Chapter XV: Part II (8)

~Mr. Dickes~ has been ill-advised to repeat and amplify, as he has done in this volume, a theory concerning Holbein’s picture of The Ambassadors of which all competent students recognized the futility when it was first broached in _The Magazine of Art_ a dozen years ago. Since then the subject and history of the picture have been completely elucidated by Miss Mary Hervey in a book published in 1895. Her work is a model of patient, sagacious and fortunate industry. No links of any consequence are wanting in the chain of evidence, internal and external, by which she has made it certain that the portraits in the picture are those of two leading French diplomatists of the time, the one a man of the sword and the other of the robe, viz.: Jean de Dinteville, bailly of Troyes, and his friend, George de Selve, bishop of Lavaur; that the picture was painted by Holbein in London when the two friends were here together in the spring of 1533; and that it is the identical work described in three perfectly authentic documents of the mid-seventeenth century as having been preserved down to that date at Polisy, the seat of the Dinteville family in Champagne. The traditional name of the picture in the eighteenth century, The Ambassadors, is thus completely justified. Of one ambassador, M. de Selve, tradition had also quite rightly preserved the name; while of the other, Jean de Dinteville, the name had been lost; and the name D’Avaux, which belonged to a diplomatic family of a later generation, had been substituted mistakenly. It is the pleasure of Mr. Dickes to ignore these proofs, and to assert a rival theory for which there is not a shadow either of antecedent likelihood or of genuine evidence, while it is flatly at variance with tradition. His work, the result of no small industry and application of a blundering kind, is a pathetic example of the fate which awaits an untrained inquirer who has become possessed by an _idée fixe_ and insists on burrowing with obstinate blindness in a hopelessly wrong direction. Kindness would suggest that such a performance should be ignored; but as its illusory air of candour and research has actually misled some unwary critics, let it be dealt with here as briefly and gently as the case admits. ¶ The theory of Mr. Dickes is that the picture represents the two German brothers, Otto Henry and Philip, counts palatine of the Rhine, who had their residence at Neuburg and were known as dukes of Neuburg, and that it was painted in celebration of a treaty of Nuremberg concluded between the Catholic and Protestant princes of Germany in 1532. The road by which the author has arrived at this conclusion is somewhat as follows: A conspicuous feature in the picture is a lute with a broken string. In Alciati’s famous book of Emblems, of which the first extant edition was published at Augsburg in 1531 (though some of the emblems had previously been in circulation, most probably in manuscript), a lute is the symbol of a treaty. Or rather it is the symbol of a particular group of treaties, _Foedera Italorum_; in all probability the league of Cognac, which in 1626 united the princes of Italy with France and England against the emperor. A set of Latin verses accompanies the emblem, and declares, among other things, that if a single string should be ill-stretched or broken, all power of pleasing will depart out of the instrument and its excellent music will become jangled. Obviously, therefore, if the lute with the broken string in Holbein’s picture has anything to do with Alciati and his emblems at all, it must signify a treaty broken and not a treaty made and confirmed. Mr. Dickes shuts his eyes to this root fact of the case, and builds all his argument on the patently false supposition that it is the emblem of a treaty signed and valid. Having further, on no reasonable grounds whatever, satisfied himself that the picture represents two brothers of whom one is Catholic and the other Protestant, he hunts up his history of the Reformation, and learns about the treaty of Nuremberg and the concern in it of the two brothers, Counts Otto Henry and Philip. From that moment it becomes a fixed dogma with him that these are the persons represented, and all facts and evidences have to be pulled about like putty in order to prove it. Thus the inscriptions on the picture, which are perfectly genuine, declare that Holbein painted it in 1533, and that at that date the age of the lay personage in short cloak, sword and dagger was twenty-nine, and of the clerical or legal personage in square cap and velvet gown, twenty-five. These indications absolutely fit alike the date of Dinteville’s mission, that of Selve’s visit, and those of Dinteville’s birth and Selve’s birth. But they are hopelessly out for Counts Otto Henry and Philip. So it costs Mr. Dickes nothing to declare the inscription with the artist’s name and the date a forgery; when in fact it has been proved unquestionably genuine by the test of the same caretul processes which cleared away the dirt and accretions of time from other details in the work. Agreeing that the picture was painted in 1533 (for which there is no evidence at all except this same impeached inscription), Mr. Dickes then assumes the arbitrary date 1532 (that of the signature of his Nuremberg treaty) from which to calculate the ages of the sitters. Even so he cannot get them right, Otto Henry having been born in 1502 and Philip in 1503. The former thus still remains one year and the latter five years too old; so that in the case of Philip the figure 25 has to be declared, again without a shadow of foundation, to have been altered. ¶ Once more, the lay ambassador in the ordinary court dress of the time, short cloak, sword and dagger and tasselled belt, wears the badge of the French order of St. Michael, thus confirming the tradition and the probability that he was a Frenchman. This would be fatal to Mr. Dickes’s theory, so it has to be made out that the badge is not that of the famous order at all. For this Mr. Dickes has no better proof than that it is not identical with the same order as figured about a century later in Favyn’s ‘Théâtre d’Honneur et de Chevalerie.’ But there was no mechanical uniformity in the badge of the order as worn by its members, and still less in its representation by artists supplying their portraits. All students of French sixteenth-century portraiture, whether painted or engraved, can easily recall a dozen or a score of variations in the badge; while no such student could have a moment’s doubt that Holbein’s sitter, whatever else he was or was not, is declared by this badge to be a knight of the order. This is again one of the cardinal facts by which an inquirer must be guided, and to contradict it as Mr. Dickes does is merely idle. ¶ Again, Miss Hervey discovered in a Paris curiosity shop in 1895, and presented to the National gallery, a docketed seventeenth-century document on parchment fully describing the picture and its contents. Mr. Dickes at the time attacked the authenticity of this document in detail, on grounds which to any trained paleographer are ridiculous. In his book he does not reprint his arguments, but in an innocently impertinent dedication to the trustees of the National gallery coolly puts it aside as ‘supposititious.’ In point of fact it has no flaw whatever except that it is destructive of his theory. But worse: Miss Hervey, whose methods are as sound and scrupulous as those of Mr. Dickes are the reverse, also found in the library of the French Institute two other documents of the seventeenth century minutely confirming the contents of the first: these are papers of the Godefroy family relating to a correspondence between themselves and Nicholas Camusat, the well-known antiquary of Troyes, who had made it his business to collect historical and archaeological traditions concerning his native town and its distinguished families, including that of Dinteville. These documents are too irrefutable to be contested: Mr. Dickes therefore placidly ignores them. In like manner, in trying to show, what his theory requires, that the picture was painted not in London but in Germany, he ignores Miss Hervey’s proof that the pavement is copied strictly from one still extant in Westminster abbey. As a point on his side, he quotes as having been painted by Holbein at Basle in 1533 a picture of a Wheel of Fortune ‘in the collection of the duke of Westminster.’ The picture he means belongs in fact to the duke of Devonshire, and was painted by Hans Schäufelein; whose monogram and mark of a shovel have been tampered with but are still clearly discernible, and whose style is quite unlike that of Holbein. One more instance may suffice for the illustration of this gentleman’s incredible method of dealing with the evidences which substantiate the real meaning and contents of the picture. Among the instruments on the table symbolical of the arts to which these two cultivated and liberal young diplomatists were devoted, is a small hand globe, which has been identified as copied, with the addition of a certain number of place-names, from that published by Schöner at Nuremberg in 1523. On this globe the name of Nuremberg appears conspicuously, as of course is natural, since that was its place of publication. Mr. Dickes at once reads this as an evidence for his theory that the picture is meant to celebrate the peace of Nuremberg. Among the place-names added by the painter to those which were inserted by the cartographer are three of German provinces, four of Spanish provinces, five of French provinces, and three of French towns, Paris, Lyons and Bayonne, besides one which is that of Dinteville’s own village and fief in Champagne, Polisy (the s a little broken by a crack in the panel). These additions are exactly what might have been expected to be dictated by a French diplomatist engaged in the combinations of his country at the time with Spain and Italy, while the insertion of Polisy is of course a final link in the proof that the lay ambassador is no other than Dinteville. This insertion is promptly and without a shadow of reason declared by Mr. Dickes an eighteenth-century forgery. ¶ Now for an instance of the kind of evidence with which this critic tries to support his own theory. Dinteville in the picture wears a girdle with a rich tassel hanging at the front. So do a number of great gentlemen in portraits of this time; as for instance the well-known Earl of Surrey at Hampton Court, and the sitter in the famous portrait of Morett in the gallery at Dresden. But Mr. Dickes thinks it a great point for his argument that a tassel (though one, as he does not mention, of other colours) was among the quarterings in the arms of his counts palatine. So he not only ignores its habitual use in the fashions of the day; he maintains that the Dresden picture, in which the sitter also wears the tassel, is another and later portrait of the same Count Otto Henry, and that it was painted not by Holbein but long after Holbein’s death by Christoph Amberger. The suggestion is merely preposterous: the Dresden picture is not only by Holbein, but one of the very finest and the most central of his works, of far finer artistic quality, indeed, than our National gallery picture; and the features have no resemblance to those of Dinteville (Mr. Dickes’s Otto Henry) in the London picture except in the mere fashion of the hair and beard. Moreover, the identity of the sitter in the Dresden picture as another French ambassador to England, Charles de Soliers, sieur de Morette, has lately been put out of the possibility of doubt by the discovery of a fine contemporary medallion portrait of the same sitter, in boxwood, with his name and titles in full and on the back his device of a seaport, a horse, and a dolphin. ¶ But why pursue the ungrateful subject farther? Mr. Dickes’s book bristles on every page with similar absurdities of statement and of inference. Fortunately, for any qualified and careful reader, he sometimes provides an antidote against his own theories by himself furnishing the obvious means of their refutation. Nothing, for instance, could be more grotesque than the collection of different and totally unlike portraits which he has picked out of various galleries in Europe, and would persuade us to accept as all representing the valiant Count Philip, the defender of Vienna. The mere possibility of his taking all these, together with the French cleric in The Ambassadors, for one and the same person, would seem to argue him form-blind in the same degree as the whole tenour of his book unfortunately argues him fact-blind and evidence-proof.

