If I am now asked whether the picture would have been a heroic one provided the painter had not substituted his own legs for those of the mayor--I must say, I am afraid not.

I have no idea of making heroic pictures out of English mayors, even with the assistance of Norman arches; yet I am sure that capital pictures might be made out of English mayors, not issuing from Norman arches, but rather from the door of the "Checquers" or the "Brewers Three." The painter in question had great comic power, which he scarcely ever cultivated; he would fain be a Rafael, which he never could be, when he might have been something quite as good--another Hogarth; the only comic piece which he ever presented to the world being something little inferior to the best of that illustrious master.

I have often thought what a capital picture might have been made by my brother's friend, if, instead of making the mayor issue out of the Norman arch, he had painted him moving under the sign of the "Checquers," or the "Three Brewers," with mace--yes, with mace,--the mace appears in the picture issuing out of the Norman arch behind the mayor,--but likewise with Snap, and with whiffler, quart pot, and frying pan, Billy Blind, and Owlenglass, Mr.Petulengro and Pakomovna;--then, had he clapped his own legs upon the mayor, or any one else in the concourse, what matter?
But I repeat that I have no hope of making heroic pictures out of English mayors, or, indeed, out of English figures in general.

England may be a land of heroic hearts, but it is not, properly, a land of heroic figures, or heroic posture-making .-- Italy--what was I going to say about Italy?
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