Smith, John: A catalogue raisonné of the works of the most eminent Dutch, Flemish, and French painters: in which is included a short biographical notice of the artists, with a copious description of their principal pictures : a statement of the prices at which such pictures have been sold at public sales on the continent and in England; a reference the the galleries and private collections in which a large portion are at present; and the names of the artists by whom they have been engraved; to which is added, a brief notice of the scholars & imitators of the great masters of the above schools (Part 3) (London: Smith and Son, 1831)

LIFE OF VAN DYCK.

XXV11

naturally proud. The good intentions of his friends
were effectual in improving his estate, but his health
was irrecoverably affected; he, however, rallied for a
few years, and the hopes of deriving benefit from his
natal air was most likely the cause of his visiting
Antwerp soon after his marriage; and at the same
time he may have gone thence to Paris, but not for
the object mentioned by Walpole*. On his return to
England, a proposal was made, through Sir Kenelm
Digby, to decorate the walls of the Banqueting House,
at Whitehall (of which the ceiling was already adorned
by Rubens), with the history of the Institution and a
procession of the Order of the Garter. The intention
pleased His Majesty, and a design was made for his ap-
probation ; but, for some reason, not now explicable, it
proceeded no further. If the artist asked the extra-
vagant sum of 80,000/., as stated by Walpolef, the
cause of its being dropped is explained; but if the sum
of 8000/., as quoted by Bryan, was the price required,
other matters must have interfered to prevent it. Van
Dyck may have been ambitious to execute some
public work, in emulation of his master Rubens ; but he
could not have been driven to Paris for want of employ-
ment : the numerous portraits of the English nobility
and others, which only the most indefatigable applica-
tion could have executed, is a sufficient refutation of
* “ Sir Anthony, soon after his marriage, set out for Paris, in
“ hopes of being employed there in some public work; he was
“ disappointed ; their own Poussin was then deservedly the favourite
“ at that court.”
•s Walpole refers to Fenton’s Notes on Waller's Poems, as his
authority.