Looking upon a serpent with its tail in its mouth, carved upon an
exhibited monument as an emblem of Eternity, and a very commonplace one,
he said to the sculptor, "It won't do, I tell you; you must have
something new." The _something new_ startled a man whose imagination was
none of the brightest, and he said, "How shall I find something new?"
"O, nothing so easy," said Fuseli, "I'll help you to it. When I went
away to Rome I left two fat men cutting fat bacon in St. Martin's Lane;
in ten years' time I returned, and found the two fat men cutting fat
bacon still; twenty years more have passed, and there the two fat
fellows cut the fat flitches the same as ever. Carve them! if they look
not like an image of eternity, I wot not what does."