Salvator Rosa wrought with wonderful facility, and could paint a well finished landscape and insert all the figures in one day; it is impossible to inspect one of his bold, rapid sketches, without being struck with the fertility of his invention, and the skill of hand that rivalled in execution the activity of his mind. He was also an excellent portrait painter. A portrait of himself is in the church degli Angeli, where his remains were interred, and he introduced his own portrait into several of his pictures, one of which is in the Chigi gallery, representing a wild scene with a poet in a sitting attitude, (with the features of Salvator); before him stands a satyr, allusive to his satiric style of poetry. During his life-time, his works were much sought after by princes and nobles, and they are now to be found in the choicest collections of Italy and of Europe. There is a landscape in the English National Gallery which cost 1800 guineas; a picture in the collection of Sir Mark Sykes brought the enormous sum of 2100 guineas.
FLAGELLATION OF SALVATOR ROSA.
It happened one day that Salvator Rosa, in his youth, on his way to mass, brought with him by mistake, his bundle of burned sticks, with which he used to draw, instead of his mother's brazen clasped missal; and in passing along the magnificent cloisters of the great church of the Certosa at Naples, sacred alike to religion and the arts, he applied them between the interstices of its Doric columns to the only unoccupied space on the pictured walls. History has not detailed what was the subject which occupied his attention on this occasion, but he was working away with all the ardor which his enthusiastic genius inspired, when unfortunately the Prior, issuing with his train from the choir, caught the hapless painter in the very act of scrawling on those sacred walls which required all the influence of the greatest masters to get leave to ornament. The sacrilegious temerity of the boy artist, called for instant and exemplary punishment. Unluckily too, for the little offender, this happened in Lent, the season in which the rules of the rigid Chartreuse oblige the prior and procurator to flagellate all the frati, or lay brothers of the convent. They were, therefore, armed for their wonted pious discipline, when the miserable Salvatoriello fell in their way; whether he was honored by the consecrated hand of the prior, or writhed under the scourge of the procurator, does not appear; but that he was chastised with great severity more than proportioned to his crime, is attested by one of the most scrupulous of his biographers, Pascoli, who, though he dwells lightly on the fact, as he does on others of more importance, confesses that he suffered severely from the monks' flagellation.
SALVATOR ROSA AND THE HIGGLING PRINCE.
A Roman prince, more notorious for his pretensions to virtu than for his liberality to artists, sauntering one day in Salvator's gallery, in the Via Babbuina, paused before one of his landscapes, and after a long contemplation of its merits, exclaimed, "Salvator mio! I am strongly tempted to purchase this picture: tell me at once the lowest price."—"Two hundred scudi," replied Salvator, carelessly. "Two hundred scudi! Ohime! that is a price! but we'll talk of that another time." The illustrissimo took his leave; but bent upon having the picture, he shortly returned, and again inquired the lowest price. "Three hundred scudi!" was the sullen reply. "Carpo di bacco!" cried the astonished prince; "mi burla, vostra signoria; you are joking! I see I must e'en wait upon your better humor; and so addio, Signor Rosa."
The next day brought back the prince to the painter's gallery; who, on entering, saluted Salvator with a jocose air, and added, "Well, Signor Amico, how goes the market to-day? Have prices risen or fallen?"
"Four hundred scudi is the price to-day!" replied Salvator, with affected calmness; when suddenly giving way to his natural impetuosity, and no longer stifling his indignation, he burst forth: "The fact is, your excellency shall not now obtain this picture from me at any price; and yet so little do I value its merits, that I deem it worthy no better fate than this;" and snatching the panel on which it was painted from the wall, he flung it to the ground, and with his foot broke it into a hundred pieces. His excellency made an unceremonious retreat, and returned no more to the enraged painter's studio.