in this respect the founder of its political independence: as by his exertions a spirit of uncontrolled action, and of resistance to all dictation, has been excited that never can be laid again.

In his parliamentary votes and conduct Mr. Shaw Lefevre was not servilely or factiously addicted to any party, but maintained on all great occasions the character of an independent country gentleman. To jobs of all sorts, to every kind of peculation, or waste of the public money, — he had the most decided enmity. In early life he was a warm advocate of parliamentary reform; and although he doubted of the expediency of carrying that measure into effect during the ferment of political opinion which prevailed at the commencement of the French Revolution, yet, that once past, he was one of its sincerest and most constant supporters. In the enumeration of Mr. Lefevre's qualities, it ought not to be omitted that he was eminently a man of business; and on this account, as well as on account of his intimate acquaintance with the forms and proceedings of the House of Commons, he discharged most successfully the unostentatious but very useful and laborious duties of a member of committees; and in these it will be admitted, by all who knew him, that he had few equals, and no superior.

Indeed it was the leading principle of Mr. Lefevre's life to consider every service that it was in his power to render to the public as no more than the discharge of a just debt due to society from men of all stations, and particularly from men of a high station; it was accordingly with this view, that when the country was menaced with invasion during the last war, and government called upon the people to enrol themselves in volunteer corps, he raised a troop of yeomanry cavalry in his own neighbourhood, and obtained the command of it. This command he resigned only with his life, as there was something in the union of the citizen and the soldier very congenial to his views, and as he considered this sort of force at once the cheapest and the most coustitutional defence

Such were the public principles and public conduct of Mr. Lefevre. If we trace him into the retirement of private life, we shall find him there also equally attentive to the punctilious discharge of all his duties. Habitual good humour, gentleness, and benevolence, marked his daily intercourse with his family. The value of these qualities, those only can appreciate who lived within the calm and bright sphere of their operation; and if it is in the abstraction of these that the poignancy of domestic affliction consists, so it is in the tender and treasured recollection of them that it finds its best consolation. A large circle of political friends and common acquaintance will bear ample testimony to his popular manners and deportment, to his quick perception of every man's character, to his suitable address, to his social talents, and to his frank and hearty hospitality.

As the family of Mr. Lefevre constituted one of the chief sources of his happiness, it would be an unpardonable omission if we did not state that he has left behind him three sons, Charles, John, and Henry. Charles, the eldest son, is married to a daughter of the late Samuel Whitbread, Esq., and may be considered as not more the heir of his father's property, than he is of his father's principles. The second son, John, who obtained the honour of Senior Wrangler, at Cambridge, is a fellow of Trinity College, and is now pursuing his legal studies. The third son, Henry, is still at the same university. In this manner, Mr. Lefevre enjoyed the happiness, the greatest that can occur to a father, of seeing all his children in his own life-time, either well settled, or with their characters and habits so well established as to leave no anxiety on his mind as to their future course and final

success.

Mr. Lefevre died on the 27th of April, 1823, at his house in Whitehall-place, London; in the 64th year of his age.

No. IX.

JOSEPH NOLLEKENS, Esq., R.A.

THE late Mr. Nollekens' life was of such a nature, that if adequate materials for drawing it up could be found, it would no doubt present many amusing, and some not unsalutary details. He was any thing but a common man. He had vanquished difficulties which often discourage persons, not of less genius, but of less persevering courage. He struck out his own path to fame; and he did more, for he overcame propensities to licentious enjoyment which were stronger than those of most men, and which seemed at one period of his life to have almost mastered his good resolves.

