IX. THE FEASTS OF THE VANDALS 403

and Granada; of all which I continually heard as the most beautiful and wonderful scenery and architecture of the European world; and in the very midst of which-in the heart of Andalusia, and on the very battle-field of Xeres de la Frontera which gave the Arab his dominion in Spain-I might have been adopted by my father’s partner to reign over his golden vineyards, and write the histories of the first Caliphs of Arabia and the Catholic Kings of Spain.

It chanced, however,-or mischanced,-for better or worse, that in the meantime I knew no more the histories of either Arabia or Spain than Robinson Crusoe or his boy Xury; that the absolutely careful and faithful work of David Roberts showed me the inconstructive and merely luxurious character of Spanish and Arab buildings; and that the painter of greatest power, next to Turner, in the English school, J. F. Lewis, rendered the facts of existing Andalusian life so vividly, as to leave me no hope of delighting or distinguishing myself in any constant relations either with its gaiety or its pride.

174. Looking back to my notices of these and other contemporary artists in the paragraphs added to the first volume of Modern Painters,¹ when I corrected its sheets at Sestri di Levante, in 1846, I find the display of my new Italian information, and assertion of critical acumen, prevail sorrowfully over the expressions of gratitude with which I ought to have described the help and delight they had given me. Now, too late, I can only record with more than sorrow the passing away from the entire body of men occupied in the arts, of the temper in which these men worked. It is-I cannot count how many years, since, on all our walls of recklessly ambitious display, I have seen one drawing of any place loved for its own sake, or understood with unselfish intelligence. Whether men themselves, or their buildings, or the scenery in which they live, the

¹ [In the third edition: the alterations were mainly in part ii. sec. i. ch. vii.; see Vol. III. pp. xlii., 195 n.]

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