Valentin [miscalled Moïse Valentin, a misreading of Mosu, i.e. Monsieur] (1600-1634) was born at Coulommiers en Brie. He attended the school of Simon Vouet for some years, and then went to Italy, where he was a friend of Poussin and Claude. A rival of Ribera in the imitation of the turbulent Caravaggio, Valentin deserted entirely the traditions of French art, and only belongs to the French school from the circumstances of his birth. To judge him justly, and to appreciate the loss art sustained in his early death, occasioned by the excess of a fiery temperament, we must be acquainted with his better and nobler works,

which show thought and reflection; the Martyrdom of S. Lawrence in the Museum of Madrid, and the Martyrdom of S. Processo, in the Vatican.

Sébastien Bourdon (1616-1671?), another of the French

disciples of Italy, was

born at Montpellier,

and received

eur, power of expression, depth of thought, and a touching sensibility and tenderness which sometimes raise him to the sublime. The Louvre has fifty of his finest paintings. There he may be seen from his austere and studious youth to his early death; from the dark and fantastic History of S. Bruno to the gay and laughing History of Love, which was his last work. But between the two extremes required by the subjects of a

his first education from his father, who was a painter on glass; and when still a boy was taken by his uncle to Paris, where he studied art for some years. At eighteen years of age he went to Italy, and worked both at Rome and Venice. He afterward returned to Paris, and painted his celebrated picture of the Crucifixion of S. Peter. In 1652 he was prevailed upon to visit Sweden, and there he executed several important works for Queen Christina. He again returned to Paris, where he died.

Eustache Le Sueur (1617-1655), the son of an artisan, studied under Vouet and became famous; but driven from the court by Le Brun, he entered the

IN THE LOUVRE, PARIS.

series of pictures for a Carthusian convent, and for the sumptuous mansion of the president Lambert de Thorigny, Le Sueur painted many compositions of varied style, although they were all on religious subjects. Of these arethe Descent

from the

Cross, the Mass of S. Martin, the brother martyrs S. Gervasius and S. Protasius refusing to worship false gods. The last picture, which was painted as a pendent to the two works of Philippe de Champagne on the same legend, is as large as the largest works of Le Brun or Jouvenet. The Preaching of S. Paul at Ephesus, painted in 1649, and offered to Notre Dame of Paris by the guild of goldsmiths, has been rightly placed in the salle des chefs-d'œuvre, for it is the masterpiece of Le Sueur.

Charles Le Brun (1619-1690) was the son of a sculptor of Paris. As he showed a decided talent for drawing, he was placed under Simon Vouet, with whom he remained for some years. He then

went to Italy, and under the tuition of Poussin studied the works of the great masters. Shortly after his return to Paris, Le Brun received the patronage of Louis XIV., who made him painter to the court and director of the Gobelins manufactory, and decorated him with the order of S. Michael.

In the Louvre there are twenty-two of his pictures, at the head of which stands the History of Alexander. This famous series, which was ordered by Louis XIV. in 1660, and which was completed in 1668, is no less important among his works than the History of S. Bruno among those of Le Sueur-to make known and to popularize this great poem in five cantos-the Passage of the Granicus, the Battle of Arbela, the Family of Darius made Captive, the Defeat of Porus, and the Triumph of Alexander at Babylonan evident allegorical flattery of the early triumphs of the great Louis. The painter had the good fortune to have it engraved by Edelinck and Audran. The other great paintings of Le Brun are the Day of Pentecost (where he has introduced himself in in the figure of the disciple standing on the left) the Christ with Angels, painted to immortalize a dream of the queen mother; and the Repentant Magdalen, which every one calls Mademoiselle de la Vallière. He is more natural and true in the Stoning of S. Stephen, as well as in the small pictures on profane history, Cato and Mutius Scaevola, works of his youth, which were once attributed to the great Poussin.

Bon Boulogne, the elder (1649-1717), the son of an historic painter, Louis de Boulogne, was much patronized by Louis XIV., who sent him to Rome to study the old masters. He painted many of the decorations of Versailles.