Mr. Nollekens was born in Dean-street, Soho, on the 22d of August, 1737, of foreign parents; his father being a native of Antwerp, and his mother a Frenchwoman. In Lord Orford's "Anecdotes of Painting," there is a particular account of his father, Joseph Francis Nollekens; who was an artist of more ingenuity than original talent, and who came over to England very young, and studied painting under Tillemans. He afterwards copied Watteau; and imitated him so closely, that several of his pictures, still in existence, are scarcely distinguishable from those of that celebrated artist. Mr. Nollekens' father died at forty-two years of age, when his son'Joseph was about five years old, leaving a widow and ten children, with little or no provision; his mother soon afterwards married a person of the name of Williams, an inferior statuary, who modelled for the Chelsea porcelain mánufactory; and who went to Flanders, where he died; his

Mr. Nollekens' juvenile productions gave but little earnest of his subsequent fame. At eleven At eleven years of age he was placed under Mr. Peter Scheemaker, the most eminent sculptor then in England, and the mediocrity of whose talent the monuments of Dr. Chamberlain, and of Shakspeare, in Westminster Abbey, sufficiently attest. Under this artist, however, who was then about seventy-two years of age, young Nollekens learned to perform the more laborious and mechanical parts of his profession. The drudgery of the tasks, to which he was doomed, and the slender hopes held out to his ambition, seem to have aided his natural inclination for dissipation; and the tradition is, that his pleasures were as coarse and excessive as his fate appeared to be unpromising. The inconvenience and necessity which resulted from this unlimited indulgence, at length brought him back to habits of temperance and industry. He began to apply himself diligently to the study of the works of the ancients; particularly at the Duke of Richmond's rooms at Whitehall, where his Grace, with a laudable anxiety for the progress of the fine arts in this country, had collected abundance of very fine casts from the principal antique statutes. Our tyro's efforts were rewarded, in the years 1759 and 1760, by premiums from the Society of Arts for a drawing from the Bacchus of Michael Angelo, and a clay model of his own composition of Jephthah's Vow. In 1762 he also gained the principal prize for a basso relievo in marble, the subject of which, we believe, was the visit of the Angels to Abraham. Feeling that England was not the place in which he could expect to obtain much professional knowledge, and having by this time saved a sufficient sum of money to enable him to prosecute his studies in Italy, he repaired to Rome, desirous of qualifying himself for what was then the summit of his ambition, the situation of assistant to Mr. Wilton, the sculptor; afterwards for many years keeper of the Royal Academy. At Rome, Mr. Nollekens profited by the instructions of Cavaceppi, a man of considerable note, who behaved very kindly to him, not only by giving him the information and advice of which he stood

so much in need, but by introducing him to the society of the artists and literati of Rome. Mr. Nollekens' progress in his art now became very rapid, and he soon had the honour of receiving a gold medal from the Roman Academy of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture; being the first premium ever adjudged by that Academy to an English sculptor.

With that acuteness which distinguished him through life, Mr. Nollekens quickly discovered that the ignorance and vanity of the greater part of the Englishmen who then visited Rome might be turned to good account; and he became a dealer in antiques, and in the modern productions of Roman art. Many reasons concurred to make his assistance sought both by the needy Italian artists, and by the wealthy English nobility; and he, at once, improved his fortune, gave general satisfaction to his clients of all descriptions, and steadily prosecuted his professional studies.

During a residence of nearly nine years at Rome, the company of Mr. Nollekens was much solicited by his countrymen; who found in his research and intelligence resources which were highly serviceable to them. In consequence, he made many, and valuable friends, who, on his return home, kept up his importance in England as they had done on the Continent. Some of his best busts were executed at Rome; the only one known of Sterne, and a very fine one of Garrick, both formerly in the possession of the late Lord Yarborough (who had the largest collection existing of Mr. Nollekens' works), and above all, the justly celebrated head of Mr. Stephen Fox when an old man, in the possession of Lord Holland, are specimens of his ability at that period of his life. It may be doubted whether Mr. Nollekens ever excelled the last-mentioned work. And yet at that time his price for a bust was only twelve guineas; although it was afterwards gradually increased to a hundred.

There are some stories told of Mr. Nollekens and of Barry the painter, who was at Rome with him, which seem to imply