The idea of Purgatory, he told me, was suggested by a vision or dream related by St. Catherine of Genoa, in which she beheld a great number of men and women shut up in a dark cavern; angels descending from heaven, liberate them from time to time, and they are borne away one after another from darkness, pain, and penance, into life and light—again to behold the face of their Maker—reconciled and healed. In his picture, Schadow has represented two angels bearing away a liberated soul. Below in the fore-ground groups of sinners are waiting, sadly, humbly, but not unhopefully, the term of their bitter penance. Among these he had placed a group of artists and poets who, led away by temptation, had abused their glorious gifts to wicked or worldly purposes;—Titian, Ariosto, and, rather to my surprise, the beautiful, lamenting spirit of Byron. Then, what was curious enough, as types of ambition, Lady Macbeth and her husband, who, it seems, were to be ultimately saved, I do not know why—unless for the love of Shakespeare. Hell, like all the hells I ever saw, was a failure. There was the usual amount of fire and flames, dragons and serpents, ghastly, despairing spirits, but nothing of original or powerful conception. When I looked in Schadow’s face, so beautiful with benevolence, I wondered _how_ he could—but in truth he could _not_—realise to himself the idea of a hell; all the materials he had used were borrowed and common-place. But among his cartoons for pictures already painted, there was one charming idea of quite a different kind. It was for an altar, and he called it “THE FOUNTAIN OF LIFE.” Above, the sacrificed Redeemer lies extended in his mother’s arms. The pure abundant Waters of Salvation, gushing from the rock beneath their feet, are received into a great cistern. Saints, martyrs, teachers of the truth, are standing round, drinking or filling their vases, which they present to each other. From the cistern flows a stream, at which a family of poor peasants are drinking with humble, joyful looks; and as the stream divides and flows away through flowery meadows, little sportive children stoop to drink of it, scooping up the water in their tiny hands, or sipping it with their rosy smiling lips. A beautiful and significant allegory beautifully expressed, and as intelligible to the people as any in the “Pilgrim’s Progress.” [Illustration] 135. Haydon discussed “High Art” as if it depended solely on the knowledge and the appreciation of _form_. In this lay his great mistake. Form is but the vehicle of the highest art. [Illustration] 136.