DUVEEN BROTHERS 
 LIBRARY 
 
 72© FIFTH AVENUE NEW YORK 
 
THE 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
Two vols. large post 8vo. price 24 s. 
 
 NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI AND HIS TIMES. By Professor 
 
 Villari, Author of ‘ Life of Savonarola ’ &c. Translated by Linda Villari. 
 ‘ The whole work promises to be one of the most permanently valuable contribu- 
 tions to the history of the Renaissance in Italy, and English students may be con- 
 gratulate d on the appearance of the translation by the hand of Madame Villari, 
 herself an English author.’ — Academy. 
 
 Two vols. demy 8vo. cloth, price 24$, 
 
 THE CIVILISATION OF THE PERIOD OF THE RENAIS- 
 SANCE IN ITALY. By Jacob Burckhardt. Authorised Translation, 
 by S. G. C. Middlemore. 
 
 ‘ The whole of the first part of Dr. Burckhardt’s work deals with what may be 
 called the Political Preparation for the Renaissance. It is impossible here to do 
 more than express a high opinion of the compact way in which the facts are put 
 
 before the reader The second volume of Dr. Burckhardt’s work is, we think, 
 
 more full and complete in itself, more rich in original thoughts, than the first. His 
 account of the cause which prevented the rise of a great Italian drama is very clear 
 and satisfying.’ — Saturday Review. 
 
 
 London: C. KEGAN PAUL & CO., 1 Paternoster Square. 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2015 
 
 https://archive.org/details/renaissanceofartOOdilk 
 
LOUIS XI. A S 
 
 ROMULUS 
 
 LAYINC THE FOUNDATION STONE OF ROME 
 
THE RENAISSANCE OF 
 
 ART IN FRANCE 
 
 BY 
 
 MRS MARK J>ATTISON 
 
 / . , , . \ 
 
 ‘ On le peut , je Vessaie , un plus Sfavant le fasse ’ — L a Fontaine 
 
 Mtjj |tuuteen Illustrations oir &teel 
 
 IN TWO VOLUMES 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON 
 
 C. KEGAN PAUL & CO., i PATERNOSTER SQUARE 
 
 1879 
 
5 
 
 V.) 
 
 (L o py ^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ( The rights of translation and of reproduction are reserved) 
 
V 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 OF 
 
 THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. The Renaissance in France i 
 
 II. Architecture (1460-1540) Chateaux of Touraine 32 
 
 III. Architecture (1540-1580) Bullant . . .72 
 
 IV. Architecture (1540-1580) De l’Orme . . . 98 
 
 V. Architecture (1542-1578) Lescot .... 143 
 
 VI. Sculpture (1540-1572) Goujon 170 
 
 VII. Sculpture (1542-1598) Pilon 218 
 
 VIII. Painting (1460-1520) Fouquet 254 
 
 IX. Painting (1475-1584) The Clouets . . . 307 
 
 Addenda 369 
 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 TO 
 
 THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 * TO FACE 
 
 FIG. PAGE 
 
 i. Building of Rome— Jean Fouquet ( Frontispiece ) 
 
 2* Chambord ... 56 
 
 3. Ecouen 82 
 
 4. Anet 1 18 
 
 5. Old Louvre . 15 2 
 
 6. Diane Chasseresse 202 
 
 7. Three Graces 250 
 
 8. Gideon’s Fleece 3° 4 
 
 9. Henri II. on Horseback 33 8 
 
THE RENAISSANCE OF ART 
 IN FRANCE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 As tu basty, pour apres ruiner ? 
 
 As tu voulu planter, et jar diner 
 
 Pour ton labeur parfait exterminer ? 
 
 O quelle perte ! — C. Marot. 
 
 The art of the French Renaissance depends for its 
 charm on the nature of the purely personal motive by 
 which it is animated. It is in a most special way the 
 expression of the desires not of a nation but of a class, 
 the result of individual needs, individual taste, individual 
 caprice at a period when the life of the few had become 
 exceedingly rich and complex. It cannot, therefore, 
 appeal to a wide public, and requires perhaps more 
 than the art of any other time a knowledge of the con- 
 ditions under which it was produced in order to arrive 
 at an appreciation of its excellence. 
 
 Art is the speech of the people only in its most 
 abstract forms. When it presents, for example, a type 
 of physical beauty unaffected by any moral agent, as in 
 
 VOL. i. 
 
 B 
 
2 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 the Antinous — or when it renders a physical ideal in 
 which is embodied a conception of moral beauty — as in 
 the Niobe, or the Sistine Madonna, the grief of the 
 mother bereaved, or the sacred joy of maternity — art is 
 universally intelligible. It is a tongue which knows no 
 accent. In the purity of these simple reductions local 
 colouring is lost, as many tints become fused into one 
 glory beneath the noon-day sun. The work of the 
 French Renaissance scarcely, however, affords any 
 instance of this sublimation of the aspirations, hopes, 
 and fears of the human spirit ; but it is, on the other 
 hand, rich in local colour, and contains in its strongly- 
 marked character an abundant source of interest for 
 those who read in it the signs of the time at which it 
 was produced. 
 
 When the imprisoned instincts of fifteen centuries 
 burst their bonds, the moment of revolt left its traces 
 everywhere ; in art and literature, as in life ; and the 
 necessary transition from old forms to new, which 
 gradually took place in Italy, was in France peculiarly 
 sudden and complete. The life of the nation had long 
 languished under an enforced repression specially 
 foreign to the French temperament, and a rule, long 
 fallen into disrepute, was shaken to the foundations on 
 coming into contact with hostile traditions embodied in 
 forms apt to the national sympathies and instincts. 
 
 The warriors of France came back from Italy with 
 the wonders of the South on their lips and her treasures 
 
CHARLES VIII. ENTERS ITALY. 
 
 3 
 
 in their hands. They brought with them books and 
 paintings, they brought with them armour inlaid with 
 gold and silver, tapestries enriched with precious 
 metals, embroidered clothing, and even household 
 furniture. Distributed by many hands in many dif- 
 ferent places, each precious thing became a separate 
 centre of initiative power. The chateaux of the country 
 nobles boasted the treasures which had fallen to the 
 share of their lords at Genoa or at N aples ; and the great 
 women of the court were eager to divide the spoil. 
 The contagion spread rapidly. Even in the most 
 fantastic moment of Gothic inspiration, the French 
 artist gave evidence that his right hand obeyed a 
 national instinct for order, for balance, for completeness, 
 and that his eye preferred, in obedience to a national 
 predilection, the most refined harmonies of colour. Step 
 by step he had been feeling his way ; now, the broken 
 link of tradition was again made fast ; the workmen of 
 Paris and the workmen of Athens joined hands, united 
 by the genius of Italy. 
 
 It must not, however, be supposed that no inter- 
 course had previously existed between France and 
 Italy. The roads by Narbonneand Lyons were worn 
 by many feet. The artists of Tours and Poitiers, the 
 artists of Paris and Dijon, were alike familiar with the 
 path to Rome. But an intercourse, hitherto restricted, 
 was rendered by the wars of Charles VIII. all but 
 universal. The brief campaign (1494), in which the 
 
4 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 king commanded in person, had left his followers 
 dazzled, bewildered, eager to return to the fertile life of 
 the land which had aroused their desires. Something 
 also of a chivalrous passion prompted them to urge 
 their leader to take up again his abandoned enterprise. 
 
 Preparations were made, and Charles was induced 
 to set forth as far as Lyons. Then, in answer to the 
 protestations of those about him, in fulfilment of the 
 pledges given to those who awaited his help, six ships 
 were despatched to Gaeta bearing men and provisions, 
 but bearing also the news that Charles had deserted his 
 own standards, in the pursuit of a vulgar amour. Two 
 years later he died, with the curse of Savonarola on 
 his head, and France could no longer be restrained. 
 
 A year had hardly passed before the French troops 
 crossed the Alps, and now it was no longer possible to 
 imagine that the expedition meant a mere triumphal 
 tour through Italy in order to take possession of 
 Naples. The experiences of the campaign of 1494 had 
 made clear the situation. If Italy were again to be 
 sacrificed and betrayed, it would be done by men 
 sinning in full knowledge. Charles and his companions 
 had been taken by surprise. When they entered Italy, 
 mind and imagination were alike led captive by the 
 magic attractions of the land and people. The 
 Italians, on the other hand, felt, and exaggerated in 
 feeling, the poetic side of the relations which they had 
 brought themselves to believe in, as existing between 
 
RESULT OF THE EXPEDITION. 
 
 5 
 
 their nation and the French. Italy was the Holy Land 
 of Europe lying bound, and awaiting its deliverance at 
 French hands. But the instinct which had carried the 
 French so far could not furnish a trustworthy guide in 
 dealing with the conflicting interests and complicated 
 intrigues of Italian politics. 
 
 As soon as Charles and his followers were called 
 upon to take decisive action, it became evident that 
 they were so fettered by sentimental relations and 
 personal pledges given on all sides that a statesmanlike 
 view of the position and statesmanlike action was im- 
 possible. The campaign of 1494 resulted therefore in 
 a confused series of fatal blunders. The interests of 
 the people they had come to succour were forgotten, 
 whilst the sympathies of the King and his nobles were 
 absorbed by tales of personal wrongs, or well-devised 
 advocacy of hereditary rights. The crusade which 
 had been undertaken in the name of a nation was de- 
 graded to the miserable championship of the quarrels 
 of this or that petty prince. Finally the French army 
 recrossed the Alps, after having, as its most signal 
 exploit, almost destroyed, at Milan, the most brilliant 
 and lettered court of the day. 
 
 This was done in good faith. It remained for 
 Louis XII. and his advisers to plan deliberate treachery. 
 Cruelly as the Italians had suffered at the hands of 
 Charles VIII. they still looked to France for help; 
 they knew that though they had been injured they had 
 
6 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 not been betrayed. But the weak and generous im- 
 pulses of Charles VIII. found no place in the councils 
 of his successors. The rulers of France were three. 
 Louis, Anne of Brittany, and Georges d’Amboise, 
 Archbishop of Rouen. Louis, a poor political contriver 
 with a royal preference for royal alliances, Amboise, a 
 scheming churchman to whom a free city or a free state 
 was necessarily odious, Anne, a woman whose masculine 
 understanding had a feminine warp, and served her 
 only to prosecute the aggrandisement of her family, 
 and to keep her well with her priest. This triumvirate 
 held the destinies of France, and sealed the fate of 
 Italy. 
 
 An ominous visitor arrived at the French court. 
 Caesar Borgia came, bearing the Papal Bull which the 
 King required to establish his marriage. The Arch- 
 bishop of Rouen at once began to spin the thread of an 
 intrigue which should obtain for him a cardinal’s hat. 
 To the King, the woman, and the priest, the friendship 
 of the Pope was so indispensable that they, with one 
 accord, gave the right hand of fellowship to his son, 
 whose filthy reputation heralded him to the highest 
 honours that France could bestow. The bastard 
 Borgia, with a French princess to wife, became Cdsar 
 de France. 
 
 The doom of Italy was pronounced. Substanti- 
 ally the compact was this. Aided by Borgia, the 
 French were to destroy the free cities of the north, and 
 
THE ITALIAN CAMPAIGNS OF LOUIS XII. 
 
 7 
 
 in return France was to aid Borgia in breaking the 
 power of the independent nobles who yet resisted Papal 
 aggression in the south. 
 
 In July 1499 the work began. At first the Italians 
 failed to realise what had taken place. When the 
 French army entered the Milanese territory the in- 
 habitants fraternised with the troops, Milan, Genoa, 
 Pavia opened their gates with joy. But in a few 
 months the course of events, in the south, aroused a 
 dread anxiety. There, Borgia, under the protection of 
 the French king, and with the assistance of the French 
 arms, was triumphantly glutting his brutal rage and lust, 
 whilst Frenchmen were forced to look on helpless and 
 indignant. 
 
 Milan, justly terrified, made an attempt to throw 
 herself on the mercy of her old ruler. To no purpose. 
 Louis went back over the Alps, leaving a strong 
 hand and a strong garrison in Milan, and dragging 
 with him the unfortunate Louis Sforza, a miserable 
 proof of the final destruction of the most brilliant 
 court of Upper Italy. Leonardo da Vinci had to 
 look on the destruction of his model for the statue 
 of Francesco Sforza, of his paintings in the palace of 
 the Duke Louis, of his constructions for the palace of 
 Galeazzo San Severino. ‘ The Duke/ he writes, c has 
 lost his State, his fortune, and his liberty, and has 
 finished nothing which he has begun.’ Leonardo 
 returned to Florence, his patron died of insult, cold, 
 
8 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 damp, and privation, after ten years of prison and exile, 
 in the Castle of Loches. 
 
 By the campaign of 1507, the work, thus begun, 
 was consummated. The ancient spirit of independence 
 still lingered in Genoa, and Venice was not yet crushed. 
 There were still fresh laurels to be won. In this Holy 
 War the Pope and the Emperor willingly joined forces 
 with France. Assured of the countenance of Austria 
 and Rome, Louis started, at the head of his troops, 
 carrying with him the court poet, Jean Marot, to 
 chronicle the exploits of the ‘ Voyage de Genes.’ The 
 deathblow was first given to Genoa. She was forced, 
 Marot tells us, ‘ la corde au coul, la glaive sous la gorge, 
 implorer la clemence de ce prince.’ Venice was next 
 traitorously surprised and irreparably injured. Having 
 thus brilliantly achieved the task of first destroying the 
 lettered courts, and next the free cities of Italy, Louis 
 died, bequeathing to Francois I. the shame of fighting 
 out a hopeless struggle for supremacy against allies 
 who, no longer needing help, had combined to drive 
 the French from the field. 
 
 There was, indeed, one other duty to be performed. 
 The shattered remains of Italian civilisation might be 
 collected, and Paris might receive the men whom Italy 
 could no longer employ. The French returned to 
 France empty of honour, gorged with plunder, satiated 
 with rape and rapine, boasting of cities sacked, and 
 garrisons put to the sword. They had sucked the life- 
 
CENTRALIS A TION OF POLITICAL POWER. 
 
 9 
 
 blood of Italy, but her death brought new life to 
 France. 
 
 The impetus thus acquired by art and letters coin- 
 cided with a change in political and social constitutions. 
 The gradual process of centralisation which had begun 
 with Louis XI. transformed the life of the whole 
 nation. The teaching of the Middle Ages, both 
 religious and civil, had inured the masses to passive 
 obedience. To men writhing beneath the exactions of 
 local tyranny, the formidable development of the 
 monarchical power brought a sense of relief ; it brought 
 the conception of the king as of one to whom all 
 should be answerable. The same system which was 
 to end by becoming an unendurable burden appeared 
 at first as a means of escape from the cruelty of more 
 immediate oppression. The ultimate seat of power 
 being removed so much farther off, the field of in- 
 dividual action and effort became, at first, so much the 
 wider. The very possibility of appeal was a source of 
 new energy and confidence. 
 
 This political change, the shaping of the monarchy, 
 and the centralisation of power, gave considerable 
 impulse to the movement of the Renaissance in the 
 province of Art. The royal court began to take pro- 
 portions hitherto unknown. It gradually became a 
 centre which gathered together the rich, the learned, 
 and the skilled. Artists, who had previously been 
 limited in training, isolated in life, and narrowed in 
 
IO 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 activity by the rigid conservative action of the great 
 guilds and corporations, were thus brought into imme- 
 diate contact with the best culture of their day. For 
 the Humanists did not form a class apart, and their 
 example incited those with whom they lived to effort 
 after attainments as varied as their own, whilst the 
 Court made a rallying point for all, which gave a sense 
 of countenance and protection even to those who might 
 never hope to enter it. 
 
 Italian artists seem never to have been as completely 
 at the mercy of the artisan element as their brethren of 
 the north. Late into the twelfth century a sense of 
 connection with classic tradition had lingered, but 
 towards its close the guilds and corporations began to 
 attain formidable power. In the north their action was 
 to a great extent in harmony with the popular instincts. 
 The craftsman triumphed over the artist. Each man 
 found his place definitely allotted to him in an inexorable 
 order of things, rebellion against which meant ruin. A 
 great Gothic Cathedral oppresses the mind as heavily 
 as the Pyramids with the sense of the subjection of 
 the individual. It tells of the never-to-be-ended labour 
 of centuries. The Pyramids bear enduring witness to 
 the complete thought which ordained their birth, to 
 the eternal life of will, but the crumbling masses of the 
 Middle Ages testify to the finite power of human 
 endeavour, to the limitation of energy, to the triumph of 
 Time. When the sound of the chisel dies away in the 
 
EMANCIPATION OF THE WORKMAN 
 
 i 
 
 echoing aisles, the work of decay has begun. Ever 
 building, and ever to be built anew, the lives which have 
 passed into them leave traces but as of letters on the 
 sand effaced again and again by the wave of each suc- 
 ceeding generation. 
 
 It has been said, by those to whom the great 
 northern school of architecture gives complete satis- 
 faction, that the workman finds within its rules alone a 
 career of independent creative energy. Classic work, 
 and the Renaissance, are supposed to have made of 
 him a slave, and a machine. But the more we study 
 Greek work the more profoundly deepens the con- 
 viction that not even the most subordinate parts could 
 have been produced by mere machines. The beauty 
 of quite simple and apparently monotonous passages of 
 ornament depends on variations of line and curve so 
 subtly determined in relation to their position that they 
 could only be apprehended and expressed by an 
 actively interested mind. The simplest border pattern 
 on a vase requires, for its successful laying on the 
 convex surface, the most exquisite delicacy of calculation 
 and practice, in which the secret activity of the intelli- 
 gence finds its outward expression. 
 
 Delightful labour went to the raising of the Par- 
 thenon, as to the building of the Cathedral of Bourges, 
 but its organisation in the one case impeded the 
 perfection of individual development, and in the other 
 required it. The necessary condition of success was 
 
12 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 that those who planned should resume in their own 
 persons all the knowledge of those whose labour they 
 directed ; the ultimate goal of effort was thus placed 
 farther off, but those who had the power were no longer 
 debarred from reaching it. 
 
 Emancipation of the individual is the watchword 
 of the sixteenth century ; to the artist it brought relief 
 from the trammels of a caste thraldom, and the cease- 
 less efforts of the Humanists find an answer even in 
 the new forms seen slowly breaking through the sheath 
 of Gothic art. 
 
 The passion, which the French displayed, in the 
 first moments of admiration, for the classic ornaments, 
 the grotesques, the arabesques unearthed in Italy, has 
 often been remarked. They seem, says M. Michelet, 
 to take an infantile pleasure in loading their ancient 
 architecture with these capricious flowers. At Gaillon, 
 these foreign accessories are transferred to outlines 
 which have in no degree been modified to receive them. 
 It is thus that all great changes of style are inaugurated. 
 The ornaments, the small details, the fittings of the 
 interior first submit themselves to the new force, which, 
 gradually breaking way, extends its dominion to the 
 more highly organised provinces of Art. 
 
 Great changes of style are always necessitated by 
 some previous change in the conditions of human 
 society and life. Changes in these conditions neces- 
 sarily affect first those objects which are not only 
 
THE OUTBURST OF LIFE. 
 
 rendered by their size most readily amenable to treat- 
 ment, but form most intimately a part of our daily life. 
 The style of each great school is but the expressive 
 garment which clothes underlying form ; change in the 
 form necessitates change in the garment. Change in 
 habits of life, means change in structural forms, change 
 in structural forms means change of style. By slow 
 degrees the varied possibilities latent in new conditions 
 are aroused, worked out, and exhausted. At the 
 close of the fifteenth century the possibility of fresh 
 development in Gothic seemed at an end. The next 
 step was no matter of choice. 
 
 A social revolution, a change in habits of life, set 
 in, at the same time, in violent reaction. For fifteen 
 hundred years the senses and their appetites had been 
 debased, and degraded in the estimation of men. 
 They had become as vile as they had been accounted. 
 Utter foulness of manners and habits of indiscriminate 
 excess were not the result of the Renaissance, but the 
 outcome of the Middle Ages. The revolt against the 
 repressive rule which had been gathering strength for 
 fifteen centuries preceded the Humanistic movement. 
 The effect of the Humanistic movement was to bridle 
 the excesses of the reaction. The outburst of life came 
 first, the attempt to maintain an aesthetic direction of 
 life followed. The Renaissance, in proclaiming honour 
 to every manifestation of human energy, gave each a 
 claim to be considered worthy of culture. Even the 
 
14 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 senses should be served like princes, and all pleasures 
 brought within the domain of Art. 
 
 The Middle Age theory of life has been touched 
 by Heine, 
 
 Funfzehnhundertjahr’ge Busse 
 Und die armste stirbt beinah, 
 
 Psyche fastet, und kasteit sich 
 Weil sie Amor nackend sah. 
 
 The reaction followed, but it was swiftly overtaken. 
 Compare Villon with Ronsard. There seems to be a 
 century between them. Villon is a voice of the re- 
 action. The cry which he utters is simply ‘ Let us 
 live ! ’ Live ‘ pour gaudir et faire grant chere.’ Steal, 
 if you cannot otherwise come by the means of enjoy- 
 ment ; only by no means die without having tasted the 
 pleasures of life. So he chronicles his meals, and his 
 loves, by turns sinking into mere dull obscenity, or 
 exulting in evanescent fits of drunken gaiety. With 
 Villon, passion lives only in its purely physical form, 
 with Ronsard it is always veiled by the grace of 
 exquisite refinement, and even presents itself also under 
 its moral aspect. For the Renaissance in this respect, 
 as in all else, conceived an exalted ideal. Love in its 
 rarest perfection combining the utmost sensitiveness to 
 physical beauty with that moral passion which makes 
 all sacrifice a sacred privilege, and gives a common 
 stimulus to all noble living, is a conception not unknown 
 to Renaissance literature, and which gives a distinctive 
 
THE IDEAL OF THE HUMANISTS. 
 
 5 
 
 charm to several stories in the Heptameron of the 
 Queen of Navarre. 
 
 The aesthetic direction of the movement rested in 
 the hands of the nobles, aided by artists and men of 
 letters. The bourgeois class, as a body, remained in- 
 different to the ideal held up by the Humanists. Rich 
 men, men of leisure and cultivation, could alone be 
 expected to feel the charm of an ideal, the realisation 
 of which demanded the harmonious perfection, in every 
 human being, of every human faculty ; an ideal which 
 offered to the world once more the conception of the 
 beautiful mind in the no less beautiful body. In the 
 twenty-third chapter of ‘ Gargantua,’ Rabelais describes 
 ‘ Comment Gargantua fut institue par Ponocrates en 
 telle discipline, qu’il ne perdoit heure du jour.’ It is 
 a fantastic picture of that complete life which the 
 Humanists exhausted themselves in the effort to 
 achieve. They strained the limit of human energy. 
 Their keen perception of the value of life brought 
 along with it the terror of death, and this terror 
 goaded them into frantic struggles to get the utmost 
 out of that present over which was cast already the 
 shadow of the inevitable end. 
 
 The men of the fifteenth century said, ‘ Our exist- 
 ence is not life, let us break our bonds and live ; ’ the 
 Renaissance came and said, ‘ Your life is that of 
 beasts, not men. Do not rest until you have shaped 
 every manifestation of human energy into its most 
 
i6 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 perfect form. Not until you have done this, and in 
 your own person combined all, can you say you have 
 tasted perfect life.’ Not a moment should be lost. 
 ‘ Le jour tant soit-il court vaut mieux que la nuitee.’ 
 The sculptor stood already chiselling the terrible 
 skeleton which should surmount the cold silence of 
 the grave. The day is all we have, they said, ‘ apres 
 la mort on ne voit rien qui plaise,’ and the passionate 
 effort to get everything into this short day, to taste al! 
 pleasure, to know all knowledge, to see all beauty, 
 defeated itself. 
 
 The studies of Gargantua embrace, in one day, 
 classic literature and language, mathematics, botany, and 
 astronomy ; he also practises wrestling, swimming, 
 riding, and all manly exercises which give strength as 
 well as those which give grace to the body ; thought 
 is taken for the pleasures of the table, and he also 
 enjoys the company and converse of learned and 
 travelled men, music is not forgotten, and time is found 
 for elaborate dress, finished even to perfume. We 
 laugh at the superhuman performance of Rabelais’ 
 giant, but a large measure of sober earnest lurks 
 beneath the extravagant fiction. It is but the differ- 
 ence between attempt and achievement. 
 
 The day of Gargantua represents the intention 
 which animated the men of the Renaissance. Leo 
 Battista Alberti is described as philosopher, scholar, 
 poet, musician, architect, painter, sculptor, mathema- 
 
ITS HIGH STANDARD OF ATTAINMENT . 
 
 17 
 
 tician, and jurist. The name of Leonardo da Vinci 
 brings to mind equally well-attested and varied acquire- 
 ments. But France can show numerous and remark- 
 able illustrations. Etienne Jodelle, the author of ‘ La 
 Rencontre,’ the earliest French example of modern 
 light comedy, was not only a poet, and a man of 
 pleasure, he was a scholar, an orator, a skilful fencer, 
 and accomplished in the arts of architecture, painting, 
 and sculpture. Jacques Grevin was a celebrated phy- 
 sician, a statesman, a poet ; his classical attainments 
 were considerable, and he distinguished himself by 
 translations both from Greek and Latin. The acquire- 
 ments of Jean Cousin are in every way remarkable ; 
 had he not achieved practical success in every branch 
 of art, his written works on Perspective, and on ‘ The 
 Measurements of the Human Body,’ would alone have 
 rescued his name from oblivion. 
 
 Cousin lived to a good old age ; so did Alberti ; so 
 did Leonardo ; but they are exceptions to the rule. 
 For the most part the life of these men is but a sudden 
 spark, as swiftly extinguished. Pico della Mirandula 
 died at thirty-one; Joachim du Bellay, whose Latin 
 verse is French poetry, died at thirty-five ; Jodelle at 
 forty; Grevin at thirty. Urged by consuming passion 
 both in work and pleasure, each had hasted through a 
 brilliant but brief existence, and this intense concentra- 
 tion of vital effort which we see mirrored in individual 
 lives distinguishes the entire epoch. 
 
 VOL. 1. 
 
 c 
 
i8 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 The most vigorous and highly endowed of human 
 creatures are rarely equal to the sustained direction 
 and control of their own energies. Though these 
 energies may, in the main, acquire a tendency to run 
 in the course in which they are usually directed, their 
 overflow at times is carried off in other than the 
 accustomed channels. Through the new issue they 
 will pass with the same force which characterised them 
 in other action. Fullest energy means fullest possi- 
 bilities of pleasure. The better animal has the keener 
 senses, and acquires the greater impetus in every 
 mode of life. Those who can put most passion into 
 their work can, if they turn that way, put most passion 
 into their pleasure. The men of the Renaissance 
 wooed the secrets of the past, or kissed out their lives 
 on the lips of their earthly loves with the same burning 
 zeal. ‘ Heureux,’ cries Ronsard, ‘sera le jour que je 
 mourray d’amour/ 
 
 One of the most significant signs of the time was 
 the delight in the nude which instantly manifested 
 itself. The eye no longer dwelt with morbid satisfac- 
 tion on the shrouded and emaciated shapes which 
 haunted the cathedrals of the Middle Ages, or yielded 
 to the unwholesome fascinations of the monstrous devils 
 who, peering from capital or cornice, enhanced with 
 their terror the denunciations of the priest Men turned 
 from the saintly virgins, whose meagre forms had been 
 blanched and attenuated by the shade of cloistered 
 
DELIGHT IN PHYSICAL BEAUTY . 
 
 19 
 
 discipline, to watch Diana and her nymphs with 
 limbs moulded by action, and finished by the free 
 air. 
 
 Whenever the senses quicken, and the instinct for 
 the beautiful is awake, then this passion for the nude 
 shows itself. It is a passion which has, like all others, 
 its coarser side, and sometimes deserts the ideal mistress, 
 to burn on other altars an impurer flame. In the 
 memoirs of the time we often come on traces of work 
 done merely to serve the end of some scandalous whim. 
 The author of the Ldgende du Cardinal de Guise re- 
 counts how the Cardinal contrived to have smuggled 
 into his chamber, as a Madonna, a painting of this 
 class, in which he himself figured, together with his 
 niece, Mary, Queen of Scots, and two other women of 
 his house. La Ldgende , it is true, was an anonymous 
 attack on the Guises, written by a Huguenot ; and 
 fanatics are not usually scrupulous as to the weapons 
 they employ ; but other instances of a similar nature 
 abound. 
 
 One noble boasts the possession of an 4 Aretin 
 en figures ’ ; another gives his mistress a volume of 
 paintings in which the loves and persons of the 
 great ladies of the court are shamefully exposed ; a 
 third gives a banquet to a mixed company of guests, 
 and passes round a ‘couppe d’argent dore grave au 
 burin avec plusieurs figures de^ l’Aretin de l’homme et 
 de la femme.’ The celebrated book lost by Charles 
 
20 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 VIII. at Fornova, and which contained portraits of 
 the most beautiful women of Italy, seems to have been 
 one of a large class of like work, to which, also, would 
 seem to have belonged the mysterious ‘ ouvraiges et 
 pourtraictures’ commissioned by Francois I. of Francois 
 Clouet immediately after his return from Madrid — 
 ‘ouvraiges et pourtraictures ’ for which Clouet was to 
 be well paid, but which ‘ le diet Seigneur ne veult estre 
 aultrement declarees.’ 
 
 These works, however, even if we had them, would 
 furnish no fair test of French art of the day. Perfect 
 beauty, like perfect love, involves the presence of the 
 moral ideal. If we wish to realise the true quality of 
 the best work of the time, we must turn to that which 
 was done to set before all men in the eye of the sun — 
 to the daylight directness and simplicity of Goujons 
 nymphs — to the frank naivetd of Palissy’s ‘ Femme 
 couchee ’ — to the dignity and indifference of the women 
 of Cousin. For in Cousins ‘ Eva prima Pandora ’ we 
 find that the French artists of the Renaissance stand 
 the severest test to which the artists of any epoch can 
 be put. They were capable of seeking beauty for her 
 own sake, and, so seeking, found her. 
 
 The poets also contain manifold illustrations of the 
 same passion. Ronsard constantly dwells on the 
 subtle lines and delicate charm of finished womanly 
 beauty. ‘ Belle gorge d’albatre, et vous chaste 
 poicrine,’ he begins, and passes on to accentuate, with 
 
EAGER PURSUIT OF ALL OBJECTS OF DESIRE. 21 
 
 sedulous care, every lovely trait, whilst through each 
 
 line is heard the sound of warning. 
 
 Pour qui gardes-tu tes yeux 
 Et ton sein delicieux, 
 
 Ta joue et ta bouche belle ? 
 
 En veux-tu baiser Pluton 
 La-bas apres que Charon 
 T’aura mise en sa nacelle ? 
 
 Then, just as the sculptor, of this epoch, placed, on the 
 mausoleum of a princess, side by side with the woman 
 in her magnificence, 4 it,’ the worn-out body of the 
 death-bed, so Ronsard goes on to draw the companion 
 picture : — 
 
 Apres ton dernier trespas 
 Gresle tu n’auras la-bas 
 Qu’une bouchette blesmie, 
 
 Et quand mort je te verrois 
 Aux ombres je n’avou’rois 
 Que jadis tu fus m’amie. 
 
 Ton test n’aura plus de peau, 
 
 Ny ton visaige tant beau 
 N’aura veines ny arteres, 
 
 Tu n’auras plus que des dents 
 Telles qu’on les voit dedans 
 Les testes des cimeteres. 
 
 ‘ Les testes des cimeteres.’ Not a Medusa head, 
 turning to stone the mortal who dared the walls of 
 Dis. The snakes of the Gorgon petrified, but the 
 snakes of the sepulchre were as a scourge of the Furies 
 driving men before them as though possessed. 
 
 What is to be done must be done quickly. There 
 must be no halting, no tarrying. The rapidity, attained 
 
22 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 in achievement, should be the wonder of an after age. 
 ‘ The Escurial/ says Brantome, ‘ what of that ? See 
 how long it was of building ! Good workmen like to 
 be quick finished. With our king it was otherwise. 
 Take Fontainebleau and Chambord. When they 
 were once projected, when once the plumb-line, and 
 the compass, and the square, and the hammer were on 
 the spot, then, in a few years after, we saw the Court 
 in residence there/ 
 
 On all sides palaces and gardens sprang up, the 
 workmen being urged by vigilant supervision to instant 
 haste. After Pavia, when the struggle across the 
 Alps sank into hopeless convulsions, the French, with 
 Francis I. at their head, set themselves all the more 
 vigorously to the task. Whilst Rosso was painting 
 the galleries of Fontainebleau, and Pierre le Nepveu 
 was calling Chambord into being, Marguerite de Valois 
 writes to her brother from Blois : ‘ Knowing your will 
 is soon to see your project complete, I have no other 
 gratification than to visit the spots which it pleased 
 you to show me, in order to entreat the workmen 
 to hasten what you have ordered. ... I do not cease 
 to go twice a day through all your building and 
 gardens.’ The gardens were, indeed, one of the most 
 marking features of sixteenth-century domestic archi- 
 tecture. Palissy calls attention to them, ‘ N’as-tu pas 
 considere tant de beaux jardins,’ and he schemes others. 
 Du Cerceau lays them down in his plans with minute 
 
THE BUILDING OF PALACES. 
 
 2 3 
 
 elaboration, and their addition greatly enhanced the 
 house air, which now crept over the fortified chateau . 
 
 Strongholds rapidly made way for lieux de plai- 
 sance . When Frangois I. came back from Spain, 
 
 one of his first acts was the destruction of the great 
 tower of the Louvre, ‘ et fist ce faire le Roy pour 
 appliquer le chasteau du Louvre, logis de plaisance.’ 
 The great tower was a place of strength suitable for 
 the safe keeping of prisoners of State. Perhaps it 
 reminded the King of his own recent captivity ; but in 
 demolishing it he was only assisting in a work which 
 was going on everywhere around him. The Renais- 
 sance had emancipated man, the habitation of man was 
 the first pre-occupation of Renaissance art. The ‘ lieu 
 de plaisance,’ the ‘ maison,’ was the type which the 
 architect, of the sixteenth century, sought to perfect. 
 The chateau of Madrid, which was rising, in the Bois 
 de Boulogne, during the very year in which the 
 great tower of the Louvre was pulled down (1527), 
 was destined, like the Louvre, to be a Togis de 
 plaisance.’ 
 
