Buchanan, William: Memoirs of painting: with a chronological history of the importation of pictures by the great masters into England since the French Revolution (Band 2) (London: Ackermann, 1824)

MR. BUCHANAN’S IMPORTATIONS. 351
course of a couple of days for Amsterdam, I had
my passport vise by the minister of police for
Brussels, and set off the following afternoon in a
light travelling calesh, accompanied by Mrs. B.
and my servant Antoine, an old campaigner. We
travelled all night, as is usual in France, and the
following morning stopped for a couple of hours
at Cambray, to see the British troops reviewed
by the Duke of Wellington*, having just reached
that place as his Grace had got upon the ground.
The day was beautiful, and the troops made a
most brilliant appearance.
“ From Cambray we passed over much ground
celebrated in the annals of war, and got by the
afternoon to Valenciennes, the siege of which
occupied so much attention at an early period of
the Revolution. From thence, the next point
which brought us up was the Hotel Royal of
Brussels.
“ After waiting on old Gaumare, the banker, I
took the earliest opportunity of calling upon Mon-
sieur Van Reyndaers, to see his two celebrated
pictures by Hobbima, which I have the pleasure
to inform you I purchased, along with a fine
Philip Won vermans, and a Backhuysen, for
40,000 francs, which, although it may appear a

* The army of occupation.