S. C.

~Un des Peintres peu connus de L’École Flamande de transition.~ Jean Gossart de Maubeuge, sa vie et son œuvre, d’après les dernières recherches et des documents inédits. Par Maurice Gossart. 147 pp., 2 engravings, and 12 phototypes. Lille, 1903.

Being at Veere some years ago, and finding that I had a few hours at my disposal before the members of the gild of St. Thomas and St. Luke could arrive, I bethought me of the local archives, which I fancied would probably contain documents throwing light on the history and works of Gossart. I found the archives in confusion, and was not so fortunate as to discover anything. I had hoped on taking up the present volume to find that the author had been more fortunate, but, alas, it contains no mention of these archives, which probably still await the visit of someone with leisure and patience to devote to their examination. It is a pity that M. Gossart has not been able to undertake this; still we must be thankful for what he has done. Any attempt to clear up the history of an artist of note, especially of one to whom many works are attributed, is deserving of praise and encouragement. The settling of the date of Gossart’s visit to Italy with Philip of Burgundy and of his death are two important additions to our knowledge. ¶ John Gossart, son of Simon, a bookbinder, was born at Maubeuge about 1472. It is not known when or to whom he was apprenticed, or where he worked prior to 1503, in which year he was admitted as free master into the gild of St. Luke at Antwerp. In 1508 he went to Rome with his patron, Philip of Burgundy, admiral of Flanders, who was sent by the Archduchess Margaret on an embassy to Pope Julius II. Starting from Mechlin on October 26, 1508, they visited Verona and Florence on their way to the Eternal City, where, after the return of Philip, Gossart remained copying antique works of art for him until July 1509, when he set out for the Netherlands, arriving at Middleburg in November. ¶ He remained in the service of Philip until the death of that prince in 1524, and then entered that of Adolphus of Burgundy, marquis of Veere, with whom he remained until his death in 1533. So far good, and had the author stopped here we should have had no fault to find with him, but he has endeavoured to draw up a list of Gossart’s paintings, a task for which he is evidently little fitted. Not only has he omitted several important works, such as the early picture in the Prado gallery, but he has included others which bear no resemblance to those painted by Gossart, or which never pretended to be other than copies, being honestly signed by the copyist ‘Malbodius inventor’; he has enumerated pictures as being now in private collections which were dispersed more than fifty years ago, and has described the same picture twice over (pp. 66 and 68) under different titles, having apparently copied out or translated any notices he has come across, and this with very little care, as his pages not only swarm with errors of spelling but also of fact, such as the monstrous absurdity that Gossart (p. 63) painted the portrait of ‘Van den _Rust_, _Carmélite_, qui recueillit Memlinc à la bataille de Nancy.’

W. H. J. W.

~Old English Masters.~ Engraved by Timothy Cole. Macmillan.

This hook contains some of Mr. Timothy Cole’s most accomplished work. The preface certainly does not exaggerate his merits when it says that no other engraver of the day could transpose into the medium of wood engraving so much of the spirit and even of the actual quality of the original pictures. Whether, as is also claimed, his engravings are of more value as records and reminiscences of the paintings than good photogravures we doubt. For any purposes of study photographic processes with all their drawbacks are essential. But there is much to be said for interpretative engraving when it reaches so high a point of excellence as Mr. Cole’s. For when we look at a photograph or a photogravure, however good, we enjoy, not the thing before our eyes, but the vision of the original, which, even if we have never seen it, we imaginatively construct. Our enjoyment is at one remove from our actual sensations, but when we look at one of Mr. Cole’s finer pieces we get an immediate pleasure from the discriminating and appreciative tact of the translator, from the rare mastery of a difficult medium which he shows, and this pleasure is superadded to a very vivid sense of the beauty of the original. Moreover, in certain instances, his power of suggesting luminous and transparent depth of colour or of hinting at subtle gradations of tone goes almost beyond the reach of photographic reproduction. It is not a little surprising that in a medium so precise as wood engraving Mr. Cole’s most distinctive excellence lies not in his rendering of design of definite form so much as in his power of giving atmospheric suffusion and infinitely subtle gradations of tone and of suggesting colour. There are, indeed, not a few cases where the form is too much lost, where the searched-out design of the original disappears in a vague penumbra; many cases, too, where the contour is unduly wavering and shapeless: on the other hand, where the chiaroscuro is most subtle, where the gradations would seem to defy any analysis into lines and dots, Mr. Cole surpasses himself. The face of Gainsborough’s Mrs. Graham is quite marvellous in this respect, while for atmospheric quality it would be impossible to surpass the Wilsons. With Reynolds he is less successful. Romney’s Parson’s Daughter is another excellent engraving; and here again it is the evasive liquid brush stroke which he understands so perfectly. Raeburn’s Lord Newton, in which similar qualities predominate, is again admirably rendered. We doubt whether this method of reproducing works of art will be continued in the future, nor do we particularly desire it. The finest qualities of wood engraving as an independent art are really contradictory to such methods as are necessary for the faithful transcription of oil painting, but the American school of wood engraving will nevertheless be remembered for the perfect attainment of its best aims in Mr. Cole’s work.

R. E. F.

PERIODICALS.

