_16th._--I went with Madame von A---- and her daughters to the =Kunstverein=, or "Society of Arts." A similar institution of amateurs and artists, maintained by subscription, exists, I believe, in all the principal cities of Germany. The young artists exhibit their works here, whether pictures, models, or engravings. Some of these are removed and replaced by others almost every day, so that there is a constant variety. As yet, however, I have seen no _very_ striking, though many pleasing pictures; but I have added several names to my list of German artists.[11] To-day at the Kunstverein, there was a series of small pictures framed together, the subjects from Victor Hugo's romance of Notre Dame. These attracted general attention, partly as the work of a stranger, partly from their own merit, and the popularity of Victor Hugo. The painter, M. Couder, is a young Frenchman, now on his return from Italy to Paris. I understand that he has obtained leave to paint one of the frescos in the Pinakothek, as a trial of skill. Of the designs from Notre Dame, the central and largest picture is the scene in the garret between Phoebus and Esmeralda, when the former is stabbed by the priest Frollo: one can hardly imagine a more admirable subject for painting, if properly treated; but this is a failure in effect and in character. It fails in effect because the light is too generally diffused:--it is day-light, not lamp-light. The monk ought to have been thrown completely into shadow, only _just_ visible, terribly, mysteriously visible, to the spectator. It fails in character because the figure of Esmeralda, instead of the elegant, fragile, almost etherial creature she is described, rather reminds us of a coarse Italian contadina; and, for the expression--a truly poetical painter would have averted the face, and thrown the whole expression into the attitude. It will hardly be believed that of such a subject, the painter has made a _cold_ picture, merely by not feeling the bounds within which he ought to have kept. The small pictures are much better, particularly the Sachet embracing her child, and the tumult in front of Notre Dame. There were some other striking pictures by the same artist, particularly Chilperic and Fredegonde strangling the young queen Galsuinde, painted with shocking skill and truth. That taste for horrors, which is now the reigning fashion in French art and French literature, speaks ill for French _sensibilité_--a word they are so fond of--for that sensibility cannot be great which requires such extravagant _stimuli_. Painters and authors, all alike! They remind me of the sentimental negresses of queen Carathis, in the Tale of Vathek--"qui avaient un gout particulier pour les pestilences." Couder, however, has undoubted talent. His portrait of De Klenze, painted since he came here, is all but _alive_.