 The nobles all vied with each other in the erection 
 of costly houses. Lautrec, doomed to die in Italy, left 
 his magnificent ‘ Maison de Coutras ’ to be finished by 
 the Bishop of Tarbes ; Cardinal Sanguin was building 
 Meudon ; the Constable de Montmorency rivalled the 
 royal palaces with the princely splendour of Ecouen. 
 Even private persons began, if not to vie with the 
 
24 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 nobles, at least to build houses of considerable preten- 
 sions. The house of Fernel, physician to Henri II., 
 was long esteemed the great ornament of the Rue de 
 la Harpe, in which it stood ; and Germain Brice, even 
 in the eighteenth century, calls attention to the sculp- 
 tures with which it was decorated, ‘ autrefois estimees 
 des plus belles/ 
 
 Du Cerceaus two volumes, ‘ Les plus excellens 
 batiments de la France/ give a marvellous picture of 
 the architectural activity of this epoch, and his pages 
 plainly show the nature of the transition which was 
 taking place. Amboise stands in startling contrast to 
 the grim reserve of Vincennes, a fortress-prison ; 
 Gaillon, it is true, still defies attack ; but already the 
 outside gallery, creeping round the court, foreshadows 
 the treatment which obtains its most conspicuous 
 development at St. Mor lez Fossez, and which is 
 plainly marked at Madrid. For at Madrid every storey 
 had its pleasant covered gallery, running outside, the 
 air of defence had entirely vanished, and the air of state 
 had not yet invaded the pleasant ease and luxury 
 which pervaded every line. 
 
 Men and women, princes, prelates, nobles, all were 
 building, fashioning anew their habitations, fitting them 
 for every purpose of manifold life. Out of doors the 
 damask roses and violets of the poets blossomed be- 
 neath trellis-work of ivy, and clustered at the feet of 
 marble statues ; shady recesses stored the waters of 
 
THE RAPID INCREASE OF LUXURY. 
 
 25 
 
 refreshing fountains, and within was every precious 
 decoration which could charm the eye. Of Meudon, 
 Corrozet tells us, 4 it was a house furnished forth with 
 columns, with busts, with paintings, with grotesques, 
 with compartments and devices of gold, of blue, of 
 more colours than it is possible to mention/ 
 
 Every art which could minister to house-luxury 
 was, indeed, suddenly stimulated. Tapestry, for in- 
 stance, does not appear anywhere in France as a 
 branch of local industry until the middle of the sixteenth 
 century, and then, at Tours, as M. Grandmaison has 
 remarked, its manufacture at once took such an im- 
 petus that it seemed as if it were going to replace the 
 art of painting, whose most illustrious representatives 
 had followed the Court to Paris. The works of the 
 four Duvals, extant at the close of the last century, 
 but which have now disappeared, belonged to this 
 school, which flourished by the side of another and im- 
 portant manufactory started at Fontainebleau in 1535. 
 The goldsmiths of Paris eagerly emulated the chased 
 and inlaid work of Milan. The demand for books, for 
 prints, for casts, became more and more general, so 
 that painters and designers began to inveigh bitterly 
 against the proportions which the popularising arts, of 
 imprimerie and moulerie , were assuming. Palissy, who 
 had himself begun life as a glass-painter, indignantly 
 complains that ‘ les verres sont mechanisez en telle 
 sorte qu’ils sont vendus, et cri6s par les villages, par 
 
26 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 ceux meme qui crient les vieux drapeaux et la vielle 
 ferraille/ 
 
 Nor were the pleasures of the table forgotten. 
 The refinement displayed at the banquets of Francois L 
 became a point of comparison for the ill-kept tables of 
 his grandsons. ‘ The great expenses of Lucullus have 
 been talked about/ says Brantome ; ‘ but Lucullus, 
 in everything of that sort, never came near our king. 
 In a village, in a forest, one was as well served as if 
 one had been in Paris/ 
 
 The refinements wrought into these pleasures, as 
 well as into every other art of life, were enhanced by 
 the presence of women at the Court. Those who 
 looked on the whole movement with disfavour some- 
 times made this innovation a subject of reproach against 
 Francois I., who had inaugurated it. It is true that, 
 by so doing, he opened the door to the priests who 
 followed in their train. ‘ Dames et Cardinaux/ Ron- 
 sard grumbles, ‘ menent trop de baggages/ But 
 perhaps, as an old courtier drily remarked, it was 
 better they should be at Court instead of preaching 
 up ‘rows in the provinces/ Their presence gave, 
 certainly, no check to the spread of a passion for 
 luxury and pleasure. 
 
 The princes of the Church were as ready as the 
 princes of the State to further the new movement. 
 Nor was it evident, at first, that it involved anything 
 like a general moral awakening. It was not suspected 
 
ACTIVITY OF THE PRESS. 
 
 2 7 
 
 that the people would be reached by it — that they 
 would find their way to the only portion in which the 
 poor and miserable could claim a part. It was not 
 foreseen that the activity of the press would not stop 
 at the issue of erotic poems, and editions de luxe of 
 classic authors, but that it would become a formidable 
 power in the hands of men ‘ infiammati dun pericoloso 
 desiderio di dir il vero.’ Prelates, long accustomed 
 to see the minor clergy openly mocked and scorned, 
 accustomed to see even grosser scandals than the 
 celebrated liaison of the Abbess and Bishop of Xaintes 
 borne in sullen patience, could not suspect that a storm 
 would arise which should shake both princely and 
 priestly orders, and that if the ark of the Church were 
 permitted to reach safe harbour, it would be but by 
 riding over a sea of blood. 
 
 At first the incessant activity of the press was em- 
 ployed in issuing translations of the classics. The 
 Roman de la Rose , which, in the days of its highest 
 fashion, had to be twisted into a spiritual allegory, 
 just as Vergil was made to announce the coming of 
 Christ, ceased to be the indispensable training for a 
 man of letters. For Jean Marot, the poet of Louis XII., 
 Guillaume de Lorris, and Jean de Meung, were the 
 supreme model of style ; but the boast of his son 
 Clement was that he could translate 
 
 1 les volumes 
 Jadis escripts par les divines plumes 
 De vieulz Latins dont tant est mention/ 
 
28 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 The work of translation, which began as early as the 
 close of the fifteenth century, assumed gigantic pro- 
 portions as soon as the relations with Italy became more 
 frequent. Homer, Vergil, Horace, Juvenal, Ovid, Per- 
 sius, Terence, Seneca, Cato, follow each other in quick 
 succession, nor did the labour of original production 
 languish. The names of Clement Marot, Scaliger, 
 Ramus, Du Bois, Rabelais, Des Periers, Marguerite de 
 Valois, are sufficient to show how varied and vigorous 
 it was. 
 
 And these names are only those which seem to 
 come first to the surface ; beneath them rank a host no 
 less active if less conspicuous, whose activity supported 
 and urged forward that of their leaders. Learning, 
 poetry, science, satire, speculation ; — the altar of all 
 knowledge, like that of all pleasure, was thronged with 
 worshippers. The mere fever of acquisition and pos- 
 session was in itself pleasure. To the question, ‘ Quid 
 tibi literse, quid historise, cognitioque rerum, quid 
 poetarum evolutio, quid tanta tot versuum memoria 
 voluptatis affert ? ’ they would have replied, even as 
 Torquatus desired to reply, ‘ Hsec enim ipsa mihi 
 sunt voluptati.’ 
 
 What was the cause which brought about the 
 abortion of the whole movement ? It collapsed, and 
 sank inane and lifeless long before the century had run 
 out. The obvious answer is — that the wars of re- 
 ligion destroyed, in France, the security and leisure 
 
THE MORAL AWAKENING. 
 
 29 
 
 necessary to its perfect development, and that in the 
 chronic disturbance of the bitter struggle between 
 Catholic and Huguenot the best energies of the nation 
 were diverted and absorbed. But when we find that 
 the most distinguished men in France, even in the 
 world of arts and letters, stood not in the ranks of the 
 cause which triumphed, but on the side of that which 
 fell, the obvious answer is insufficient. It seems more 
 likely that the collapse of the Renaissance and the 
 victorious wars of the Catholic party sprang from some 
 common cause. 
 
 When Schelling was asked, ‘ What makes an 
 Ethnos ? ’ he answered, ‘ Language and religion.’ 
 All fertile movements, destined widely to affect the 
 future of the race, movements which bring new life 
 to other forms of human energy, bear in their breasts 
 the seed of renewed ethical impulse. The Renaissance 
 is no exception ; it had not only its artists, its men of 
 science, its men of letters, it showed, like all great 
 moments, the signs of spiritual life. The rush of re- 
 newed energy did not leave unsought even the dark 
 places of thought, it entered even the clouds of ghostly 
 mystery. * Le Mirrouer de l’Ame pecheresse’ of the 
 Queen of Navarre has, like her pathetic poem on the 
 death of her brother, the true accent of spiritual 
 passion. 
 
 But the Queen of Navarre was an exception to the 
 
30 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 class of which she was a member. The temper of the 
 Court, and of those from whom the Court derived its 
 support, was characterised by a supreme moral indif- 
 ferentism, which rendered it impossible that they should 
 either give an initiative or take a share in this part of 
 the Renaissance movement. Louise of Savoy, the 
 mother of Frangois I., writes in her journal : ‘ L’an 1519^ 
 le 5 Juillet, Frere Francois de Paule des freres men- 
 dians evangelistes fut par moi canonist, a tout le moins 
 j’en ai pay6 la taxe.’ The flippant accent of this entry 
 reflects the prevailing tone of mind, a tone which ren- 
 dered the rejection of the element of renewed moral 
 impulse, then shaping itself amongst the Huguenots, an 
 inevitable consequence. 
 
 A state of moral indifference, whether in an indi- 
 vidual or a nation, cannot be fruitful of noble life. It 
 is compatible with startling surprises of momentary 
 enthusiasm, with great emotional facility, which is an 
 affair of temperament rather than of moral conviction, 
 and which can never give the stamina necessary to 
 sequence of action sustained at a high level. It is true 
 that each so-called reform destroys as well as replaces, 
 and the fanaticism necessary to such action is indeed 
 foreign to that high philosophical standpoint, to attain 
 which a man must become a law unto himself, by 
 bringing his life into harmonious fulfilment of the most 
 perfect uses of being. But fanaticism, such as was 
 
WHY IT FAILED . 
 
 3i 
 
 embodied in the Huguenot creed, when embraced by 
 a full national life, has before it the possibility of final 
 development into such an attitude, whilst moral in- 
 differentism deprives the finest powers of the very 
 principle of growth. 
 
32 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ARCHITECTURE (i 460- I 5 40). 
 
 The Chateaux of Touraine. 
 
 Quid sibi volunt isti lapides ? — Josh. iv. 6. 
 
 The epoch of the French Renaissance may be said 
 to embrace two distinct periods. The first extends 
 from the middle of the fifteenth century to the reign of 
 Francois I. The second ends with the life of the last 
 of the Valois, Henri III., who fell at St. Cloud by the 
 knife of Jacques Clement in 1589. Each period 
 has peculiar and characteristic features ; features which 
 are not only indicative of the artistic revolution which 
 was afoot, but of the political and social change of 
 which that revolution was a part, and are plainly affected 
 by the influence which the centralisation of government 
 had upon every branch of art. The policy which had 
 been inaugurated by Louis XI. continued to shape 
 itself effectively in succeeding reigns, and at his acces- 
 sion Francois I. found the unity of the nation, and the 
 paramount authority of her ruler, definitely established. 
 The King was at last king, and his court took the 
 initiative both in politics and in arts. 
 
 Louis XL and his immediate successors Charles 
 
THE SCHOOL OF TOURS. 
 
 33 
 
 VIII. and Louis XII. dwelt, for the most part, not at 
 Paris but at Tours, and thus Touraine became the 
 centre of the new movement. Elsewhere, in France, 
 the same process was going on, but Tours took the 
 lead, and it is to Tours that we must look, until with 
 the reign of Francis I. the second period commences, 
 and the centre of activity is transferred from Tours to 
 Paris. Up till this time the school of Tours was the 
 school of France. It not only held its place with 
 honour, but, under the rule of Louis XI., it absorbed 
 the flagging energies of a once formidable rival. 
 
 The ancient vigour of the school of Burgundy had 
 been slowly and certainly exhausted in disturbing 
 struggles for a political independence, the loss of which 
 was plainly inevitable. Claux and Anthoniet, the 
 skilful sculptors of the tombs of the Dukes of Burgundy, 
 now in the Museum of Dijon, were the last great names 
 of the Burgundian school ; and by them Michel 
 Columbe, a Breton born, to whom we owe the magnifi- 
 cent monument of Francois, Duke of Brittany, in the 
 Cathedral of Nantes, was trained. But Michel Columbe 
 did not remain in Burgundy. He left Dijon for Tours, 
 and took service with Louis XI. His example was 
 followed by others, but the school of Tours by no 
 means owed its existence to, though it received a 
 renewal of energy from, the breaking-up of the Bur- 
 gundian centre. 
 
 The works of the artists of Dijon are pervaded 
 
 VOL. T. 
 
 D 
 
34 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 by the sentiment of the Flemish school, to which 
 they were in truth affiliate. The artists of Tours were 
 of a wholly different ancestry. In their sculpture, and 
 in their illuminations as in the enamels of their tombs, 
 they show a wholly different bias in choice of form, 
 and taste in colour. Once introduced into their circle, 
 the Burgundian artist received its inevitable stamp. 
 Dwelling in Dijon, he had been, it is true, in constant 
 communication through Lyons with Italy, but the 
 distant influence of Italy was subject to the direct and 
 powerful action of Flemish teaching. Touraine, on 
 the other hand, had never been in permanent contact 
 with Northern influence, but had long enjoyed a 
 frequent, if not continuous, intercourse with Italy. 
 Travellers coming from Rome and landing at the port 
 of Narbonne, passed this way on their road to England 
 and even to Paris. Now and then the artists of Tours 
 themselves, as for instance Jean Fouquet, painter to 
 Louis XI., visited Rome, and before the close of the 
 fifteenth century many Italian artists had in turn 
 made their way into Touraine. The beautiful chateau 
 of Bury, now in ruins, was built in 1502 for Florimond 
 Robertet by an Italian architect whose name has 
 perished with his work. 
 
 Their commerce with the south brought to the men 
 of Tours moments of precious insight by which they 
 were well fitted to profit. From the north they seem 
 to have been practically cut off. The journey into 
 
PRESERVED A NATIONAL CHARACTER. 
 
 35 
 
 Flanders is spoken of by Michel Columbe, in a letter 
 to Jean Lemaire, secretary to Margaret of Austria, as a 
 journey not to be lightly undertaken unless a competent 
 person be sent to guide travellers thither ; and this 
 difficulty of communication with Flanders was pro- 
 bably an advantage to the school of Tours, for it was 
 thus left free to develop in the direction best suited to 
 it, only receiving now and again from Italy an inspira- 
 tion, not too foreign to be well assimilated, which 
 stimulated the keen French senses to fertile passion. 
 
 By their intercourse with the South, the artists of 
 Touraine not only received impulses which thrilled 
 them with new life ; they were also gradually prepared 
 for the immediate contact of that band of Italians 
 who thronged the Court of Paris during the reign of 
 Francis I. Before they were exposed to the insidious 
 influence of the Ecole de Fontainebleau , the fundamental 
 elements of change had been slowly absorbed in happy 
 unconsciousness. In the presence of II Rosso, and 
 Primaticcio, and Sebastian Serlio, the painters, the 
 sculptors, the architects of France, though subjected 
 to the imposing authority of Italian style, remained 
 French. 
 
 There is indeed a great difference between the 
 work executed by them before and after the trans- 
 ference of the school from Tours to Paris, and this 
 difference is so distinctly marked that some have 
 regarded the two successive periods as independent 
 
- 36 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 and separable epochs. They have called the first the 
 French Renaissance, and have abruptly cut off the men 
 who worked during the reigns of the Valois from 
 national traditions, looking on them as forming, in all 
 branches of art, a bastard Italian school. They have 
 depicted their work as animated wholly by foreign in- 
 spiration, the introduction of which acted injuriously 
 on the characteristic promise of French art, and for 
 this introduction Francois I. is blamed as wholly 
 responsible. 
 
 If, however, it is certain that the nature of the 
 movement taking place in Italy was known to French 
 artists a quarter of a century before Francois I. was 
 born, it is no less certain that the needy troop whom 
 the troubles of Italy sent to claim the bounty of the 
 French King found at Paris men who maintained 
 national traditions, and who had the strength to 
 continue to maintain them even when appropriating 
 the fruits of a practical experience richer than their 
 own. There are French names, it is true, in the 
 subordinate ranks of those who worked at Fontaine- 
 bleau, men whose work is merged in that of their 
 teachers, but these were weaker brethren, born to be 
 obedient scholars only ; the stronger spirits such as 
 Clouet, Cousin, Goujon, Duvet, Delaulne, Bullant, 
 Lescot, Palissy, never abandoned their birthright nor 
 forgot their own individuality. 
 
 A great deal too much importance has also been 
 
WAS NOT THE CREATION OF FRANCOIS /. 
 
 37 
 
 attached to the part played by Francis I. He created 
 art in France, writes Frederick the Great, and even 
 now the popular belief is identical with that of Frederick 
 the Great ; but to attribute to any one person a direct 
 initiative, is wholly to mistake the nature of the move- 
 ment, to leave out of sight the broad basis of general 
 interest and enthusiasm to which it owed its fertility and 
 its strength. 
 
 Little by little a steady advance had been made 
 under the reigns of Louis XI., Charles VIII., and 
 Louis XII., and as successive tentative efforts were 
 crowned by success, each success gave courage for 
 fresh audacity. The movement slowly developed 
 itself, and learnt the secret of its strength ; at last 
 arrived the culminating moment, the moment in which 
 perceptions excited to the most exquisite sensibility 
 became one with the vital intellectual forces by which 
 they were invigorated and controlled. With this 
 moment the name of Francois I. had the good fortune 
 to be associated, but the art activity of his reign was 
 not the arbitrary creation of despotic will, it was the 
 natural result to which previous conditions had been 
 tending. 
 
 When the King sent Le Fevre d’Etaples to collect 
 MSS., or bade Primaticcio bring works of' art from 
 Italy, or summoned Leonardo from the ruined city 
 of Milan, he was but giving royal effect to an impulse 
 shared by all about him. The currents of the day 
 
3 8 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 carried him with them ; he neither controlled nor could 
 he direct their course, but his firmly established position 
 on the throne of France enabled him to give con- 
 spicuous and powerful expression to the general will, 
 whilst every caprice of purpose found ready response 
 in the personal motive which animated the whole world 
 of art and letters. 
 
 The moral change in the conditions of human life 
 and society, the eminently secular character of the 
 revolution in thought and manners found its direct 
 artistic expression in the erection and decoration of 
 palaces and chateaux . The religious architecture of 
 the day only reflects social changes which took their 
 first shape in civil monuments. The palace of the 
 Prince employs the energies formerly dedicated to the 
 house of God, and it is to the chateaux of the King or 
 of those princes who stood nearest to his throne, that 
 we must look for illustrations of the nature and suc- 
 cession of those changes which go to make up the 
 history of the Renaissance in France in its relation to 
 architecture. 
 
 These changes were changes in construction neces- 
 sitated by the changes in requirement born of social 
 change, and accompanied by a great change in style. 
 They had for their object the transformation of the 
 fortified castle of the Middle Ages into the prototype 
 of the modern palace, and the history of the progressive 
 alterations and developments by which this transforma- 
 
FIRST TOOK EFFECT ON ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 39 
 
 tion was effected, is the history of French architecture 
 as fashioned by the Renaissance. 
 
 During the first period, the period which begins 
 even with the days of Louis XI., the transition from 
 the maison forte to the maison de plaisance was accom- 
 plished. The old traditions of defence were shaken 
 off, and from Langeais to Gaillon, from Gaillon to Blois, 
 from Blois to Azay le Rideau, the passage of a gradually 
 developing style may be traced. First come the minor 
 modifications of detail which herald great constructive 
 change, and then great constructive change itself. 
 
 The type of that which should be, was indeed, 
 revealed in the illuminations of the fifteenth century, 
 years before the stubborn stone began to yield to the 
 force of new impressions. When Jean Fouquet, painter 
 to Louis XI., filled his backgrounds with architecture, 
 the fashion of which expresses an ardent desire for 
 classical symmetry and perfection, Gothic in France 
 was prostrate beneath the wealthy burden of decora- 
 tion which it had heaped upon itself. All outline 
 disappeared beneath an accumulation of frail and 
 toylike prettiness. The costly church, erected by 
 Margaret of Austria at Brou, is the helpless protest of 
 an expiring style. 
 
 Yet even at Brou, where at first sight Gothic motive 
 seems to rule alone, a close inspection detects the advent 
 of a new era. Margaret had called to her aid Michel 
 Columbe, who had laboured with Jean Fouquet in the 
 
40 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 pay of Louis XI. In 1511, at the age of eighty, the 
 great sculptor designed the tomb of Philibert of Savoy, 
 and although the work was afterwards entrusted to 
 Flemish hands, the original intention of Columbe has 
 evidently influenced its execution. He followed, he 
 said, in his project the set precedent of Gothic fashion 
 as he had seen it in the ‘ sculptures de feuz messeigneurs 
 les dues de Bourgoigne/ when as a boy he worked at 
 Dijon under those ‘ souverains tailleurs d’ymaiges, 
 maistre Claux et maistre Anthoniet,’ but on the minor 
 details he engrafted the delicate arabesques and surface 
 patterns which all men then had begun to love. In 
 the tomb of Margaret herself, a later work, the signs of 
 the time are even yet more evident ; the border of her 
 dress, her pillow, are all patterned with interweaving of 
 Renaissance ornament; the very columns, which sup- 
 port the upper shafts, have undergone strange modifica- 
 tions, and their surface is subtly varied with threading 
 of figured lines. 
 
 But although, in his design for Brou, Michel Columbe 
 himself attempted no modification of structure, such 
 modifications had already been made by others. In the 
 town of Tours, in the city where Columbe dwelt, men 
 were seeking for the lines which should fitly enframe the 
 details which he loved, and were at the same time adapt- 
 ing these details to architectural features rapidly under- 
 goingimportantalterations. The battlement, for instance, 
 which had defended a castle of the previous century, 
 
FIRST PERIOD ENDS WITH REIGN OF FRANCOIS I. 41 
 
 was destined to become the cornice, which, rich with 
 moulding and ornament, surmounted, like a crown, the 
 mai'son tie plaisance that was to be. 
 
 Not at Tours only, was the work pressed forward 
 with eager zeal. The myriad chateaux of the Loire 
 bear witness to the skill and training of the architects 
 and sculptors of Touraine. Blois, and Chenonceau, 
 and Azay le Rideau, and Chambord, all arose before the 
 sure force of political centralisation had finally sucked 
 into the capital the rich springs of provincial energies. 
 Before many years elapsed, each of these monuments 
 was re-handled by Parisian architects, and brought as 
 near as might be to the point of fastidious symmetry 
 required by Parisian eyes ; but when Bastien Francois 
 built the cloister of St. Martin of Tours, and Pierre le 
 Nepveu worked at Chenonceau, Touraine was still the 
 centre of France. 
 
 With the reign of Francois I., the first period ends, 
 and before the accession of Henri II. (1547) the 
 character of future effort was irrevocably fixed. The 
 transitional air, which much of the work done during 
 his father’s reign still wears, had finally disappeared. 
 Throughout this second period, the period which ends 
 with the extinction of the house of Valois, the central 
 idea of the maison de plaisance was elaborated until it 
 touched the highest point of luxury and convenience 
 permitted by the resources of the time. Paris now 
 enjoyed that established pre-eminence which Tours had 
 
42 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 so long and so honourably maintained. The names 
 of local artists no longer occupy the leading place on 
 the lists of those engaged in carrying out work of 
 importance. They are replaced by Parisians ; if not, 
 indeed, Parisians by birth, Parisians by training. Instead 
 of Bastien Frangois, and Pierre le Nepveu, we have 
 Bullant, Lescot, and De l’Orme ; instead of Chambord 
 and Madrid, Ecouen, Anet, and the Louvre. 
 
 Throughout the earlier period which, beginning 
 after the middle of the fifteenth century, closed with 
 the death of Francois I., we find that though many 
 buildings, of that epoch, show marks of strongly indi- 
 vidual treatment, nothing is to be learnt concerning the 
 lives, nor can we, except in rare instances, even identify 
 the names of those who built them. All that can be 
 done is to trace the tendencies expressed in the build- 
 ings themselves, selecting in their order some of the 
 most typical of that district which was the cradle of the 
 Renaissance in France. 
 
 In so doing it will be necessary to treat each as if 
 it were the product of a single epoch and of a single 
 mind, though this is true only in a strictly limited 
 sense. Each building was an agglomeration of work 
 done by different hands at different times. Not even 
 Chambord was the sole creation of Francois I. and his 
 architect Pierre Le Nepveu. Many a stone bears the 
 cipher of Henri II., and the names of Primaticcio and 
 Philibert de l’Orme are associated with certain portions 
 
LANGEAIS. 
 
 43 
 
 of the building. But at Chambord, and even at 
 Chenonceau, the characteristic form had been deter- 
 mined by those who began the work. 
 
 Chenonceau owes much more to later additions than 
 Chambord, yet the general character of Chenonceau 
 is unmistakably that of a chateau built under Frangois 
 I. The after-touches, such as the gallery-bridge built, 
 over the Cher, by De l’Orme for Diane de Poitiers, or 
 the chapel thrown out by Catherine de Medicis, show 
 plainly as after-touches — as so many distinct and sepa- 
 rable additions, the value of which must be estimated 
 by reference to the main intention as declared at 
 the very commencement. It is the evident predomi- 
 nance of this main intention which justifies the con- 
 sideration of each building as belonging to the epoch 
 in which it originated, so that it may be counted as of 
 that epoch, all later additions being reserved as ex- 
 ceptions always made, if not always specified. 
 
 Beginning with Langeais, an almost pure example 
 of the fortress-chateau (1460), we pass to the cloister 
 of St. Martin of Tours (1508) ; taking next Blois and 
 Chenonceau (1515), then the Hotel Pince at Angers 
 (1525), Chambord and Azay le Rideau (1526), until at 
 last with the building of Madrid and the works of 
 Fontainebleau, we find the centre of activity wholly 
 transferred to Paris, and a second period commencing 
 with the accession of Henri II. 
 
 Langeais is a fortress of the Middle Ages, but it 
 
44 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 bears within its very walls the traces of coming 
 change. It stands on the banks of the Loire, not far 
 from Tours, and is one of the finest existing examples 
 of a French castle built about the middle of the fif- 
 teenth century. Pierre de la Brosse, barber to Louis 
 IX., is said to have begun laying the foundations, 
 but there ended his share in the construction, which 
 was taken up and continued by Jean Bourre, a later 
 owner. 
 
 The problem which the architect of Langeais had 
 to solve was how to conciliate the necessities of 
 defence with the already increasing demands of 
 domestic life. The system on which the fortifications 
 were planned seems to have been curiously behind the 
 science of the day. For the effects of gunpowder are 
 left wholly out of calculation, whilst every means of 
 repelling attack by scaling ladders has been provided. 
 One gate only affords access to the interior court, and 
 that gate is flanked by massive towers, and protected 
 by a portcullis. The interior court is almost wholly 
 confined by the buildings around it, the high walls 
 which defend it on the outside are cut up at well- 
 guarded angles by massive towers, and pierced at 
 irregular intervals by narrow openings. The whole 
 length is crowned by heavy machicolated battlements, 
 so that the aspect of the exterior is severe, but the fagade 
 which looks upon the court within is not wanting in 
 elegance. Four small towers, each of which contains 
 
THE TOUR DES GENDARMES. 
 
 45 
 
 a spiral staircase, break the monotony of the front, and 
 give access to the different stories. The interior space 
 is divided out in the simplest fashion, and the arrange- 
 ments adopted on the ground-floor continue in unvary- 
 ing repetition tier above tier. But above, along the 
 roof, run no heavy battlements ; a bold projecting 
 cornice takes their place in surmounting the wall, and 
 over this rises a sharply-pointed roof, the outline of 
 which is broken by towers, and pierced with chimneys 
 and dormers. 
 
 This cornice in the interior court gives the first 
 note of change, and the way in which it was developed 
 out of the battlement is curiously illustrated by the 
 Tour des Gendarmes at Caen, built towards the close 
 of the fifteenth century. Each battlement in this 
 tower contains a sculptured medallion. Thus one has 
 Janus, another the heads of a woman and two children, 
 a third a woman’s bust. The next step was to fill up 
 the notch between the subjects and make the mould- 
 ings continuous ; we then get the first form of the 
 cornice, which rapidly became one of the most im- 
 portant and distinguishing features of every consider- 
 able building. 
 
 At Langeais it replaces the battlements on the 
 walls of the inside only, but it was destined soon to 
 replace them on the outside also. At Chenonceau, 
 at Azay le Rideau, at Blois, at Chambord, its bold 
 projecting lines encircle each building with a crown. 
 
46 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 The fresh spirit, which had taken the direction of 
 the failing energies of French art, next commanded 
 another change. The sculptured dormers, which were 
 handed down by Gothic tradition, are grouped with a 
 symmetry hitherto unknown, and the croistes, which 
 take us back into the far-off thirteenth century, are 
 ordered inexorably one above the other. Not only do 
 all openings at irregular intervals disappear before the 
 growing exigencies of an instinct which marshals even 
 the smallest details into fitting place within an ordained 
 framework of well-considered lines, but gradually 
 all these openings are placed so as to give the per- 
 pendicular lines of the general design. They are thus 
 opposed to the sense in which they had been previously 
 taken, for, in Gothic work, openings, when disposed 
 regularly, are almost invariably made to indicate hori- 
 zontal bands, but horizontal bands, when required in 
 Renaissance work, are obtained by the accentuation of 
 the division line between the superimposed stories of 
 the building. 
 
 Both these peculiarities are to be seen in the still- 
 existinof remains of what was once one of the most 
 beautiful -constructions left by the Renaissance in 
 Touraine — perhaps even in France — the cloister of 
 St. Martin of Tours. ‘On the 24th May, 1508/ so 
 runs the entry in the register of the Corporation, ‘ the 
 chapter commences building the beautiful galleries, such 
 as they now stand.’ Of these beautiful galleries, the 
 
THE CLOISTER OF ST. MARTIN AT TOURS. 
 
 47 
 
 eastern side alone has survived. It is little known, 
 and has therefore fortunately not been restored, but 
 left to go quietly to ruin ; yet even in its present con- 
 dition, the sculptures with which it is enriched, the 
 bas-reliefs, arabesques, and medallions which fill the 
 delicate lines of the pilasters and arcades, testify to the 
 brilliant and decided character which the Renaissance 
 early assumed in Touraine. It is conjectured that 
 the credit of this work, which was executed just after 
 the completion of the chateau of Bury, is due to Bastien 
 Francois, nephew of Michel Columbe, for we happen 
 to know from the Cathedral accounts that he held the 
 appointment of architect to the chapter in 15 11, when 
 this work was still in progress. 
 
 But notwithstanding the distinct and positive as- 
 sertion of certain leading principles made by the 
 architect of these galleries, they had yet to win their 
 way with other men ; the triumph of the new style was 
 not to be rapidly complete. M. Lassus, in his valuable 
 criticisms on the architectural designs which occur in 
 the ‘ Hypnerotomachia Poliphili ’ (1467), has remarked 
 that the author solves the structural problems which 
 they contain by the procedures of that very Gothic 
 which he at the same time broadly condemns. Even 
 thus, in many of the chateaiix of Touraine, the archi- 
 tect relies in construction on that very school the prin- 
 ciples of which he denies in every minor detail. Here 
 and there, as at Azay le Rideau, a boldly innovating 
 
48 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 hand may be seen at work, but for the most part 
 throughout this transitional period men are feeling 
 their way towards constructive change, not daring to 
 touch essential features, but tentatively busy on the 
 transformation and adaptation of minor details. 
 
 Chenonceau is a case in point. The foundations 
 were laid in 1515, the very year of the accession of 
 Franqois I., by whom it was acquired in 1535. The 
 name of the architect has never been positively as- 
 certained, but there is reason to suppose that he was 
 no other than Pierre le Nepveu dit Trinqueau, who 
 became at a later date maistre de la magonnerie du 
 bailment du chattel de Chambord. 
 
 In the plan of this building, the same wild spirit 
 which lends its charm to Chambord still pierces through 
 the later refinements and additions with which the 
 original work has been overlaid. On approaching 
 the chateau from the eastern side the eye is caught 
 by a confused medley of spires, minarets, and 
 cupolas ; the lines of the roof seem lost beneath the 
 luxuriant and disorderly growth of shafts springing to 
 the sky. 
 
 Here is the same quality of harmonious extra- 
 vagance which a few years later was to rule with royal 
 liberality at Chambord. Tourelles break out from the 
 massive walls at points where they cease to suggest 
 the flanking towers which they originally replaced. 
 Every turret, every pinnacle, is crowned with some 
 
CHENONCEAU. 
 
 49 
 
 fantastic ornament, and the angles at which gables jut 
 forth here and there from the pierced and carved 
 work which surrounds them are selected with the 
 express intention of misleading the eye, but the 
 heavy cones which surmount the larger towers, 
 thrust through the ornaments which flame about 
 them, and bring a sense of order into troubled 
 places, even where every element of design seems 
 absent. 
 
 The surprises, the accidents of the interior multiply 
 with incessant mystery. The numberless halls, cham- 
 bers, cabinets, present the most striking signs of 
 diversity, both as to size and character. The infinitely 
 varied necessities of a complex civilisation have begun 
 to make themselves felt. M. Michelet, writing of 
 Chambord, remarks that it is neither a Gothic donjon 
 nor an Italian palace. The Italian palace is roomy, 
 but has few rooms. Chambord, on the contrary, affords 
 every facility, not only for the life in common, but also 
 for the life apart. The convenient passage, the 
 double staircase, permit of every freedom for pleasure ; 
 and M. Michelet sees in these arrangements a reflection 
 of the state of the health and temper of the King on 
 his return from Spain. But this idea of the secular 
 convent, which should bring together, under one roof, 
 halls of state, private apartments, secluded cabinets, 
 and hidden cells, was not peculiar to Chambord ; it is 
 the ruling idea at Chenonceau, at Azay le Rideau, 
 
 VOL. I. E 
 
5o RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 at Nantouillet, and reaches its full proportions in the 
 splendours of Anet and Ecouen. 
 
 It is not to the liberties of pleasure only that these 
 buildings afford all opportunity. At the Court of the 
 Queen of Navarre, Des Periers complains that ‘ il y a 
 si grand’ presse de gens ceans qu’on ne se peut tourner.’ 
 His motto is a cry for ‘ loysir et liberte ; ’ he entreats 
 for freedom, for time, specially for room. Now these 
 numerous and separate chambers gave room, they gave 
 freedom from the overbearing pressure of other lives, 
 they permitted the individual life to develop even in 
 the midst of a common society. When the Queen of 
 Navarre sketches a division of the day for the courtly 
 company of the Heptameron, she allots a certain space 
 to be spent by chascun dans sa chambre. The demands 
 of a more complex and luxurious civilisation coincided 
 with the necessities of the growing intellectual activity 
 of the epoch. 
 
