There were a great many of the earlier period; these seemed to me charming, but superficial, views of Nature.

They were of a character that he who runs may read,--obvious, simple, graceful.

The later pictures were quite a different matter; mysterious-looking things,--hieroglyphics of picture, rather than picture itself.

Sometimes you saw a range of red dots, which, after long looking, dawned on you as the roofs of houses,--shining streaks turned out to be most alluring rivulets, if traced with patience and a devout eye.

Above all, they charmed the eye and the thought.