I first saw Lady Blessington under circumstances sufficiently characteristic of her extraordinary personal beauty at the period in question, to excuse my referring to them somewhat in detail. It was on the opening day of that Royal Academy Exhibition which contained Lawrence’s celebrated portrait of Lady Blessington--one of the very finest he ever painted, and universally known by the numerous engravings that have since been made from it. In glancing hastily round the room on first entering, I had duly admired this exquisite portrait, as approaching very near to the perfection of the art, though (as I conceived) by no means reaching it, for there were points in the picture which struck me as inconsistent with others that were also present. Yet I could not, except as a vague theory, lay the apparent discrepancies at the door of the artist.... Presently, on returning to this portrait, I saw standing before it, as if on purpose to confirm my theory, the lovely original. She was leaning on the arm of her husband, Lord Blessington. And then I saw how impossible it is for an artist to flatter a really beautiful woman.... I have seen no other instance so striking, of the inferiority of art to nature when the latter reaches the ideal standard, as in this celebrated portrait of Lady Blessington.... As the original stood before it ... she fairly “killed” the copy, and this no less in the individual details than in the general effect. Moreover, what I had believed to be errors and shortcomings in the picture were wholly absent in the original. There is about the former a consciousness, a “pretension,” a leaning forward, and a looking forth, as if to claim or court notice and admiration, of which there was no touch in the latter. I have never since beheld so pure and perfect a vision of female loveliness, in what I conceive to be its most perfect phase, that, namely, in which intellect does not predominate over form, feature, complexion, and the other physical attributes of female beauty, but only serves to heighten, purify and irradiate them; and it is this class of beauty which cannot be equalled on canvas. At this time Lady Blessington was about six-and-twenty[11] years of age; but there was about her face together with that beaming intelligence which rarely shows itself upon the countenance till that period of life, a bloom and freshness which as rarely survives early youth, and a total absence of those undefinable marks which thought and feeling still more rarely fail to leave behind them. Unlike all other beautiful faces that I have seen, hers was, at the time of which I speak, neither a history nor a prophecy; not a book to read and study, a problem to solve, or a mystery to speculate upon, but a star to kneel before and worship ... an end and a consummation in itself. P. G. PATMORE: ‘My Friends and Acquaintance.’ London: Saunders & Otley, 1854. * * * * * [Sidenote: Her beauty at twenty-eight.]