 The fortress of Louis XII. was built to house one 
 noble family with its officers, guards, and dependants ; 
 the palace of Francis I. gathered within its walls a 
 congeries of families, of which the royal house was 
 but the centre. Social life naturally assumed an im- 
 portance hitherto unknown in this assemblage of great 
 personages of both sexes. A few hautes chambres 
 tapissdes might suffice for the needs of Jean Bourre 
 when he raised the chateau of Langeais, but the wants 
 of Thomas Bohier, as they stand expressed in Chenon- 
 
THE EAST WING OF BLOIS. 
 
 5 
 
 ceau, were far more complex ; and not only do the 
 chateaux of great nobles give evidence of the change 
 in the manners of the day, but the less pretentious 
 hotels and country houses of private persons present 
 the same striking differences. The Hotel de Beaune 
 at Tours, the Hotel de Bourgtheroulde at Rouen, and 
 the Hotel Pince at Angers, were not built by princes, 
 yet each provides according to its space and means for 
 the separate as well as for the common needs of many 
 dwelling beneath the same roof. 
 
 Whilst Chenonceau was building, Louis XII. died 
 (1515), and the reign of Francois I. began. The 
 building of the eastern wing of the chateau of Blois, 
 commenced by Louis, was already far advanced, and 
 to Frangois fell the speedy honours of its completion. 
 The names of the architect who planned and of the 
 sculptors who decorated this splendid monument of the 
 earlier Renaissance are alike unknown to us. The 
 main features are such as are common to other chateatix 
 in the valley of the Loire ; but there are important 
 though minor differences which specially individualise 
 it. The architectural scheme is very simple. Three 
 rows of pilasters are superimposed one above another. 
 At about two-thirds down the front the open spiral 
 staircase juts out and towers upwards. It seems at 
 first to stand free, breaking up the even succession of 
 small columns and their perpendicular descent with 
 the bold projection of its octagonal lines. But above 
 
52 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 it is embraced and caught into the whole mass by 
 the broad crowning cornice which gathers within its 
 strengthening bands every various curve. The sculp- 
 tured dormers fret along its edge, searching the air 
 with their pointed tongues, and twice the carved cases 
 of the chimney-stacks break aloft through the roof, like 
 towers, but the cornice keeps firm hold upon their 
 base. 
 
 So far this eastern fagade at Blois brings to 
 mind the general type which may be recognised in 
 other chateaux of the district. It is but by the grave 
 simplicity of the ordonnance that Blois appears to 
 detach itself from the rest, and to stand somewhat 
 alone. A disciplined intellect, disposing soberly of the 
 means at its command, here carries on the work begun 
 by Bastien Francois in the cloisters of St. Martin. It 
 may be Bastien Francis himself, or that unknown 
 Italian who raised ten years earlier the beautiful chateau 
 of Bury, now lying a heap of ruins on the shores of 
 the Cisse. The fine and choice instinct for proportion 
 which marks every disposition, the symmetrical order 
 preserved in the distribution of ornament, show at 
 least that the architect of Blois had wholly given him- 
 self up to the intention of the new movement. 
 
 The division between the stories, plainly defined at 
 Blois, is yet more strongly marked in the little Hotel 
 Pince, built at Tours for Pierre de Pince, lieutenant 
 criminel du seneschal d' Anjou, about 1525. The effect 
 
HOTEL PIN Ci t 
 
 53 
 
 of the horizontal bands of ornament introduced for 
 this purpose is here vigorously counteracted by the 
 introduction of rapidly descending perpendicular shafts, 
 which space the wall curtain, group the openings, and 
 keep the whole building together. 
 
 This is precisely the mode of treatment on which 
 the chief architects of the second period rely. It is 
 the method in virtue of which De l’Orme triumphs 
 at Anet, and Bullantat Ecouen. At Chambord, which 
 was in building a year or two later (1526), the stories 
 are, it is true, forcibly indicated, but the whole building 
 is pulled together in Gothic fashion by the towers of 
 the corps de logis , and by those which flank the 
 pavilions or wings which stretch out on either side of 
 the main body. In a building of the size of Chambord 
 the result of this treatment is hardly satisfactory, for 
 the lines of the wings to right and left of the main 
 body seem to droop away from the heavy towers on 
 either side. 
 
 De rOrme, indeed, depends wholly on the corner 
 towers at Chaumont for the necessary amount of per- 
 pendicular accent ; but Chaumont is not a palace. It 
 is a chateau of ordinary dimensions, the whole extent of 
 which might be enclosed within the space occupied by 
 the corps de logis alone at Chambord. Inside the court, 
 however, the unpleasant effect, even at Chambord, dis- 
 appears, for the apparent length of the wings is greatly 
 abbreviated by the effect of the two spiral staircases 
 
54 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 which run up outside the building at the internal angles 
 on opposite sides. 
 
 Chambord is, indeed, throughout truly typical of the 
 earlier stage of the movement. In the general arrange- 
 ment, in the ordonnance , late Gothic caprice and fantas- 
 tic love of the unforeseen rule triumphant. The older 
 portions of the chateau , the seemingly irregular assem- 
 blages of half-Oriental turrets and spires, are debased 
 Gothic, full of audacious disregard of all outward seem- 
 ing of order. The architect, instead of seeking to bring 
 home to the eye the general law, the plan on which the 
 whole is grouped, has wilfully obscured and concealed it 
 beneath the obviousness of the wild and daring conceits 
 heaped above. 
 
 But even at Chambord, as at Brou, the mark is 
 set which promises other days. It is the transition 
 moment ; Gothic fancy may wildly distribute ornament 
 and obscure design, but the ornament which it distri- 
 butes is Gothic no longer. The obsccena which haunt 
 the cathedrals of the middle ages, which infest the 
 earlier towers of Amboise, and linger defilingly about 
 Gaillon, these are banished. In their place come faint 
 foliated traceries and arabesques in low relief, enriching 
 every surface, disturbing none, moving with melodious 
 adaptation of subtle line, winding, falling, rising in 
 sympathy with every swiftly ascending shaft or hollow- 
 ing curve. 
 
 It is not now possible to approach Chambord 
 
CHAMBORD . 
 
 55 
 
 carrying in our eyes a vision of the great Renaissance 
 palace, as engraved by Du Cerceau in his ‘ Plus excellens 
 Batimens de la France.’ Burdened by the weighty 
 labours of Louis XIV., weakened by eight improving 
 years at the hands of Stanislas Leczinski, muti- 
 lated by Marshal Saxe, the Chambord which we now 
 go out from Blois to visit is not the Chambord of 
 Francois I. The broad foundations and heaving arches 
 which rose proudly out of the waters of the moat no 
 longer impress the eye. The truncated mass squats 
 ignobly upon the turf, the waters of the moat are gone, 
 gone are the deep embankments crowned with pierced 
 balustrades, gone is the no-longer-needed bridge with 
 its guardian lions. 
 
 All the outlying work which gave the actual 
 building space and dignity has vanished, and we enter 
 directly from the park outside to what was once but 
 the inner court of the chateau. It is not until we stand 
 within this inner court — until we have passed through 
 the lines of building which enclose it on the western 
 side, and which show the unmistakeable signs of stupid 
 and brutal destruction, that we can believe again in the 
 departed glories of Chambord. Lippomano, ambassa- 
 dor from Venice to France in the reign of Henri III., 
 turned out of his way to visit Chambord. ‘ On the 
 2 ist,’ he says, ‘we made a slight detour in order to 
 visit the chateau of Chambord, or, more strictly speak* 
 ing, the palace commenced by Francois I. ; and truly 
 
56 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 worthy of this great prince. I have seen many magni- 
 ficent buildings in the course of my life, but never 
 anything more beautiful or more rich. They say that 
 the piles for the foundations of the chateau in this 
 marshy ground have alone cost 300,000 francs. The 
 effect is very good on all sides. ... I counted one 
 hundred and eighty-six steps in the spiral staircase 
 which occupies the centre ; it is constructed with such 
 skill, and is so convenient, that a party can go up one 
 side and down the other, six or eight abreast, at a 
 time. . . . The number of the rooms is as remarkable 
 as their size, and indeed space was not wanting to 
 the architect', since the wall that surrounds the 
 park is seven leagues in length. The park itself is 
 full of forests, of lakes, of streams, of pasture land, 
 and of hunting-grounds, and in the centre rises the 
 chateau with its gilt battlements, with its wings 
 covered in with lead, with its pavilions, its towers, 
 and its corridors, even as the romancers describe 
 to us the abode of Morgana or of Alcinous. More 
 than half remains to be done, and I don’t believe it 
 will ever be finished, for the kingdom is completely 
 exhausted by war. We left much marvelling, or rather 
 let us say thunderstruck, and we arrived that evening 
 at Blois.’ — ‘ Documens In6dits,’ v. 2, p. 300. 
 
 To destroy the character of Chambord from the 
 outside was not difficult. It was not easy to tame the 
 rude defiance of Vincennes, or give facility to the 
 
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CHAMBORD, 
 
 57 
 
 reserved and guarded approaches of Gaillon. Solid 
 rectangular towers, heavy machicolations, and pon- 
 derous drawbridges offer a stubborn resistance to 
 schemes of ruthless innovation ; but Chambord was no 
 fortress, it was a country house. The very site is 
 motived by no other reason than the pleasures of the 
 chase. The battlements of Gaillon gave back the 
 echoes of the trumpet, but the galleries of Chambord 
 resounded with the huntsman’s bugle. 
 
 The construction of these galleries in itself points 
 to the rapid progress of social change. There are not 
 only such as may be called covered passages com- 
 municating from the spiral staircases with the rooms on 
 each story j galleries which have their special cause in 
 actual need and daily use ; but the roofs of the range 
 of one-storied buildings which connect the side wings 
 on the north and south, and which run along the 
 western front, are finished up from the cornice with a 
 balustrade, and turned into a promenade for courtiers. 
 
 The women, whom Francois I. was blamed for 
 bringing about the Court, throng the spaces of Du 
 Cerceau’s cut, idling with their fans, attended by their 
 servants, and followed by their little dogs. The draw- 
 bridge of the past age is already replaced by a fixed 
 bridge, and a couple of lazy sentinels find their occupa- 
 tion in watching the groups who saunter by the side 
 of the moat, the rippling waters of which send up 
 c’oolness into the thirsty air. 
 
58 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Yet, in spite of these marked indications of change 
 the ancient spirit lingers. The unrestrained freedom 
 of grotesque caprice finds expression everywhere, even 
 in those later portions which belong to another reign. 
 Pierre le Nepveu has left on all his work the imprint 
 of profuse and fantastic force; the outlines of his 
 cupolas strike the sky with an audacity which seems to 
 defy the adverse criticism of those who moved within 
 the limits of more cautious rule. Symmetrical balance, 
 for which the masters of a succeeding era sought, and 
 by which they strove to harmonise every portion of 
 their design, obliged them to reject the aid of those 
 varied resources which Le Nepveu shrewdly marshalled 
 with a vigorous hand. 
 
 Chambordis in truth abrilliant example of transition. 
 The early Renaissance is there to be seen, taking on it- 
 self the burden beneath which had sunk the failing forces 
 of the Gothic spirit. But the intention of the work 
 is wholly foreign to the main direction taken by the 
 new movement. If we turn from Chambord to Azay, 
 we shall see the point which was actually being made 
 by others, whilst Le Nepveu was engaged in the 
 execution of a project condemned, by its very nature, 
 to remain, in spite of the wonderful genius lavished 
 upon it, an unfruitful tour de force. 
 
 The graceful chateau of Azay le Rideau rises 
 directly out of the waters of the Indre. It was in 
 actual progress during the earlier years of the works of 
 
AZAY LE RIDEAU. 
 
 59 
 
 Chambord. It is built on two sides of a square, one 
 side of which is prolonged somewhat and then abruptly 
 truncated at an outward angle. This unsymmetrical 
 ground-plan is a trace still retained of earlier days, 
 which are also faintly recalled by the elegant tourelles 
 carried on corbels, which complete each angle. In 
 every other respect, Azay is a continuation of the 
 intention manifested in the eastern wing of Blois. The 
 openings, like those of the Hotel Pince at Angers, are 
 grouped within pilasters one above another so as to 
 strengthen with their perpendicular lines the broad and 
 outspread surface. 
 
 Ornament, with one exception, is reserved to 
 accent the bands of the different stories, and to 
 enrich the cornice. The one exception is important : 
 the very pretence of defence having been abandoned, 
 the entrance is made by a high portal, and this portal, 
 together with the staircase which it supports, is mag- 
 nificently enriched with carving. The first frieze 
 shows bas-reliefs of the salamander of Francois I., and 
 of the ermine of Claude of Brittany his wife, who lay 
 dying at Blois in July 1524, when this chateau was 
 still in course of building. On the plinth which 
 supports the two windows of the pediment the same 
 devices appear, then a little arcade connects the ground- 
 « floor with the upper stories, the pilasters and other 
 members of which are covered with arabesques which 
 may challenge comparison for beauty of design with 
 
6o 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 the most exquisite passages produced at a later 
 period. 
 
 From Azay to the chateau of Longchamps or 
 Madrid we pass with ease. But the erection of this 
 chateau in 1527 marks the transference of the chief 
 activity to Paris, and the building itself shows important 
 modifications, both in the fashion of the exterior and 
 in the disposition of the internal arrangements. Azay, 
 though minor portions were added at a later period, 
 may be considered to have been practically finished 
 before the building of Madrid was begun. 
 
 Francis had undertaken the works of Chambord 
 in 1526, and throughout succeeding years he went 
 on building there and elsewhere incessantly. In 
 February 1527, fresh alterations were set on foot 
 in the Louvre. The great tower, the destruction of 
 which is deeply lamented by L’Etoile, was pulled 
 down to make room for these improvements. But 
 even Chambord and the Louvre together could not 
 absorb the restless energies of the King, and before 
 the close of the same year the foundations of Madrid 
 were laid. 
 
 The chateau of Longchamps, in the Bois de 
 Boulogne, which was afterwards called Madrid, was not 
 raised by French hands, and it may be said that it 
 cannot therefore claim a place in French work. The 
 enamelled terra-cottas, the ornamental tiles, the delicate 
 friezes, and medallions, which are to be seen in Du 
 
THE CHATEAU OF MADRID . 
 
 6 1 
 
 Cerceau’s engraving, filling the springing arches of the 
 windows, and marking out the masonry with brilliant 
 decoration, were, it is true, the work of no other than 
 Girolamo della Robbia himself, who left Florence for 
 Paris, in order that he might execute this task. 
 
 The actual practice of covering the wall surface 
 with a veneer of enamelled tiles, was not indeed 
 unknown in France, Two houses at Beauvais, dating 
 from about the end of the fifteenth century, are often 
 instanced, on the authority of M. Leon Vaudoyer, as 
 still existing examples ; and the tiles, with which the 
 facades of these buildings are overlaid, are ornamented 
 with little figures enamelled and in relief, so that in 
 one respect at least they resemble the brilliant works 
 presenting ‘all the characteristics of sculpture,’ which, 
 according to Corrozet, ‘ shone on the walls of Madrid.’ 
 
 Several of the arabesque designs which enriched 
 the tiled pavements of the room are represented by Du 
 Cerceau, and all these present those characteristics of 
 delicate elegance and symmetry of arrangement which 
 invariably belong to Italian decorative work, whilst 
 'here and there are bits which rival the hand of that 
 perfect master of the art, Giovanni da Udine. The 
 chimney-pieces, too, would seem, from Du Cerceau’s 
 drawings, to have been due to the chisels of Italian 
 sculptors. The accent is softer and more languorous 
 than is the wont of definite French speech, but over the 
 accumulated mass of foreign details the spirit of the soil 
 
62 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 maintained its ascendency and compelled the strange 
 exotic to shape itself anew. The fantastic devices that 
 covered the building, ‘ entrelacez les uns les autres,’ 
 shewed the presence of a kindred instinct to that which 
 produced Chenonceau and Chambord. In spite of the 
 importation of Italian craftsmen, Madrid was a French 
 chateau ; the ornaments which they designed, and the 
 caprices which they invented, were alike subjected to 
 the controlling force of French taste, and to the rule 
 of outlines planned probably by a French architect, 
 for the maitre wagon Pierre Gadier was a Frenchman, 
 and the elevation, as given by Du Cerceau, has neither 
 the proportions nor the style of Italian design. 
 
 This chateau of Madrid, however, on which 
 Francois I. lavished the utmost resources of wealth 
 and art, is to us now no more than a name ; during 
 the days of the Revolution everything perished, and 
 the loss is the more to be regretted as the original 
 outlines of the plan, preserved for us by Du Cerceau, 
 are most expressive. There is no room for official 
 display or state ceremonial ; we are within the con- 
 secrated precincts of private pleasure. The covered 
 galleries, running round outside every story, are pleasant 
 places for idle enjoyment, a sheltered lounge whence 
 may be watched out the long course of a summer day. 
 The interior is filled with light, brilliance, and air. 
 The sun streams in through numberless panes of 
 fixed glass, and wooden shutters are placed beneath, 
 
7 HE CHATEAU OF MADRID. 
 
 63 
 
 which fly open at the gust of fresh winds blowing past 
 them. 
 
 The gay summer-house is full too of little touches 
 of personal fancy, and marks of individual caprice. 
 The ceilings of the small rooms which flanked the 
 great hall on either side were placed at half-way of 
 the whole height. A secret chamber occupied the 
 space above them. Thither Francois could creep 
 unseen by means of staircases hidden behind the 
 imposing chimney-pieces of the rooms below ; the 
 object of all this contrivance being to afford, says Du 
 Cerceau, a retreat to the prince, whence he might, at 
 any time without being seen, play the spy upon those 
 who met and talked in the hall below. 
 
 The great space and importance assigned, at Madrid, 
 to th z garderobes is also a noticeable point which reminds 
 us that dress was now a serious and complex business. 
 Lippomano tells us that under Francois I. no man was 
 esteemed rich, especially amongst those who followed 
 the Court, if he had not from twenty-five to thirty suits 
 of clothes, so that he might change every day. Space 
 for the wardrobe was therefore a first necessity, but an 
 even more characteristic feature of the internal arrange- 
 ments, and one which was then regarded as a peculiarly 
 remarkable innovation, was the commodious complete- 
 ness of the offices. They were, indeed, partly under- 
 ground, but they were as convenient and well-lighted 
 as the other apartments, and in this respect differed 
 
64 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 greatly from the sombre and mysterious dungeons 
 
 which lurked amidst the heavy supporting piles of 
 
 the chateau of Chenonceau. At a later period, at 
 
 Anet, at Ecouen, attention was paid to the offices as 
 
 a matter of course, but at Chambord, at Amboise, at 
 
 Blois, special provision for the service was unheard of. 
 
 The architect provided for the guardchamber, and left 
 
 the household to seek refuge in the cellar. As for 
 
 sleeping accommodation, any hole, any bed was good 
 
 enough for those in attendance. Des Periers says : — 
 
 En cour pour le beau premier soir, 
 
 Couche fuz comme en un pressoir, 
 
 En lit bien autre que de plume, 
 
 Un petit plus dur qu’une enclume : 
 
 On le peut sentir k s’y seoir. 
 
 An improvement in the number and arrangement of the 
 upper chambers had been rendered necessary by the 
 press of nobles about the Court, and it finally became 
 imperative to provide in some measure for the wants of 
 a service greatly enlarged by the train of attendants 
 who accompanied them. 
 
 The C 07 r ps de logis or main body of the chateau of 
 Madrid was flanked by two pavilions, the angles of 
 which were accented only by ordinary projections. 
 This is a noteworthy change in the external plan. The 
 tourelle no longer records the tower which fifty years 
 before of necessity defended each outward point. This 
 feature, which had not elsewhere ceased to be indis- 
 pensable and prominent, is at Madrid relegated to the 
 
THE WORKS AT FONTAINEBLEAU. 
 
 65 
 
 unimportant office of carrying certain staircases at the 
 sides, and it never again obtained the leading import- 
 ance which it had previously enjoyed. Henceforth, 
 in all buildings of the first rank, the square pavilion 
 takes its place. 
 
 We have now quitted the shores of the Loire. 
 Paris, and its neighbourhood, becomes the scene of 
 that building of palaces and chateaux :, the projects 
 for which amused the later years of Frangois I. In 
 the same year (1527), says Corrozet, that the King 
 commenced the superb edifice of the chateau of Madrid, 
 
 ‘ il fit poursuivre avec diligence les bastimens qu’il avait 
 fait commencer a Fontainebelleau, a St. Germain en 
 Laye, au Bois de Vincennes, et en notre ville/ It has 
 been supposed that Pierre Lescot was the architect 
 entrusted with the alterations going on at Fontaine- 
 bleau, 
 
 chasteau qui s’appelle 
 Du gracieux sumom (Tune fontaine belle. 
 
 Felibien des Avaux seems to have been the first to 
 have put this tradition on record ; but he, writing in 
 1680, has not even the weight of second-hand authority ; 
 and had Lescot early given proof of his ability as 
 architect of Fontainebleau, the King would not have 
 sent to Bologna in 1541 for Sebastian Serlio to fill the 
 place of * surintendant des bastimens et architecte de 
 Fontainebleau.’ Rosso, who held the same post before 
 Serlio, did not arrive in Paris till 1530, and not only 
 
 VOL. 1. F 
 
66 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 was Madrid far advanced before his arrival, but the 
 works at Fontainebleau and the Louvre were also in 
 full progress. 
 
 M. Berty, in his learned work ‘ Vieux Paris/ conjec- 
 tures that, as regards the Louvre at least, the additions 
 projected by Francois I. were only carried out on paper. 
 The letters patent which confer on Lescot the whole 
 charge and superintendence of the works, and approve 
 his plans, were only granted by the King, at Fon- 
 tainebleau, in the year before his death (1546). Little 
 progress, therefore, can have been made during his 
 reign with the additions planned by Lescot, and M. 
 Berty supposes that nothing was done before this date, 
 because Corrozet, who, in the 1550 edition of his 
 ‘ Antiques de la Ville de Paris/ says, * Francois I. fit 
 faire au Louvre de grandes reparations et nouveaux 
 edifices/ is silent concerning them in an earlier edition, 
 that of 1543, although he mentions the destruction of 
 the great tower as a preparation for the execution of 
 future plans. 
 
 If, then, says M. Berty, Corrozet, who gives these 
 details in 1550, does not give them in 1543, it must be 
 because in 1543 the works of reconstruction had not 
 begun. But there is another edition cf the same 
 book which has escaped M. Berty s notice, a yet earlier 
 edition, the edition of 1532, and in it we find on p. 49, 
 
 ‘ Celluy seigneur (Francois I.) a aussi fait reparer le 
 chateau du Louvre de plusieurs riches edifices , lequel 
 
THE BUILDING OF THE LOUVRE . 
 
 67 
 
 lieu il a esleu pour sa demourance. , From this passage 
 it is plain that the King had indeed made important 
 additions to the Louvre fourteen years before he sanc- 
 tioned the plans of Lescot, but it is impossible to say 
 by whom they were conducted or designed. Rosso, it 
 is true, arrived in 1530, two years before the date at 
 which Corrozet writes ; but even two clear years would 
 scarcely give time for the erection of ‘ plusieurs riches 
 edifices ; ’ and his name is wholly connected with 
 Fontainebleau, where he nearly always resided during 
 his ten years’ life in France. 
 
 As long as we are dealing with the chateaux of 
 Touraine we half accept the mystery which seems to 
 shroud their erection, as the natural result of their con- 
 nection with a more remote past. They seem to hang 
 on, as it were, to the skirts of that ghostly Middle Age 
 which is enveloped in even deeper obscurity ; but Paris 
 in the reign of Francois I. should be well within the 
 reach of modern curiosity. We expect to get easily at 
 definite knowledge concerning its work and those by 
 whom it was done. But again we are forced to 
 acknowledge that often the utmost efforts of search 
 will not even yield a name, and that, if we are sure of 
 a name, we are sure of nothing else. Considerable 
 works were undoubtedly undertaken at the Louvre, at 
 Fontainebleau, at Longchamps (Madrid), and other 
 places, during the first four or five years after Francois 
 I. returned from his Spanish captivity (1525) ; but we 
 
68 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 know neither by whom they were planned nor by 
 whom they were executed. 
 
 One thing only is certain ; the number of Italian 
 artists in Paris was not considerable until the sack of 
 Rome (1527) and the fall of the Medici drove them 
 northwards. Such as had come into France earlier, 
 coming in one by one, found themselves absorbed 
 by forces already active, and added only some inappre- 
 ciable impulse of foreign vigour. After a while, when 
 they flocked in greater numbers, they constituted an 
 individual school, which drew to itself some French 
 followers, but which as a rule was regarded with envy 
 and dislike by native artists. Prior, however, to the 
 coming of Rosso, who was, as has already been said, 
 specially engaged at Fontainebleau, no Italian of note 
 is known to have been employed in directing the works 
 undertaken at the various royal chateaux. 
 
 It was not till the year 1530 that Maitre Roux 
 (Rosso del Rosso) arrived in Paris, where, says Vasari, 
 
 ‘ fu con molte carezze della nazione fiorentina ricevuto.’ 
 The King was very liberal to him. His appointments 
 began with the yearly pension of 400 crowns and a 
 house, in Paris, which he rarely inhabited, for he spent 
 most of his time at Fontainebleau, where he also 
 had apartments. In the following year (1531) came 
 Primaticcio. 
 
 Born at Bologna in 1490, Francesco Primaticcio 
 quitted his native city for Mantua at the age of thirty- 
 
ROSSO AND PRIM A TIC CIO. 
 
 69 
 
 five, attracted thither by the fame of Giulio Romano. 
 In Mantua he worked for six years with great credit, 
 and now arrived in France with all the prestige which 
 could accrue from the fact that Giulio, unable to accept 
 for himself the royal invitation addressed to him, had 
 nominated Primaticcio as his worthy representative. 
 He was welcomed at Paris with all the honours due to 
 his credentials. He was named Prior of Bretigny and 
 Abbot of St. Martin de Troyes, two places which 
 brought him in an annual income of 8,000 crowns, but 
 he does not seem to have found active and immediate 
 employment. Rosso, who, as a man of general culti- 
 vation, well-bred, well-mannered, of good figure and 
 address, had rendered himself acceptable to the King, 
 was already in possession of the title of surintendant 
 des bdtiments. The arrival of Primaticcio seemed to 
 threaten his supremacy, and it is conjectured that it was 
 in consequence of the difficulties which arose between 
 them, that Primaticcio was eventually despatched to 
 Italy, under commission from the King, to take casts of 
 the finest examples of ancient and modern sculpture, 
 and to purchase other works of art. 
 
 The field was thus left clear for Rosso (1531). 
 Under his supervision were constructed the Galerie 
 Francois I. in the Cour Ovale at Fontainebleau, and a 
 portion of the Cour de la Fontaine , in which Charles V. 
 and his suite were lodged in 1539; but that either he 
 or Primaticcio were practically skilled as architects is 
 
70 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 doubtful. Decorative painting and every class of 
 ornamental work in relief, from surface patterns to 
 statuettes, were familiar technic in the hands of both ; 
 and in this respect, by the introduction of methods of 
 procedure and ornament common only in Italy at that 
 date, they enlarged the boundaries and enriched the 
 resources of French art. But their action on the con- 
 struction of the buildings which they decorated was 
 probably limited to a mere general dictation and con- 
 trol. Such portions of Fontainebleau as were in build- 
 ing during the rule of Rosso do not differ essentially 
 from parts previously executed, and we are probably 
 right in concluding that the legitimate credit due to 
 him is simply that of having developed and extended 
 changes which had already taken place in interior 
 decoration and architectural detail, and of having thus 
 carried forward the work of preparing and educating 
 the national taste to relish the decisive revolution which 
 was now far advanced, and destined to be completed 
 with the next reign. 
 
 For it is to the era inaugurated by the accession of 
 Henri II. that we must look for a perfect expression 
 of change, and it is a significant fact that the works of 
 this reign are signed. Ecouen speaks to us of Bullant, 
 Anet and the Tuileries once bore witness to the talent 
 of De rOrme, the genius of Lescot is still acknowledged 
 by the Louvre. These four palaces not only resume 
 for us the successive steps by which the final form of 
 
BULLANT, DE EORME AND LESCOT. 
 
 7 1 
 
 the architectural intention of the epoch was attained, 
 but their authors are in themselves examples of the 
 mighty change wrought, by the new gospel of self- 
 development, in the world of art. 
 
 We know not much, indeed, concerning these men, 
 but enough to individualise our conception of their 
 character, and to make them appear to us not as names 
 only but as men. Bullant, a man of the people, a born 
 workman, is akin to the unknown builders of a previous 
 era ; only, whilst he works, even as they did, chisel in 
 hand, he reads and ponders, and the book is Vitruvius, 
 and his dream is of the perfection of the Five Orders. 
 De rOrme and Lescot carry us onward ; they are men 
 of honourable birth, liberally trained in the society 
 of their equals, men to whom the best learning of their 
 day was a familiar tongue, but the chisel dropped from 
 their fingers, and the race of maitres magons was 
 extinct. 
 
7 2 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ARCHITECTURE (154O-I580). 
 
 Dieu gard gentils ouvriers et vous doctes esprits 
 Qui avez le bel art d’architecture appris, 
 
 Les uns pour desseigner en plan et en modelle, 
 
 Autres pour employer l’esquierre et la cordelle. 
 
 GALLIADE. LA BODERIE. 
 
 Bullant . — The Chateau of Ecouen. 
 
 The rapid facility with which the French appropriate 
 and fashion to perfection the fruits of discovery, the 
 ingenuity with which they find a fitting channel for 
 every fresh supply of motive energy, is at no time 
 more signally exemplified than during the course of the 
 Renaissance. 
 
 The artist of an earlier epoch had been an artisan. 
 The architect was a mason, who worked upon his 
 scaffolding, and knew no other world. But when the 
 forces of the Humanist revolution swept the quiet sur- 
 face of artistic life, the dream of complete and all- 
 embracing cultivation caught the fancy of those who 
 had been content to dwell within narrow and distinct 
 limits ; they, too, would reproduce themselves, and 
 would put into their work the fulness of their indi- 
 viduality. When the fifteenth century had run to its 
 
BULLA NT. 
 
 73 
 
 close in Italy, art had ceased to be popular. Artists 
 turned for their audience to an intellectual aristocracy, 
 to a specially trained class. They thus obtained a 
 freedom in conception, which enabled them to seize the 
 liberties of the whole subject world of sense, Conscious 
 of independent personality, they were now bold to 
 fashion their work into a clear expression of their 
 own nature, and the outcome of these conditions was 
 an ideal of artistic education which sought to combine 
 the fulfilment of the severe requirements of practical 
 training with the stimulating discipline of theoretical 
 exercise and inquiry. 
 
 No sooner had the French apprehended than they 
 adapted themselves to the situation. When Philibert 
 de rOrme returned from Italy in 1536, he was not 
 the only Frenchman fitted by versatility of technical 
 acquirement and polish of general culture to meet his 
 Italian rivals on equal ground. Pierre Lescot and 
 Jean Bullant had also secured for themselves all the 
 advantages which Italy could afford. To have been 
 in Italy was in itself a great advantage, for it conferred 
 a prestige which inspired confidence in the minds of 
 court employers wisely doubtful of the value of their 
 own judgment. De l’Orme had not only visited Italy, 
 he had become known there, and returned to France 
 * backed by powerful and noble patrons. Lescot was 
 less fortunate in this respect, but he belonged to a 
 family of condition and importance, so that he might 
 
74 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 at least feel assured of a busy future. Bullant was, it 
 would seem, a man meanly born, and he owed his only 
 chance in life to the fortunate patronage of the 
 Constable de Montmorency. To these three men 
 France owes the chief and most characteristic works 
 of the later years of the Renaissance. To Bullant, 
 Ecouen ; the Tuileries and Anet to De l’Orme ; to 
 Lescot, the Louvre. 
 
 Of Bullant’s origin, and of his life up to 1 540, when 
 the Constable de Montmorency called him to build his 
 chateau of Ecouen, nothing is known. He had certainly 
 spent some time in Italy, for in his ‘ Reigle gen^rale 
 d’ Architecture,’ a work published in 1564, he says ‘ cinq 
 manieres de colonnes . . . que fay mesurd a V antique 
 dedans Rome ; ’ but whether this visit took place pre- 
 viously to his employment at Ecouen, or after he 
 entered the service of the Constable, does not appear. 
 The few facts of which we are in possession, concerning 
 his life subsequent to this epoch, are derived from 
 entries in the Royal Accounts and from the registers 
 preserved in the municipal archives of Ecouen, extracts 
 from which have been printed by M. de Montaiglon 
 in ‘ Les Archives de l’Art Frangais.’ 
 
 From these sources we learn that in 1570, thirty 
 years after the commencement of Ecouen, Bullant, then 
 in the fifty-fifth year of his age, was called, on the 
 death of Philibert de l’Orme, to carry on the unfinished 
 buildings of the Tuileries, and to look after the works 
 
BULLANT EMPLOYED BY HENRI II. 
 
 75 
 
 in progress at the chateau of St. Mor-lez-Fossez, at 
 that time the property of the Queen-Mother. 
 
 He is first mentioned as employed by the Court in 
 letters patent given by Henri II. at St. Germain-en- 
 Laye on October 25, 1557. By these letters he is 
 appointed ‘ controleur des bastimens de la couronne ; ’ 
 in January 1558 the building accounts contain an entry 
 of the payment of his half year’s wages, 200 livres, 
 and in January 1559 he was still under a commission 
 to visit and inspect. In the following January, how- 
 ever, Henri II. was dead, and Bullant was then replaced 
 in his office by a certain Francois Sannat, a protege, it 
 is supposed, of the Queen- Mother. It was not until 157 r, 
 when eleven years had elapsed, that we find him taken 
 into Catharine’s service as architect, ‘ au bastiment de 
 son palais des Thuilleries.’ 
 
 The next entry refers to the year 1573, when Bullant 
 receives as ordonnateur de la stpulture of Henri II. 
 523 livres, being the wages of ten months and fifteen 
 days. In the following year (1574) there are two 
 entries of payments made to him, amounting in all 
 to 450 livres, and in 1575, the first year of the 
 reign of Henri I II., Bullant is styled ‘ controleur des 
 bastiments du roi,’ and architect of the tomb of the 
 Valois, his yearly wages having been increased from 
 400 to 600 livres. But in spite of these engagements 
 he seems to have constantly resided at Ecouen. In 
 1561, writes La Croix du Maine, ‘ il florissoit a 
 
76 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Escoan pres Paris.’ At Ecouen he had married 
 Fran^oise Richault and had become the father of nine 
 children, the dates of whose birth are successively re- 
 corded in the registers, the youngest, Claude, being 
 born in 1575, when her father was sixty years of age. 
 
