Marie Leezinska, femme de Louis XV. A cleverly painted head.
Le Cardinal Mazarin. By P. de Champagne. Whole length. A fine portrait--which I never contemplate without thinking of the poor unfortunate "man in an iron mask!"
Madame de Motteville. She died in her 74th year, in 1689. This is merely the head and shoulders; but in the Vandyke style of execution.
Charles Paris d'Orleans, dernier Duc de Longueville. He was killed in the famous passage of the Rhine, at Tolhuys, in 1672.
Charles I. By Vandyke. A beautiful half length portrait. Perhaps too highly varnished.
Le Marquis de Cinq-Mars. He was beheaded at the age of twenty- two, in September 1642. There is also a whole length of him, in a rich, white, flowered dress. A genuine and interesting picture.
Mary Queen of Scots. Whole length: in a white dress. A copy; or, if an old picture, repainted all over.
Don Carlos, the unfortunate son of Philip II. of Spain. A beautiful youth; but this picture, alleged to have been painted by Alfonso Sanchez Coello, must be a copy.
The foregoing are the principal decorations along the gallery of this handsome and interesting room. In an adjoining closet, where were once two or three portraits of Bonaparte, is a beautiful and highly finished small whole length of Philip Duke of Orleans, Regent of France. Also a whole length of Marmontel, sitting; executed in crayon. The curiously carved frame, in a brown-coloured wood, in which this latter drawing is contained, is justly an object of admiration with visitors. I have scarcely seen a more appropriate ornament, for a choice cabinet, than this estimable portrait of Marmontel. Here are portraits of Neckar, and Clement Marot, in crayons: the latter a copy. Here is, too, a cleverly painted portrait of L. de Boulogne.
We descend--to a fourth room, or rather to a richly furnished cabinet--below stairs. Every thing here is "en petit." Whether whole lengths, or half lengths, they are representations in miniature. What is this singular portrait, which strikes one to the left, on entering? Can it be so? Yes ... DIANE DE POICTIERS again! She yet lives every where in France. 'Tis a strange performance; but I have no hesitation in calling it AN ORIGINAL ... although in parts it has been palpably retouched. But the features--and especially the eyes--(those "glasses of the soul," as old Boiastuau calls them[186]) seem to retain their former lustre and expression. This highly curious portrait is a half length, measuring only ten inches by about eight. It represents the original without any drapery, except a crimson mantle thrown over her back. She is leaning upon her left arm, which is supported by a bank. A sort of tiara is upon her head. Her hair is braided. Above her, within a frame, is the following inscription, in capital roman letters: "Comme le Cerf brait après le décours des Eaues; ainsi brait mon Ame, après Toy, ô Dieu." Ps. XLII. Upon the whole, this is perhaps the most legitimate representation of the original which France possesses.[187]