instruments; but that she painted on the rough side of the panel, in such tints, and in such a manner, that, at a competent distance, the picture had all the effect of the neatest pencil and high finishing. Other writers, however, affirm, that she neither used oil nor watercolours in her performances; and only worked on the rough side of the panel with a preparation of silk floss, selected with great care, and disposed in different boxes, according to the several degrees of bright and dark tints, out of which she applied whatever colour was requisite for her work; and blended, softened, and united there with such Inconceivable art and judgment, that she imitated the warmth of flesh with as great a glow of life as could be produced by the most exquisite pencil in oil. Nor could the nicest eye discern, at a proper distance, whether the whole was not the work of the pencil. But by whatever art her pictures were wrought, they were exquisitely beautiful, and perfectly natural. Her portraits were remarkably faithful, and every object was a just imitation of the model, whether the subject was animal life, architecture, landscape, or flowers. As her manner of working could not well be accounted for, she was distinguished by the name of the Sorceress. One of her landscapes is said to have been sold for five hundred florins; and though the subject was only the trunk of an old tree covered with moss, and a large spider finishing its web among the leaves and branches, every part appeared with so great a degree of force and expression, that it was beheld with astonishment. One of her principal performances is in the cabinet at Florence, and is considered a singular curiosity in that collection. She died in 1680.
RUFINA, CLAUDIA,
A noble British lady, who lived about the year 100, wife of Aulus Rufus Pudens, a Bononian philosopher, and one of the Roman equestrian order. She is said to have been an intimate associate of the poet Martial, who, in many places, highly extols her for beauty, learning, and virtue. Of her poetic writings, Balseus mentions a book of Epigrams, an "Elegy on her Husband's Death," and other poems besides which she wrote many things in prose.
RUSSELL, LADY ELIZABETH,
Daughter of Sir Anthony Cook, married Sir Thomas Hobbey, and afterwards Lord John Russell, son and heir of Francis, second Earl of Bedford. She was a woman of well-cultivated mind, and translated from the French a religious book on the Sacrament. She died about 1600, aged seventy-one. She lived to write the epitaphs in Greek, Latin, and English, for both her husbands.
RUSSELL, LADY RACHEL,
Second daughter of Thomas Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, was born in 1636. She married first. Lord Vaughan; and after his death she married, in 1669, William, Lord Russell, third son of William, first Duke of Bedford. One son and two daughters were the fruits of this union, which was a. very happy one, though Lady Rachel was four or five years older than her husband. Lord Russell, being implicated in a conspiracy with the Duke of Monmouth, natural son of Charles the Second, Algernon Sidney, John Hampden, grandson to the celebrated patriot of that name, Essex,