 At Ecouen he had lived and worked ; at Ecouen, 
 too, he died. The preamble to his will sets forth that 
 ‘. . . jour d’Octobre, 1578, fut present (l’honorable 
 homme) M e . Jehan Bullant, architecteur du Roy nostre 
 Sire, et de la Royne mere, demourant a Ecouen, estant 
 en son lit malade et indispos de corps mais sain de 
 son entendment.’ The will itself is simple enough, ‘ Et 
 premyerement a recommande son ame a Dieu, et a la 
 glorieuse Vierge Marie, Monseigneur Saint Michel 
 l’Ange, et a M. Saint Acceol, son patron, et toutte la 
 cour celeste de Paradis, et a ordonne son corps estre 
 inhume en terre sainte.’ The funeral services are to 
 be ‘ suyvant la coutume audit Escouen ; ’ to the Church 
 he grants ‘ une piece de terre labourable . . . pour luy 
 estre diet et c^lebre a. toujours, perpetuellement en 
 ladicte eglise, une messe hautte de Requiem, &c.’ The 
 end was near ; on October 10 he died, for Le Laboureur, 
 in his edition of ‘ Les Memoires de Castlenau,’ says, 
 speaking of the tomb of the Constable Anne, ‘ Ce 
 mausol^e est demeure imparfait en quelque chose par 
 la mort du celebre Jean Bullant qui l’avoit entrepris, 
 arriv^e le 10 Octobre 1578.’ 
 
 During the period of his disgrace at Court Bullant 
 
THE TWO WORKS WRITTEN BY BULLANT. 
 
 77 
 
 brought out two books. The first, ‘ Recueil d’Horlo- 
 giographie, contenant la description, fabrication, et 
 usage des horloges solaires,’ was dated from Ecouen 
 1561, published at Paris, and dedicated to the Constable 
 de Montmorency ; the second part of the work, entitled 
 ‘ Petit Traicte de Geometrie, et d’Horlogiographie,’ 
 followed in 1562. At Ecouen, too, he produced, in 
 1564, his second work, ‘Reigle generale d ’architecture 
 des cinq manieres de colonnes, a sgavoir : Toscane, 
 Dorique, Ionique, Corinthe, et Composite, a l’exemple 
 de l’antique suivant les reigles et doctrines de Vitruve.’ 
 This volume also was printed at Paris ; but the Con- 
 stable was dead — killed in the battle of St. Denis — and 
 the ‘ Reigle generale ’ is dedicated to his son Francois, 
 then Duke de Montmorency. 
 
 Bullant, however, goes back to the memory of his old 
 patron, Monseigneur le Conestable, ‘ Lequel m’a tou- 
 jours occupe, et entretenu aus oeuvres de son chasteau 
 d’Escouen, afin de ne me consommer en oysivete, 
 d’autant que la pluspart du temps me restoit sans autre 
 occupation.’ The last work of his life, the work which 
 was, as we have seen, actually unfinished at the day 
 of his death, was the tomb of his old master. It was 
 erected in the Abbey Church of St. Martin of Mont- 
 morency. 
 
 The choice which the Constable made of Bullant 
 for his architect, the long connection existing between 
 the two, had in itself a peculiar fitness and signi- 
 
73 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 ficance. The Constable Anne, whose prayers were 
 more terrible than his curses, was a descendant of 
 Bouchard le Barbu, a plundering bandit who laid 
 the foundations of the house of Montmorency. The 
 Renaissance movement had infected him with a 
 strange enthusiasm for the arts ; but to letters he 
 remained wholly indifferent, and of his eldest son it 
 is recorded that at the age of twenty-three, when he 
 was taken prisoner by the Imperialists at the siege of 
 Terouanne, he could barely read, and could not write. 
 The conduct of the Constable as a statesman was de- 
 ficient in command ; his policy was driven about by 
 his passions, and he used power unsparingly, taking 
 vengeance or doing justice without pity or remorse. 
 The devotional exercises, which, as a zealous Catholic, 
 he scrupulously performed, whether at home or in the 
 field, gave new strength to his furious energies. His 
 soldiers said, ‘ II fallait se garder des patenotres de M. 
 le Connetable, car en les marmottant il disoit . . . 
 Taillez-moi en pieces ces marauts-la. Brulez-moi ce 
 village. Boutez-moi le feu partout a un quart de lieue 
 a la ronde : semblables mots de justice proferoit-il 
 selon ces occurrences sans se debaucher nullement de 
 ses Paters.’ 
 
 Violent and brutal, the Constable had one great 
 gift — he knew when work was well done, and he 
 could recognise a man capable of doing it. For 
 blunders and slips he had no mercy, and whether the 
 
BULLA NT AND CONSTABLE DE MONTMORENCY . 79 
 
 offender were a dignitary of the robe or one of his best 
 officers, he was addressed, says Brantome, much to the 
 point, with ‘ Ass, Mooncalf, Fool ! ’ The polish and ac- 
 quirements of men such as Lescot and De l’Orme would 
 not specially recommend them to his notice, but in 
 Bullant he found a man of a different stamp ; an artist 
 of splendid energies, practically skilled, but devoid of 
 that tincture of letters and grace of various accomplish- 
 ments which specially distinguished the more typical 
 men of the time. Bullant had visited Italy and read 
 Vitruvius, but for the rest he remained the maztre 
 magon , the builder and stone-cutter of an older time, 
 just as his patron the Constable, in spite of his passion 
 for the brilliant show of Renaissance work, was indeed 
 a representative of the race of turbulent warrior nobles, 
 half freebooters, half princes, then becoming rapidly 
 extinct. 
 
 Bullant has himself put on record his wants in 
 respect of general culture. In his preface to the 
 ‘ Reigle generale ’ he apologises beforehand for having 
 possibly but imperfectly understood the meaning of 
 Vitruvius, and begs excuse for Ta rudesse, et mala- 
 ornement de mondit langage, parce que je nesuis latin.’ 
 The text which he had before him was probably the 
 French translation by Jean Martin, printed at Paris in 
 1547. The illustrations, by Goujon, were added to the 
 second edition of the same work, which did not, how- 
 ever, appear till 1572, and could not, therefore, be of 
 
So 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 any service to Bullant. He himself had apparently 
 attempted to execute illustrations for his own book, for 
 two engravings on copper, dated 1566, and signed by 
 him, are described by M. Robert-Dumesnil in his cata- 
 logue of ‘ Les Peintres-graveurs F rancais.’ They repre- 
 sent two capitals, and it has been supposed that it is to 
 these drawings that Bullant refers in a passage occurring 
 in the ‘ Reigle g^nerale,’ which runs as follows : ‘ Vous 
 aurez recours a ceux que j’en ay faict en cuivre, 
 estampes non trop nettement.’ If so, the date on the en- 
 gravings must have been added two years after their 
 production, for the 4 Reigle g£n£rale ’ appeared in 1564. 
 
 The chateau of Ecouen, the work which absorbed 
 nearly the whole of Bullant s lifetime, presents, in every 
 feature, characteristics precisely corresponding to the 
 special type of his genius. The peculiarities of his 
 position midway between the maitre magons who raised 
 the chateaux of Touraine, and the architects who 
 planned the Louvre and the Tuileries — peculiarities 
 which are put plainly enough before us in his written 
 pages, are wrought out at Ecouen in the most tangible 
 and intelligible form. In this respect, as illustrating 
 the final moment of departure from Gothic traditions, 
 Ecouen possesses an historical value which does not 
 attach in the same degree to any other chateau on 
 French soil. 
 
 The ground-plan of the building is a quadrangle, 
 similar to that of the Luxembourg. The four blocks, 
 
THE CHATEAU OF ECOUEN. 
 
 81 
 
 or corps de logis which occupy the four sides are flanked 
 at each corner by projecting square pavilions. The 
 angles which these pavilions make with the main 
 building are occupied by small tourelles, which termi- 
 nate in covering cones, supported on a circle of 
 pilasters. The drawing of Du Cerceau shows us that 
 the castle, which is situated on an eminence, was ori- 
 ginally surrounded on three sides by the deep fosse, 
 part of which still exists. This fosse was replaced on 
 the fourth side by a high terrace, beneath which ran the 
 alley of the jeu de paume. The terrace commanded the 
 village at its foot, from which the building was ap- 
 proached by a succession of ascents and esplanades. 
 It is, indeed, as if the military spirit of the Constable 
 had fashioned the outward approaches, so as at least to 
 convey a reminiscence of the traditions of defence ; 
 but this character is not maintained in the rest of the 
 chateau. 
 
 The face of the portal, which occupies the centre of 
 the principal block, was covered with a profusion of 
 rich adornments. On either side the opening still 
 stand double fluted Doric columns, raised on isolated 
 pedestals from a solid base. These columns sup- 
 port a frieze, above which a second set, of the Ionic 
 order, are imposed, so as to mark the line of the upper 
 story. Between these four columns an arcade is 
 pierced, which parts them, just as the entrance gateway 
 separates those below. Over all springs an arch, 
 
 VOL. i. 
 
 G 
 
82 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 supported on either side by caryatides, whilst on a 
 pedestal, above their heads, couches a doubtful griffin. 
 Aloft, beneath this centre crowning arch, was formerly 
 seen the majestic shape of the Constable himself, 
 riding in stone, with a royal air. 
 
 The lavish magnificence of this main portal was re- 
 sponded to right and left in the fantastic and capricious 
 enrichments of the dormers, and these dormers still 
 give effect and character to the otherwise monotonous 
 line of the high-pitched roof. They spring in sharp 
 spires from the top of every long upward line of window 
 openings, and Bullant has succeeded in preserving a 
 sense of balance and elegance in their design in spite 
 of the somewhat bastard forms which injure the style 
 of the pilasters and other accompanying details. 
 
 Of the interior court Du Cerceau says, ‘ Elle est si 
 richement paree qu’il ne se trouve point qui la seconde. 
 Des quatre corps de logis circuissant la court, les trois 
 servent a commoditez de salles, chambres, et autres 
 membres, la quatrieme estant une gallerie. A Tune 
 des faces d’un des corps dans la court y a deux niches, 
 lesquelles sont deux figures de captifs de marbre blanc 
 un pen plus grand que le naturel.’ 
 
 These figures were the celebrated Slaves of Michael 
 Angelo, given to the Constable by Henri II. He 
 placed them at 6 couen right and left under the peristyle 
 of four Corinthian columns, beneath which issued the 
 staircase which gave access to the apartments. This 
 
REPRODUCED FROM DU CERCEAUS LES PLUS EXCELLENTS BASTIMENTS DE FRANCE. 
 
THE CHATEAU OF ECOUEN. 
 
 8 3 
 
 entrance, which is the principal, differs in one important 
 respect from the rest. The others are composed of two 
 orders ; here the columns, which are a direct reproduc- 
 tion of those of the temple of Jupiter Stator, run to 
 the entire height of the building. The central opening 
 is so wide that the line of ascending steps within be- 
 comes visible behind the arcade which protects the 
 entry. The space above is filled by an entablature, 
 over which opens a window ; escutcheons in profile, 
 tablets which formerly received coats of arms, and 
 other devices, are scattered on either hand. 
 
 Both this fagade, and the entrance gateway, which 
 are the two most striking features of the whole building, 
 show the same disregard of strict rule redeemed by 
 the same elegance, justness of taste, and quickness of 
 perception. Bullant takes licence in dealing with 
 many details, a licence which has no bravado nor con- 
 sciousness ; but which is even essential to the spirit in 
 which he wrought. For to him the forms of classic 
 work were not the rigid expression of absolute rules 
 to be got by heart, and repeated in timid obedience ; 
 they meant only increased resource, and though he 
 does not hesitate to make variations, which are adapta- 
 tions to the fit fulfilment of his immediate purpose, yet 
 whenever he has recognised, as in the proportions of 
 the orders, a perfection not to be touched without fear, 
 he respects it with scrupulous reverence. 
 
 These proportions are observed throughout at 
 
8 1 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 Ecouen with perfect intelligence, and in their applica- 
 tion Bullant gives proof not only of rare natural powers 
 of discrimination, but shows that he had mastered as 
 well as studied the teaching of that author whom he 
 had zealously sought to interpret according to the 
 power of his ‘ peu d’entendement.’ The genuine delight 
 which his new acquisitions bring to him — the delight 
 which he finally expressed in print in the folio of 1564, 
 is betrayed by every stone in the walls. The orders 
 are employed everywhere ; now they appear in the 
 porticos, then to right and left of the windows of the 
 two principal stories ; they support and crown the 
 mansards of the roof, and finally range in circle beneath 
 the cones which enclose the top of the side tourelles. 
 
 There is something verging on the fantastic in this 
 lavish use of pillar and pilaster. The exuberant profu- 
 sion of creeping ornament which overflows the border- 
 ing lines of every frieze, — ornament in which the 
 crescent of Diane de Poitiers and the martial trophies 
 of the warrior Constable are swept along enveloped 
 in tangles of trailing foliage, — also heightens the im- 
 pression of caprice. The jointing of the small masonry, 
 of which the walls are composed ; the sharp angles 
 of the massive flanking pavilions ; the steep lines of 
 the high-pitched roof ; these points recall the ordinary 
 characters, if not the actual features of a Gothic edifice. 
 For these square and massive pavilions at Ecouen, as 
 at Madrid, have indeed replaced the large round towers 
 
THE CHATEAU OF ECOUEN. 
 
 85 
 
 which give a protecting touch to the walls of Chambord ; 
 it is the Gothic tourelle which still maintains its claims, 
 though but in a subordinate position, beneath the bell- 
 shaped cupolas, and the gaiety of spirit which relieves 
 itself in frank bursts of gracious ornament, in the eager 
 display of newly-acquired possessions, has something of 
 the same unreflecting impulse which animates the sculp- 
 tors who decorated the walls of Blois and Chambord. 
 
 But these points, which show the presence of early 
 association in the mind of a man trained in traditions 
 which were handed down from father to son, trowel 
 in hand, do not disturb the general character of the 
 structure. National and individual peculiarities are 
 forced to fall in with the lines of a symmetrical com- 
 position, the spirit of which maintains its ascendency 
 in paramount rule over every part. 
 
 In place of the outlines of a Gothic chateau , filled 
 with the ornaments, and overlaid by the additions sug- 
 gested by the growing appreciation of classic work, 
 Ecouen expresses the fusion of the lingering elements 
 of Gothic character with the absorbing principles of 
 Italian design. Even the caprice which overloads many 
 features with variety of ornament acquires a shade of 
 forethought from the intention of equal balance which 
 directs its distribution. Trailing wreaths of foliage, 
 thronging masses of detail, are marshalled within 
 mouldings and border lines, profiled with exquisite 
 taste and precision. 
 
86 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 The details themselves are full of elegance, and cut 
 with a splendid touch. It is said, indeed, that Bullant 
 was aided in this part of the work by Jean Goujon. 
 The character of the design in many ornamental details, 
 of certain chiselled locks, for instance (which now exist 
 only in an engraving in Lenoir’s ‘ Musee des Monumens 
 Frangais’), and of the caryatides, which are applied to the 
 entrance portal, suggest the co-operation of Goujon. 
 If, however, he worked much at Iicouen, it must have 
 been in early days, prior to his engagement by Lescot, 
 on the sculptures of the Louvre, which took place at 
 some time subsequent to the year 1548. 
 
 But the share which should be assigned to Bullant 
 in the actual decoration of the edifice which he had 
 himself designed is so vast that the assistance which 
 he received from others sinks into insignificance 
 before it. The charm which its walls still possess, is 
 the apparent impress of 4 single purpose and a single 
 mind. The entire mass is informed with individual 
 life, and so much of the still existing ornament is 
 marked by distinct personal character that it seems 
 impossible to accept the theory that Bullant did not 
 himself use the chisel ; rather, one would say, the 
 master’s hand has left its touch and finish on every 
 detail. Knowledge of the ultimate intention, which 
 he alone could command, has given to every stroke a 
 sympathetic value, an original point of meaning, which 
 invigorates with its spirit every portion of the structure, 
 
THE CHATEAU OF ECO UEN. 
 
 87 
 
 and fills the whole with energy and life. Lippomano, 
 the Venetian Ambassador, who described Chambord, 
 visited Ecouen also, and saw the chateau in its full 
 beauty. He says ‘ A mio giudizio non si puo aggiungere 
 ne desiderare cosa alcuna nel castello di Equan.’ 
 
 The building as it now stands is a mere shell, from 
 which the greater part of the rich ornament which it 
 was fitted to receive has been torn. It was saved from 
 the total destruction with which the Revolution at the 
 close of the last century overwhelmed so many other 
 monuments, only because it fortunately presented certain 
 conveniences of structure and situation which suited the 
 requirements of a military hospital. 
 
 In 1796, when it was already fulfilling the functions 
 of an ‘asile au courage malheureux,’ M. Dusommerard 
 visited it and found that most of the splendid decora- 
 tions were still in place. But, little by little, the walls 
 were stripped. The chapel, which occupied the left 
 wing of the building, had been enriched with the 
 utmost profusion of elaborate ornament. N othing was 
 spared. 
 
 Alexandre Lenoir, who did good work during the 
 Revolution by gathering into the ‘ Musee des Monu- 
 mens Frangais,’ all that he could save from destruction, 
 calls attention in his catalogue to the ‘ Chapelle Sepul- 
 crale d’Anne de Montmorency.’ ‘ Ce morceau,’ he 
 says, ‘ n’est effectivement qu’un detail de la grande 
 chapelle, qui n’est elle-meme qu’un detail du palais. 
 
88 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 quoiqu’elle soit tres-vaste et tres-elevee . . . elle etait 
 ornee dune boiserie de la plus grande beaute, de sculp- 
 tures faites par Jean Bullant lui-meme, et de marque- 
 terie charmante, d’un dessein extremement elegant. 
 Cette boiserie, par un malentendu, a ete deplacee, et 
 transportee au Musee des Arts et Metiers.’ 
 
 The mausoleum itself, fragments of which have 
 now passed to the Louvre, was also, as set up by Lenoir, 
 but a mutilated monument. The bronze statues of the 
 Constable and his wife Madeleine de Tende had been 
 removed from their place and melted down in 1794. 
 Lenoir therefore treated the marble recumbent effigies, 
 which should properly have occupied but a subordinate 
 position, as the principal features of the design, and 
 eked out the rest of the monument (as his habit was) 
 with a statue which happened to be at hand. In this 
 instance he applied, most inappropriately, a figure in 
 white marble, ‘ representant le genie de l’etude, placee,’ 
 he tells us, ‘ originairement dans le tresor de Saint- 
 Denis, on croit qu’elle avait ete executee pour le 
 mausolee du Connetable de Bourbon.’ 
 
 The fate which overtook the precious work of the 
 chapel carried away in its course the various decora- 
 tions of the rest of the chateau. The locks of the doors, 
 the tesselated pavements, the panelling of the walls, 
 the windows, were torn from their places, some de- 
 stroyed, some carried away. In 1838 M. Dusommerard 
 again returned ; he found the building gutted. In 1 796 
 
THE MAUSOLEUM OF THE CONSTABLE ANNE. 89 
 
 the glories of its brilliant detail still shone with but 
 diminished splendour ; forty years later nothing re- 
 mained but a few fragments of the pavement mentioned 
 by Fabry de Peiresc (1606) and in the village church 
 ‘plusieurs panneaux de vitraux en grisaille.’ The 
 remains of the glass both in colour and in grisaille, which 
 once filled the windows of the village church, are still 
 to be seen, but the chateau is now occupied by a girls’ 
 school ; the Sisters by whom it is conducted deny all 
 access to the interior, and even the privilege of standing 
 on the deserted bridges of the moat can be but with 
 difficulty obtained by an unauthorised visitor. 
 
 In the execution of the mausoleum, which stood 
 in the church of St. Martin at Montmorency, Bullant 
 was aided by Bartelemi Prieur, a young sculptor whose 
 chisel had caught much of the facile elegance of his 
 reputed master, Germain Pilon, tempered, however, by 
 a more direct regard for natural grace of movement 
 and expression. Prieur completed another funeral 
 monument raised in the Constable’s honour. His heart 
 had not been deposited in the tomb at Montmorency, 
 but in the church of the Celestins at Paris. 
 
 M. Millin, the industrious author of ‘ Antiquites 
 Nationales,’ writing in 1798, describes as still in place 
 the twisted column rising from a base girt about by 
 three figures which supported the urn wherein lay the 
 heart of the Constable. ‘ L’ordonnance,’ he adds, ‘ de 
 ce monument est de Jean Bullant, l’execution de 
 
90 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Bartelemi Prieur, sculpteur calviniste qui devait beau- 
 coup a la protection de la maison Montmorenci.’ In 
 the hour of revolution, however, the treasures of the 
 Celestins suffered indiscriminate destruction. Alex- 
 andre Lenoir again interfered, and carried off fragments 
 of this monument to shelter within the walls of the 
 museum which he had established at the Petits 
 Augustins. There they remained till the Restoration, 
 after which they were set up in the galleries of the 
 Louvre. 
 
 Nothing now remains of two other buildings, on 
 which Buliant was engaged during his later years. At 
 the death of De l’Orme he was called to carry on the 
 construction of the Tuileries (1570), and two years 
 later (1572) Catharine de Medicis employed him to 
 build the vast Hotel de la Reine, known in after time 
 as the Hotel de Soissons. As regards the Tuileries, it 
 must be remembered that when De l’Orme died, he 
 had nearly completed the centre pavilion with its crown- 
 ing dome, as well as the two wings to right and left. 
 
 It is difficult to say precisely what was contributed 
 by Buliant, but most probably the whole, or a part 
 of the pavilions which originally terminated these two 
 wings on the north and south. In their erection he 
 followed, we must suppose, the plans left by De 
 rOrme, for in the main the two pavilions were of a 
 piece with the rest of the building. The Ionic order, 
 the ‘ ordre feminin,’ specially affected by De l’Orme, 
 
THE TUI L ERIE S . 
 
 9i 
 
 ranged below ; and above, along the first floor, ran 
 the Corinthian. The proportions and character of the 
 general features he left unaltered, but in the decoration 
 and adjustment of parts, Bullant took a certain licence. 
 He had proved at Ecouen, in the years of his vigorous 
 youth, his full command over the utmost resources of or- 
 nament, and he came to the Tuileries with the habits of 
 earlier days unshaken, with the fire of his gay enthu- 
 siasm apparently unquenched. 
 
 To his eyes the polite elegance of De TOrmes 
 work, the refined inspiration of Lescots design as 
 expressed in the neighbouring courts of the Louvre, 
 seemed wanting in fervour, and meagre in enrichment. 
 De rOrme had panelled his surfaces with delicate 
 pilasters; Bullant detached along the front innumerable 
 columns, and niched between them royal coats-of-arms. 
 De rOrme had pointed blank spaces here and there 
 by the application of a lightly outlined frame, a touch 
 of ornament, a scutcheon faintly profiled. Bullant cut 
 bravely and unsparingly broad sweeps of decorative 
 line in high relief. The ornament which encircled 
 every blazoned niche was burdened to the utmost with 
 elaborate details. Wreaths garlanded the sides of 
 the windows ; crowns filled the spaces above them ; 
 crowns, surmounted with points of fleur-de-lis, were 
 again repeated at the summit of intermediate shields, 
 uplifted by the outstretched arms of accompanying 
 figures. 
 
92 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Yet this luxurious superabundance of ornament 
 never degenerated into vulgar profusion. Exquisite 
 delicacy of sight and touch gave truth of accord to all 
 the parts, and traces of brilliant execution not long ago 
 revealed the same rare quality of light and happy touch 
 which still enlivens the gracious courts of Ecouen. U ntil 
 the hour of the Commune brought fire upon their walls, 
 these two pavilions stood in grace scarcely impaired 
 either by time or restoration. The alterations which 
 took place during the reign of Louis XIV. resulted in 
 a complete refashioning at the hands of Le Veau and 
 Dorbay of the centre portion, and the two wings com- 
 pleted by De l’Orme. But the two pavilions raised 
 by Bullant suffered only the loss of the mansard roof, 
 which was replaced by a more convenient attic, and 
 the addition of some ill-calculated ornaments carved 
 upon the shafts of columns originally plain. A sun 
 and moon dial, one such as those described in the treatise 
 ‘ De l’Horlogiographie,’ which had been affixed to 
 a blank side-wall facing south, necessarily disappeared 
 in contact with the extensions of the Louvre executed 
 by Henri IV., but the rest remained even as Bullant 
 had left it, the effect of the graceful Ionic order pre- 
 vented somewhat, indeed, but not destroyed by the 
 neighbouring presence of the towering columns of Du 
 Cerceau’s additions. Now there remain only such rare 
 fragments of columns and pilasters as might be gathered 
 by the hand. 
 
THE TUILERIES. 
 
 93 
 
 In May 1571 the work of roofing was prepared for. 
 Letters patent were obtained from the King by the 
 Queen-Mother, granting to her for this purpose ‘ vingts 
 arpents de bois de haulte futaye,’ to be taken from 
 the forest of Clermont en Beauvoisis. But at this 
 moment Catharine suddenly abandoned the further 
 conduct of the projected palace. Two reasons, it is 
 suggested, may have determined her resolution. The 
 pig-dealers of the pig-market herded their swine 
 in the filth of the hctte St. Roch, hard by the 
 palace, and the near neighbourhood of this spot was 
 not only unpleasant but unwholesome. In July 
 1571 a royal letter was sent to the prdvot des mar - 
 c hands , directing him to take the necessary measures 
 to remedy the existing evil ‘ pour ce que nous 
 esperons alter de bref loger au palais des Thuileries, 
 ou sans doubte les dictes voieries et immondices, 
 que Ton mene au dit marche, y engendrent un tres- 
 mauvais air.’ 
 
 The pig-market was a discomfort to be remedied, 
 but there was a graver cause for anxiety. M. 
 Fournier, in his papers on ‘ Les Palais brules/ con- 
 tributed to the ‘ Gazette des Beaux Arts,’ in 1872, 
 has pointed out that the new palace was not within 
 the walls of Paris, and consequently was not a safe 
 place of abode in troublous times. During the wars 
 of the League, though the building itself escaped, 
 the grounds in which it stood were ruthlessly laid 
 
94 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 waste. The fortifications intended to include it, of 
 which the first stone had been laid by Charles IX. in 
 1566, were unfinished. The Tuileries were actually 
 outside the walls, and lay open to the attack of any 
 adventurous captain ready to dare a coup de main , 
 and this in itself would seem to be a sufficient reason 
 for the sudden cessation of the works. 
 
 The abandonment of the Tuileries was, however, 
 but the signal for the execution of a new project. In 
 the centre of Paris, on certain lands ‘derrieres les 
 C61estins,’ says Corrozet, Catharine commenced the 
 vast Hotel de la Reine. In order to give herself ample 
 space for the development of her magnificent plans, she 
 even dared to seize on the convent of the Filles pdni- 
 tentes. Public opinion disapproved the act, and the 
 Queen was obliged to build a chapel in apology ; a 
 chapel of which, says Germain Brice, ‘ on voit le portail 
 avec deux campaniles que Ton nomme encore Chapelle 
 de la Reine.’ The palace itself had, when Dom Brice 
 wrote, changed its name ; it had become the Hotel de 
 Soissons, and the Paris world saw nothing in the edifice 
 worthy of remark except its size.’ ‘ L’ Hotel de Sois- 
 sons,’ he says, ‘ n’a rien du tout considerable que son 
 etendue. Les edifices en sont tristes, et mal ordon- 
 nes. . . . On voit dans un des coins de la cour une 
 grande colonne Dorique de cent pies de hauteur, dans 
 le fust de laquelle on a pratique un escalier a vis, a 
 l’imitation de la colonne Trajane, le plus beau monu- 
 
THE HOTEL DE LA REINE. 
 
 95 
 
 ment de Rome, sur laquelle il paroit line Sphere 
 armillaire composee de plusieurs cercles de fer. On 
 croit que la Reine Catharine la fit construire expres 
 de la sorte, pour observer les astres avec un savant 
 de son temps, nomme Come de Ruggieri.’ 
 
 This column is, now, the single relic which 
 remains of a palace once the largest in Paris, the 
 Louvre only excepted, and it is the sole vestige of 
 Bullants work which the Parisians have spared, 
 The vast assemblage of buildings and gardens 
 which made up the Hotel de la Reine was entirely 
 swept away to make room for new constructions 
 in the present Halle aux Bles , and its surrounding 
 houses. The great court, the marble sculptured 
 fountain of the garden, the boasted campaniles of the 
 chapel — said to have been the most richly decorated 
 of any in Paris — all this is gone. The generosity of a 
 private person, M. de Bachaumont, rescued from the 
 common ruin the isolated column which may now be 
 seen awkwardly attached to one of the walls of the 
 market. He had wished to place it in the centre, 
 where it might at least have been seen ; but the space 
 was refused, and the column was therefore set on one 
 side, so that now, as M, Ouatremere de Quincy has re- 
 marked, ‘ Sa tete seule jouit des regards du soleil, et fixe 
 ceux des passans par un cadran circulairequi la defigure. ’ 
 The base is turned to account as a fountain, and in this 
 position, and thus perverted from its original intention, 
 
96 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 the graceful and fantastic creation but half reveals 
 itself. The quaint union of Doric and Tuscan style 
 keeps even in strange surroundings an accent of high- 
 born dignity ; but we cannot realise its effect in former 
 days, the days when Catharine climbed its solitary 
 height beneath the fatal stars, playing with those super- 
 stitions which had a strange fascination for that shrewd 
 intelligence which mocked both philosophy and belief. 
 
 Everywhere between the eighteen divisions which 
 space the shaft are scattered tokens which recall the 
 presence of the queen. The tragedy which ended her 
 husband’s days brought to his wife the first possibility 
 of independent life and power, but she took upon her all 
 the signs of seemly affliction. Her emblem, after the 
 death of Henri II., was a heap of hot coal, on which 
 fell heavy raindrops, explained by the motto, 4 Ardorem 
 exstincta testantur vivere flamma.’ Round about this 
 centre were grouped various symbols, such as cracked 
 mirrors, torn fans, and broken plumes and necklets, 
 on a ground strewn with precious stones, and pearls, 
 and unlinked chains. 
 
 These are the devices which may yet be traced on 
 the column of the Halle aux Bids . It is possible that 
 the very obscurity of its position has been the means 
 of preserving it from the complete destruction which 
 has overtaken the other works of Bullant’s chisel. If 
 not the last, it is amongst the last of his many produc- 
 tions. To the end he showed the same lively affection 
 
THE COLUMN OF THE HALLE AUX BLES. 
 
 97 
 
 for early traditions, enduring through the newer passion 
 with which the impressions of classical art had been 
 received. The same caprice in choice which irritates 
 Quatremere de Quincy into stigmatising his work as 
 i un melange assez informe de la barbarie nationale, 
 et des grands modeles de T Italie/ is joined with an 
 elegance of brilliant touch, a ruling grace of native 
 instinct, and a fervour of artistic inspiration, the zeal of 
 which animated to the last his unflagging spirit. 
 
 VOL. i. 
 
 H 
 
9 8 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 ARCHITECTURE (1540-1580). 
 
 De VOrme — A net and the Tuileries . 
 
 ‘Gaster inventa art, et moyen de battre et demolir forteresses, et 
 chasteaulx par machines et ormens bellicques, beliers, balistes, catapultes, 
 desquelles il nous monstra la figure, assez mal entendu des ingenieux 
 architectes disciples de Vitruve : comme nous ha confess^ messer Phili- 
 bert de rOrme grand architecte du roy megiste/ — Pantagruel, c. 61. 
 
 In accordance with strict chronology, the person to 
 whose works we should next turn would be Pierre 
 Lescot, who gave in his designs for the palace of the 
 Louvre about five years after Bullant began to be 
 employed at Ecouen. But there are two reasons for 
 not keeping closely to the exact order of succession. 
 The Louvre additions were carried out slowly. The 
 portion designed by Lescot was still unfinished at his 
 death, so that the part which he did complete may be 
 taken to stand, even in point of time, as it fitly should 
 in point of style, for a later work than the stupendous 
 chateau of Anet, built, at the cost of the nation, for 
 Henri II.’s mistress, Diane de Poitiers. 
 
 The architect of Anet was Philibert de l’Orme, a 
 man of great accomplishment and various acquirement. 
 He was wanting in the delightful and vigorous spring 
 
99 
 
 DE VORME AT ROME , 
 
 which never failed his predecessor, Bullant, but he 
 possessed a cultivated elegance of manner, a trained ' 
 facility of appropriation, and an ingenious turn for the 
 adaptation, and even the invention, of constructive ap- 
 pliances which went far to conceal his wants in respect 
 of sensitive feeling and original resource. He seems 
 to have possessed also that gift of effective per- 
 sonal display, which is usually the heritage of those 
 natures which find a truer pleasure in exhibiting their 
 knowledge than in acquiring it, and this enabled him 
 to make his mark wherever he went, and to inspire 
 confidence and respect in his ability even before it was 
 put to the proof. 
 
 He never failed to attract attention. Both he 
 and Lescot had visited Italy, but De l’Orme did 
 not only visit Italy, he made himself known there. 
 He, in his own writings, has related the little scene 
 which introduced him to an influential section of Roman 
 society. He tells us how he took the measures of 
 ‘ bare triomphant de Saincte Marie Nove,’ exactly when 
 ‘ plusieurs cardinaux et seigneurs se pourmenants, 
 visitoient les vestiges des antiquitez et passoient par le 
 lieu oil j’estois.’ The Cardinal de Sainte Croix, Mar- 
 cellus Cervinus, afterwards pope, but then ‘ only a 
 bishop,’ addressed him ‘ en son langage romain,’ and 
 « invited him to visit him at the palace of St. Mark, and 
 after the first visit the bishop and his learned friend 
 
IOO 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Rotholanus, who lived with him, ‘ me prierent de rechef 
 de leur visiter souvent.’ 
 
