[32] Hollar is not merely one of the most distinguished of German engravers. There are few artists in any country who have handled the needle with so much skill and intelligence; there is probably none who has so greatly excelled in rendering the details of apparel and of the daintiest objects. His achievement numbers more than 2,000 prints, which, in spite of their small size, and the generally trifling nature of the subjects, deserve to be classed amongst the most remarkable etched work of the seventeenth century.
[33] His first plates are sometimes signed "De Leeuw," sometimes "Tomaes de Leu," which has led many writers—M. Robert-Dumesnil among them—to suppose that he migrated to Paris from a town in Flanders.
[34] It represents a "Holy Family," with this inscription on a stone, to the right: "R. Nanteuil Philosophiæ Auditor Sculpebat Rhemis An^o dni 1645."
[35] These flights were not Nanteuil's last. There is extant a sort of petition in verse, which he one day presented to Louis XIV. to excuse himself for not having finished in time a portrait ordered by the king. These rhymes, quoted by the Abbé Lambert in his "Histoire Littéraire du Règne de Louis XIV.," and some others composed by Nanteuil in praise of Mlle. de Scudéry, are not such to make us regret that he did not more frequently lay aside the graver for the pen.
[36] The greater part of Nanteuil's drawings are in three crayons, made out in places with light tints in pastel. The colour is sober and delicate, and offers a good deal of resemblance to the charming French crayons of the sixteenth century. Nanteuil doubtless produced many portraits which he never engraved, but he engraved very few that he had not previously produced. It must also be remarked, that in his achievement, which is composed of more than two hundred and thirty pieces, there are not more than eighteen subject pictures or illustrations. It is worthy, too, of special note that there are only eight portraits in which the hands are seen, and in six of these only one hand is shown.
[37] "Édit de Saint Jean-de-Luz," 1660.
[38] Claude, it is true, was still alive in 1667; but after his second installation in Rome (1627), he never saw France again.
[39] Vitet: "Eustache Lesueur."
[40] It is said that Lebrun one day proclaimed that Audran had "improved his pictures." It is possible he may have said, "that he had not spoilt them." Such an expression in the mouth of such a man is quite modest enough; but it is difficult to imagine Lebrun so far humbling himself in public.
[41] We said that Edelinck was born at Antwerp; but as he was very young when he took up his abode in France, and as he never returned to his native country, we may be allowed to include him in the French school with as much right as his countryman, Philippe de Champaigne.