DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.62822#0258
186
CLAUDE LORRAINE.
and another was Queen Esther, with her maidens,
approaching the palace of Ahasuerus. When sur-
rounded by his particular friends, he took great delight
in recounting the events of his youth, the struggles
and privations endured in his boyhood, and the diffi-
culties and dangers he had experienced in his maturer
years ; he would dilate on the tricks which had been
imposed on him, and the insidious snares he had
escaped. Some, who had pretended to be his sriends,
would often visit him while painting, with a view of
borrowing his ideas and compositions; they would aster-
wards imitate his works, and then sell them secretly
under his name: thus they deceived the amateur,
and robbed him of his reputation.
In order to prevent a practice so injurious to himself
and others, he determined in future to make drawings
of every picture he painted, and to record on them the
names of the persons for whom they were done, and
the places to which they were sent*. This precaution
was still further rendered necessary by the frequent
applications from persons possessing spurious pictures,
which they continually sent him to be identified,
* This curious compilation, known under the appellation of the
Liber Veritatis, consists of two hundred drawings, done in bistre,
occasionally heightened with white. After the decease of the artist,
they became the property of his heirs, and were sold by one of his
nephews, for two hundred scudi, to a Frenchman, who took them to
Paris,and offered them to the king; the purchase being declined, they
were shortly after bought by the late Duke of Devonshire, and they
now adorn the magnificent mansion of His Grace at Chatsworth.
Richard Earlom has most admirably imitated them in mezzotinto.
CLAUDE LORRAINE.
and another was Queen Esther, with her maidens,
approaching the palace of Ahasuerus. When sur-
rounded by his particular friends, he took great delight
in recounting the events of his youth, the struggles
and privations endured in his boyhood, and the diffi-
culties and dangers he had experienced in his maturer
years ; he would dilate on the tricks which had been
imposed on him, and the insidious snares he had
escaped. Some, who had pretended to be his sriends,
would often visit him while painting, with a view of
borrowing his ideas and compositions; they would aster-
wards imitate his works, and then sell them secretly
under his name: thus they deceived the amateur,
and robbed him of his reputation.
In order to prevent a practice so injurious to himself
and others, he determined in future to make drawings
of every picture he painted, and to record on them the
names of the persons for whom they were done, and
the places to which they were sent*. This precaution
was still further rendered necessary by the frequent
applications from persons possessing spurious pictures,
which they continually sent him to be identified,
* This curious compilation, known under the appellation of the
Liber Veritatis, consists of two hundred drawings, done in bistre,
occasionally heightened with white. After the decease of the artist,
they became the property of his heirs, and were sold by one of his
nephews, for two hundred scudi, to a Frenchman, who took them to
Paris,and offered them to the king; the purchase being declined, they
were shortly after bought by the late Duke of Devonshire, and they
now adorn the magnificent mansion of His Grace at Chatsworth.
Richard Earlom has most admirably imitated them in mezzotinto.