 De FOrme’s own writings are indeed the principal 
 source to which we owe our information concerning his 
 life. His two published works, ‘ Nouvelles Inventions 
 pour bien batir/ and his ‘ Livre d’Architecture,’ of which 
 the first volume only appeared, contain frequent 
 passages of personal history and allusion. What has 
 been gleaned from these two volumes is supplemented 
 on many important points by additional facts derived 
 from a MS. Memoir, undated, but written by De TOrme 
 himself, probably about 1560. This memoir was 
 discovered in the Bibliotheque Nationale by M. 
 Leopold Delisle in i860, and has been printed in full 
 by M. Berty in his valuable work, ‘ Les grands archi- 
 tectes frangais de la Renaissance.’ It is addressed 
 to some person unknown, and is put together by De 
 TOrmewith the evident object of clearing himself from 
 the accusation which had been brought against him of 
 having become richer than he should be by the practice 
 of his profession. The death of Henri II. and the 
 consequent fall of the Duchess de Valentinois deprived 
 De TOrme of his chief protectors and employers, and 
 left him exposed to the attacks of all those who, like 
 Primaticcio, were jealous of his credit, or who, like 
 Paiissy, hated his overbearing use of office. He ad- 
 dressed a memoir, therefore, to some powerful person- 
 age not ill-disposed towards him (whom M. Berty, 
 
DE L'ORME EMPLOYED BY PAUL III. 
 
 IOI 
 
 i 
 
 * 
 
 with every probability, conjectures to have been 
 Eustache du Bellay, Bishop of Paris), and recapitulates 
 the labours of his life. 
 
 Of his family we know nothing, but in his ‘ Nouvelles 
 Inventions ’ De l’Orme tells us that at the early age 
 of fifteen he was already employed on important work, 
 and had at his command more than three hundred 
 workmen. It has always been supposed that this 
 must have been during his stay in Italy, because we 
 are able to guess with tolerable certainty that his 
 journey thither must have taken place when he was 
 about fourteen. Writing in 1567, he says, ‘ Depuis 
 trente-six ans j’ai observe/ &c. — that is to say, ‘ I have 
 been studying ever since 1531/ 
 
 Now if De l’Orme was entrusted at the age of 
 fifteen with the control of over three hundred work- 
 men, he must have had previously some kind of train- 
 ing which qualified him in the eyes of others for the 
 post. In his memoir, he commences his proud enu- 
 meration of his works with, ‘Jay servy papes, roys, 
 et plusieurs cardinaux, et feu Monsieur de Langes, 
 Guillaume du Bellay, et Monsieur le Cardinal son frere 
 me d^bauchairent du service du pape Paulle a Rome, 
 ou j’estoys et avoys une belle charge a St. Martin 
 dello Bosco alia Callabre.’ Here, then, is the probable 
 time and place of his first employment in his profes- 
 sion. The time can be fixed pretty accurately by the 
 fact of his meeting with Marcellus Cervinus, ‘alors 
 
102 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 simple evesque/ to whom De 1 ’Orme was probably 
 indebted for his introduction to the notice of Paul III. 
 
 Marcellus, who was highly esteemed and trusted 
 by the Pope, was frequently absent from Italy on 
 foreign missions ; but, in his capacity of Bishop 
 of Reggio, he was in Rome during the year 1534, 
 precisely two years before De 1 ’Orme says he 
 himself returned to Lyons. It is therefore probable 
 that it was in the course of this year that De 1 ’Orme 
 attained the age of fifteen, ‘auquel temps je com- 
 m envoys avoir charge/ and that this charge was no other 
 than that which he describes as the ‘ belle charge a 
 St. Martin dello Bosco.’ His preliminary training 
 must, then, have begun at the early age of twelve or 
 thirteen, in 1531, which gives us the thirty-six years 
 of study which he claims in 1567. 
 
 Though Cardinal Du Bellay and his brother induced 
 De l’Orme to quit the service of Paul III., they do not 
 seem to have found immediate employment for him in 
 France, for on leaving Italy he remained some time 
 in his native town of Lyons. He was only eighteen, 
 but he won the faith of his fellow-citizens, and was 
 instantly set to work. The Rue de la Juiverie is still 
 noted for a house enriched by a bold and skilful addi- 
 tion at his hands. The problem was how to connect 
 by a gallery two detached portions of the house of a 
 M. Billau, gdndral de Bretaigne , without in any way 
 interfering with the space beneath. To this end De 
 
THE VOUTE EN TROMPE. 103 
 
 rOrine employed the expedient of two vodtes en 
 trompe , a contrivance which in later days he repeated 
 at Anet, with equal credit, to support a private chamber 
 for Henri II. The term trompe appears to designate 
 a series of arches, spanning diagonally an internal 
 angle whether inside or outside of a building ; the 
 stones of these arches being arranged, as De FOrme 
 adds, en porte a faux , that is to say, in a false bed. 
 
 The sketch which he gives, in his ‘ Traite de 
 f Architecture,’ of the construction at Anet appears to 
 represent (I quote from a letter of Mr. Basil Champ- 
 neys) ‘a tourelle corbelled out of a plain wall on a 
 corbel modelled in imitation of the segment of a vault, 
 the ribs of which are jointed unconstructionally in radii 
 of the arc.’ The lines of the mouldings which spring 
 from the angle at Anet run on a bias, and, nearing the 
 limit of their spring, fold sharply over like the edges of 
 a lily-petal, and in this respect closely resemble the 
 effect of one of the two in the Rue de la Jtiiverie at 
 Lyons. These last rest in opposite angles ; both 
 carrying chambers or closets caught together by a 
 suspended gallery of small arches enriched with the 
 Ionic order and forming the means of communication 
 between the two separate corps de logis. 
 
 The Lyonnois were so highly satisfied by the ex- 
 - periment, that they at once entrusted De FOrme with 
 the construction of the portal of the church of St. Nizier. 
 His project for this work he describes as tin r enforce- 
 
104 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 ment en cul de four , ornamented with columns and 
 pilasters of the Doric order with niches between. But 
 it was never carried through. D’Argenville says, but 
 without citing his authority, that when De POrme 
 had just commenced the work he was interrupted by a 
 call from Du Bellay, on which he suddenly left Lyons 
 for Paris, and the church remains unfinished to this 
 day. 
 
 On arriving at Paris, De POrme would seem, at 
 first, to have been employed by the Cardinal du Bellay 
 only. For him, as he tells us in his ‘ Traite de 
 P Architecture,’ he began to build the chateau of St. 
 Mordez-Fossez, but at some time subsequent, he was 
 taken into the royal service not, in the commencement, 
 indeed, to build, but to inspect. In the MS. Memoir, 
 already cited, he heads the enumeration of his services 
 with ‘en Bretagne du temps du feu roy Francis a qui 
 Dieu ayt lame, que le feu roy ’ (Henri II.) ‘ n’etait que 
 daulphin je visitoys tous les ans par deux foys toute la 
 coste et forteresses de Bretagne.’ It has also been said 
 that, during the reign of Francois, De POrrne was 
 engaged on building in the Cour du Cheval Blanc at 
 Fontainebleau, and that he furnished plans for the 
 chateau of Meudon, on which he worked conjointly 
 with Primaticcio, but this seems very unlikely. 
 
 The certain and important period of his activity 
 really begins with Henri II., from whom, at his acces- 
 sion, De POrme received letters-patent given at St. 
 
DE L'ORME IN THE SERVICE OF HENRI II. 105 
 
 Germain en Laye, April 3, 1547. In these letters 
 De l’Orme is styled ‘ Conseillier et ausmonier ordi- 
 naire, ’ and is appointed as ‘architecte du Roy’ to 
 overlook the works of St. Germain, of Fontainebleau, 
 Villers Cotterets, etc. This commission was con- 
 firmed by other letters given in January 1548, and in 
 an order for payment of the same year he is en- 
 titled Abbe d’lvry. The ‘ Comptes des Batimens 
 royaux,’ also, for the year 1548, contain the notes of a 
 proch verbal de visite , in which De l’Orme is men- 
 tioned and styled simply architecte du roy , but on 
 April 3 following, Henri II., in letters-patent given 
 at Fontainebleau promoted him to the post of Inspector 
 of the Royal Works, and he now began one of the 
 most important labours of his life, the building of 
 Anet. 
 
 Diane de Poitiers, Duchess de Valentinois, had 
 been gratified on the accession of the King by the gift 
 of ‘ la paulette.’ The paulette was the yearly tax paid 
 by the officers of justice and finance into the Royal 
 Exchequer, for the renewal of their patents. This pre- 
 sent, which actually engaged, for the private benefit of 
 the Duchess, a large part of the prospective revenues of 
 the Crown, was felt at the time to be excessive, and 
 provoked much hostile comment. Yet, says Brantome, 
 ‘ encore de ces deniers cette Dame n’en abusa point, car 
 elle fit batir, et construire cette belle maison d’Anet qui 
 servira pour jamais d’une belle decoration a la France, 
 
io6 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 qu’on ne peut dire rien de pareille.’ With these vast 
 resources at her command, and royal authority in her 
 hands, Diane was able to force on the completion of 
 her projects at incredible speed, but for the zeal which 
 he displayed in her service De FOrme afterwards 
 found it necessary to apologise. 
 
 In his Memoir, written when he was wholly at the 
 mercy of the Queen-Mother, he recapitulates his ser- 
 vices ; he mentions how, at Fontainebleau, he had re- 
 paired the ‘ grande salle de bal qui tomboyst — je n’en 
 parle point : M. de St. Martin (Primaticcio) sgait son 
 estat ; 5 at Villers Cotterets he had built ‘ ung temple 
 dedans le pare ; ’ at St. Germain en Laye, something 
 which he does not specify, probably some work of ceiling 
 or roofing, for he adds, ‘ et a la Muette ne la pouvoyt-on 
 couvrir sans Finvention que j’ay trouve de charpen- 
 terye ; ’ at Mousseux (Monceaux) he had worked for 
 the Queen herself, ‘ qui est cause que je trouvay Finven- 
 tion de charpenterye pour le jeu de paille-maille qu’elle 
 voulait faire couvrir-la ou j’avoys dresse de tant belles 
 inventions, mais M. de Neverset aultres me detournerent 
 de plusieurs belles enterprises, et estoyent tout marys 
 que madite Dame vouloyt batir.’ 
 
 At last De FOrme comes to the point, and after 
 having thus skilfully indicated what he would have 
 done for Catharine,' had he only been permitted, 
 proceeds to excuse himself for his labours in the 
 service of the Duchess. He adroitly attempts to 
 
WORK DONE FOR DIANE DE POITIERS . 
 
 107 
 
 direct the supposed irritation of the Queen against 
 the memory of the King ; he, De l’Orme, was an 
 irresponsible agent, it was the King who compelled 
 him to use his best diligence in the service of Diane. 
 ‘ A Anneth,’ he apologises, ‘ ou il y a tant de belles 
 choses 9a este par le commandement du feu Roy qui 
 estoit plus curieux de sgavoir ce que Ton y faisoit 
 que en ses maisons et se courrougoyt a moy quand 
 je n’y allois asses souvent. Pour ce c’estoyt tout 
 pour le Roy.’ From this passage, it is evident 
 that, to whomsoever the MS. was ostensibly ad- 
 dressed, it was intended to fall under the eye of the 
 Queen-Mother. In the lifetime of Henri, ‘ noble homme 
 Philibert de TOrme, conseiller ordinaire, ausmonier du 
 Roy, etmaitre de sescomptes a Paris, abbe d’lvry,’ etc. 
 had readily enough appeared to act for the Duchess 
 and supervise even her contracts for the work done in 
 building the bridge across the Cher at her chdteau 
 of Chenonceau (1556), and he had also even made 
 repairs at her chdteau of Limours, but after the 
 death of her protector it became necessary to renounce 
 a connection which no longer brought either honour 
 or profit. 
 
 In spite of the pressing claims of Anet, De TOrme 
 contrived, during the reign of Henri II., to get through 
 a great deal of other work. Germain Brice mentions 
 the Chapelle aux Orfevres, rue des Deschargeurs, as de- 
 signed by De FOrme and constructed about 1550. Up 
 
io8 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 till 1558, he continued, also, to inspect and tax work done 
 at St. Germain and Fontainebleau, to make repairs at 
 Madrid, at Coucy, and at Folembray ; and he himself 
 also mentions in his Memoir ‘ la sepulture du feu roy 
 Frangois que jay fait faire.’ The details of this monu- 
 ment were executed by Pierre Bontemps, and Germain 
 Pilon, aided by other artists of less note, and Lenoir 
 gives the reproduction of a drawing made previous to 
 its demolition during the Revolution, together with 
 extracts from ‘ Memoires de la Chambre des Comptes,’ 
 Feb. 28, 1555, from which we obtain particulars not 
 only of the expenses but also of the parts assigned to 
 each of the sculptors engaged. 
 
 But in 1559 came the hour of disgrace. In May 
 of this year De l’Orme had completed a chapel in the 
 Bois de Vincennes ; but, by letters-patent given in 
 the July following, Francois II. dismissed him from his 
 service, and he carried a less conspicuous brother with 
 him in his fall. In 1562-3 he again, indeed, signs 
 some orders with Primaticcio, but Catharine does not 
 seem to have been induced by the diplomatic state- 
 ments of the Memoir to reinstate him fully in his 
 former posts, and he was not even allowed to carry 
 out the plan of a refectory for the Abbey of Mont- 
 martre which he had previously prepared. He occu- 
 pied himself, therefore, in going to law with the monks 
 of his Abbey of St. Bartelemy-lez-Noyon, and in writing 
 his 4 Nouvelles Inventions,’ which appeared in 1561, so 
 
DE L'ORME ARCHITECT TO THE QUEEN-MOTHER. 109 
 
 that we may assume that the book was written just 
 when the death of Henri II. left him for awhile in un- 
 welcome leisure. 
 
 At last, in 1564, he was called again to the active 
 exercise of his profession. Cathaiine had found work 
 for him. In the month of May were laid the foundations 
 of the Tuileries. The Queen-Mother herself not only 
 took an active share in the general direction, but 
 actually made working drawings for the palace which 
 she meant to build. De l’Orme commences the pre- 
 face of his ‘ Livre d’Architecture,’ which he addressed 
 to Catharine with these words : ‘ Madame, avis de 
 jour en jour l’acroissement du grandissme plaisir que 
 vostre Majeste prend en l’architecture, et comme de 
 plus en plus vostre bon esprit s’y manifeste, et reluit, 
 quand vous-mesme prenez la peine de portraire, et 
 esquicher les bastiments qu’il vous plaist commander 
 estre faicts, sans y omettre les mesures des longueurs 
 et largeurs, avec le departement du logis, qui veritable- 
 ment ne sont vulgaires, et petits, ains fort excellents, 
 et plus qu’admirable : comme entre plusieurs est celuy 
 du Palays que vous faictes batir de neuf a Paris pres la 
 porte neufve et le Louvre, maison du Roy. Lequel 
 Palays je conduis, de vostre grace, suivant les disposi- 
 tions, mesures, et commandement qu’il vous a plait 
 men faire.’ 
 
 Germain Brice remarks that De l’Orme, as is pro- 
 bable, only made this statement to flatter the Queen. 
 
IO 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 It is, however, just possible that Catharine knew 
 enough to enable her to form a practical opinion, 
 for a knowledge of this branch of art was specially 
 affected by other women of the day. Brantome says 
 of one of his own connections, his sister-in-law, Mme. 
 Andr<£ de Bourdeille, ‘ De tous les arts elle ayma 
 fort la g£om£trie et l’architecture,’ and he adds that 
 she was, in his judgment, an excellent practical architect. 
 The Queen-Mother also had, amongst the ladies of her 
 household, a certain Marie de Pierre- Vive, dame du 
 Perron, who was officially associated with De l’Orme in 
 the conduct of the Tuileries works. Her name occurs 
 in the list of ‘ MM. les surintendans des bastimens du 
 Roy/ for the year 1566. ‘ Dame Marie de Pierre- 
 
 Vive, dame du Perron, lune des dames ordinaires de la 
 chambre de la Royne-mere du Roy, ordonnoit les 
 bastimens des Tuilleries, suivant l’advis de M. 
 Philibert de l’Orme, qu’elle avoit commis pour visiter 
 les diets bastimens.’ On May 14, 1564, when a con- 
 tract was made with the master ferryman of the 
 station opposite to the Tuileries (la Grenouilliere, now 
 the Quai d’Orsay), providing for the establishment of a 
 ferry for the transport of building materials, the signa- 
 tures both of De l’Orme and of Madame du Perron 
 were attached, the Ordinary Woman of the Bedchamber 
 signing first. 
 
 Although the Queen-Mother herself thus exercised 
 direct pressure, the building proceeded but slowly. In 
 
Ill 
 
 THE TUILERIES. 
 
 order to meet the expenses of the undertaking, she had 
 obtained for herself an assignment of certain sums out 
 of ‘ les restes du tresor.’ By this term were designated 
 sums which might accrue after the annual accounts had 
 been made up, from old dues or tardy payments. From 
 this source it was to be expected that, at some time or 
 other, means fully sufficient would be obtained. The 
 supply was, however, neither quick nor regular. In 
 order to get hold of funds immediately, Catharine let her 
 concession to certain ‘ solliciteurs generaux,’ who paid 
 down to her the amount required in hard cash at once. 
 A document relating to one of these bargains, bearing 
 date February 1 6, 1573, is still extant. The first sum 
 obtained from this source was conceded by an order of 
 January 25, 1565, and it amounted to exactly 100,000 
 livres. The order specifies the object for which it 
 is destined to be employed, ‘ pour la construction des 
 bastimens du pallais que la Royne, nostre tres-honoree 
 dame et mere, faict construire et edifier aux Tuil- 
 leries.’ 
 
 The expenditure which was thus incurred was not 
 popular. Ronsard addressed a poem to the ‘ Tresorier 
 de l’Espargne,’ in which he directly attacks it : — 
 
 II ne faut plus que la Royne bastisse, 
 
 Ny que sa chaux nos tresors appetisse ; 
 
 Molins suffit sans en bastir ailleurs. 
 
 Peintres, magons, engraveurs, entailleurs, 
 
 Succent l’espargne avec leur piperies, 
 
 Mais que nous sert son lieu des Thuilleries ? 
 
12 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 The difficulties in getting supplies still continued, 
 and the building rose but slowly. De Thou remarks, 
 
 ‘ qu’on ne travailla que lentement a cet ouvrage,’ and at 
 one moment the works would have been altogether 
 stopped, had not the Queen succeeded in obtaining 
 a loan of 120,000 livres from the Florentine banker 
 Francis Sixtus. Money was always wanted. Pay- 
 ments were never made in full, but sums were given 
 at irregular intervals on account. This went on to the 
 very end, and work which had been completed between 
 1 5 70-76, which had been duly visited and passed, 
 was not finally paid for till ten years after (1586). 
 
 The difficulties were, indeed, twofold. Had the 
 Queen-Mother been in full possession of the source 
 which she had endeavoured to pre-occupy, it would 
 not have sufficed for the realisation of her ample 
 projects. She had not intended the Tuileries to 
 remain a mere isolated line of building ; she had 
 planned a palace, the four wings of which should en- 
 compass a vast centre-court, flanked on the north and 
 south by other four smaller courts, the constructions of 
 which should afford every convenience for the adequate 
 service of a royal house. The foundations had been 
 carried so far that even when her whole attention 
 seemed to have been diverted to the Hotel de la 
 Reine, men still thought the project must one day be 
 completed in its entirety. Du Cerceau (1579) says, * Ce 
 bastiment nest de petite entreprise ni de petite oeuvre ; 
 
THE TUILERIES. 
 
 u 3 
 
 et estant paracheve ce sera maison vrayment royalle.’ 
 But there was always the same difficulty as to funds, 
 and Catharine was not even able to retain undisputed 
 possession during the reign of Charles IX. of the 
 means which she had attributed to herself in the name 
 of Francois II., for grants of money were made to 
 various persons from the same source. At last, on 
 May 15, 1578, an edict was obtained from Henri III., 
 by which these gifts were revoked, and it was further 
 enjoined that all back debts due to the Crown from the 
 officers of the Treasury should henceforth be strictly 
 applied in the construction of the palace of the Tuileries. 
 In spite, however, of renewed efforts, Catharine’s mag- 
 nificent plans came to nothing. A small part of the 
 garden front was all that she was able to finish, and of 
 this the centre pavilion only, with its two side wings, 
 was completed during the lifetime of Philibert de 
 | l’Orme. 
 
 De l’Orme’s services were amply and honourably 
 rewarded by the gift of benefices and other places of 
 profit. In the preface to his ‘ Livre d’ Architecture ’ he 
 styles himself ‘conseillier, et aumonier ordinaire du Roy, 
 et Abbe de St. Serge lez Angiers.’ He was also pre- 
 ferred as Abbe of Ivry, one of the richest benefices in 
 Normandy, and it is as Abbd d’lvry that he is com- 
 L monly alluded to by his contemporaries. He was now 
 in the full career of prosperous activity. The Tuileries 
 were completely planned ; such parts as were finished 
 
 VOL. 1. 
 
 1 
 
14 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 gave admirable promise of excellence, and he had also 
 been entrusted with the conduct of another great work, 
 the erection of the Tour or Tombeau des Valois , the 
 payments on account of which to Jacques Chanterel 
 and others are made by his authority. 
 
 This mausoleum was built in close proximity to the 
 church of St. Denis, with which it actually communi- 
 cated. The exterior presented two orders of columns 
 (Doric and the favourite Ionic) surmounted by a 
 third and composite order, which sustained a cupola 
 crowned in its turn by a pierced lantern. Within, 
 directly beneath this cupola, stood the tombs of 
 Henri II. and Catharine. The tomb itself was four- 
 teen feet in height, the twelve columns and twelve 
 pilasters, which went round about it, were of marble, 
 
 ‘ bleu turquin.’ At the corners were bronze figures 
 symbolising the four cardinal virtues, and both the 
 exterior and interior were made to receive the richest 
 and most elaborate forms of decoration. Gradually its 
 splendours fell into neglect, want of timely repairs 
 accelerated the slow process of decay, until finally, in 
 1719, it was demolished by the order of the Regent 
 in the name of Louis XV., then a child, ‘ a cause du 
 mauvais etat de sa construction.’ 
 
 The earliest reproduction of the monument occurs in 
 the continuation by Bonfons of Corrozet’s work on the 
 ‘ Antiquites et Singularites de Paris’ (1588), the illus- 
 trations to which were ‘recueillis par Jean Rabel, maitre- 
 
THE TOMB OF THE VALOIS. 
 
 u 5 
 
 peintre.’ L’Estoile, when noticing his death, March 
 4, 1 603, says of him that he was ‘ un des premiers de 
 l’art de portraiture, et qui avait un bel esprit.’ He ap- 
 pears to have been much employed as a book-illustrator, 
 but his designs, as for instance the cuts in ‘ Les Oracles 
 des douze Sibylles,’ do not exceed a measure of tolerable 
 performance, and he is now better known by his en- 
 graved portraits of celebrated personages (De Thou, 
 Ramus, etc.) than by his original compositions. The en- 
 gravings in Corrozet’s work are rude and lame, but 
 must be always valuable as contemporary record of 
 much work which has, like the Tombeau des Valois , been 
 recklessly destroyed. 
 
 On December 29, 1 569, De l’Orme made his will, 
 a lengthy testament, the complicated provisions of 
 which indicate the possession of considerable wealth. 
 The language is prolix and inflated as compared with 
 the brief and simple sentences in which Bullant ex- 
 pressed his last dispositions. He begins pompously 
 with truisms about the certainty of death, and the 
 uncertainty of the day of its coming. 
 
 Then succeed other clauses, ‘ et preincrement, ma 
 pauvre ame partant de ce monde, je la recommande a 
 la tres-saincte Trinite, ala tres-sacree Vierge Marie, 
 et a tous les saincts, et sainctes de la court-celleste, et 
 a mon bon ange, affin d’interceder envers Dieu pour 
 madicte pauvre ame, et la mectre, et colloquer avec 
 celles de ses bien aymez, et esleus.’ Five succeeding 
 
ii6 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 divisions are occupied with provisions for the funeral, 
 and its accompanying pomps and services — circum- 
 stances dismissed by Bullant in a single line. Then 
 come gifts to various religious and charitable bodies, 
 and lastly a long succession of legacies to relations and 
 friends, of money, houses, and lands. Two houses in 
 Paris, ‘Tune appelee l’Hotel d’Estampes,’ the other in 
 the ‘ rue de Cerisaye,’ are left to his sister Jehanne de 
 rOrme, whom he requests to take charge of his two 
 illegitimate children, Philibert and Charlotte de 
 rOrme. 
 
 His books and drawings he leaves to his brother 
 Jehan, and to the same brother he leaves property ac- 
 quired at Fontenay, and also his ‘ Lieu de Plaisance 
 pres Paris/ To another sister, Anne, he leaves a 
 yearly revenue of 100 liv. t. Philibert the son is to 
 receive a rent of 300 liv . yearly, and the daughter 
 Charlotte 140. Amongst many smaller legacies to 
 more distant relatives, and various provisions for ser- 
 vants, there appears one important entry: ‘a monsieur 
 le premier president de Paris, messire Christophe de 
 Thou, mes maisons, lieux, et jardins que jay a Sainct 
 Maur les Fossez.’ For these, he adds, he had on one 
 occasion refused an offer of 6,000 liv . /., and this con- 
 siderable present is made to De Thou, he giving in re- 
 turn the promise that he will see paid to De l’Orme’s 
 heirs the sum of about 1 1,000 liv . t. due to De 1 ’Orme 
 from the Crown. Besides the two younger children, 
 
THE DEATH OF DE VORME. 117 
 
 Philibert and Charlotte, acknowledged in the will, and 
 who must have been born to him after his admission to 
 his canonry,De 1 ’Orme had an elder daughter, Catharine, 
 married to Pierre Giraud, ‘ maitre-magon,’ whose name 
 appears in the registers of the parish of Avon, near 
 Fontainebleau, under the date of January 1557, but to 
 her no reference is made. 
 
 On January 8, 1570, De l’Orme died, in his house 
 in the Cloister of Notre Dame. The Chapter, of which 
 he had been a member, decided that, according to his 
 wish, De l’Orme should be buried with all the ceremony 
 customary at the funeral of a canon, and that his grave 
 should be made in the nave, or in any other part of 
 the building deemed more suitable by his executors. 
 To the record of this decision is appended a notice to 
 one of De l’Orme’s executors (the Canon de Breda) 
 to see after the preservation of certain plans and 
 models left in the hands of the late Canon, as is de- 
 sired by the procureur of the Queen. These plans and 
 models were probably those of the Tuileries and St. 
 Maur. 
 
 Of the two great works, Anet and the Tuileries, 
 by which De l’Orme is best known, Anet is that 
 which may be taken to represent most completely the 
 special qualities which have been ascribed to his genius. 
 At the Tuileries he was to a great extent liable to the 
 interference of another, at Anet he exercised his powers 
 uncontrolled. The first impression conveyed by the 
 
1 1 8 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 plans of Du Cerceau is that of overwhelming size. 
 The vast extent of wall seems capable of encompassing 
 an army. The magnificence of the central edifice is set 
 in strong contrast with the solid plainness of the out- 
 buildings included in the plan, and which take up no 
 inconsiderable space. The chateau itself occupies 
 three sides of a square, the fourth being filled in 
 by a richly decorated gateway and its accessories. 
 To right and left of the broad centre-court on which 
 look the inner windows, are other courts of even 
 greater extent, and at the back, far out into the 
 country, spreads the many-plotted garden, surrounded 
 by an orderly circumference of trellised walks. 
 
 Du Cerceau tells us of the spacious glories of Anet 
 as they disclosed themselves in all their pristine splen- 
 dour. He describes at length, and draws in every detail, 
 the noble ‘ chapelle dans le logis/ the chapel which was 
 in itself worth long study, and which De l’Orme had in- 
 geniously placed in the exterior angle, formed by the 
 junction of the left wing with the remnant of the elder 
 chateau , which was remodelled and preserved in the 
 new scheme for convenience sake. Diane had for- 
 gotten nothing ; within the precincts of her pleasure- 
 house she had raised an Hotel Dieu, an infirmary for 
 her sick servants and poor dependants, and further on 
 ‘ hors la cloture des bastimens et jardins,’ Du Cerceau 
 saw another chapel, and was told that the Duchess 
 destined it for her tomb. Within its walls she had 
 
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THE TOMB OF DIANE DE POITIERS. 
 
 19 
 
 laid with anxious secrecy the bodies of the two children 
 which she had borne to Henri II. ; there too she was 
 herself interred, but the cruel chances of the Revo- 
 lution destroyed her chateau and laid bare the secrets 
 of her tomb. We learn from a curious account inserted 
 on the 29th of April 1868, in ‘ Le Druide,’ a journal 
 published in the little town of Dreux, that, on the 18th 
 of June 1795, the Commissary of Public Safety and his 
 adjoint visited Anet and decided to destroy the tomb of 
 Diane de Poitiers. Equality demanded that the dead 
 should lie in earth common to all. The bodies of the 
 Duchess and her children were stripped and exposed to 
 the impudent curiosity of a brutalised peasantry ; they 
 lay naked in the mid-day sun, till, with decent hands, two 
 pitying women replaced the costly burial robes with 
 strips of paper torn from the walls of a ruined house, 
 and drove away the little troop which had gathered 
 to the sight of things not fit for childish eyes. The 
 clothes and ornaments went as proof of zeal to Paris, 
 and the hair of the Duchess, torn from her head by the 
 gravedigger, was distributed as a souvenir between 
 the members of the local committee of surveillance. 
 
 The chateau itself was sold, during the course of the 
 Revolution, by the administration of the department of 
 Eure et Loir. Those who bought it, says M. Lenoir, 
 were fully aware of the importance of their acquisition ; 
 they were anxious to preserve a monument which at- 
 tracted the attention of all connoisseurs. U nfortunate 
 
120 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 circumstances, which M. Lenoir however does not 
 communicate, obliged the owners to demolish the 
 chateau in order to enable them to fulfil their engage- 
 ments. This work of destruction was nearly complete 
 when M. Lenoir made an arrangement by which he 
 managed to get possession of a part of the building, 
 and was also fortunate enough to acquire some most 
 precious bits of sculpture, which had passed into other 
 hands even before the actual sale of the chateau took 
 place. Amongst the number was the tomb of Diane, 
 the scattered portions of which had been sold to five 
 different persons ; five large glass paintings by Jean 
 Cousin ; bronzes by Jean Goujon, which had orna- 
 mented the entrance gateway ; the sculptured wooden 
 ceiling of the bed-chamber of the Duches s ; carved 
 wainscoting ; and lastly the white marble group repre- 
 senting the huntress Diana which is now in the 
 Louvre. 
 
 The fagade of the entrance, which Lenoir also ob- 
 tained, he transported to Paris, where it is now set up in 
 the courtyard of the‘Ecoledes Beaux Arts;’ but on the 
 spot, where the chateau itself once stood, a few frag- 
 mentary remains, carefully restored and preserved by the 
 present proprietor, M. Moreau, show like a wreck upon 
 the land. The lines of the walls, part of one wing, and 
 the chapel, these are the miserable relics of a palace 
 which had absorbed the proceeds of royal revenues 
 during many years. 
 
THE CHATEAU OF ANET. 
 
 121 
 
 Du Cerceau’s faithful drawing and minute plans 
 are in this instance invaluable. He gives us the 
 elevation from a point of view which admits us at 
 once to the centre of the interior court. The grand 
 gateway rises before us connected with the two side 
 wings by buildings which gradually curve inwards 
 from right and left. On all sides the decorations 
 recall the story of the goddess whose name the 
 Duchess ostentatiously bore. The crescent appears 
 shaping its waxing curves above every conspicuous 
 point, and mingles its lines with royal devices, showing 
 everywhere, with half-checked arrogance, the explana- 
 tory motto ‘ Donee to turn impleat orbem.’ 
 
 The hapless daring of Actaeon warns the visitor at 
 the entrance. Aloft, above the portal, he struggles, 
 pulled to the ground by his maddened dogs. The 
 fountains playing in the side-courts are also embellished 
 with the attributes of Diana, and on the carved base 
 of that to the left, she herself, ‘ Diane chasseresse/ 
 reposes, towering above the flooding waters which rise 
 to the brim of the basin beneath, accompanied by her 
 favourite stag, and faithful hounds — the group which 
 Goujon chiselled. The wide courts, the far-stretching 
 gardens with shady trellised paths, the walks fringed 
 with trees which line the banks of the broad moat, the 
 cheerful presence of the sculptured fountains, all com- 
 bine to give an aspect of sunlight and radiance to the 
 splendid palace which rises in their midst. 
 
122 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Points of construction in the building itself speak 
 plainly also of the oppression of summer heats. The 
 long colonnade which runs entirely round the basement, 
 the roof of which forms a pleasant balcony beneath the 
 windows of the first story, suggests a refuge from the 
 glare of light and heat which beats down upon the open 
 court. Anet is a summer palace. Only the brilliant 
 force of summer daylight could reveal the intricate deli- 
 cacy of surface patterning which gave variety to the 
 unaccented length of its far-stretching facades. The 
 snows of winter would obscure the light lines of its 
 graceful ornament, and they would lie obliterate beneath 
 the chill rays of a November sun. 
 
 The subdued elegance of style which is a leading 
 characteristic of Anet, if compared with the lively ani- 
 mation of Ecouen, appears to be lacking somewhat 
 in spirit. The native vigour which imparts a lively 
 interest to every detail from the hand of Bullant 
 is here replaced by the tamer accent of long-cultivated 
 talent ; for the ruder energy of direct attack is sub- 
 stituted the calculated lightness of an over civilised 
 touch. The decoration which covered every surface 
 was purposely effaced, so that it might not disturb 
 the eye with too much pattern, or obscure the leading 
 lines. 
 
 The elevation consisted, as did that of Ecouen, of a 
 ground-floor, upper story, and attic ; but the propor- 
 tions were accented with greater anxiety to preserve a 
 
THE CHATEAU OF ANET. 
 
 123 
 
 predominant impression of accurately symmetrical 
 arrangement. Those who entered beneath the centre 
 gateway found themselves immediately fronted by the 
 principal fagade, exactly opposite. The grand portal 
 of access was not, as at Ecouen, put on one side of the 
 court, it occupied the most imposing situation, precisely 
 in the centre of the principal facade. There, it towered 
 upwards, heavy, crescent-crowned, finding support right 
 and left (after an interval spaced with ingenious skill) 
 in the prominence given to the great dormers which 
 surmounted the third column of openings on either side. 
 This grouping of the windows so as to form perpen- 
 dicular shafts was a conspicuous feature of the design ; 
 but it was a feature which De l’Orme’s work shared with 
 that of other Renaissance architects. It was but the 
 emphatic expression of a tendency which showed itself 
 in the earliest days of the movement, which announced 
 itself as clearly in the Hotel Pince (1525) as in the 
 chateau of Ecouen. 
 
