Benjamin West, John Galt, and the biography of 1816

95. "Mr. West's Picture," Poulson's American Daily Advertiser, Sept. 9. 1811; and "Some Remarks on Mr. West's Picture," Port Folio, 3rd ser., 7 (Jan. 1812): 17-26. The writer for Port Folio, following custom, is not identified, but Dennie (who died Jan. 7, 1812) is known to have been closely involved with the production of that issue. A response by "R" appeared in Port Folio, 3rd ser., 7 (Feb. 1812): 142-44, with identification of the writer as Rembrandt Peale in papers of Nicholas Biddle; John T. Queenan, "The Port Folio: A Study of the History and Significance of an Early American Magazine," Ph.D. diss., University of Pennsylvania, 1955, 336. Readers of the magazine were familiar with West's painting Christ Healing the Sick from the line engraving and commentary published with the reprinted Belle Assemblee biography of the artist; "Mr. West's Picture of Christ Healing in the Temple," Port Folio, 3rd ser., 6 (Nov. 1811): 489-91.

96. The author of the text reprinted in Poulson's is identified as Ange Denis Macquin in Von Erffa and Staley (as in n. 36), 346. The text appeared in the British newspaper Phoenix in 1811 but was eventually published as a brochure: A. D. M., Description of the Picture, Christ Healing the Sick in the Temple, Painted by Benjamin West, Esq., President of the Royal Academy and Now in the British Gallery, Pall Mall (London, 1812).

97. "Some Remarks on Mr. West's Picture" (as in n. 95); "Mr. West's Picture" (as in n. 95); and Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (1759-67), ed. James Aiken Work (Indianapolis: Odyssey Press; New York; Bobbs-Merrill, 1940), vol. 3, chap. 12. Sterne's character Parson Yorick, introduced in Tristram Shandy, inspired Dennie's imaginary persona in his Lay Preacher essays, written before 1801 but intermittently reprinted in Port Folio. On Dennie's affinity for Sterne's work, see William C. Dowling, Literary Federalism in the Age of Jefferson: Joseph Dennie and "The Port Folio," 1801-1812 (Columbia, S. C.: University of South Carolina Press, 1999), 28, 53-55.

98. "Remarks on Various Objects of the Fine Arts," Port Folio, 4th ser., 7 (June 1812): 538: "The Fine Arts," 4th ser., 4 (July 1814): 88-89 (letter from West praising C. R. Leslie).

99. "The Fine Arts," Port Folio, 3rd ser., 7 (Feb. 1812): 134; the last in the series of European artists' biographies appeared in Port Folio, 4th ser., 1 (Feb. 1813). Biddle (who became editor after Dennie's death in January 1812) met with West in London in 1807 (for his account of their conversation, see n. 23 above). Authorship of the articles on the fine arts during Biddle's tenure has been credited to his chief assistant, Paul Allen: Queenan (as in n. 95), 335.

100. The list of artist names concluded a brief defense of paintings by two Philadelphians. Adolf Wertmuller and Rembrandt Peale--an effort to provide some perspective on their perceived offense; "For the Port Folio," Port Folio, 4th ser., 4 (Feb. 1814): 155.