enforced obscurity to which he found himself condemned was necessarily irksome to an artist like Raymond Bonheur, conscious of