This beautiful edition was never completed owing to the lack of subscribers due to the Revolution. The volumes were to have contained 80 plates. A number of the plates were ready or nearly finished, and these can only be added to the work, since they were not published with it. In all, 38 subjects are obtainable, but no complete set is known. The ordinary copies contain 20 plates, most of them being after Fragonard.
LA ROCHEFOUCAULD (Le Duc de). Maximes et Réflexions Morales. A Paris, de l’Imprimerie royale, 1778, 8vo. Portrait of the author finely engraved by Choffard after the enamel by Petitot.
“Gravé en 1779 par P. P. Choffard Des. et Grav. de S. M. Imp. et du Roi d’Espagne” is how the engraver signed himself on the right-hand side of this little chef-d’œuvre.
The portrait is absent in many copies, but the book is considered incomplete without it.
It is no uncommon thing for the plates to be post-dated in eighteenth-century volumes; in this particular case it would be difficult to decide if the plate was published later than the book it was to illustrate, or whether the work containing the frontispiece was issued in 1779 in spite of 1778 being printed on the title-page. This portrait does not appear to have been published wholly without connection with the book it usually illustrates, like some portraits contained in volumes of that period were.
LE GENDRE. Description de la Place de Louis XV que l’on construit à Reims, etc. A Paris, de l’imprimerie Prault, 1765, atlas folio. One head-piece, a plan, 2 plans with elevations, 2 views and 3 other plates.
The beautiful head-piece is by Choffard, who also engraved 2 views and 2 plans with elevations.
LIGNE (Prince de). Préjugés Militaires, par un officier autrichien. A Kralovilhota, 1780, 2 vols., 8vo. A head-piece on the dedication-page, 1 tail-piece, and 14 little battle scenes which form head-pieces. Choffard drew and etched all.
The vignettes are little gems of the art of miniature etching, and their composition, although on such a small scale, is handled with the artistic judgement of a thorough master of the art.
N.B.—In all reference books 15 battle views are mentioned in error.