~Gazette des Beaux Arts~, July.--_La Sculpture beige et les influences françaises. By M. Raymond Kœchlin._--The author endeavours to show that the realistic tendencies hitherto supposed to be indigenous in Flemish art from its commencement did not in reality declare themselves till the end of the fourteenth and beginning of the fifteenth centuries. In the twelfth century German influence predominated at all events in Mosan art, but was succeeded in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries by the decisive influence of French figure sculpture. Belgian art was at this period informed by the same idealistic and generalizing tendencies as the French school from which it derived. M. Kœchlin makes his point good by a number of interesting examples, but in his anxiety to proclaim French influence he minimizes the distinctions between the two schools, the shorter proportions, the blunter and more angular modelling of the Belgian sculptors. If the effigy of Blanche of Castile which came from Tournai to St. Denys is really--as M. Pit supposes--a work of the thirteenth century, it shows that already the Flemings were beginning that angular and cutting treatment of the folds of drapery which is associated with the realistic art of the late fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and which the French did not accept till a much later date. _Quelques réflexions sur les Salons._ (_Second, concluding article._) _By M. Henry Cochin._--This is as brilliantly and fascinatingly written as the first article, and is, like it, pleasantly discursive. M. Cochin discusses with stimulating suggestiveness the theory that every work of art is a symbol, a sign in a universal language, a token corresponding with spiritual and mental values. He proceeds to elaborate the very tenable thesis that all portraiture is caricature, and justly praises in this connection M. Weber’s satiric comedies. His remarks on the ‘modern style,’ as the French call it, or ‘l’art nouveau’ as we, with a laudable desire to assign to the disease a foreign origin, term it, deserve to be quoted: ‘Le temps est venu, je pense, de prononcer le _De profundis_ et les dernières prières sur le soi-disant _modern style_, être abortif et adultérin, qui porte un nom Anglais, mail est né vraiment en Allemagne, qui n’est pas _moderne_ puisqu’il paraît déjà suranné et court la province--qui de plus n’est pas un _style_, comme it serait aisée de le démontrer.’ _Un Manuscrit de Philippe le Bon._ (_Second Article._) _By M. S. Reinach._--The author continues his description of these remarkable miniatures and gives still further proof, drawn from the types and gestures of the horses, for supposing that its author is none other than Simon Marmion, of whose picture at Wied he gives three illustrations. It is certain that the likenesses to the early Dutch school, particularly to Dirk Bouts, are common both to Simon Marmion and the miniaturist. While he is discussing Simon Marmion, we hope M. Reinach will take account of the picture of St. Michael attributed to the Flemish school at Hertford House (No. 528), which bears, we think, the impress of his style. The idea had already occurred independently to Mr. Claude Phillips. We hope that M. Reinach will be able to secure rather better reproductions of the succeeding miniatures in his forthcoming article. _Le Salon de 1761._ (_Second article._) _By M. Casimir Stryienski._--By the aid of the minute and brilliant sketches with which Gabriel de Saint-Aubin annotated his catalogues, the author continues to trace the history of the pictures which figured in this salon. The most interesting of those here discussed is Chardin’s _Benedicite_, a second replica of one of those in the Louvre. In this version the artist extended his canvas laterally to take in another figure which he succeeded in relating admirably with the original group. The purpose of this change was to make his picture a companion piece to a Teniers. The central composition was frequently repeated by contemporary copyists and imitators. _Tradition française et musées d’art antique. By M. Georges Toudouze._ --An eloquent appeal for the vulgarization of art, in the proper sense of the word, by making the arrangement of specimens more intelligible and interesting to the unlearned and by adding to fragmentary figures explanatory models of the whole figure or composition.

~Rassegna d’Arte.~--_Le feste artistiche da Milano._--An account of the inauguration of the gallery of art in the castle at Milan, and of the new rooms at the Brera. The history of what the public spirit and intelligence of the Milanese has accomplished, both in the castle and the Brera, may well make us envy the energy of the decadent Latin races. To take the Brera: in the last four years, under the able direction of Signor Ricci, the Brera has been entirely remodelled; the sixteen galleries have been increased to thirty-five, in which the pictures are displayed according to their affinities of time and place; the frescoes by Luini from the chapel of S. Giuseppe in the della Pace have been placed on a vault expressly adapted to them; while among the new acquisitions, mentioning only the more important ones, we find eight frescoes by Bramante, four panels by Gentile du Fabriano, one by Benozzo Gozzoli, several pieces by Lazzaro Bastiani, Butinone, Beltraffio, Solario, Cosimo Tura, and a magnificent Cima. In addition to this, that most desirable adjunct to all places intended for the study of art, a large and representative collection of photographs, has been installed. We fear that in spite of our greater wealth the last four years’ acquisitions by the National gallery would show poorly compared with the work accomplished in this provincial town in Italy. _Butinone and Zenale_: a reply by Malaguzzi Valeri to the criticisms of Herr Seidlitz, of which we gave an abstract last month. In this he maintains the validity of the date 145-- for the altarpiece in the Brera, and brings in as evidence for its possibility Foppa’s Crucifixion at Bergamo of 1456, which he describes as showing a similar squarcionesque influence. We should have said that the influence was rather that of Jacopo Bellini, and that the squarcionesque element found its way later into Lombard art and lingered on even when Leonardo was in the city. _Della Robbia at Marseilles_: two school pieces, one of which is catalogued by Miss Cruttwell, are figured and described by Signor Rossi. _La Rocella di Squillace_: Dr. Groeschel replies to the article by Signor Caviglia in the April number, in which this was referred to the sixth century. The author says that the naves were covered with ogival vaults, and that the church cannot antedate the end of the eleventh century. _Miscellaneous Articles_: Don Guido Cagnola, who is well known for his efforts in the preservation of works of art, writes to protest against the disfigurement and obliteration of pictures and frescoes by ecclesiastical authorities. An article signed Piceller describes vividly the battle of San Egidio and the capture of Malatesta; the description is fitted to the picture by Ucello in the National gallery. This is evidence of how little attention is paid abroad to the work of English historians of art, for Mr. Horne, in the _Monthly Review_ for October 1901, once and for all disposed of the theory that Ucello’s picture represents this battle. With admirable patience and minute research, he proved point by point that it represents the rout of San Romano in which Niccolo da Tolentino defeated the Sienese under Bernardino della Carda in 1432. His article leaves the matter no longer open to such vague guesses. Among various items of news we learn that a school piece of the Della Robbia which stood in the oratory of the Annunziata at Legri has been stolen, or rather broken to pieces and the greater part taken away.