 At Anet, however, this intention derived a peculiar 
 character from the method which De l’Orme employed 
 at the point of junction with the roof. The cornice 
 which replaced the battlements of older time dis- 
 appeared when Francois I. set about building Madrid, 
 but a very strong enforcement of the roof-line was 
 still felt to be important. At Ecouen it was plainly 
 marked, and maintained in unbroken continuity, except 
 where the main entrance to the court detached itself 
 
124 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 wholly from the surrounding buildings. The entrance 
 to the court at A net did not possess in itself such 
 predominant importance as attached to the great gate 
 at Ecouen. The opposite portico, the centre of the 
 central facade, made the most conspicuous display, its 
 summit towering far above the lines of the roof. The 
 lines of the different stories, the line of junction between 
 roof and wall, were just indicated upon its face ; they 
 were but lightly touched, and left the impression only 
 of pleasant variations of surface. The same treatment 
 was observed in the attachment of the dormers, or 
 other windows of the attic, to the long shafts of openings 
 which they surmounted, and the result was an admir- 
 able lightness of general effect. 
 
 For thus the impression was produced that the whole 
 front of the chateau consisted of symmetrically disposed 
 groups of lines springing upwards, linked together by 
 graceful bands of ornament, which sufficiently marked 
 successive impositions of structure without attracting 
 attention to their horizontal direction. This method of 
 treatment was a serious modification of that hitherto 
 employed by De 1’Orme, as exemplified, for instance, 
 at Chaumont. The different stories were there 
 far more forcibly marked out by bands of ornament, 
 and also by the bold outward projection of the founda- 
 tions. the whole being afterwards carried together by 
 vigorous accentuation of the vertical lines of flanking 
 
 towers. 
 
THE CHATEAU OF ANET, 
 
 12 5 
 
 At Anet one point, and one point only, gave back 
 a faint echo of distant tradition. The chateau was 
 built round three sides of a square ; the buildings which 
 connected the main walls with the great portal rising 
 only to the elevation of the ground-floor. In approach- 
 ing the entrance from without, the walls of the moat, 
 with their bordering trees, hid from the eye the section 
 of the ground-floor on either side, but above, the section 
 of the upper story and attic was plainly visible. It 
 was impossible to leave their surface a blank. For 
 their decoration De FOrme had recourse accordingly 
 to the old expedient of the tourelle. At each corner 
 he threw out one of these little towers borne on carved 
 plinths abutting from the base line of the upper story ; 
 they were covered in by light open cupolas, between 
 which rose central pyramids of chimneys. 
 
 The dignity given to an elevation by a bold abut- 
 ment at its base had acquired a sensible value with 
 De FOrme. To project the foundations of Anet would, 
 however, have given a fortified air ill in keeping 
 with a chateau destined wholly to serve the purposes 
 of pleasure. De FOrme, therefore, achieved the same 
 effect by other means. The colonnade which runs 
 round the court, and the roof of which forms a terrace 
 in front of the windows of the upper story, makes the 
 required projection, on which the upper part of the 
 building is elevated. 
 
 When, in May 1564, De FOrme came to work upon 
 
126 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 the Tuileries, he employed precisely the same expe- 
 dient. A colonnade and terrace were among the prin- 
 cipal features of the building. The elevation, like that 
 of Anet, consisted originally of but two floors, but the 
 proposed extent of the palace was even more consider- 
 able than the wide area occupied by the famous chateau 
 of the Duchess de Valentinois. Du Cerceau (1576) 
 gives a drawing of the portion then finished ; of the rest 
 he says, ‘ En partie les fondements sont assis il y a ja 
 assez longtemps, mais il n’y a encore qu’un corps double 
 eslevee portant deux faces servant iceluy corps de 
 membres de commoditez, et dune galerie joints en- 
 semble. En Tune des faces est la galerie du coste du 
 jardin, en l’autre sont les commoditez du coste de la 
 court, or d’autant, qu’il n’y a elevation que dim corps 
 je ne vous declareray point d’avantage, et aussi que les 
 elevations, et commoditez se pourront changer.’ 
 
 The adverse fates to which the building was des- 
 tined from the very day of its commencement had 
 already overtaken it. The original ground-plan con- 
 sisted, as has been said, not of a single line of building, 
 but of a considerable group of constructions forming a 
 great centre with minor courts depending from it on 
 either side ; only the centre pavilion, with the wings 
 attached to it — the wings which contained, as Du Cer- 
 ceau tells us, the colonnade or gallery of the garden 
 front, behind which were offices looking on the court — 
 was completed during the lifetime of De l’Orme. This 
 
THE TUILERIES. 
 
 127 
 
 centre pavilion was arranged to receive every variety 
 of costly and elaborate ornament, ‘garny,’ says Du 
 Cerceau, ‘ de colonnes fort enrichies de certains marbres 
 et jaspes.’ Catharine herself drove on De l’Orme to a 
 point of extravagance which would not seem to have 
 been approved by his more sober judgment. 
 
 As the work went on, he tells us, ‘ le bon vouloir 
 luy a creu de faire son palais fort magnifique et beau- 
 coup plus riche, voire jusques a faire tailler et insculpter 
 plusieurs sortes d’ouvrages, et devises — sur les bases et 
 assiettes qui sont faites de marbre,’ and again he con- 
 tinues, ‘ D’abondant elle a voulu me commander faire 
 faire plusieurs incrustations de diverses sortes de 
 marbre, de bronze dore, et pierres minerales comme 
 marchasites incrustees sur les pierres de ce pays qui 
 sont tres-belles, tant aux fasces du palais, et par le 
 dedans, et par le dehors.’ 
 
 From the phrase ‘beaucoup plus riche’ it is 
 evident that De l’Orme himself had not proposed to 
 overload the structural lines with these fantastic in- 
 crustations. He still contrived, with wonderful skill, 
 so to deal with the after-additions forced upon him 
 by the Queen’s passion for an excessive luxury, as 
 to produce an impression of balance in the ornament, 
 and of space in the design. Du Cerceau’s contem- 
 porary drawings testify to these points. The deep 
 shadow beneath the wide arcade rests the eye, and 
 the building shows, in spite of its burden of elabo- 
 
128 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 rate refinements, that air of dignity which is never 
 wanting in good Renaissance work. 
 
 After De l’Orme’s death the task of carrying on the 
 building was entrusted, as has already been said, to 
 Bullant. Bullant died, and to him in turn succeeded 
 Baptiste and Jean Androuet, the son and grandson of 
 the celebrated Huguenot engraver, Du Cerceau. Jean 
 Androuet, the architect of Louis XIII., raised the blocks 
 adjoining the pavilions added by Bullant, but his addi- 
 tions were made without reference to the style or spirit 
 of De FOrme’s original plans. The heavy columns, of 
 a so-called composite-Corinthian order, which he ran 
 up from the base to the very roof of the fagade, dealt a 
 fatal blow to the effect of the older work. The size of 
 these columns, as compared with that of the pillars and 
 pilasters employed, in double tiers, by De l’Orme and 
 Bullant, was enormous. Consequently the earlier 
 portions of the front were painfully dwarfed, ornament 
 which could never have had a very large character 
 became almost insignificant, and the unity of the whole 
 plan was destroyed. 
 
 The next step to ruin was taken under Louis 
 XIV. To Le Veau and Dorbay was allotted the 
 task of, what was called, bringing together the dis- 
 cordant parts. Their first act was to destroy the spiral 
 staircase which De TOrme had placed in the centre 
 pavilion, and which prevented the view of the garden 
 from the inner court. Sauval describes it with enthu- 
 
THE TUILERIES . 
 
 129 
 
 siasm, ‘ il ne s’est encore rien vu de ce genre-la de plus 
 hardi ni de plus admirable.’ The special feature which 
 excited astonishment and admiration was the absence 
 of any central support. The steps, springing from the 
 ground, went up turning round and round until they 
 almost touched the top of the domed ceiling above. 
 The points of support were obtained by means of four 
 flying buttresses of the sort commonly called, says 
 Sauval, ‘ trompes en tour creuse.’ These were distri- 
 buted in the four angles of the cage, and served as 
 support and framework for the steps. The buttresses 
 took a spiral curve which, carefully adapted to the 
 general turn of the main line, insensibly lost itself in 
 the ellipse which it formed. ‘ Si bien qu’autant de fois 
 qu’on vient a regarder cette pesante masse de pierre 
 et de bronze faite en coquille, qui roule entre deux airs, 
 il semble quelle soit prete a tomber, et a ensevelir sous 
 les ruines ceux qui la contemplent.’ 
 
 When Germain Brice, in his turn, addressed him- 
 self to the task of describing the palace of the Tuileries 
 he can only tell us of that which had been. ‘ On voyait 
 autrefois,’ he says, ‘ un escalier fort hardi dans le meme 
 espace ou se trouve a present le vestibule,’ and he 
 then continues minutely to describe the other reforms 
 effected by ‘la grande restauration en 1664, sur les 
 dessins de Louis le Veau dont Frangois Dorbay eut 
 toute la conduite.’ The staircase itself having been 
 destroyed, the next step taken was the entire remodel - 
 
 VOL. 1. 
 
 K 
 
130 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 ling of the case in which it had been contained. The 
 cupola, by which it was originally surmounted, was 
 changed into a species of quadrangular dome. Of the 
 decoration of the front, nothing was left intact, except 
 the first order of pillars banded with marble drums. 
 The rest was replaced by a Corinthian and a composite 
 order crowned by a frontispiece, and dwarfed by the 
 application of the already inevitable attic, which was 
 also imposed upon the two wings, pierced with arcades 
 on either side of the centre pavilion. The lower story, 
 with its galleries looking to the garden, was left un- 
 changed, but of the upper portion nothing was spared, 
 except some rich decorations which were attributed to 
 the hand of Bullant. But these, although left in their 
 place, were none the less destroyed. 
 
 On this point, hear what Germain Brice says : 
 
 ‘ Before the building was repaired, those who cared for 
 architecture used to go and look with wonder on one 
 of the fluted Ionic columns placed in the interior 
 angle, between the first arcade which sustains the 
 terrace (or balcony) and the little pavilion on the river 
 side. They thought that the proportions and contours 
 of this column were admirable, but since the work has 
 been scraped, so much has by this means been taken 
 off the original proportions, that this column possesses 
 no longer the beauty which once distinguished it.’ 
 
 In order to complete the desired unity of effect, 
 the pavilions built by Bullant, in their turn, received 
 
THE TUILERIES 
 
 131 
 
 the necessary attic, and the work of restoration was 
 terminated, again to quote the words of Germain Brice, 
 ‘par des vases sur une balustrade, qui feraient un 
 meilleur effet si l’invention en etait plus belle.’ The 
 uniformity desired by Louis XIV. had now been 
 achieved. 
 
 It is scarcely possible to blame Le Veau and his 
 assistant for the way in which they carried out the task 
 imposed upon them. The very conditions under which 
 it was to be executed implied the absolute loss of all the 
 original character of the building. The delicate work- 
 manship, and elegant proportions, of Catharine’s un- 
 finished palace, had to be forced into harmonious union 
 with the commonplace additions made by Henri IV. 
 and Louis XIII. The discordance existing between 
 the two could only be removed at the expense of the 
 earlier work. Le Veau spared, on the whole, as 
 much as he could. The first story, and the open 
 galleries looking on the garden, remained, to testify to 
 the original grace and style of the design, even till the 
 evil days of Louis Philippe. Then, began the mania for 
 so-called restoration, which has disfigured every royal 
 palace in France. The Tuileries was attacked, and 
 one of the still remaining galleries of the garden-front 
 blocked up. The indignant protest of the leading 
 journals arrested, but only for a time, the work of 
 destruction. The second Empire finally remodelled 
 all that remained of the original structure. Then 
 
132 
 
 RENAISSANCE OE ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 came the hour of civil war, and left but ruins where 
 the palace once had stood. 
 
 Thus it has come to pass that of De l’Orme’s mani- 
 fold activity scarcely a trace remains. The unfinished 
 portal of St. Nizier at Lyon, the ruins of Anet, cer- 
 tain touches of modification and addition at Chenon- 
 ceau, at Chambord, and at Chaumont, this is all which 
 is now left. Not one considerable work has been 
 suffered to escape. 
 
 Both that which remains, and the contemporary 
 records of that which has been destroyed, produce the 
 impression that De l’Orme owed his success and repu- 
 tation as an architect not so much to the artistic cha- 
 racter of his work, as to his boldness and ingenuity in 
 the invention of constructive devices, and expedients. 
 Throughout his own writings, he lays especial stress on 
 his claims to notice on this account. In the MS. 
 Memoir, which has been so often already quoted, he 
 boasts that he brought into France ‘la fagon de bien 
 bastir,’ and by this phrase he evidently does not mean 
 a revolution in style, but the introduction of practical 
 change. For he goes on to explain that he had 
 abolished ‘ les fa^ons barbares, et les grandes com- 
 missures.’ 
 
 Practical details such as these always engaged his 
 chief attention, and his first book, ‘ Nouvelles inventions 
 pour bien bastir, et a petit fraiz,’ is chiefly noteworthy 
 on account of the variety and utility of the precepts 
 
PRACTICAL CHARACTER OF BE VORME'S GENIUS. 133 
 
 which it contains on such points as the cutting and pre- 
 paration of stones, the jointing of masonry, and other 
 details concerning the actual conduct of building opera- 
 tions. The skill which he had himself acquired in 
 these matters, he indeed freely placed at the disposal of 
 those whom he employed, and in the selection of his 
 maitres-mafons he was very particular, taking care to 
 have the best, ‘ lesquels/ he adds, ‘j’avais fa£onne petit 
 a petit, et de longue main/ He was thus always able 
 to rely on those who carried out his projects, and could 
 confidently appeal to their co-operation in working out 
 fresh experiments. 
 
 The voute en trompe , which De l’Orme employed 
 at Lyon to sustain a gallery, and at Anet to support 
 a private chamber for the use of Henri II., has already 
 been mentioned. It was a favourite device, and he 
 mentions in his ‘ Traite ’ that for a third time he put it 
 in practice at a house in the Rue de la Savaterie, an old 
 street of the Cite. Another expedient, to the intro- 
 duction of which he attached great importance, was the 
 employment of columns composed of several drums, 
 the joints being dissimulated by bands of moulding, and 
 sculpture. He is said to have first made use of this 
 invention in restoring the portico of the chapel at 
 Villers Cotterets, but in his ‘ Livre d’ Architecture ’ he 
 gives an example of ‘ une colonne ionique de plusieurs 
 pieces bandee,’ having ornaments sculptured on the 
 bands, which was, he says, designed for the Tuileries. 
 
34 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 De l’Orme is, however, never so proud either of 
 his voute en trompe or of his colonne bandde as he is of 
 his improvements and inventions in the employment 
 of timberwork. He revolutionised the system which 
 had, up till his day, been in vogue, and gave his name 
 to the method which still is called couverhcre a la Phili- 
 bert de rOrme. The merits of this method will be 
 best understood by an examination of the designs by 
 which it is illustrated and explained in his treatise, 
 i Des nouvelles inventions.’ At Chambord also, the 
 system can be studied in practical application beneath 
 the vaulted domes erected by Henri II. 
 
 The enormous fixed beams which had previously 
 been employed in covering in the high roofs of French 
 chateaux , were replaced in De TOrme’s work by an 
 appliance which consisted of a double line of short light 
 planks, bolted together like the joints of a Russian 
 puzzle, so that the junction in each case took place 
 upon the centre of the piece by which it was doubled. 
 In this way perfect flexibility and strength were attained, 
 and the failure of a single piece did not endanger the 
 safety of the whole line, for any portion could be re- 
 moved and replaced without disturbing the remaining 
 parts, and as the curves of these separate planks could 
 be infinitely varied and combined, the method was 
 susceptible of application to any surface. 
 
 De FOrme claimed for his invention that it was as 
 durable as the then prevailing system, was far cheaper, 
 
COUVERTURE A LA PHILIBERT DE VORME . 135 
 
 possessed greater facilities in use, and, being much 
 lighter, relieved old walls of a burden which had often 
 proved too great for them to bear. He had first spoken 
 of it to Henri II. himself ; but the bystanders, he tells 
 us, made a joke of his proposals, and the King kept 
 silence. For the moment it was clear that nothing 
 could be done ; but after awhile a favourable oppor- 
 tunity offered itself. Catharine wished to erect a 
 covered gallery for the jeu de paume at Monceaux. 
 The estimate of the necessary timber- work alone 
 alarmed her. De FOrme seized the occasion to again 
 draw attention to his scheme. 
 
 An experiment was made at the chateau of La 
 Muette, and, says De FOrme, ‘ ne la pouvoit-on 
 couvrir sans Finvention que j’ai trouve de charpenterye.’ 
 The treatise ‘ Nouvelles inventions’ is almost wholly 
 devoted to the development of the various possible 
 adaptations of the new method, and no later than 1783 
 Legrand and Molinos, the architects of the dome of the 
 Halle Neuve at Paris, based their work on the plans 
 published by Philibert de FOrme in 1561. 
 
 The hostile reception which the scheme met with 
 at Court when first suggested by De FOrme was due 
 probably in part to the general unpopularity of its 
 author. One or two stories which have come down 
 to us, and one or two contemporary allusions, show that 
 he certainly failed in the art of conciliating those with 
 whom he lived. He excited the jealousy of Ronsard, 
 
136 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 who wrote a sonnet, it is supposed, on the occasion of 
 De POrme’s obtaining the Abbey of Ivry, in which the 
 following lines occur : 
 
 Ah ! il vaudroit mieux estre architecte ou magon 
 Pour richement tymbrer le haut d’un ecusson, 
 
 D’une Crosse honorable en lieu d’une Truelle ! 
 
 Mais de quoy sert l’honneur d’escrire tant de vers. 
 
 This poem is noticed by Binet in his ‘ Life of Ron- 
 sard,’ and Binet tells the story, repeated afterwards by 
 La Croix du Maine, and others, of De POrme’s annoy- 
 ance and attempt at revenge. Ronsard had followed 
 in the Queens train to the Tuileries, and De POrme 
 refused him admittance to the garden. The poet 
 chalked on the door, ‘ Fort. Reverent. Habe.’ The 
 angry architect, coming back, found himself addressed, 
 he supposed, as ‘ Very Reverend Old Hag.’ He com- 
 plained to the Queen, whereupon Ronsard triumphantly 
 explained that the words stood for Latin, not French, 
 and were the abbreviation of the beginning of a distich 
 of Ausonius — 
 
 Fortunam reverenter habe, quicunque repente 
 Dives ab exili progrediere loco. 
 
 Then, as the story goes, the Queen added to the con- 
 fusion of De POrme by reprimand, and told him that the 
 gardens of the Tuileries were dedicated to the Muses. 
 
 De POrme was not even permitted to enjoy undis- 
 turbed his much boasted supremacy in matters of 
 practice. Palissy, in writing ‘des Eaux et Fontaines,’ 
 
PALISSY ATTACKED DE L'ORME . 
 
 137 
 
 violently attacked his conduct of certain waterworks, 
 probably those at Meudon. It should be remembered, 
 however, that De TOrme was engaged conjointly with 
 Primaticcio to direct the buildings in progress at this 
 chateau almost immediately after his arrival in Paris 
 from Lyon. The failure which then overtook his 
 schemes may therefore be reckoned to the account of 
 early inexperience. But Palissy seems purposely to 
 couple his account of these youthful mishaps with sneers 
 at the wealth and position which only rewarded De 
 l’Orme later in life when he had often proved his value 
 by success. For almost in the same sentence Palissy 
 speaks of him ‘ as carrying himself so as to be styled the 
 god of masons and architects, of his wealth ’ (‘ vingt mil 
 en benefices ’), ‘ and of his credit at court,’ and continues, 
 ‘ He boasted at one time that he could send up water 
 as high as he would by means of pumps and 
 machinery, and by such-like boasting inspired a great 
 lord with the desire to raise water from a river to a 
 high garden which he had near the said river. He 
 commanded that money should be given him for the 
 expenses, which being granted, the said architect had a 
 large number of leaden pipes made, and certain wheels 
 in the river, to move the mallets which bring into play 
 the valves ; but when it came to raising the water 
 there was not a pipe which did not burst.’ After this 
 ‘ the said architect ’ had pipes cast in iron, and the ex- 
 pense became so great that it amounted when taxed to 
 
138 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 40,000 francs, ‘ combien que la chose ne valust jamais 
 rien.’ 
 
 These early failures were not indeed the only points 
 of attack, De FOrme’s enemies even dared to challenge 
 his right of invention to his favourite masterpiece, the 
 famous spiral staircase of the Tuileries. Sauval him- 
 self notes certain defects which had existed from the 
 beginning, and accounts for their presence by supposing 
 that the death of De FOrme prevented him from cor- 
 recting and completing the work. But in Simons 
 ‘ Histoire de Beauvoisis’ a story is told which accounts 
 for these same defects in a manner greatly to the dis- 
 advantage of the architect. 
 
 De FOrme, says Simon, began but could not finish 
 the great spiral staircase, ‘ a noyau vuide.’ He was res- 
 cued from his embarrassment by the skill and ingenuity 
 of a certain Vaast, a member of a family of architects 
 of the same name in Beauvoisis. To this man De 
 rOrme was obliged to cede the conduct of the work. 
 Soon it was talked about the town that the honour of 
 the work would be due not to De FOrme but to 
 Vaast. De FOrme, furiously jealous, treated Vaast 
 extremely ill, supposing that even should Vaast resent 
 his conduct, and withdraw his aid, he would be able to 
 complete the staircase successfully without him, for 
 Vaast had imprudently sketched on the wall of the 
 guard-room a drawing which revealed his secret 
 
 Vaast saw his danger, and, slipping back at night, 
 
DE L'ORMES WEALTH. 
 
 139 
 
 effaced the sketch and disappeared. De FOrme, 
 thrown upon his own resources, was forced to finish 
 the staircase as well as he could, and hence the work 
 but imperfectly realised the beauty and convenience 
 which marked the original conception. It is not prob- 
 able that this story has any^. basis of fact, but it shows 
 the sort of thing which people thought they might 
 safely say about De FOrme, and the class of imputa- 
 tions to which he had laid himself open by offensive 
 habits of self-assertion and domineering. 
 
 His wealth, too, was another and a fruitful cause 
 of jealousy and envy. He possessed, says Palissy, 
 twenty thousand in benefices. Palissy did but echo 
 the common report. De FOrme, in explaining his 
 purpose in writing the memoir of his life, works in these 
 words, ‘ Pource que plusieurs crient que jay tant de 
 biens en leglise et d’argent content, je desire que ung 
 chacun congnoisse la verite, et les services que j’ay 
 faict.’ He then recapitulates his various sources of 
 income. The late King (Henri II.) had given him 
 the Abbey of Jeveton in Brittany, which was refused 
 by M. de Rieux because it was only worth 300 liv. 
 Afterwards he received the Abbey of St. Bartelemy- 
 lez-Noyon, the value of which was but 1,700 liv . 
 About a year after Henri gave him the Abbey of Ivry, 
 farmed at 1,300 liv . ‘ Et le dernier bien, estant mal- 
 
 lade en ceste ville, il me donna Fabbaye de Sainct- 
 Sierge, d’Angiers, qui est afermee ij m vij c 1 ., et voylk 
 
140 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 tout le bien que le feu Roy m’a faict, qui est de six 
 mil livres, bien loing deconte de vingt mil livres qu’ilz 
 disent qu’il m’a donne.’ 
 
 In this calculation it will be seen that De l’Orme 
 does not comprehend the revenues which he received 
 from other offices. He was canon of Notre Dame, 
 and in 1557 he had been appointed, in consideration of 
 the repairs which he executed at La Muette, a ‘ maitre 
 de comptes.’ The Abbey of Ivry, says M. Berty, quoting 
 ( Gallia Christiana,’ he had, in 1560, ceded to Jacques, 
 brother of Diane de Poitiers. If so, it is strange that 
 he should continue, in 1562, to reckon it amongst the 
 benefices from which he still derived his revenues 
 without which, indeed, his yearly income drops to 4,700 
 livres in place of the 6,000 at which he himself computes 
 it. The writer in the ‘ Gallia Christiana ’ states, I find, 
 in a preceding paragraph, that De l’Orme ‘ obiit anno 
 exeunte 1560,’ the same date at which he puts the in- 
 coming of Jacques de Poitiers. Is it possible that in 
 both places he is equally mistaken ? The actual date 
 of De l’Orme’s death we know to have been 1578. 
 
 Certain statements made by De l’Orme himself in 
 the MS. Memoir suggest an honourable explanation 
 of at least some part of the odium which he had in- 
 curred. In freeing himself from the charge of having 
 been overpaid for his services he gives a list of several 
 occasions on which he had been the means of detecting 
 frauds upon the Crown. From this list we find that 
 
ACCUSATIONS BROUGHT AGAINST DE VORME . 141 
 
 he had not only taxed, and greatly reduced the claims 
 of the workmen engaged at Fontainebleau, and other 
 royal palaces, but that he had attacked the paymasters 
 themselves : ‘ Semblables choses je fiz a Sainct-Mallo et 
 a Conercueau (probably Concarneau), a Mantes, et 
 aultres, et oultre plusieurs mauvais mesnaiges que je 
 trouvoys de plusieurs tant des cappitaines, contre rol- 
 leurs, et aultres, les tresoriers faisoyent de leur couste, 
 de sorte que je fiz rendre, et payer au trezorier Charron 
 trente-six mil livres, qui estoient egarees et desrobees, 
 et si n’eust este un grand seigneur qui le soustenoyt et 
 Boys daulphin, j’eusse bienfaict veoir d’aultreslarrecins.’ 
 
 But the point on which De 1’Orme lays, in each case, 
 especial stress, is that even when the given quantity of 
 work was done, it was ill-done. Those employed had 
 done nothing, he repeats ; that is to say, ‘ rien qui vaille.’ 
 The workmanship everywhere was so bad (‘ mauvaises 
 fagons that, had it not been, he says, for the constant 
 inspection, which he maintained, of the different palaces 
 both King and Court would have disappeared beneath 
 a heap of ruins. 
 
 These passages not only furnish a probable motive 
 for the scandalous accusations of which De POrme tells 
 us he was the innocent victim, but illustrate the nature 
 of his genius. He began his career not as an architect, 
 but as an engineer. He attached himself rather to the 
 scientific than to the aesthetic side of his profession. 
 The skilful cutting and laying of stones, the exquisite 
 
142 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 adjustment of mechanical contrivances, all that comes 
 under the head of ‘ Tart de bien bastir/ these are the 
 accomplishments on which De TOrme dwells with the 
 most zealous satisfaction. None of his work shewed 
 either the energy of creative impulse which animated 
 Bullant, or the rare artistic feeling which distinguished 
 Lescot ; but for the practical side of his profession he 
 had a genuine passion and every line of his book on 
 architecture is inspired by it. 
 
143 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 ARCHITECTURE (1542-1578). 
 
 Pierre Lescot — The Louvre . 
 
 Toy, L’Escot, dont le nom jusques aux astres vole, 
 
 As pared naturel : car, estant a Pescole, 
 
 On ne peut le destin de ton esprit forcer, 
 
 Que toujours avec Pencre on ne te vist tracer 
 Quelque belle peinture, et ja, fait g£ometre, 
 
 Angles, lignes et poincts sur une carte mettre. 
 
 Puis, arrivant ton age au terme de vingt ans, 
 
 Tes esprits courageux ne furent pas contans 
 Sans doctement conjoindre avec la peinture 
 L’art de mathdmatique et de Parchitecture, 
 
 Ou tu es tellement avec honneur monte 
 Que le siecle ancien est par toy surmonte. 
 
 Car bien que tu sois noble et de mceurs et de race, 
 Bien que des le berceau Pabondance te face 
 Sans en chercher ailleurs, riche en bien temporel, 
 
 Si as-tu franchement suivi ton naturel, 
 
 Et tes premiers rdgens n’ont jamais peu distraire 
 Ton cceur de ton instinct pour suivre le contraire. 
 
 Jadis le roy Frangois, des lettres amateur, 
 
 De ton divin esprit premier admirateur, 
 
 T’aima pardessus tout : ce ne fut, en son age, 
 
 Peu d’honneur d’estre ayme d’un si grand personnage, 
 Qui soudain cognoissoit le vice et la vertu, 
 
 Quelque deguisement dont Phomme fust vestu. 
 
 Henry, qui apres lui tint la sceptre de France, 
 
 Ayant de ta valeur parfaite cognoissance, 
 
 Honora ton sgavoir, si bien que ce grand roy 
 Ne vouloit escouter un autre homme que toy, 
 
144 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 Soit disnant et soupant, et te donna la charge 
 De son Louvre enrichy d’edifice plus large ; 
 
 Ouvrage somptueux, a fin d’estre monstrd, 
 
 Un roy tr£s-magnifique, en t’ayant rencontre. 
 
 II me souvient un jour que ce prince, k la table, 
 
 Parlant de ta vertu comme chose admirable, 
 
 Disoit que tu avois de toy-mesmes appris, 
 
 Et que surtous aussi tu emportois le pris : 
 
 Comme a faict mon Ronsard, qui k la poesie, 
 
 Maugrd tous ses parens, a mis sa fantaisie. 
 
 Et pour cela tu fis engraver sur le haut 
 Du Louvre une ddesse, k qui jamais ne faut 
 Le vent k joue enflee, au creux cPune trompette, 
 
 Et la monstras au roy, disant qu’elle estoit faite 
 Expres pour figurer la force de mes vers, 
 
 Qui comme vent portoient son nom vers Tunivers. 
 
 These lines of Ronsard, written in 1 560, sum up almost 
 all we know of the facts of Lescot’s life. He came, 
 as Ronsard tells us, of a family which had already 
 acquired property and position. His father, Pierre 
 Lescot, ‘ procureur du roi en la Cour des Aides,’ was 
 Seigneur de Lissy en Brie, and counted amongst his 
 other possessions the fief of Clagny, which had come to 
 him through his marriage with Anne Dauvet, daughter 
 of Guillaume Dauvet, ‘ Seigneur de Clagny, conseilleur 
 du roi, maitre des requetes de son hotel et second 
 president de la Cour des Aides.’ Pierre Lescot the 
 younger did not, however, succeed his father as 
 Seigneur de Lissy. This property went to a brother. 
 Pierre became, like his maternal grandfather, Seigneur 
 of Clagny, near Versailles, and he is also styled, as 
 was his father, ‘ Seigneur du fief de la Grange du 
 Martroy en la justice de Montreuil.’ 
 
PIERRE LESCOT BORN AT PARIS. 
 
 145 
 
 M. Berty, through whose diligent researches, in the 
 National Archives, these facts, concerning the family 
 and property of Pierre Lescot, have been ascertained, 
 has not been able to determine precisely either the place 
 or date of his birth. Jean Goujon, in the epistle to the 
 reader which closes Martin’s translation of Vitruvius, 
 speaks of Lescot as ‘ Parisien ; ’ it is therefore probable 
 that he was born in the house of the Rue du Port-Saint- 
 Landry, possessed by his father in right of his wife, the 
 site of which is now occupied in part by No. 19 Quai 
 Napoleon; and if he was, as is commonly supposed, 
 about sixty-eight at the time of his death in 1578, the 
 year 1510 must have been the date of his birth. In 
 1533 his father died, and in 1536, when Lescot must 
 have attained, according to the above calculation, the 
 age of twenty-six, he signed, on account of his succes- 
 sion to the fief of Clagny, which appears to have been 
 held of the Celestins of Paris, a document which is 
 still preserved, and to which the signature of his 
 father had previously, in 1531, been attached. 
 
 At this date Lescot does not appear to have been 
 employed in any important undertaking. Rosso was 
 directing the works at Fontainebleau, Girolamo della 
 Robbia was engaged on the chateau of Boulogne, 
 Dominico di Cortona was reconstructing the Hotel de 
 Ville, whilst under him Pierre de Chambiges, one of a 
 distinguished family of French architects, superintended 
 workmen at 25 sols a day. We do not hear of Lescot 
 
 VOL. 1. L 
 
146 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 until five years later. Rosso was then dead, but the 
 honours and emoluments of his place were not destined 
 for a Frenchman. The King sent to Florence for his 
 successor, and Sebastien Serlio, with all his family, 
 arrived in Paris before the year was out. Primaticcio 
 was also recalled, and to him was entrusted the task of 
 carrying on the decorations left unfinished by Rosso at 
 Fontainebleau ; whilst Serlio was engaged in raising 
 the eastern facade of the cour de la fontaine in the 
 same chateau. There was no place for Lescot. ‘ II 
 faut,’ cries Ronsard, 
 
 Chasser quelques Italiens, 
 
 Les vrays corbeaux ravisseurs de nos biens. 
 
 The Court had no work for Lescot, but he found 
 other, if less distinguished, employment. In 1542 the 
 church of St. Germain l’Auxerrois was being restored 
 and rebuilt ; and to Lescot was entrusted the task of 
 erecting the screen or jubi y the sculptures of which were 
 executed by Jean Goujon, one of the most gifted artists 
 ever produced by France. Some of the reliefs were 
 preserved when the jubd itself was destroyed in 
 1745, and are now to be seen in the Louvre, and whilst 
 the monument was yet entire, its construction was 
 minutely described by Piganiol de la Force. 
 
 From Piganiol we learn that this jubd was carried 
 on three arches, the centre forming the principal 
 entrance to the choir, and the side bays receiving two 
 small altars. At each extremity were placed project- 
 
THE TRIBUNE OF ST. GERMAIN L'AUXERROIS. 147 
 
 ing altars, bearing statues of the Virgin and St. Louis. 
 The pillars consisted of double Corinthian columns, 
 the capitals of which were decorated with the instru- 
 ments of the Passion, and the decorations were com- 
 pleted by four statues of the Evangelists, and by a 
 large bas-relief representing Nicodemus burying Christ 
 in the presence of the Virgin, St. John, and the three 
 Maries. But in 1744 St. Germain l’Auxerrois was 
 deprived of its chapter, and became a parish church. 
 In the following year, when Piganiol wrote, the church- 
 wardens had already begun to spoil the work of 
 the principal monument committed to their care by 
 gilding ; their next step was to do away with it al- 
 together. 
 
 In 1546, at the age of thirty-seven, Lescot was at last 
 taken into the royal employment. Francis I. had re- 
 solved to make the Louvre a palace the magnificence 
 of which should eclipse the fame of the chateau 
 of Iicouen, on which the exiled Constable de Mont- 
 morency was at this time lavishing the treasures of his 
 vast fortune. The project for awhile hung fire ; the 
 King was engrossed by the works at Fontainebleau, and 
 at Chambord, but especially by those of his favourite 
 chateau of Boulogne or Madrid. It was not until the 
 freshness passed away from these undertakings that he 
 recurred once more to the proposed rebuilding of the 
 Louvre. 
 
