These notes for the "Art Journal" were so written; and I like
them myself, of course; but ask the reader's pardon for their
confusedness.
135. "Sir, it cannot be better done."
We will insist, with the reader's permission, on this comfortful saying
of Albert Duerer's in order to find out, if we may, what Modesty is; which
it will be well for painters, readers, and especially critics, to know,
before going farther. What it is; or, rather, who she is, her fingers
being among the deftest in laying the ground-threads of Aglaia's cestus.
For this same opinion of Albert's is entertained by many other people
respecting their own doings--a very prevalent opinion, indeed, I find it;
and the answer itself, though rarely made with the Nuremberger's crushing
decision, is nevertheless often enough intimated, with delicacy, by
artists of all countries, in their various dialects. Neither can it
always be held an entirely modest one, as it assuredly was in the man who
would sometimes estimate a piece of his unconquerable work at only the
worth of a plate of fruit, or a flask of wine--would have taken even one
"fig for it," kindly offered; or given it royally for nothing, to show
his hand to a fellow-king of his own, or any other craft--as Gainsborough
gave the "Boy at the Stile" for a solo on the violin.
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