This day I waited upon Mr. Stepney, who among other papers from England shewed me that traiterous Epigram, written in praise of Sorrel, or the horse, from which his late Majesty received his fatal fall.
October xxv.
There was brought to his Excellency’s house a male child, seven years of age, born at Rigetsch, three miles and a half from Papa, of a beautiful countenance, but without legs or thighs; and the left hand deformed, but the right intire. It walks, and raises itself with ease, while its trunk supplies the use of one leg, and the right hand that of the other. The hips terminate in a round figure, not unlike a woman’s breasts, and have in the middle an excrescence exactly resembling a large nipple. The child is healthy and lively, and from the crown of the head to the extremity of the trunk is three palms and a half long.
I had now, in company of several English gentlemen, an opportunity of seeing the Emperor’s collection of pictures, which is exposed at the price of twelve florins. It consists of three long galleries, with four or five large and square chambers. The whole number of pieces amounts to a thousand six hundred and sixty three, performed by the best hands of Europe, particularly these which follow: Albert Durer, Anton. Correggio, Bassan, Palma senior and junior, Prugel senior and junior, Paul Veronese, Bronzini, Franck senior, Paduanino, Jo. Bellino, Poussin, Gerome Poss, Portononi, Spagnoletto, Raphael Sancio, Giorgioni, Titian, Tintoretto, Van Ach, Holbein, Rubens, Van Dick, John de Heem, Pauditz, and others. Among these there was one piece of Raphael, which seemed to excel the rest, being a saint holding a crucifix, which belonged to the cabinet of King Charles the first of England, and was sold by Oliver to this court for twelve thousand florins. Besides this collection of pictures, there is another set of rarities, preserved in a cabinet at one end of the third gallery, and consisting of intaglios and cameos; among which is a large head of Domitian in agate; a series of gold medals, and among them two of Otho, to which is added a Pisennius Niger in silver of the third size. In the same cabinet are several small statues of brass and stone, among the rest those of Venus and Hercules; and likewise several antient busts, particularly of Plato and Aristotle; with divers sepulchral lamps, urns, and other remains of antiquity. To say nothing of the curiosities found in the tomb of Childeric the first by Leopold William, Archduke of Austria, and uncle to this Emperor, at Tournay in the year 1657. Among these are some remarkable gold coins of that time, with the repeated emblem of flies or bees, the wings of which at a distance give the figure of a flower de lys, and are supposed to be the real arms of France, tho this resemblance has occasioned their being mistaken for that flower. But more especially is to be remembred the order of antient busts ranged on one side of the three galleries, among which are several heads of Emperors, and Satyrs, with one of Socrates; as likewise an intire figure of Magna Mater turrita, with a lion under her chair, a tympanum in her left hand, and patina in her right; which cost this court a thousand florins at Rome.
November iii.
I went to visit Mr. C. Boét, a famous painter in enamel, who had a salary from his late Majesty, whose picture, with those of other confederate Princes, drawn by him he now shewed me. But that which is most remarkable, he is at present working for this court the largest piece, that ever was known in enamel, being an oval of eighteen inches by fifteen; which contains the figures of the Emperor and Empress, King and Queen of the Romans, with the Archduke, the four Archdutchesses, and the two young Daughters of the King of the Romans. He was sent for hither by his late Majesty on purpose for this work, for which when finished he is by compact to receive four thousand ducats of gold. The materials of it are a copper plate covered with a white enamel, which being hardened in the fire, is afterwards painted over in colours of a peculiar composition, with oil of lavender and rosemary; and then again put into the fire to receive a gloss, and additional hardness; after which it is liable to no accident, but that of breaking. It may be observed, that all the red colours in this work are made of gold.
November vi.
This day by order of his Excellency I waited on the two young Messieurs Olmeus and others, in order to see the Emperor’s treasury the third time, and thereby perfected my catalogue of those rarities. And his Excellency being then preparing for his departure, the Emperor presented him with six thousand dollars.