~La Revue de l’Art Ancien et Moderne.~--The July number is devoted almost exclusively to modern art. An article on the discoveries at Antinoe by Mons. Gayet describes some very remarkable Byzantine textiles, on which are symbols of a mixed Greco-Roman and Egyptian character, such as the Venus-Isis. The form, however, appears to be decadent Alexandrine Greek.

~Architectural Review.~--Contains an article by Mr. A. C. Champneys on Iona, with many excellent reproductions. The author’s careful analysis of the building and the historical evidence seems only to show the hopeless uncertainty of any theories which would connect the existing buildings with the sites of St. Columba’s original monastic foundations. Nor is the architectural history of the cathedral itself much clearer. The curious habit of the later builders of imitating older forms makes the determination of dates exceedingly difficult. The appeal made by ~The Burlington Magazine~ for the preservation of Clifford’s Inn is taken up in an editorial article, and Mr. Lethaby protests, we fear in vain, against the proposed destruction of the beautiful eighteenth-century bridge over the Exe, at Exeter.

~Repertorium für Kunstwissenschaft.~--_Die Gotteshäuser von Meran, der Alten Hauptstadt des Landes Tirol. By Franz Jacop Schmitt._ An analysis of the architectural features of the churches of Meran and the neighbourhood, with the result, which the author describes as _hocherfreulich_, of finding that German gothic forms crossed the border line between the ecclesiastical provinces of Mayence and Aquileja, and arc found in parts of Tyrol where Italian was the spoken language. The result is interesting; the patriotic fervour with which the author hails it is to be deprecated in writing the history of art. ¶ _Due Strambotti inediti per Antonio Vinciguerra e un ignoto ritratto di Vettor Carpaccio. By Arduino Colasanti._ The author publishes two octaves by an unknown poetaster of the end of the quattrocento. In one written about 1502 he describes a portrait of Antonio Vinciguerra, called il Cronico, by Carpaccio. The portrait, like others by the same hand of which we have records, has disappeared. ¶ _Ueber die Proportionsgesetze, etc. By Constantin Winterburg._ A third instalment of this minute analysis of the types of proportion established by Dürer, and of the changes in his point of view between the first and second book. ¶ _Die Allegorie des Leben und Todes in der Gemäldegalerie des Germanischen Museums. By Ludwig Lorenz._ An account of the picture in two parts of the above subject, No. 135 in the Nuremberg museum. The author finds in this remarkable work, which was originally ascribed to the mysterious Gerard van der Meire, the characteristics of the Meister des Hausbuches, an artist of the middle Rhenish school, known hitherto only by his engravings. ¶ _Zur Geschichte der Plastik Schlesiens von 1550-1720. By Berthold Haendcke._ The author praises highly the renaissance sculpture of Silesia, and finds in the best work the influence of Italian, and, to some extent, Flemish models, but rejects with some fervour the idea of foreign workmanship.

R. E. F.

FOREIGN CORRESPONDENCE

NOTES FROM FRANCE[119]