Jean Jouvenet (1644-1717), the son of a painter, was born at Rouen. At seventeen years of age he went to Paris, where he quickly rose to fame. He was a pupil and assistant of Le Brun, and followed his style. In old age he lost the use of his right hand by palsy, and, to the astonishment of his brother artists, painted with his left hand the Magnificat, now in Notre Dame. Nearly all his pictures were of sacred subjects. Jouvenet's art is theatrical, carried almost to the style of scenepainting By what other name could we call the enormous sheets of canvas on which the Miraculous Draught of Fishes, the Christ driving the MoneyChangers out of the Temple, and even the famous

Raising of Lazarus, are painted? His less ambitious compositions, such as the Descent from the Cross, which he painted for the convent of the Capucines, and an Ascension for the church of S. Paul, are calmer in style, besides being better in every other respect.

Jean Baptiste Santerre (1650-1717), who was born at Magny, near Pontoise, went early in life to Paris, where he studied under Boulogne. His pictures are carefully composed and harmoniously colored. At the time that, in order to flatter the pompous taste of Louis XIV., Jouvenet was exaggerating the exaggerations of Le Brun, there was one artist who religiously observed the worship of the beautiful. This was Jean Baptiste Santerre. Like Le Sueur before him, and Prud'hon after him, he escaped from academic tyranny, as well as from the slavery of the court. He sought for real greatness more than for fame or fortune, and found it, far from theatrical effect, in delicacy and grace. Santerre, in a tolerably long life, completed but few works, and the Louvre has only succeeded in obtaining two-Susannah at the Bath, and a Female portrait, which seem to make the link in the chain uniting Correggio to Prud'hon.

THE AGE OF LOUIS XIV.

To bring into one group the best portrait painters of the age to which Louis XIV. has given his name, we must go back a few years, and commence with

Pierre Mignard (1610-1695), who, although born at Troyes in Champagne, was called the "Roman," because after having studied under Simon Vouet, he passed twenty-two years at Rome. Mignard was not merely a portrait painter; he also painted historic pictures, and in the dome of Val-de-Grâce frescoes larger in size than that of Correggio in the duomo of Parma. He succeeded Le Brun in the office of king's painter, and was made a Chevalier de Saint Michael, and chancellor of the Academy. He entered into direct rivalry with Le Brun in a Family of Darius at the feet of Alexander, now in the Hermitage; and in the Louvre we may see the charming Madonna with the Grapes, brought from Italy, in which he imitated the style of Annibale Carracci, while exaggerating the studied grace of Albani; and a number of historic portraits, the Grand Dauphin, the Duke of Burgundy, the Duke of Anjou, Madame de Maintenon, and Mignard himself.

PAINTERS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.

Antoine Watteau (1684-1721), the son of a poor thatcher of Valenciennes, was placed with an obscure artist in his native city, and for a long time painted pictures of S. Nicholas for three francs a week and his soup. In 1702 he went to Pariswhere the scene-painter Claude Gillot introduced him to the green-room of the opera-and there he founded a school of Painting. In the hands of his plagiarists, Van Loo, Pater, Lancret, Boucher, and a long train of their followers, art was more and more degraded and dishonored in ridiculous and licentious paintings of sheepfolds decorated with satin ribbons; and pictures were merely used as ornaments for boudoirs.

Watteau attempted only very small genre sub

HORACE VERNET. FROM THE PAINTING BY HIMSELF.

jects; but he has imparted such elevation and grandeur to them that he will always be considered far above a mere decorator. In the works of this painter of Fêtes Galantes, besides the exquisite coloring taken from Rubens, we shall always have to admire his invention, fun, wit, and even propriety; for we feel that he was, as his biographer Gersaint says, a "libertine in mind, though of good morality."

Nicolas Lancret (1690-1743), a painter of Fêtes Galantes, who was born in Paris, took Watteau as his model, and became an ignoble disciple of that

master, though in his own time his works were very popular.

In the National Gallery is a series of four of his best paintings. They are the four ages of manInfancy, Youth, Manhood and Age.

Jean Baptiste Joseph Pater (1696-1736), who was born at Valenciennes, went, when still young, to Paris, and entered the studio of Watteau, whom he copied both in subject and, as far as possible, in style. His works are somewhat scarce.

