The sculptor, the painter, the engraver, has each, in his own department, peculiar difficulties to overcome; but these for the most part are such as skill or manual dexterity will enable him to vanquish. He has not to do with a mighty power that opposes itself to his human strength, and strives for the mastery. He has not to combat an element which he purposely rouses into fury, and then subjugates to his will. But the caster in metal has to do all this. He flings into the furnace heaps of brass--cannon upon cannon, as though they were leaden toys; and he lights a fire, and fans and feeds the flames, till within that roaring hollow there is a glow surpassing what we have yet seen of fire, and growing white from very intensity. Anew it is plied with fuel, fed, gorged. The fire itself seems convulsed and agonized with its own efforts; but still it roars on. Day by day, and night after night, with not a moment's relaxation, is this fiery work carried on. The air is hot to breathe; the walls, the rafters, are scorched, and if the ordeal last much longer, all will soon be in a blaze. The goaded creature becomes maddened and desperate, and is striving to burst its prison; while above it a molten metal sea, seething and fiery, is heaving with its ponderous weight against the caldron's sides! Lest it be thought this picture is too highly colored, or that it owes any thing to the imagination for its interest, let us look into the foundry of Munich, and see what was going on there at midnight on the 11th of October 1845. When King Louis I. had formed the resolution of erecting a colossal statue of Bavaria, it was Schwanthaler whom he charged to execute the work. The great artist's conception responded to the idea which had grown in the mind of the king, and in three years' time a model in clay was formed, sixty-three feet in height, the size of the future bronze statue. The colossus was then delivered over to the founder, to be cast in metal. The head was the first large portion that was executed. While the metal was preparing for the cast, a presentiment filled the master's mind that, despite his exact reckoning, there might still be insufficient materials for the work, and thirty cwt. were added to the half-liquid mass. The result proved how fortunate had been the forethought: nothing could be more successful. And now the chest of the figure was to be cast, and the master conceived the bold idea of forming it in one piece. Those who have seen thirty or forty cwt. of metal rushing into the mould below, have perhaps started back affrighted at the fiery stream. But 400 cwt. were requisite for this portion of the statue; and the formidable nature of the undertaking may be collected from the fact that till now, not more than 300 cwt. had ever filled a furnace at one time.