~Exhibition of French Primitives~

The splendid exhibition at Bruges, of which Mr. W. H. James Weale is writing for the readers of ~The Burlington Magazine~ with that eminent proficiency for which he is so widely known, has had an unexpected effect and has become the decisive cause of the realization of a plan dear to numbers of French art-lovers. I refer to an exhibition of French primitives. ¶ The origin of the talent of the van Eycks has long preoccupied the minds of art-historians. M. P. Durrieu said lately, in the _Gazette des Beaux-Arts_: ‘The prodigious talent of the van Eycks seems to be revealed suddenly, like a sort of brilliant meteor, which bursts forth and dazzles men’s eyes. It presents a peculiarly attractive problem.’ ¶ The Bruges exhibition has given a fresh impulse to the study of the question. On the other hand, it has brought home to us the injustice of the profound neglect into which we had allowed our old French masters to fall, while the renown of the primitives of Flanders and Italy was increasing year by year. Lastly, certain works attributed to the Flemish artists, some of which even figured in this way in the Bruges exhibition, had called for a more careful examination, which led eventually to French attributions. The question was really pertinent. ¶ I have spoken of ‘profound neglect.’ The expression is not strictly accurate. M. Paul Vitry, of the Louvre, published lately a remarkable pamphlet in which he resuscitated a whole collection of French works on our old fifteenth-century painters. He quoted the studies of Vallet de Viriville, of the Marquis de Laborde, of Messrs. de Grandmaison, Bouchot, Leprieur, Durrieu, Salmon, Benoît, Salomon Reinach, etc. It is nevertheless true that an undeserved ostracism and an unjustifiable ignorance still weigh down upon the French primitives. ¶ Every art-lover will applaud the happy initiative of M. Henri Bouchot, the distinguished keeper of prints at the national library, who has undertaken to restore to our painters of the middle ages and the Renaissance the glorious place which they have the right to occupy in the history of art. Without seeking in the least to detract from the value of the Flemish primitives, it is nevertheless well to recall the close connexion that exists between their work and that of our limners of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, whose reputation at that time was worldwide. Is it not likely that the latter were the masters and leaders of the former? The artistic centre of the world in the fourteenth century was the court of the Valois. We owe the prodigious output of works of art that forms the pride of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries to those Maecenases who are known as Philip VI, John II, Charles V, to the dukes of Berry, Anjou and Burgundy. ¶ M. Bouchot has thought that it would be interesting to show _de visu_ how great was the influence upon the destinies of art of all those master-pieces conceived and executed for princes so French in their taste and language. Would it not be interesting to prove that the van Eycks were the heirs of the Limbourg-Malouels, who worked in France for the duke of Berry, and that such Flemings as Broderlam were inspired by Jacquemart de Hesdin and André Beauneveu, themselves the successors of our old Parisian miniature painter, Pucelle? ¶ Thanks to M. Henri Bouchot, who knows this period of our national art better than any of his contemporaries, the exhibition of French primitives has issued from the conception stage and entered into the domain of active life. It will be held in 1904. The French government has given its best support. The exhibition is organized under the honorary presidency of the minister of public instruction and the honorary vice-presidency of the director of fine arts and the director of higher education, and it will have for its acting president M. Aynard, member of the Institute, and for its vice-presidents M. Georges Berger, president of the Union centrale des Arts décoratifs, and M. Robert de Lasteyrie, member of the Institute, professor at the École des Chartes. The members of the managing committee are M. Léopold Delisle of the Institute, administrator of the national library; M. Kaempfen, director of the national museums; M. Pascal, of the Institute, in- spector-general of civil buildings. The members of the council of organization are, for painting, M. Georges Lafenestre, of the Institute; for miniatures, M. Henri Omont, of the Institute; for tapestries, M. Maurice Fenaille; for enamels, M. E. Saglio, of the Institute. The general secretary is M. Henri Bouchot, keeper of the print-room and a member of the consultative committee of ~The Burlington Magazine~, assisted by M. P. A. Lemoisne. The treasurer is M. T. Mortreuil, treasurer-general of the national library, assisted by M. P. Lacombe. ¶ There will doubtless be three exhibitions: one at the Louvre, which will include the primitives of that museum and those of Cluny; the second at the national library, consisting of the rich collection of miniatures in the print-room. The third exhibition, the place of which is not yet definitely fixed, will comprise the works lent by the provincial museums and by private collectors. These will be very numerous and very fine, to judge by the many kind offers which M. Henri Bouchot has already received. I can only repeat the words of M. Paul Vitry and hope with him that all those who set store by the glory of French art and of art pure and simple will make a point of supporting ‘the Bouchot plan’ and giving it, at the exhibition of French primitives, ‘the benefit of their knowledge and of their good will.’

~G. de Rorthays.~

~Rouen.~

To those who know the grand portal of the cathedral of Rouen, resplendent with sculptural wealth, a master-piece of the sixteenth century in all its magnificence, the work of its complete restoration, which is now being pursued, will appear enormous. Thanks to the support of the state, of the city of Rouen and of the diocesan administration, this work will be entirely finished within a few years. ¶ It is already, in fact, well forward. During the last three well-filled years, they have restored, on either side of the central portion, a whole row of little gables and fourteenth-century niches, in which old statues, kept in reserve in the Tour de Beurre and the Cour d’Albane, have been replaced. They have also completely reconstructed and re-erected two large stone pyramids, 16 m. in height, which had not been rebuilt since the terrible hurricane which in 1632, in a few hours, overthrew most of the steeples and spires of the Rouen churches. ¶ These works were followed by the complete restoration of the large central gable, against which the extremity of the roofing of the nave rests, and by the entire repair of the great open gallery, dating to the end of the fifteenth century. At the same time one of the great buttresses flanking the main front was removed. They were erected in our own time, when, after the fire of 1822, the new metal spire was constructed by the architect Alavoine. This buttress, the carving of which had never been executed, and which had remained corroded, has been replaced by a large fourteenth-century buttress. There remains another, which will also be entirely replaced. ¶ These different works completing the restoration of the upper portions of the portal have allowed an important part of the tall scaffolding that concealed it to be removed. There still remains to be restored the whole of the lower portion of the portal, notably the great gable, very much fretted and sunk, which at present supports the clock; the great arch of the rose-window and the rose itself; and, lastly, the covings, embellished with innumerable small statues, sheltered under canopies, that form the chief portal itself. It is to be hoped that they will be able to put back all those delicious little figures of which a large number were broken down by the Protestants: they will probably succeed in doing so, for the credit placed at the disposal of the restoring architect, M. Sauvageot, is about to be increased by a sum of 600,000 fr., bequeathed to the archbishop for the express object of being employed exclusively on this work of restitution in the cathedral, by M. Gosselin, an architect who had long collaborated in the work of the cathedral church. ¶ Several works have been carried out in the archbishop’s palace itself. For instance, they have been engaged on the restoration of a gallery, on the east side overlooking the garden, which was built during the Renaissance by one of the Cardinals d’Amboise, at the same time as a pretty fountain in marble, the memory of which has been preserved by Jacques Le Lieur, who drew it for his ‘Livre des fontaines.’ This gallery, supported by columns, is to be restored to its original form. ¶ During the excavations necessitated by the construction of an important building in the rue Grand Pont the eminent archaeologist M. Léon de Vesly, corresponding member of the ministry of public instruction, brought to light, at a depth of 5 m., numerous fragments of red earthen Samos bowls, handsomely decorated. ¶ I will mention the following among the objects discovered: the bottom of a basin, in red earth, ·120 m. in diameter, with the inscription, SCOTNS: _Scotnus_ (See ‘Corpus inscriptionum latinarum,’ Vol. XII, p. 758. _Scotnus_, Vase found at Nîmes and in the Saint-Germain museum). ¶ Another bottom of a dish, ·151 m., with the inscription