François Boucher (1704-1770) was one of the most popular artists of his time, was appointed painter to the king, and acquired a great reputation, which did not long survive him. Boucher was called the "Painter of the Graces," because, in the midst of landscapes as weak and false as the scenes at the opera, he introduced, as the shepherdesses of his be-ribboned sheep, veritable dolls, without modesty, and only fresh-looking from the vermilion of their toilette, and because they are reposing in the style of goddesses on clouds of cotton! A Pan and Syrinx by him is in the National Gallery.

François Desportes (1661-1743) was the first in France to make a special domain for himself by imitating Snyders, and he became the historiographer of the hunts of Louis XIV. It is said that he visited England, and painted sporting scenes there.

Jean Baptiste van Loo (1684-1745), the grandson of an artist, was born at Aix in Provence. He painted in public buildings at Toulon, Turin and Rome, and was made a member of the Academy at Paris. In 1737 he paid a visit to England, and was patronized by Sir Robert Walpole, and painted many portraits of the nobility. In 1742, he returned to his native land, and there he died.

Jean Baptiste Oudry (1686-1755), whose genre was the same as that of Desportes, became in his turn the historian of the hunts of Louis XV. His works, which are very numerous in the LouvreHunts of stags, wolves, boars, pheasants and partridges show that he had neither the invention nor the movement of Snyders, nor the exquisite skill and touch of Fyt or Weenix.

Jean Baptiste Siméon Chardin (1699-1779), the rival of Willem Kalf, the painter of kitchens, was a powerful colorist, who emulated the Dutch school in the vigor of his tints, until then unknown in the French school. "Oh, Chardin !" said Diderot, "it

Claude Joseph Vernet (1714-1789), the celebrated marine painter, was born at Avignon. A whole room in the Louvre is devoted to his works, which are ranged on the walls round his bust in marble. These are, in the first place, Views of the principal French Seaports, painted in 1754 to 1765, by order of Louis XV.; an ungrateful task, which would have required a mind inexhaustible in its resources. Then, a large number of Marine Pieces properly so called, in which he has represented the sea in all its aspects, in the south and the north, in, the morning and in the evening, with

THE EXQUISITES.

the sun and the moon, in rain and in fine weather, in calm and tempest, but they do not possess the intoxicating poetry of Claude. He may be studied in the National Gallery in a view of the Castle of S. Angelo, Rome, and a Landscape. He had a son, Antoine Charles Horace, called Carle Vernet (17581835), who painted battle-pieces; and who was the father of the celebrated Horace Vernet, of whom we shall speak hereafter.

Jean Baptiste Greuze (1725-1805) was born at Tournus, near Mâcon, and received his early education in art at Lyons. He was one of the first French painters to go to Nature for his subjects by taking

his figures from rural life, and representing simple and touching village scenes.

Some of these contain merely a comic incident, such as the Broken Pitcher; others rise to pathetic drama, like the Father's Curse. The Village Bride is of intermediate style, more simple and graceful, and may be considered as the masterpiece of his transition style. These choice works, with five others, are in the Louvre. The gallery of Sir Richard Wallace contains twenty-two paintings by Greuze, several of which have been engraved; and there are three heads of Girls in the National Gal

lery. His paintings, which at the present day command fabulous prices, were not appreciated in his own time, and the unhappy painter passed his old age in extreme poverty.

Joseph Marie Vien (1716-1809) was born at Montpellier. He studied first in Paris, and from 1775 to 1781 directed the French school at Rome. In studying works of the earlier ages, he learned to understand the greatness of the art which had almost perished, and endeavored to return to the style of To Vien belongs the honor of having been the first to attempt the part of the reformation in art which was accomplished by his pupil Louis David. This may be seen, in his fine composition, S. Germain of Auxerre and S. Vincent of Saragossa receiving martyrs' crowns from an angel; and for chastened and powerful execution, in the Hermit asleep. Vien said, "I have only half opened the door; it is M. David who will throw it wide."

BY CARLE VERNET.

the great masters.

Jacques Louis David (1748-1825), a relative of François Boucher, was born at Paris, accompanied Vien to Rome, and with him studied the works of