Cupid, tear off your bandage, new string your bow and tip your arrows with harder adamant.

Oh! shame upon you, only hear the words of your exultant votarist--'Even Love, which according to the proverb conquers all things, when put in competition with painting, must yield the palm and be a willing captive.' Oh! fie, fie, good master Cupid, you shoot but poorly if a victim so often wounded can talk in terms like these.
"Poor luckless Jannette! the epithets 'divine' and 'heavenly' which have so often been applied to thee are now transferred to miserable daubings with oil and clay.

Dame Nature, your triumph has been short.

Poor foolish beldam, you thought, indeed, when you had formed your masterpiece and named her Jannette, that unqualified admiration would be extorted from the lips of prejudice itself, and that, at least, till age had worn off the first dazzling lustre from your favorite, your sway would have been unlimited and your exultation immeasurable.

My good old Dame, hear for your comfort what a foolish, fickle youth has dared to say of your darling Jannette, and that while she is yet in the first blush and bloom of virgin loveliness--'_next_ to painting I love Jannette the best.' Insufferable blasphemy! Hear, O Heavens, and be amazed! Tremble, O Earth, and be horribly afraid!" In spite of this impassioned arraignment, Morse devoted himself exclusively to his art for the next few years, and we have only occasional references in the letters that follow to his first serious love affair.
We also hear nothing further of "Marius on the Ruins of Carthage"; but in February, 1811, he writes to his brothers: "I am painting my large piece, the landing of our forefathers at Plymouth.