ONESM
: _Onesimus Caï Annus_.
CANNI

This is a mark of Arezzo read by M. Seymour de Ricci (See the ‘Corpus inscript.,’ Vol. XIII, part 3, p. 95). ¶ The bottom of a _lecythus_, ·40 m., with, on a rectangular seal, the mark CACASIM. ¶ Fragments of a large amphora. On the rim, near the _sinus_, from right to left, SEX VALECT: _Sextus Valenus fecit_, with a cartouche with a rectangular border and circles.¶ Other discoveries included an antefix of a somewhat rare character, seeing that the Saint-Germain museum does not contain a similar one. It is decorated with the figure of a child, full-face, with puffed cheeks, and forms the stem of a palm-leaf. This is evidently the copy of a type of antefix that came from Italy or Greece. Among the remains found in the excavation were also found many bones of cattle, of the _Sus scrofa_, or wild-sow, and vestiges of stakes, of which an array had already been discovered previously, which might suggest the existence of a lacustrine settlement in the neighbourhood of the Seine. ¶ In the course of the excavations executed on the site of the Haute Vieille Tour, where stood the original palace of the dukes of Normandy, there were found, beside important vestiges of military fortifications, a little bottle, in black earth, of Roman origin; various bones, including numerous horns of the _cervus elephas_; and two fifteenth-century tokens. One of these is ·026 m. in diameter, and bears on the obverse a caravel, on the reverse a lozenged shield charged with four fleurs-de-lys. It is said to resemble the English noble. The other measures ·032 m. This is a French token, imitated from the coinage of Dauphiné, a dolphin quartered with fleurs-de-lys. A silver half-crown of Louis XV, dated 1741, was also found, as was a token of German make of the eighteenth century, bearing on the obverse a quartered shield and on the reverse the legend CVIQUE SVVM, and the date 1701.

~Georges Dubosc.~

FROM BELGIUM[120]

~Ghent~

The staircase which at present gives access to the crypt in the cathedral of St. Bavo at Ghent is to disappear in consequence of the installation of the _Heilig Graf_ in the place at which it starts. In view of the artistic and archaeological importance of this vast crypt, it will now be approached, as, for that matter, the greater number of crypts were approached, by two staircases. With this object, the two primitive staircases will simply be reinstated in their original positions. The restoration of these primitive entrances is desirable from another point of view: it will allow of the immediate rebuilding of the lower portions of the columns, which were rashly cut away, in the eighteenth century, for the installation of large marble slabs. All the columns in the choir have undergone the same dangerous mutilation; their bases have been slashed into, to a great depth, right and left. So long ago as 1900, the royal commission on monuments declared that it was necessary to take thought of this position of affairs, which was capable, at a given moment, of compromising the very existence of the building. ¶ In the crypt, two large funeral monuments have been discovered. They are in marble, and belong to the Renaissance period; they were originally in one of the chapels in the circumference of the choir, whence they were removed to make room for some works of restoration. These funeral monuments will be placed against the walls of the south-east entrance of the church. ¶ Lastly, the commission has requested the governor of the province to instruct the committee of correspondents to draw up an inventory of the objects of art housed in the cathedral crypt and to state, as far as possible, the origin of these works, several of which appear to present a real artistic importance.

~Nieuport~

The work of restoration of the fine church of Nieuport is being actively carried out. In consequence of certain demolitions effected since an earlier inspection, it has been ascertained that the cross-vaulting of the transept was originally in wood, as were all the other vaults of the building. A portion of the wooden ribs is still in position, as is also the case with the remains of the shingle roofing. All doubt being now resolved, this vault will be reinstated in wood. In the wall of the south transept, a primitive window has been laid bare. It was built up at the time of a general alteration of the edifice and replaced by a larger bay. The window will be restored to its first state. The removal of the covering of the south transept has shown that the ridge of that portion of the monument is higher by about 50 cm. than that of the adjacent roofings. As no alteration has taken place in this part, the actual height of the roofing and of the south gable will be maintained. Pains have been taken to restore the primitive buttresses of the south nave, beside the choir, of which the old sites have been found.

