Page:Nollekens and His Times, Volume 2.djvu/437

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FUSELI.
425

exclaimed, "Well Brown, Brown, we have had enough of Brown; let us now talk of Cipriani, who is in hell!" Cipriani had been one of Fuseli's best friends when he first came to England. Fuseli, whose wit was at all times spirited and unexpected, upon entering the Antique Academy one evening, bruised his shin against one of the student's boxes which stood in his way, but, instead of chiding the student who had left it there, he very good-humouredly cried out, drawing his leg up to his body, "Bless my heart! bless my heart! well, I see one thing, I must now wear spectacles upon my shins as well as upon my nose."

The students, whilst waiting to go into the schools one evening, were making so great a noise, that Fuseli came out of his office' into the hall, and called out in a voice of thunder, "By G—d! you are a pack of d—d wild beasts, and I am your bl—st—d keeper!" upon which some of the students laughing at the singularity of the expression, the old gentleman was put into so good a humour, that he went back without saying any thing more.

Upon his entering the Model Academy, he observed the pieces of a figure on the ground; "Who the devil has been doing this?" A tell-tale of a student, wishing to initiate himself