 The interior of the old Louvre was ill-adapted for the 
 
148 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 circumstances of royal state ; the exterior was without 
 any architectural pretensions. The building consisted of 
 many different blocks ; the fagades presented the appear- 
 ance of blank walls capriciously pierced, at irregular 
 intervals, with numerous small openings. On all sides 
 the chateau was girt about by a host of towers and sur- 
 rounded by wide and deep moats. These towers, with 
 the exception of those at the gateways and angles were 
 distributed without any semblance of plan or regularity. 
 Some reached only the height of the first story, others, 
 more lofty, were surmounted by weather-cocks painted 
 with the national arms. But the great tower which 
 stood of old isolated in the principal court had been 
 demolished by the King as far back as 1527, when he 
 had first proposed to enlarge and remodel the ancient 
 palace. 
 
 It is said that in the first place Francois I. addressed 
 himself to Sebastien Serlio, and desired him to prepare 
 a project. Plans were, however, also received from 
 Pierre Lescot, and to these the preference was accorded, 
 and Serlio has the credit, most likely undeserved, of 
 having concurred in the judgment which awarded the 
 palm to his rival. The general character of the conduct 
 of Italian artists in France deprives this story of any 
 air of probability, but it is certain that on August 2, 
 1546, Francis, then at Fontainebleau, granted letters- 
 patent to Lescot, appointing him to the direction of 
 the works to be carried on at the Louvre. ‘ A nostre 
 
THE LOUVRE. 
 
 149 
 
 cher et bien-aime Pierre l’Escot, seigneur de Claigny 
 . . . nous avons donne, et donnons plain puissance, 
 authorite, charge, et emoluments especial par ces pre- 
 sentes, de ordonner du fait des dits batimens, et 
 ediffices que nous avons ordonne estre fait en nostre 
 chastel du Louvre, et autres que nous pouvons faire 
 construire cy apres en nostre ville de Paris.’ 
 
 That part of the palace which we owe to the designs 
 of Lescot still goes by the name of the Old Louvre, in 
 contradistinction to the different portions erected at 
 various more recent dates. The bit which he actually 
 completed consists of the east wing, from the central 
 block called ‘ pavilion de l’Horloge’ to the south-west 
 corner of the quadrangle ; also the chief part of the 
 south wing which runs parallel with the Seine from the 
 south-west corner as far as the * Pont des Arts.’ This 
 piece forms only one-fourth of the great court ; the other 
 three-fourths were erected subsequently. The continu- 
 ation on the river-side of the south wing as far as the 
 south-east corner, where it was connected with a yet 
 remaining portion of the old chateau , was carried out 
 during the reign of Henri III., according to plans left 
 by Lescot, by Baptiste Androuet du Cerceau, who, at 
 his death, succeeded to the vacant post of architect of 
 the Louvre. 
 
 The decoration of the river-side was not, however, 
 completed until after the accession of Henri IV., during 
 whose reign the work was superintended by Jacques 
 
150 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Androuet du Cerceau, brother of Baptiste, and son 
 of the old Huguenot engraver. Henri IV., however, 
 did but little to the Old Louvre ; he was chiefly oc- 
 cupied by his project of uniting the palace to the 
 Tuileries, and the erection of the galleries, commenced 
 by Catharine de Medicis, which formed a part of 
 this scheme, absorbed his interest. After his murder, 
 his son, Louis XIII., in 1624, laid the first stone of 
 the new Louvre, and during his reign Jacques Lemer- 
 cier completed and rehandled the buildings of the old 
 court according to plans which resulted in the quad- 
 rangle as it now stands. 
 
 Very little progress was, in truth, made with the 
 works of the Louvre before the death of Francois I. 
 — so little that to Henri II. the credit of initiating the 
 undertaking has been generally ascribed. Even 
 Ronsard, who was in a position to know the facts 
 exactly, although he puts on record, in his epistle to 
 Lescot, the favour shown to him by Francois, ascribes 
 to Henri II. alone his appointment as architect of the 
 Louvre. Something had indeed been actually carried 
 out at an earlier date by Francois, who began plans 
 and demolitions in 1527; but what was done was 
 certainly destroyed in order to make way for the palace 
 as projected by Lescot. His letters-patent from 
 Frangois I. were received in 1546, and in the follow- 
 ing year, after the accession of Henri II., they were by 
 him confirmed. 
 
THE LOUVRE . 
 
 15 
 
 These letters-patent given by Henri II. on April 
 14, 1547, were again confirmed on July 10, 1549, for the 
 following reason : ‘ Ayant trouve que pour grande 
 commodite, et aisance du dit batiment, il estoit besoin 
 de le parachever autrement, et pour cet effet faire 
 quelque demolition de ce qzd estoit jd fait , et ce survient 
 un nouvel devis, et dessein que vous ’ (Lescot) ‘ en avez 
 fait dresser, par nos commandemens, que voullons estre 
 suivi.’ 
 
 The terms of this document clearly indicate that 
 there was already standing some earlier commencement 
 of proposed new buildings which were actually in the 
 way of Lescot’s now matured plans. ‘ Ce qui estoit j a 
 fait ’ cannot be the ancient chateau , for the demolition 
 of which no order or permission was ever thought 
 necessary, either before or after the date of these letters. 
 The words therefore probably refer to the ‘ plusieurs 
 riches ediffices ’ with which, as Corrozet tells us (see 
 p. 66), Francois I. enriched the Louvre. 
 
 For thirty-two years, that is to say, from the date 
 of his appointment by Frangois I. in 1546 up to the day 
 of his death in 1578, Lescot continued to labour 
 on the building. The salary attached to his office 
 was the same as that paid to Primaticcio, namely 
 1,200 livres yearly, and was fixed by letters-patent 
 given at Blois in 1550. The earliest extant entry of 
 this payment occurs in the building accounts for 1555. 
 
 ‘ Estat et entretenement du Sieur de Clagny. Pour 
 
152 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 sa charge, et commission de la somme de 1,400 liv. 
 pour 14 mois . . . qui est a raison de 1,200 liv. par 
 an.’ The accounts for the same year contain also a list 
 of the various payments made to those employed on the 
 Louvre works, and these are all made ‘par l’ordon- 
 nance du Seigneur de Claigny/ From this list we 
 learn too that Goujon, whom he had employed at St. 
 Germain Y Auxerrois, was called by Lescot to co-operate 
 in the decoration of the Louvre. 
 
 The west wing, together with the square block at = 
 
 r~ 
 
 the south-west angle, was finished, and the south wing ? 
 commenced before the death of Henri II. Du Cerceau, 
 after praising as ‘ merveilleusement beau, et commode/ 
 the great block erected for his Majesty’s lodgings at 
 that end of the west wing which abuts on the river, 
 .adds that ‘le roy Henry se trouvant grandement 
 satisfait de la vetie dune oeuvre si parfaite, delibera 1 
 la faire continuer es trois autres costez, pour rendre 
 cette cour nompareille. Et ainsi par son commande- 
 ment fut commence l’autre corps de bastiment, depuis 
 le susdit pavilion, tirant le long de la riviere, lequel 
 a este poursuivy par les roys Francois second, et 
 Charles neufiesme . . . ou plustost par la Royne 
 leur mere/ 
 
 The new palace stood exactly on the site of the 
 old chateau , so that Lescot was able to incorporate a 
 portion of the walls on the western side, and had it 
 been completed on the scale originally contemplated 
 
 3 U U OHM 
 
REPRODUCED FROM DU CERCEAUS 'LES PLUS EXCELLENTS BASTIMENTS DE FRANCE" 
 
 
THE LOUVRE . 
 
 153 
 
 by Frangois I. and his son, there seems little doubt 
 but that the court of the Louvre would only have 
 occupied the area covered by the ancient building - 
 that is to say, about a fourth of its present extent. 
 Sauval, indeed, has affirmed that from the commence- 
 ment both Frangois and Henri intended the limits of 
 the court to comprise a square of ‘ soixante-quatre 
 toises,’ and Lippomano, writing from Paris in 1577, 
 remarks, ‘ Ma non ve fatto piu ch’un quarto.’ At that 
 date, therefore, the project of increasing the dimensions 
 at first proposed must have been conceived. 
 
 Du Cerceau, however, says Henri II. was so pleased 
 with the west wing that he planned the continuation 
 ‘ ds trois austres costez,’ and these words evidently 
 show that the writer considered the west wing, half 
 of which only was then standing, as having been com- 
 pleted by Lescot This supposition is further confirmed 
 by the exact coincidence of the west and south wings 
 as standing at the death of Henri II. with two sides 
 of the ancient building. For the south wing actually 
 terminated on the west in the tower which originally 
 completed the south-west angle. On the other hand 
 it may be urged that the lines of the plan given by Du 
 Cerceau suggest the contemplated extension of the west 
 wing towards the north, and, in the absence of any 
 direct evidence, even this slight indication cannot be 
 overlooked. 
 
 It is possible that as the work proceeded the plans 
 
154 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 may have been enlarged. But these plans are lost. 
 In 1624 they were still existing, and it is stated in 
 letters-patent of January 5 of that year that the King 
 had had laid before him the plans of the Louvre, ‘ qui 
 furent faictz et arrestez apres bonne et mure deliberation 
 du raigne de Henry deuxieme.’ Sauval, a century 
 later (1724), affirms that ‘les plans et les elevations 
 que Ton fit sous Francois I. et Henri II. ont ete egares 
 par malice : ’ but he adds, in speaking of the later ad- 
 ditions and continuations, ‘quoiqu’on n’ait pu decouvrir 
 qu’en partie le dessein qu’il (Lescot) fit pour le Louvre, 
 cette petite partie, neanmoins, a ete si respectee de nos 
 rois, qu’ils s’y sont toujours assujettis et l’ont suivie 
 ponctuellement.’ 
 
 Nearly the whole length of the west wing, both on 
 the first and on the second floors, was devoted to a 
 single state room. That on the first floor, the ‘ Salle 
 des Cariatides,’ communicated directly with the court 
 by a door which occupied the centre projecting 
 portion. It was lighted by six windows, three to right 
 and three to left of the entrance, and it contained the 
 gallery sustained by the celebrated Caryatides of Jean 
 Goujon, from which it derived its name. Over the 
 door were two inscriptions, one of which is still existing. 
 The first, which is given by Du Cerceau in facsimile, 
 stated simply that Francois had begun to restore the 
 ruined palace, and that the work had, in memory of 
 the father, been completed by the piety of the son. 
 
THE LOUVRE. 
 
 155 
 
 The second gave a date. It runs thus : ‘ An. a 
 Salu. Resti. md xxxx viii.’ Both inscriptions are 
 given by Corrozet, and he adds positively that the 
 King, Henri II., ‘a fait parachever la salle.’ From 
 this it is clear that the construction was actually com- 
 pleted in the second year of the reign of Henri II., 
 but the decoration of the interior was not proceeded 
 with till some time after, for Sauval reports that the 
 agreement made with Goujon for the execution of 
 the Caryatides bears date September 5, 1550. The 
 exterior decoration was probably carried out even later. 
 But we have no certain data to go upon till 1555, when 
 the accounts, which we still possess, begin. 
 
 In that year occurs the first entry of the receipt by 
 Lescot of fixed appointments, and in the accounts of 
 Jacques Michel, ‘tresorier, clerc, etpayeur de ses oeuvres 
 du Louvre,’ we find, on account of the ‘ grand corps 
 d’hostel,’ payments made to Goujon and others ‘ par 
 l’ordonnance du Seigneur de Claigny.’ These payments 
 were probably made for the works of exterior decoration 
 by which the building at least of the east wing was 
 now completed. Corrozet reports, indeed, that the 
 date, 1556, was inscribed in an ‘auvale,’ ‘ au chef de 
 ladite salle (des Cariatides) par dehors tout au haut 
 d’icelle,’ but Du Cerceau, who carefully fac-similes the 
 earlier and longer inscription, makes no mention of the 
 second. The labels which decorate the upper story 
 are .filled by fleur-de-lis, and no ‘ auvale ’ is visible. 
 
156 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 It is conjectured, therefore, that the date noted by 
 Corrozet most probably occurred on one of the oval 
 shields placed on the face of the corner pavilion, and 
 that it gives the year in which the construction was 
 finished. This is the more likely as the pavilion was 
 completed, and the continuation of the wing contiguous 
 to it on the south was, as Du Cerceau tells us, projected 
 by Henri II., whose death took place in 1559, about 
 three years after the date inscribed in the ‘ auvale.’ 
 
 Although a regular salary of 100 liv. a month was 
 assigned to Lescot only in 1555, that is to say, four 
 years after he began his work at the Louvre, we can- 
 not suppose that his post had been of no profit to him 
 previously. It was the custom at court to pay for 
 work by the gift of any vacant office which might 
 bring in a proportionate sum. Thus we have seen 
 that Philibert de FOrme carried out the reparations 
 and additions required by Catharine de Medicis at 
 La Muette, receiving in compensation the office of 
 ‘maitre des comptes.’ Lescot was also, probably, in- 
 demnified by similar means. As the work proceeded, 
 its merit was universally acknowledged, and the King 
 conferred on him both honourable and substantial 
 rewards. 
 
 In 1554, on December 18, he was appointed to a 
 canonrv of the Cathedral of Notre Dame, and took his 
 seat on the left of the choir in solemn procession on 
 the last day of the same month. On Easter Day, 
 
LESCOT INSTALLED CANON OF NOTRE DAME . 157 
 
 1555, his name appears in the list of canons, but 
 throughout the year his signature is always absent 
 from the proceedings of the chapter. His full admission 
 to the rights of his office was delayed by the refusal of 
 the canons to receive him into their body until he had 
 shaved off his beard. Lenoir, writing from tradition 
 only, says that the canons were successful in the 
 contest, and that ‘ on le forga de couper sa barbe.’ 
 This statement, however, is a little too strong ; for, 
 after much negotiation, a compromise was effected. 
 
 On August 7, 1556, Lescot demanded to be admitted 
 (although bearded) in propria to the enjoyment of his 
 canonry and prebend. The beard, indeed, he said he 
 must keep, in order to fulfil in a becoming manner his 
 daily duties in attendance on the King ; to touch it at 
 that moment, too, was the more impossible, as he was 
 on the point of being sent in a public capacity to Rome. 
 He offered, however (whilst protesting his deep respect 
 for the statutes which obliged every canon to shave 
 at least once in three weeks), to promise that he would 
 not enter the cathedral during divine service without 
 having first shaved and dressed himself with the same 
 propriety as his colleagues. This proposal was hotly 
 discussed, but at last the chapter decided that for 
 once they would make an exception to their rules in 
 his favour, and on the following Wednesday he 
 was installed after having first taken the accustomed 
 oaths, 
 
i5« 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Lescot’s rewards did not end with a canonry of 
 Notre Dame. In the letters-patent of April 7, 1556, 
 a certain Jean Durant was nominated in the room of 
 Jacques Michel as ‘ tresorier, clerc, et payeur des oeuvres 
 du Roy ; ’ but a subsequent clause provided that the 
 powers hitherto given by the King to Lescot should 
 remain the same as before, and Lescot, in this document, 
 is styled, in addition to the titles by which he was already 
 known, ‘ Abbe de Clermont, conseiller, et ausmonier 
 ordinaire du Roy.’ During the two succeeding years, 
 1557 and 1558, Lescot continued to authorise the pay- 
 ments made to those who were engaged in carrying 
 out his designs, and when, after the sudden death of 
 Henri II., in July 1559, De l’Orme lost his place, 
 Lescot was confirmed in his office by the young king, 
 Francois II., within fourteen days after the death of 
 his father. On the accession of Charles IX., Lescot’s 
 functions still remained the same, and year after year 
 his name recurs regularly in the accounts of the 
 treasurer of works, up to 1568, at which date docu- 
 ments again fail us. 
 
 No appreciable advance was made in the continua- 
 tion of the south wing during the brief reign of Frangois 
 II. For at the death of Henri II., the first avant- 
 corps, which bears his initials, was certainly completed ; 
 and the second, together with the three travees which 
 separate it from the first, bear the double K (Karolus) 
 of Charles IX. With this second avant-corps ended 
 
THE DEATH OF LESCOT. 
 
 l S9 
 
 the work executed during this reign. The plan given 
 us by Du Cerceau shows us the state of the building 
 shortly after the death of the King (1574), and on the 
 eastern side of the second avant-corps appears the 
 suggestion only of a hall or chamber in course of con- 
 struction. 
 
 The death of Charles IX., and the accession of his 
 brother, Henri III., brought no change in the position 
 of Lescot. We have indeed neither accounts of the 
 works, nor the letters-patent which should have con- 
 firmed him in his office. But he is still styled super- 
 intendent of works in a ‘Memoire de marbrerie ’ of 
 1573. The building of the Louvre would seem to have 
 languished, for Lippomano, writing in 15 77, says, ‘ La 
 fabbrica mancando piu della meta, cosi non penso mai 
 che si fornisca.’ But, in certain letters, supposed to 
 have been given in 1579, Baptiste Androuet Du Cer- 
 ceau was nominated to the ‘ charge, conduitte, et super- 
 intendance d’iceluy nostre dit bastiment neuf de nostre 
 chasteau du Louvre, a Paris,’ ‘ comme estant puis 
 nagueres ddcede le sieur de Claigny.’ 
 
 On Wednesday, September 10, 1578, Lescot died 
 at about four o’clock in the afternoon. He was living 
 in a house in the cloister of Notre Dame, the house 
 which had been assigned to him as canon. On the 
 Friday following he was buried in the Cathedral, in 
 the chapel of Saint Ferreol. He was succeeded in his 
 canonry by a nephew, Leon Lescot, who became also 
 
i6o 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Abbe of Clermont and ‘ conseiller et ausmonier du Roy.’ 
 To this nephew, Leon, Lescot left a large house in the 
 Faubourg St. Jacques, which was called the Hotel de 
 Clagny ; and by this nephew a tomb was erected to 
 the memory of Lescot in the chapel where he was in- 
 terred. It has since disappeared, but a drawing of the 
 monument is preserved in the Print Room of the 
 National Library at Paris. 
 
 The tomb itself was probably not destroyed until 
 the general sack of the Cathedral took place during 
 the Revolution, for on the drawing is inscribed ‘ Leve 
 sur le lieu par A. Duchesne fils, 1 789.’ The upper 
 half of the slab contained the following epitaph, 
 Petro Lescotio, e gente dominorum a Lissy, domino 
 a Clagny, monasterii B. Mariae a Claromonte abbati 
 commendatario, regum sub queis vixit, Francisci I., 
 Henrici II., Caroli IX., et Henrici III., aconsiliis, hujus 
 insignis Ecclesiae Parisiensis canonico. Obiit iv idus 
 Septembris anno Domini mdlxxviii., aetatis suae l xhi.’ 
 
 To this succeeds the epitaph of his nephew, ‘ Leo 
 ex fratre nepos, e successione Clanius, a resignatione 
 Claromontanus abbas, regius in Senatu Parisiorum 
 supremo (sic) Parlamenti curia conciliarius, in Ecclesia 
 Parisiensi canonicus patruo suo charissimo de se optime 
 merito, mcerens curavit. Obiit 111 idus Novembris, 
 anno mdcxxiv.’ These two epitaphs are followed 
 by inscriptions in Latin, which have probably been 
 badly transcribed by Duchesne, for they are unreadable, 
 
TOMB OF LESCOT. 
 
 161 
 
 and by quotations from the Psalms and from the Book 
 of Job, both of which are in Hebrew. 
 
 The ornamental border in which the inscriptions 
 are enframed is composed of skulls and crossbones, on 
 a ground sown with tears ; at the foot in the centre 
 appears an escutcheon with the arms of the family : 
 these are quarterly, first and third sable , a stags head 
 argent bordered or , second and fourth azttre, three 
 nuggets (rocs) or, bordered gules. The record of the 
 death of Leon Lescot was probably added at a date 
 posterior to the rest, for the character of the work, 
 as M. Berty remarks, shows that the monument was 
 erected some while after the death of Lescot, possibly 
 even as late as the reign of Louis XIII. 
 
 As regards the personal character of Lescot, all that 
 we know is told in the verses of Ronsard already quoted. 
 In general accomplishment he seems to have been not 
 inferior to De TOrme. Goujon in his ‘ Epitre aux 
 lecteurs,’ mentions him as one of those who might 
 indeed, if they would, write well on the science of 
 architecture, but who nevertheless ‘ ne se sont encores 
 mis en peine, et pourtant ne sont dignes de petite 
 louenge.’ His early practice of ‘la peinture/ also com- 
 memorated by Ronsard as having occupied him even 
 ‘ estant a l’escole/ Lescot had carried to a point 
 which had brought him considerable credit. A contem- 
 porary, J ean Bodin, writing in the very year of Lescot's 
 death, says, ‘ Nousen avos (paintings) de Michel Ange, 
 
 VOL. i. M 
 
1 62 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 Raphael Durbe, de Durel, et sas aler plus loig, un de 
 Monsieur de Clagny en la galerie de Fontaine-Beleau, 
 qui est un chef d’ceuvre admirable, que plusieurs ont 
 parangonne aux tableaux d’Appelles.’ 
 
 No painting, by his hand, has come down to us, 
 nor have we any written work by him. He does 
 not seem to have been very fertile in production even 
 in that profession in which he achieved a great and 
 justly deserved reputation. The jubd of St. Germain 
 FAuxerrois and the south west angle of the Louvre 
 are the only works known to have been incon- 
 testably his. His collaboration is indeed claimed 
 for the Fons nymphium, sculptured by Jean Goujon 
 in 1550, and the plans of the Hotel Carna valet have 
 also been attributed to him. The Hotel Carnavalet 
 was a private house ; it is not probable, therefore, that 
 the building accounts were preserved, and there is little 
 chance of ever obtaining certain information concerning 
 those engaged in its erection. It was possibly com- 
 menced by Lescot, and the fact that several of the bas 
 reliefs in the inner court show the characteristic qualities 
 of Goujons design seems to throw an air of greater 
 probability over the supposition. 
 
 It is true, indeed, that Goujon had been employed 
 under Buliant also, at Ecouen, but at an earlier date 
 he had worked for Lescot at St. Germain FAuxerrois, 
 and to Lescot he returned, at the Louvre, when the 
 death of the old Constable left him free to seek a new 
 
THE LOUVRE CREATED BY LESCOT. 163 
 
 master. Yet, even if it could be proved that the Hotel 
 Carnavalet was commenced on the plans of Lescot, little 
 would have been gained. It has been rehandled at 
 various times, and the interior suffered during the 
 occupation of Mme. de Sevigne to an extent which 
 has deprived it of much of its original character. 
 
 To the Louvre alone, then, we must look for the 
 justification of the great reputation which Lescot en- 
 joyed in his own time, and has maintained even to our 
 own. And in the Louvre we find that it is but a por- 
 tion of that which he designed which has been left to 
 us comparatively intact. This portion is that which 
 stands on the western side of the court. For the con- 
 tinuation on the south which he partly accomplished 
 lost its attic in compliance with the exigencies of the 
 extension planned, under Louis XIV., by Claude 
 Perrault. 
 
 In place of the attic, which in Lescots plan lightly 
 surmounted the more imposing stories beneath, Perrault 
 introduced a third order — a third story, which equalled 
 the importance of the rest. This story was covered 
 by a flat roof, and finished with a heavy and mono- 
 tonous balustrade. Monotonous is the word which pre- 
 cisely gives the character of Perrault’s work. The 
 lines of his design suggest space, order, convenient 
 provision for court life and state ceremony, and are 
 characterized by a due dignity of outward show ; but 
 over all presides an air of oppressive uniformity. The 
 
 M 2 
 
164 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 obligation of compliance with the rigid results of cal- 
 culation has been too strictly enforced, and the grace 
 of sensitive taste withholds its charm. 
 
 One above another the ponderous stories are piled, 
 the apparent diminution in their proportions being so 
 small that the last looks as if without disturbance it 
 might take the place of the first — as if it mattered little 
 whether it lay heavy on the earth or reared itself 
 against the sky. Perrault did not live to complete his 
 third story, but those who saw the building in pro- 
 gress foretold that, when the moment came for welding 
 the new to the old, the attic of Pierre Lescot must 
 be sacrificed in order to obtain anything like uniformity 
 in the general aspect of the court. ‘ On est etonne en 
 effet,’ writes M. Legrand in 1808, ‘de voir Oaude 
 Perrault s’elever contre le projet.’ It is to his honour 
 that he did so. His opinion carried weight, and up to 
 the days of Napoleon’s rule the question remained 
 undecided. Then, three sides of the court were ter- 
 minated with the third order of Perrault, and the attic 
 of Lescot, destroyed on the south side only, was 
 suffered to remain, a precious but fragmentary ex- 
 ample, upon the east. 
 
 Just as we look back from Anet and the Tuileries 
 to the chateau of Ecouen, even so we look back from 
 the court of the Louvre to Anet and the Tuileries. 
 Bullant had shown the point to which the vigorous 
 resources of natural genius, tinged with the traditions 
 
THE LOUVRE THE TYPE OF MODERN PALACE . 165 
 
 of the soil, enriched by a practical acquaintance with 
 certain forms of classic work, could carry the Renais- 
 sance conception of a habitation fit for a prince — the 
 
 home of every human exercise and pleasure. Yet at 
 / 
 
 Ecouen some faint traces linger even now of that 
 air of defence which distinguished the chateaux of 
 Frangois I.; and De FOrme, it must be confessed, came 
 nearer than Bullant to achieving the ultimate form of 
 the ideal palace rising in the midst of woods and 
 flowers. 
 
 At Anet De FOrme realised a complete and princely 
 type of the country house. The open galleries, the 
 garden stairs which abounded at Anet, at the Tuileries, 
 and at St. Mor, proclaim the combination of outdoor 
 and indoor life. Rabelais describes St. Mor as a 
 ‘ paradis de salubrite, amenite, serenite, commodite, 
 delices, et tous honnestes plaisirs d agriculture et vie 
 rustique.’ In describing the one palace, Rabelais has 
 described all ; but the ideal which he indicated was 
 embraced in its fullest perfection by Anet. 
 
 At Anet De FOrme had raised the palace of the 
 country. To Lescot fell a different task. In the Louvre 
 Lescot shaped and perfected the palace of the town. 
 The portion which he planned and partly executed has 
 determined the form under which the entire building 
 has continued to develop. Successive additions and 
 extensions have always been forced to accept in some 
 measure the laws which Lescot at the beginning im- 
 
1 66 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 posed ; not only so, but after the various rehandlings to 
 which the building has been submitted, the most beau- 
 tiful part of the Louvre, the only part which shows 
 something more than the result of talent, and taste, 
 and training, the only part which has the brilliant life 
 of genius, is that south-west angle of the court which 
 we owe to his design. 
 
 He has been reproached for want of correctness in 
 his use of the orders. The height, it is said, of his 
 composite and Corinthian columns and pilasters on the 
 ground floor and in the story above, is out of proportion 
 when compared with that of the arcades and window 
 openings which they space. But if Lescot did not 
 employ his means according to strict classical prece- 
 dent, he did employ them in the true classical spirit. 
 He was not building a temple or a hall, but a palace ; 
 he had quite a different interior to express, and that 
 treatment and those proportions, which had become 
 perfected in the one use, demanded not imitation but 
 adaptation to the requirements of the other. For the 
 distinct accentuation of the rising tiers of a many-storied 
 building the successive superimposition of the two 
 orders offered ready service. He adapted them with 
 an exquisite sense of fitness to the desired end, obtain- 
 ing the needed force of perpendicular lines for the 
 spacing and strengthening of his front by the massive 
 constructive projections of the building itself, by groups 
 of windows which break up the surface at equal 
 
WEALTH OF ARCHITECTURAL DECORATION. 167 
 
 intervals, and by the appropriate predominance of the 
 magnificent portal, from beneath which should issue 
 the King with the accompanying pageant of his 
 Court. 
 
 By those who accept or condone what they consider 
 to be the constructive defects of his work, Lescot has 
 also been reproached with a too lavish use of ornament. 
 The attic especially, it has been said, is loaded by a 
 superabundant wealth of decoration. But what was 
 the effect of that attic when the original high-pitched 
 roof rose boldly upwards from its edge ? The covering 
 by which the western front is brought into line with 
 the rest of the court is not that on which Lescot calcu- 
 lated, and the effect of his work is still further injured 
 by the different construction of the other three sides, 
 and by the petty notches of the balustrade by which 
 they are crowned. 
 
 Lescot, it is true, like all other architects of the day, 
 attached no less value to the decorative than to the con- 
 structive part of his design, and the work upon the walls 
 which he raised is of great importance, but the sculp- 
 tures, which cover the south-west angle like a net- 
 work, are nowhere obtrusive ; they make a general 
 wave of pattern through which the constructive pro- 
 jections cut broad shafts of shadow ; — shadow which 
 brings order, and relief, and colour, such as a painter 
 loves, into the richly-chiselled surface. Ornament 
 becomes an integral part of the design, and throughout 
 
1 68 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 the whole extent not a fold of drapery falls, not a 
 figure moves, not a garland winds its wreathing curves, 
 but in harmony with the constructive lines of the 
 magnificent monument which they enrich. 
 
 Foremost amongst those by whose industrious 
 genius the carven surface was wrought to rare perfec- 
 tion stands Jean Goujon. His name is as indissolubly 
 connected with the Louvre as that of Lescot himself. 
 This is, in itself, an answer to those who cry out that 
 art in the sixteenth century was enslaved to the indi- 
 vidual will — that within its own province it took a 
 monarchical form, so that one man enslaved many 
 myriad workers, absorbing in himself the fruits of their 
 intelligence and their toil. Art in the sixteenth 
 century, and most especially in architecture, was great 
 as being the exponent of sustained and distinct in- 
 tellectual intention. A hierarchy of labour was 
 established which, whilst it checked the play of undis- 
 ciplined caprice, permitted, nay, encouraged, in each 
 worker that degree of initiation which best enabled him 
 to co-operate in the fulfilment of an over-ruling purpose 
 issuing in a clearly foreseen end. 
 
 When Lescot died, the spirit of the Renaissance, 
 that spirit which had animated the very stones with 
 life, lay dying too. In its place came the rule of order 
 and good taste. To be correct, to be in good taste — 
 this became the summit of ambition both in art and 
 morals. The type, which was born of this ideal, was 
 
REPLACED BY THE RULE OF ORDER. 
 
 169 
 
 inaugurated by Henri IV., and we have but to look at 
 the portal of St. Eustache or the fronts of the Jesuit 
 churches of Paris, to see it in the full promise of its 
 sterile perfection. 
 
i7o 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 SCULPTURE (154O-1572). 
 
 Jean Goujon — Diane Chasseresse . 
 
 Labor et gloria vita fuit. Mors requies. 
 
 Michel Columbe was the forerunner of that band 
 of illustrious sculptors who worked under Bullant 
 and Lescot, and De FOrme. Columbe was ‘ tailleur 
 d’ymages’to three Kings of France, — to Louis XI., 
 Charles VIII., and Louis XII., — and his long life 
 covers nearly the whole of that early period which 
 saw the birth of the French Renaissance on the shores 
 of the Loire. 
 
 In 1511, when Margaret, Governess of the Low 
 Countries, required from him a model for the tomb 
 of her husband, Philibert of Savoy, Michel Columbe 
 was eighty years old. He had recently executed ( 1 508) a 
 bas-relief of St. George and the Dragon for the chateau 
 of Gaillon, and Anne of Brittany had employed him 
 on the royal monument which she erected in 1506 
 to the memory of her father, Frangois II., Duke of 
 Brittany, in the church of the Carmes at Nantes. A 
 tablet, affixed to the wall hard by, proclaimed ‘ M e 
 Michel Columbe premier sculpteur de son siecle 
 
MICHEL COLUMBE. 
 
 171 
 
 originaire de Fevesche de Leon en Bretagne.’ This 
 tomb was considered his capital work, and its fame 
 probably suggested his employment by the Duchess 
 Margaret. Columbe is said to have been trained at 
 Dijon by the celebrated Burgundian sculptors Claux 
 and Antoine le Mouturier, but he attached himself, 
 like the elder Clouet, to the rising court of France, 
 and in 1473 he was settled at Tours, and had been 
 commissioned by Louis XI. to execute a bas-relief for 
 the church of St. Michel-en-FHerme. 
 
 The general plan of the tomb of Frangois, Duke 
 of Brittany, shows little sign of change, but the details 
 betray the infiltration of elements from a new source. 
 It is clear that the sculptor had already been subjected 
 to the influences which were at work especially at Tours, 
 slowly transforming the fashion of French style. 
 
 At Tours, Columbe, like Fouquet, formed a school 
 and left not unworthy successors. His nephews, Bas- 
 tien and Martin les Frangois, worked with him on the 
 Cathedral of Tours, which once could boast its wealth 
 in proofs of their skill. U nder his direction, too, they 
 erected in Tours that still lovely, but mutilated monu- 
 ment, the Fontaine de Beaune. 
 
 It was put up in 1510 by Jacques de Beaune, who 
 had recently built himself a magnificent house at the 
 corner of the square which he adorned with this fountain. 
 The contract, containing minute stipulations concerning 
 every detail of the execution, has been published by 
 
172 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 M. Grandmaison, and is still preserved in the archives 
 of Tours. The four blocks of marble which compose 
 the pyramid by which the basin is surmounted were 
 commissioned at the cost of De Beaune from Genoa ; 
 the other expenses were defrayed by the municipality. 
 A commission, of which Michel Columbe himself was 
 a member, was appointed to direct the execution of the 
 work, and his two nephews, Bastien and Martin les 
 Frangois, were the sculptors to whom it was entrusted. 
 
 In the presence of this graceful work, we see that 
 the old things have incontestably passed away. The 
 Fontaine de Beaune was a genuine blossom of the 
 Renaissance, a flower which sprang up on French soil, 
 whilst the school of Fontainebleau was yet hidden in 
 the distance. The apparent simplicity of its construc- 
 tion conceals a combination of exquisite calculations. 
 The seven gradually-diminishing blocks of marble, 
 which rise out of the water to the sky, are diminished 
 with a perfection of skill which means thorough science 
 of means as well as a just instinct for the beauty ol 
 symmetrical proportions. They tower one above the 
 other till the last of the many-sided drums becomes 
 abruptly trilateral, and bears a pyramidal point, which 
 was of old surmounted by an enamelled crown and 
 hammered work of flowers, above which stood a group 
 of the Crucifixion, bronzed and gilt ; but these rich 
 ornaments are now replaced by a sharp iron spike 
 piercing through a tiny ball. 
 
JEAN JUSTE. 
 
 *73 
 
 The same admirable command ot means, the same 
 thorough science, go to the fashioning of every 
 decorative detail. The four porcupines, who bristle 
 from the four corners of a lower block, thrusting forth 
 their fleshy snouts into the air, are treated with 
 absolute mastery. The quaint archaic charm, the 
 touching naiveness, which stamp the works of the pre- 
 ceding century and affect us with a pleasure to be felt 
 rather than analysed, are past for ever. In their place 
 comes the dawning promise of the moment in which the 
 artist will finally free himself from all restraints, and 
 enter into the possession of mature powers. 
 