~R. Petrucci.~

FROM BERLIN[121]

Within the last few months the picture gallery of Berlin has had the opportunity of making some very fortunate purchases which supplement the collection of pictures of the northern schools in a way that is particularly desirable. The acquisition of the large picture by Hugo van der Goes was an event for the Berlin gallery, one of those purchases which may suffice to reconcile an acquisitive curator with the chances of a restless profession for another year or two. ¶ Of the pictures of older German masters the gallery had the opportunity of buying two striking works. The Rest on the Flight of the year 1504, always acknowledged as Lucas Cranach’s best picture, passed from the hands of Frau Fiedler of Munich, the widow of its last owner, into the possession of the Berlin gallery. The picture, enamel-like in painting and in excellent preservation, was formerly in the Schiarra gallery in Rome. Further, they succeeded in acquiring one of the few authentic panels of Martin Schongauer, a painting of moderate dimensions, very near akin to the Münich, and still more to the Vienna Madonna pictures. Of particular charm is the sunny bright landscape in the background. ¶ The gallery hitherto lacked a great religious painting by Rubens; this default is now very happily atoned by the acquisition of the Conversion of Paul. The picture, that dates from about the time of the great religious pictures of Antwerp, reveals stress of emotion and very penetrating harsh illumination. Of the recently acquired Italian pictures only one deserves comment here; but this is a master work--the Resurrection of Christ, by Giovanni Bellini, of the earlier period of the master.

I. S.

FROM VIENNA[121]

To-day Vienna has its modern gallery. The old possessions of the municipal art gallery and of the academy of the graphic arts furnished the foundations for this new institution, and the works acquired of late years in behalf of the state and of the province of Lower Austria supplement this nucleus in such a way as to give us to-day a fairly comprehensive review of the evolution of art in Austria since the year 1848. Some 200 well-chosen paintings adorn the old and venerable apartments of the Lower Belvedere--in the palace, that is to say, which Prince Eugene of Savoy commissioned Lucas von Hildebrand (1668-1745) to build for him. ¶ Some few masters, such as Rudolf von Alt, Hans Makart, Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller, who have carried their names and the fame of their art far beyond the boundaries of their native land, are represented by a considerable number of their works. Other ornaments of the Vienna school, such as Moriz Schwind, Joseph Danhauser, Joseph Führich, E. Jacob Schindler, are unfortunately by no means represented in proportion to the claims of their art or fame. Whether in these cases mistakes in selection--for the storehouse still contains great treasures--or actual dearth of the works of the one or the other was the cause we are not in a position to decide. In any case the authorities of the new museum of the town of Vienna, whither on its completion the modern gallery is to migrate, have their work cut out here to make good all the mistakes that have been committed in their time, and to restore the monuments of eminent men which have slipped somewhat into the background of the temple of fame to their proper places. The right wing of the palace is devoted to foreign artists. Germany is represented by Klinger, Böcklin, Stuck, Uhde, Achenbach; Italy by Segantini; France by Monet, Rolt and Dagnan-Bouveret; England and the Netherlands by Alma Tadema; and Spain by Zuloaga.

J. M.

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

_To the Editor of_ ~The Burlington Magazine~.

~Dear Sir~,

In your July number, Mr. Cecil Smith states that the head of a girl, from Chios, recently exhibited in the Burlington Fine Arts club, is rubbed down ruinously over the entire surface. A microscopic examination of the piece in various lights will convince him, or anyone open to conviction, that his statement is plainly contrary to fact. Seldom is seen a marble with greater freshness of surface. ¶ That the original modelling is evanescent--or, as he may care to call it, ‘rubbed down’--is obvious, even to me; but the whole effect, good or bad, depends on that evanescence, which is found repeatedly in works which aim at Praxitelean effects. ¶ Mr. Smith having given you his estimate of the head as a work of art, allow me to quote the judgement of another man, Auguste Rodin, almost equally eminent. When questioned by an interviewer concerning his impressions of London during his recent visit, he is reported to have answered: ‘This time I have been most fortunate, for I have seen at the Burlington Fine Arts club an antique head of great beauty. It is life itself. It embodies all that is beautiful, life itself, beauty itself. It is admirable! Those parted lips! I am not a man of letters, hence I am unable to describe this truly great work of art. I feel, but I cannot find the words to express what I feel. It is a Venus. I cannot tell you how interesting that Venus is to me. It is a flower, a perfect gem. Perfect to such a degree that it is “aussi déroutante que la nature elle-même!” It defies description.’ ¶ The interviewer thought M. Rodin was speaking of the Petworth Aphrodite, but a few inquiries will enable Mr. Smith to find out the truth of the matter, if it is worth his while. ¶ Thus it appears that about a model in partly-melted loaf-sugar there may be as diverse opinions as concerning the tone of a cracked bell.

I am, Sir,
Your obedient servant,
~John Marshall~.

July 28, 1903.