 The honour of having carved this lovely monu- 
 ment was of old wrongly attributed to the two Juste 
 de Tours, supposed to have been sons, or perhaps 
 brother and son, of Antoine Juste le Fleurentin, whose 
 name occurs in the accounts of the building of Gaillon. 
 Italian by extraction, the family had settled in Tour- 
 raine. The tomb of the children of Anne of Brittany, 
 now in Tours Cathedral, was executed by Jean Juste, 
 probably brother of Antoine, in 1506. In 1531 he 
 completed the magnificent mausoleum of Anne herself, 
 and her husband Louis XII. The work was executed 
 at Tours, and the order for its removal from Tours to 
 the Cathedral of St. Denis ‘ en France/ signed by 
 Francois I. at Marly on November 22, 1531, has been 
 printed for the first time by M. Grandmaison. 
 
 The tomb of Louis XII. and Anne forms a passage 
 
174 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 of transition between the tomb of Francis II., Duke 
 of Brittany, which represents the opening moment of 
 the Renaissance ; and the monuments of the later epoch, 
 the tombs of Francois I. and Henri II., beside which it 
 stands. The first aspect is that of very strongly pro- 
 nounced Renaissance treatment, but there is one feature 
 which expresses a tendency proper to the dawn of the 
 movement : that is, the exceeding lowness of the 
 bas-reliefs. Throughout this tomb all these passages 
 are kept so subdued that they have the effect of flat 
 spaces and are actually used as such to relieve the more 
 conspicuous arabesques and figures above them. The 
 style of these arabesques recalls those of the Hotel 
 Pined (1523), and of the staircase of the chateau of 
 Blois, but the four allegorical figures who occupy the 
 corners, and the prophets who peer from beneath the 
 arcades which shut in the sarcophagus from sight, show 
 unmistakable signs of Italian parentage ; draperies 
 freely cast slip from shoulder to loin, and every figure 
 is full of action. 
 
 The modelling of the dead bodies, on the other 
 hand, which lie beneath the canopy within the shelter- 
 ing arcades, is carried out with a conscientious ex- 
 actness which suffers no terrible detail to escape, 
 and from which all thought of effective display is 
 absent, and the kneeling figures of the King and Queen 
 which surmount the canopy are thoroughly French in 
 their precise and spirited character. They show the 
 
JEAN GOUJON. 
 
 175 
 
 power of the school of Tours to infuse something of 
 the leading elements of its style, even where, as in 
 the case of Jean Juste, the strong bias of a foreign 
 nationality, and probably of a foreign training, opposed 
 its immediate influence. 
 
 The generation which inherited the labours of Michel 
 Columbe, the Francois, and the Juste, never came to 
 fruitful perfection. The most distinguished sculptors 
 of the sixteenth century, Jean Goujon and Germain 
 Pilon, made no school during their life-time, and left 
 no worthy successors. Pilon, indeed, was seriously in- 
 jured by the influence of the bastard sentiment proper 
 to the school of Fontainebleau; and Goujon, though 
 his healthy temperament preserved him from being 
 deeply infected by its foreign tone, yet was now and 
 again caught by the artificial graces which lent an 
 insidious charm to the fading glories of Florentine 
 style. Cousin we have scarcely the right to reckon 
 amongst the sculptors, although we owe to him the 
 monument of Admiral Chabot, one of the most com- 
 plete works of this epoch — a work, the technic of 
 which is so accomplished that it seems impossible that 
 it should have been due to the chisel of a man who 
 had not devoted his life to the profession. But 
 Cousin’s activity expressed itself in the main in other 
 directions, and it is as a painter, and especially as a 
 painter on glass, that he must be considered. ‘ Le 
 opere,’ says Cicognara, ‘che onorano maggiormente lo 
 
176 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 scarpello francese, sono quelle che si attribuiscono a 
 Giovanni Goujon, di cui signora e patria e nascita.’ 
 Even now we do not know whence Goujon came. 
 
 The first contemporary mention of his name occurs 
 in the accounts of the chapter of Rouen cathedral, and 
 of the church of St. Maclou. M. Deville, in his 
 ‘ Tombeaux de la Cath^drale de Rouen,’ gives extracts 
 from these accounts for building and repairs, from 
 which we learn that in 1540 Goujon had already exe- 
 cuted for the chapter ‘ les portraitz ’ (designs) ‘ du portail 
 et de la fontaine,’ for which he receives the sum of 
 six livres fifteen sols. On May 22 in the following 
 year, he receives fifty-seven sols six deniers for another 
 design for a column and pedestal for the pipes of the 
 organ of St. Maclou. Again, in August, a contract 
 was made with him for the execution in the same 
 church of two marble columns, the capitals and bases 
 of which were to be white ; but the shaft and foot 
 black marble of Tournay. For this work he was to 
 receive a total of seventy escus soleil, of which thirty- 
 five were paid in advance. For his wine on the same 
 day, he receives five sols. Another design executed 
 in the course of the same year, was for a 1 custode 
 pour porter le corps de nostre Seigneur,’ for which he 
 receives twenty-five sols eight deniers, and thirty sols 
 were also paid to him for having made ‘ le deviz de 
 paindre les orgues.’ 
 
 Two little doors ‘ enclaves dans les vanteaux de 
 
GOUJON'S WORK AT ROUEN 
 
 1 77 
 
 leglise,’ of which no mention occurs in the accounts, 
 have also been attributed to Goujon ; if not actually 
 his work they have at least all the characteristics of 
 his design. They have been twice engraved, but very 
 differently. M. Dusommerard gives not only the 
 little gates themselves, but their entire surrounding 
 framework; the drawing of M. Vauzelle (one of the 
 illustrations of M. Willemin’s ‘ Monumens de la Renais- 
 sance, et du Moyen Age ’) reproduces the little gates 
 alone. They have been much injured, having been 
 long covered with whitewash, but the touch of Goujons 
 hand still lingers on the lines. M. Vauzelle’s drawing 
 is a specimen of delicate accuracy. Side by side with 
 it, the coarse work in Dusommerard is scarcely to be 
 recognised as representing the same thing. In his 
 version the beautiful basin (which forms the base to 
 a female figure ending in scroll-work) out of which two 
 birds are drinking, is transformed into a crown, whilst 
 the five birds which support it become a mere unmean- 
 ing mass of decorative flourish. In the right-hand 
 lower panel the female figure, to whose left foot the 
 reins of the dolphins are fastened, is hardly recognisable, 
 and a comparison of these two plates alone is suffi- 
 cient to show how worthless the Dusommerard illus- 
 trations always are for any purpose of reference. 
 
 During the same years in which Goujon was 
 working in St. Maclou, he worked also in Rouen 
 Cathedral. Georges, nephew of Cardinal d’Amboise, 
 
 VOL. I. N 
 
i/8 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 minister of Louis XII., decided, in 1541, to remove the 
 attendant angels from the tomb of his uncle, that he 
 might set up his own figure instead. He employed 
 Goujon to execute ‘ la teste du prians et sepulture de 
 monseigneur et pourparfaire et asseoir icelle en sa place/ 
 paying him, on April 6, thirty livres for the design. 
 Goujon’s work did not, however, remain long in situ , for 
 Georges, dying a cardinal, some ten years after its 
 completion, ordered in his will that the figure should 
 be replaced by another in cardinal’s robes — the clumsy 
 effigy still existing. 
 
 On the fact that Goujon had been working in 
 Rouen for some time previous to 1540, has been based 
 the attribution to him of the tomb of Louis de Breze. 
 On March 27, 1535, Diane de Poitiers signified to the 
 chapter by letter her intention to erect a tomb to her 
 husband in the cathedral, ‘ ce qu’elle n’avait pu effec- 
 tuer jusqu’a ce jour en ayant ete empechee par un 
 grand nombre d’autres affaires.’ After this date 
 some time must have elapsed whilst the materials of 
 which the monument is composed were collected, for 
 it is a splendid mausoleum rather than a tomb. In 
 the centre stands the sarcophagus surmounted by a 
 sculptured corpse ; at the sides are lofty columns be- 
 tween which appears on the right the mourning figure 
 of Diane supplicating consolation from the Blessed 
 Virgin, who occupies a corresponding position on the 
 left : ‘ Suscipe preces, Virgo benigna ! ’ At the back 
 
THE TOMB OF LOUIS DE BREZE. 
 
 179 
 
 stood, formerly, a statue of De Breze wearing the 
 mantle and coronet of a Count ; above appeared, be- 
 neath a semicircular arcade, a second effigy, which 
 still represents him mounted and armed as a warrior 
 riding to the field. Around the entablature which 
 crowned the first order ran a frieze composed of masks 
 and pendant garlands alive with delicate birds ; from 
 each mask hung a label bearing the De Breze 
 motto, ‘ Tant grate chevre que mal giste.’ At other 
 points the stags themselves were introduced rampant, 
 and supporting shields bearing the initials L. B. inter- 
 laced. The decorations were further enriched by 
 Caryatides representing Victory, Faith, Prudence, and 
 Glory, bearing baskets of fruit on their heads, and ac- 
 companied by explanatory inscriptions ; besides these, 
 four female figures surmounted the main columns, and 
 finally, in a niche above the arcade which contained the 
 equestrian statue, stood an allegorical figure, the inten- 
 tion of which, except as a portion of the design, is not 
 obvious. 
 
 These statues are all of white alabaster, but the 
 plinth and sarcophagus, the shafts of the columns, the 
 cornices and entablatures, were carried out in black 
 marble enriched sparingly with gold. The work was 
 fully completed about the time of Goujons departure 
 from Rouen, for a manuscript (quoted by M. Deville), 
 which dates from 1544, gives the various inscriptions 
 which figure upon it. But the attribution to Goujon 
 
i8o 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 is only conjectural, and the question cannot be re- 
 garded as finally settled. Occasionally the monument 
 is still ascribed to Cousin, but during 1535-40 Cousin 
 was fully occupied at Paris, and it is therefore not 
 likely to have been his work. 
 
 Goujon left Rouen to become one of the distin- 
 guished band of men employed on the restorations of 
 St. Germain l’Auxerrois, under the direction of Pierre 
 Lescot. The Abb6 de Clagny was a man of genius 
 as well as education, and capable, therefore, of quick- 
 ening the minds of others ; so that Goujon, during the 
 time he worked under him, was prepared to receive 
 the influences which awaited him at Ecouen. It is 
 supposed that the carvings of the pulpit were the 
 principal portion of Goujons work in this church ; but 
 the accounts of the building show that he executed 
 much besides. M. de Laborde had the good fortune 
 to discover several of these entries dating from 1 542 to 
 1544 on a morsel of parchment ‘ qui avait 6te employe 
 a une reliure.’ 
 
 One of these specifies, as executed by Goujon, a 
 Notre Dame de Pidtd y which, however, can no longer be 
 identified, and also four Evangelists ‘ a demye taille 
 servant au diet pupitre.’ The pulpit was described by 
 Sauval in 1600, and again in 1718, by Germain Brice, 
 who adds that it shows ‘ des ornemens de sculpture 
 estimes seulement parcequ’ils sont dun maitre de re- 
 putation. On croit que cet ouvrage est de Germain 
 
THE PULPIT OF ST. GERMAIN LAUXERROIS. 181 
 
 Pilon, qui avait encore quelque reste du gout gothique.’ 
 These disgraceful remains of Gothic taste were re- 
 moved some years later (1754) when the church was 
 cleansed and beautified by enthusiastic churchwardens. 
 The pulpit was of stone (‘ en pierre de liais ’) decorated 
 with a large bas-relief of the Descent from the Cross, 
 supported to right and left by four small columns on 
 which stood the four Evangelists. These four figures, 
 together with the bas-relief, had been built into side 
 chapels when removed from the pulpit ; and when these 
 chapels were destroyed during the Revolution, the 
 works of Goujon were secured by M. Lenoir for the 
 Museum of the Petits Augustins. According to his usual 
 plan of piecing together the various fragments which 
 he collected, he inserted the bas-relief of the Descent 
 from the Cross at the foot of the pedestal on which 
 he had placed a column erected to Charles de Bourbon 
 (the Charles X. of the League). The column itself 
 had originally borne a statue of the Cardinal, but this 
 statue had been broken past restoration. 
 
 The remains of the pulpit ultimately found their 
 way, after strange vicissitudes, to their present resting- 
 place in the galleries of the Louvre, but before they 
 left the Petits Augustins they were visited by 
 Cicognara, who severely criticised the Descent from 
 the Cross which then enjoyed a great reputation. 
 ‘We are,’ he says, ‘convinced that this was not the 
 style in which this artist best succeeded ; the distribm 
 
182 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 tion and shape of the composition is unhappy, and the 
 breaking up ( tritume ) of the folds injures the effect of 
 the principal masses.’ He further objects to the rigid 
 and angular drop of the body of Christ, finds an affec- 
 tation of movement rather than life and passion, and 
 somewhat hastily concludes that the field of Goujon’s 
 true success lay in architectural decoration. 
 
 From Paris, Goujon went out to Ecouen, where 
 the Constable de Montmorency was occupying his 
 years of exile from Court with the execution of those 
 magnificent works which gave Ecouen a foremost place 
 among the chateaux of the French Renaissance. The 
 period of his employment there, under Bullant, cannot 
 have lasted more than one or two years, but it marks 
 an important epoch in his career. Till then he had 
 scarcely crossed the threshold of provincial life ; 
 Ecouen placed him at once in the world of Paris. He 
 lived amongst the triumphs of sixteenth-century art 
 gathered together by the richest prince in France. 
 Here, he perfected the training which he had already 
 received from Lescot in the company of Bullant, of 
 Palissy, of Jean Martin (the translator of Vitruvius) and 
 other men of mark. Here, he found himself within 
 reach of the highest rewards possible to his profession. 
 
 Up to this moment Goujon’s patron had been the 
 Church ; from this moment he ceases to work for her. 
 The Church, indeed, during the movement of the 
 Renaissance, ceased to occupy the pre-eminent position 
 
GOUJON AT ECOUEN. 
 
 183 
 
 as mistress of the arts. The development of secular 
 magnificence eclipsed the brilliance of ecclesiastical 
 splendour. Even the monuments which were neces- 
 sarily erected in sacred buildings had an essentially 
 human character, they were sustained by earthly motives, 
 and spoke of the desires of the flesh rather than of 
 the aspirations of the spirit. The chapel and the 
 tomb were but a part of the fitting furniture of the 
 palace, and as such shared in the general wealth of 
 decoration. Even the princes of the Church, as for 
 example Cardinal du Bellay, lavished their revenues 
 not in raising cathedrals, but in building for themselves 
 ‘ a lordly pleasure-house.’ In the service of the great 
 nobles and their chief, the artist found the widest scope 
 for his efforts, and the richest reward for his labours. 
 
 It is also possible that Goujon, who has always 
 been claimed as a Huguenot, found it more pleasant 
 as well as more profitable, to work for secular patrons. 
 At Ecouen he came directly under the influence not 
 only of the Humanists but of the Reformers. He 
 lived not only with Jean Martin, but with Palissy. 
 He was amongst Huguenot workmen, working for the 
 head of a family which furnished chiefs to the Hugue- 
 not party. Had he become, like Palissy, a violent 
 religionist, we certainly should not have been allowed 
 to remain in ignorance of it ; yet, on the other hand, 
 we can hardly believe that he resembled Cousin, a 
 man of considerable intellectual culture and therefore 
 
1 84 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 not likely to be very outspoken. In his work we know 
 Goujon as a skilful craftsman, endowed with a full sense 
 of beauty, and subtle rather than profound perceptions 
 of character, with powers sustained in natural activity 
 by a vigorous healthful temperament ; too harmo- 
 niously energetic to be twisted by brooding asce- 
 ticism into a fanatic, but just the person whose warm 
 and generous sympathies would be caught by the 
 contagion of the Huguenot opinions of those amongst 
 whom he lived, and whose honest mind once actively 
 interested would be delicately susceptible to simple 
 scruples. 
 
 Fragments of the various works supposed to have 
 been executed by Goujon at £couen, carvings in 
 marble and stone and wood, were collected by M. 
 Lenoir, and most of these passed from the Museum 
 which he had constituted, into the Louvre. One of 
 these, which however I do not find there, a remarkable 
 figure of Victory, carved in line with decorative orna- 
 ments on a panelling, has been reproduced by M. 
 Willemin. The figure, which bears a certain resem- 
 blance to the figures of the oeils-de-boeuf of the Louvre, 
 stands with great dignity, and holds the symbolic 
 crown and palm. The draping is in one respect 
 peculiar ; the scarf wound round the head is drawn 
 over the right arm and twisted into a knot through a 
 band hanging from the girdle which is also employed 
 to support the tunic. This veil or scarf is also em- 
 
GOUJONS ILLUSTRATIONS OF VITRUVIUS. 185 
 
 ployed pendant in a similar fashion from the head of a 
 figure in the Louvre court. In both cases it serves a 
 like purpose, balancing the movement of the figure just 
 as in the Ecouen wood-carving it carries off and 
 supports the broad curves of the palm of Victory. 
 The bit of panel, if not actually from the hand of 
 Goujon, must have been carried out from his designs, 
 and the capital engraved upon the same leaf, if com- 
 pared with Goujon’s illustration of the order ‘ Latine, 
 ou Composite,’ at p. 35 of Martin’s Vitruvius, will be 
 found to resemble it too closely for accident. 
 
 The illustrations to Vitruvius were also a work 
 of the days passed at Ecouen. Jean Martin, who was 
 secretary to Cardinal Lenoncourt, brought out his 
 translation, ‘ en langage que je lui ’ (Vitruvius) ‘ ai apris 
 a parler en deux ans,’ shortly after the accession of 
 Henri II. in 1547, with a dedication to the King. In 
 his ‘Notice to the Reader,’ he says, ‘si . . . je ne 
 me feusse prevalu du labeur . . . de maistre Jehan 
 Goujon qui a faict nouvellement les figures concernantes 
 la massonnerie . . . jamais je ne feusse venu au bout 
 de mo entreprise.’ 
 
 Goujon himself adds a preface : ‘Vitruve diet, 
 messeigneurs, et plusieurs autres autheurs antiques et 
 modernes, le confirment qu’entre les autres sciences 
 requises a decorer l’architecture, ou 1’art de bien bastir, 
 Geometrie et Perspective sont les deux principales. 
 Et n’est aucun digne d’etre estime architects s’il n’est 
 
1 86 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 prealablement bien instruict en ces deux. Qu’il soit 
 vray, nous en avons eu Fexperience par noz predeces- 
 seurs de bonne memoire : A savoir, Raphael d’Urbin 
 (qui a este parfaict en Fart de paincture), Andre 
 Mantegne, non inferieur en son temps, Michel Ange, 
 Antoine Sangal, Bramant, et assez d’autres excellens 
 hommes.’ After these great names he mentions 
 Sebastian Serlio, then residing in France, and ascribes 
 to him ‘ le commencement de mettre tels doctrines en 
 lumiere au royaume. Toutes fois,’ he adds, ‘j’en 
 congnois plusieurs autres qui sont capables de ce faire, 
 neantmoins ilz ne sen sont encores mis en peine : et 
 pourtant ne sont dignes de petite louenge. Entre ceulx 
 la ce peut compter le seigneur de Clagny (Lescot), 
 Parisien, si faict aussi maistre Philibert de FOrme 
 lequel assez suffisamment a conduict un edifice que 
 monseigneur le Cardinal du Bellay a faict faire en son 
 lieu de Sainct Mor dez Fossez lez Paris. Et combien 
 que pour le present je ne m’amuse a en nommer 
 davantage si est ce que je le pourroye bien faire ; mais 
 je men desiste tout a propos pour en eviter prolixite, 
 voulant retourner a la deduction d’icelles, Geometrie et 
 Perspective, qui me faict dire de rechef que Fhomme 
 prive de leur intelligence ne s9auroit fors a grand’ 
 peine entendre le texte de Vitruve : et a la verite la 
 congnoissance que Dieu m’en a donn^e me faict 
 enhardir de dire que tous hommes qui ne les ont point 
 estudides, ne peuvent faire oeuvres dont ilz puissent 
 
GOUJONS ILLUSTRATIONS OF VITRUVIUS. 187 
 
 acquerir gueres grande louenge si ce nest par quelque 
 ignorant ou personnage trop facile a contenter.’ 
 
 The last sentence has a touch of the hardy plain- 
 speaking of Palissy, the accent of undoubting self- 
 confidence proper to the self-taught artisan ; and it 
 is evident that the assistance which Martin received 
 from Goujon in elucidating the text was confined to 
 points of practice only. Nevertheless, Goujon’s co- 
 operation in the work has been adduced as evidence 
 of his knowledge of Latin, but Martin, both in his 
 dedication and in the notice to readers, expressly limits 
 the aid given by Goujon to ‘ figures nouvelles concer- 
 nantes l’art de la massonnerie.’ Of these figures, seven- 
 teen are specified by Goujon, in his list of annotations, 
 i.e. 34, 35, and 37 to 40 ; 46 and 48 to 57, and these 
 may be taken as certainly his. Deveria attributed to 
 him the figures, as well as the architectural designs 
 contained in the volume, but these figures Quatremere 
 de Quincy excluded. There is, however, nothing 
 specially distinguishing in their style, and as Goujon 
 possessed more than sufficient knowledge for their 
 execution, there is no reason for their exclusion from 
 the rest of his work. 
 
 A marked difference does, however, exist between 
 the illustrations of the first seven books, and those 
 which accompany the eighth, ninth, and tenth. All 
 the designs in the three last books are by a very inferior 
 hand, and are also less well engraved than those which 
 
i88 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 precede them. One of the best of the early cuts, the 
 Scene satyrique (79), is signed on one of the blocks of 
 stone in the foreground with the monogram [gj, — the 
 initials, probably, of the engraver. The cut preceding 
 it, the Scene comique , is also a good example. It is 
 curious as presenting on the base of the statue of Diana, 
 which forms part of the decorations, the salamander of 
 Francis I., whilst the crescent is used in the orna- 
 ments of the adjacent houses often enough to suggest 
 an allusion to the mistress of Henri II. The design, 
 indeed, was probably begun under the reign of Fran- 
 £ois and completed after the accession of his son. 
 
 Before the book was in print, Goujon had passed 
 from the service of the Constable to the service of 
 Henri II. Martin says of him in his dedication, 
 
 4 nagueres architecte de monseigneur le Connetable, et 
 maintenant Fun des votres.’ He was employed at 
 Paris on the interior and exterior decorations of the 
 Louvre, and there found himself again under the direc- 
 tion of the Seigneur de Clagny, Pierre Lescot. Goujon 
 was at this date (1547), as nearly as we can guess, 
 somewhere between thirty-five and forty years old ; 
 and he continued to work on the Louvre, with various 
 interruptions from other commissions, for the rest of 
 his life. The carvings of the south-west angle of the 
 court are his, and his too are the decorations of the 
 Escalier Henri If. and the figures of the Tribune des 
 Cariatides. 
 
GOUJONS WORK ON THE LOUVRE. 189 
 
 Sixteen of the figures either side of the upper 
 windows of the west fagade are attributed to Goujon 
 without contest, and his also are those to right and left 
 of the ceils-de-boeuf above the doors in the angle below. 
 The frieze of children and birds playing in garlands of 
 fruit and foliage, which had been long claimed for him, 
 must now be transferred, in virtue of a document lately 
 published by M. Berty, to the credit of names less 
 known, for Pierre and Francois l’Heureux, Martin le 
 Fort, and Pierre Nanyn were paid for its execution in 
 the year 1562-3. If compared with the frieze of the 
 Escalier Henri II. it will be seen that though the general 
 arrangement of the composition bears a strong resem- 
 blance to Goujon’s design, the actual work in parts is 
 less strong. The birds are charming, they peck and 
 flutter with lively movement, but the action of the 
 children is not so happy, and they are slighter and 
 weaker in form than the mighty infants who figure in 
 the bas-reliefs of the staircase. 
 
 M. Berty notices great differences of technic and 
 even of style in the execution of the sculptures of the 
 staircase, the Caryatides, and the figures of the attic. 
 The bas-reliefs especially about the doorway are ex- 
 cessively elegant, in low relief, and delicate rather than 
 vigorous in drawing. The Caryatides on the other 
 hand stand out in full prominence, and the forms are 
 indicated with boldness and freedom. Finally, the 
 figures of the attic appear to M. Berty clumsy, and 
 
1 90 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FINANCE. 
 
 ( tres saillans.’ But these differences in execution and 
 style were necessitated by the different positions for 
 which the works were intended. The bas-reliefs of the 
 doorway had to meet the eye at a near level, they ad- 
 dress us in the low key befitting close approach. The 
 Caryatides were destined to stand conspicuous in the 
 Guard-room, bearing with triumphant ease the weighty 
 gallery resting on their heads, and the vigour of their 
 treatment is expressly calculated to command our at- 
 tention. The figures of the attic were intended to 
 appeal to us from a considerable height, they are there- 
 fore struck out with a force which would be intolerable 
 at a lesser distance. The very movements, and atti- 
 tudes, which if close at hand would appear exaggerated, 
 when seen from below have no more than a duly pro- 
 portioned effect. 
 
 In spite of ‘ poses affectees,’ a charge which may 
 with more or less justice be brought against much of 
 Goujon’s work, the figures of the attic are remarkable 
 not only for grace, but dignity. Now and again the 
 drapery is too much cut up ; details, such as the wings 
 of the figure of History, are ill placed; or attitudes, 
 as, for example, that of Commerce, are in themselves 
 awkward : but in spite of these serious blemishes the 
 architectural intention of the decoration is so well kept 
 in view that the effect of the whole does not suffer. 
 The value of every line is felt in relation to the direc- 
 tion taken by those of the surrounding framework, a 
 
CARYATIDES OF THE SALLE DES GARDES. 191 
 
 certain charm of grace and feeling is not wanting even 
 to the least successful reliefs, and some possess also an 
 independent value. The figure of War challenges the 
 the most searching inspection. The graceful elegance 
 of line which is inseparable from Goujon's work, has in 
 this instance caught an appropriate energy which gives 
 an unusual grandeur to his style. 
 
 The reliefs, and other exterior decorations of the 
 south-west angle were probably the last work executed 
 by Goujon for the Louvre. There is, indeed, no receipt 
 or other document extant which might fix the date 
 of their completion, but looking at the mere amount 
 of the work we see that they cannot have been com- 
 pleted in the three years between his return to Paris, 
 and his departure for Anet. These three years were 
 probably occupied in producing the E scalier Henri //., 
 the Fons Nymphium, and the Caryatides of the Salle 
 des Gardes . The reliefs which decorate the exterior 
 of the Louvre must have been produced at a later 
 date. 
 
 Michelet has drawn a suggestive picture of the 
 lively Duchess d’Etampes, mistress of the last days 
 of Frangois I., calling, to decorate her rooms, a 
 Frenchman, a young man, the magician Jean Goujon. 
 The Caryatides of her mysterious chamber seem, 
 says M. Michelet, Tessai d’un jeune homme, hardi, 
 incorrect, and heureux.’ But unfortunately for M. 
 Michelet’s romance, the 737 livres tournois which 
 
192 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Goujon received on September 5, 1550, are actually 
 specified (and that contrary to common custom) as pay- 
 ment for the execution of these Caryatides which were 
 destined for a chamber no less mysterious than the 
 Salle des Gardes. Anne de Pisseleu was then far from 
 Paris and from power, and Goujon, whom she had 
 probably never seen, for he was certainly not employed 
 on the Louvre till after the death of her royal lover, 
 was on the eve of departure for A net, there to labour in 
 the service of her old enemy, the then reigning favourite, 
 Diane de Poitiers. 
 
 The Caryatides have always commanded the admi- 
 ration not only of the public, but of judges trained in the 
 most opposite schools of criticism. Sauval does not 
 forget them, they are engraved in Perrault’s Vitruvius, 
 Quatremere de Quincy pays them fitting tribute, and 
 Cicognara cannot withhold his homage from ‘ le belle 
 cariatidi colossali, . . . che possono venire a para con 
 quante altro se ne conoscono in simil genere.’ ‘ II tocco 
 vivace dello scarpello,’ the lively touch of the chisel 
 which animates everything coming from Goujon’s hands, 
 is never more conspicuous than in the modelling of these 
 figures where it allies itself with a dignity, and even 
 solemnity of conception which is of almost heroic 
 inspiration. Out of the frequent feet of idle crowds, 
 these mysterious figures rise bearing eternal witness in 
 their brooding quiet to the splendid effort with which 
 Goujon sought to reach a deeper secret in his art. The 
 
THE CAR YA TIDES. 
 
 193 
 
 burden of a riddle never to be read lies on their lips, 
 desire never to be fulfilled enchants their sight, in 
 dreams they have seen the unattainable, and in life 
 they have sought that perfection which allures, and 
 eludes ; for ever foiled they have for ever renewed their 
 search, ‘ seeing the wider but to sigh the more. Most 
 progress is most failure ! ’ 
 
 The knot formed in the centre of the body by 
 the drapery of these figures has been the subject of 
 severe animadversion. The mode was not peculiar 
 to Goujon, but popular in his day. The Lucretia of 
 Raphael, engraved by Marc Antonio, shows this 
 arrangement, and the works of Agostino Busti and 
 Benvenuto Cellini furnish numerous examples of the 
 same treatment. When the whole figure is seen, this 
 knot has the disadvantage of marking a division which 
 consists of two nearly equal halves, and so giving an 
 undue preponderance to the body whilst the lower limbs 
 look awkwardly shortened ; but the modified form 
 in which it is employed by Goujon in the Caryatides 
 seems free from this objection. The knot and the 
 folds of the drapery which it confines gather the 
 upper lines together, the eye is satisfied, and a point 
 is obtained which is valuable in relation to the con- 
 structive lines of the gallery itself, and out of which 
 the lower curves flow gracefully to the base. 
 
 No similar defence can be raised for the practice 
 of looping up the drapery from both legs, a pecu- 
 
 vol. 1. 
 
 o 
 
194 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 liarity which is conspicuously hideous in the Ceres 
 introduced, with the companion figure of Bacchus, by 
 MM. Perrier and Fontaine, above the fireplace of 
 the Salle des Cariatides. Both these figures have been 
 attributed to Goujon, but the attribution is, I think, 
 doubtful. Those who are in its favour explain the 
 clumsy pose and heavy treatment of the figure of 
 Bacchus by insisting that, since the predominant cha- 
 racteristic of Goujon’s style was grace, he, therefore, 
 succeeded better in dealing with feminine than mascu- 
 line forms. But this argument, which may furnish an 
 apology for Bacchus, cannot apply to Ceres ; for, if it 
 is certainly true that Goujon was an essentially grace- 
 ful artist, it is equally certain that Ceres is a very un- 
 graceful figure, awkward and pervaded by an air of 
 polite affectation. The Bacchus is heavy, not so much 
 because the treatment (as M. de Clarac has remarked) 
 is wanting in energy, as because the action and atti- 
 tude of the figure are in themselves ill-conceived. 
 The modelling also throughout is conspicuously defi- 
 cient in intelligent finish, and neither recalls the virile 
 force which distinguishes the handling of the Carya- 
 tides, nor the exquisite delicacy which caresses the faint 
 reliefs of the Henri II. staircase, and the supple forms 
 which grace the Fontaine des Innocents . 
 
 The Fontaine des Innocents , or Fons Nymphium, 
 must have been decorated by Goujon during the early 
 years of his employment on the Louvre. It was 
 
FONTAINE EES INNOCENTS. 
 
 195 
 
 already complete when Henri II. made his entry into 
 Paris on June 6, 1549. In the description of the pro- 
 cession published by Jean Dallier, the work is 
 specially mentioned. ‘ Plus oultre sur main droite 
 se trouvait la Fontaine sainct Innocent de nouveau 
 rebastie dun ouvrage singulier enrichy de figures 
 de nymphes, fleurs, et fontaines a demy taille, 
 ensemble de feuillaiges si artificiellement undoyans 
 et refendus, qu’il nest possible de Texprimer en petit 
 de parolles, par quoy en est laisse le jugement a ceux 
 qui de present la peuvent voir et s’entendent en tels 
 ouvrages.’ 
 
 Corrozet chronicles the fact of its erection, which 
 he dates in a later year. He says, ‘ L'an mil cinq 
 cens cinquante, les fontaines S. Innocent furent basties 
 de neuf avec un corps d’hostel par dessus, le tout de 
 pierre entaillie a lantique ou sont representees au 
 naturel les nymphes, et dieux Poetiques, sur deux des 
 quelles estans demy nues est escrit en lettres d or, 
 Fontium Nymphis.’ 
 
 More fortunate in this respect than other works 
 of equal beauty to which the same century gave 
 birth, the weird sisters of the Fons Nymphium seem 
 never to have lost their power. They have main- 
 tained their value in mens eyes as things specially 
 precious and apart, even at moments when the popular 
 taste seemed least likely to value the qualities which 
 they possess. For their beauty has a strange ascetic 
 
196 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IA FRANCE. 
 
 calm and the sensuous curves of line which might 
 fascinate the common gazer are checked in the full 
 swell of voluptuous expression ; across the delicate 
 sentiment which plays about the slight suggestions of 
 movement and of gesture, falls the faint shadow of the 
 past, tinging with vague melancholy the subtle and 
 singular charm which for ever obeys these spirits of 
 the floods. 
 
 Throughout, the treatment keeps the same low- 
 toned level of exquisite refinement, neither fading into 
 flat insignificance nor approaching the directness of 
 obvious appeal. What attraction could work such as this 
 have for senses trained to enthusiasm for the inflated 
 and sterile pomp of Louis XIV. ? Yet Germain Brice 
 exclaims : ‘ On ne peut rien desirer de plus beau, et de 
 mieux execute que les bas-reliefs que Ton y voit, 
 lesquels represented des nayades dans diverses atti- 
 tudes.' ‘ Le Cavalier Bernin/ he continues, * fort 
 avare des louanges, et qui affectoit selon Timper- 
 tinent et ridicule maniere de ceux de sa nation, de ne 
 rien estimer de tout ce qu’il voyait de beau en cette 
 ville, ne peut sempecher de se recrier en examinant cet 
 incomparable ouvrage.’ A later writer, De Bachaumont, 
 praises ‘ la belle forme, lelegante simplicity, la l^gerete 
 de son Architecture, la delicatesse de ses Pilastres, 
 l’agrement de ses bas-reliefs, et la finesse de leur execu- 
 tion.' 
 
 Up till 1787 the Fons Nymphium, the ancient 
 
FONTAINE DES INNOCENTS. 
 
 197 
 
 Fountain of the Innocents, stood in decaying beauty on 
 its original site, occupying the angle of the Rue St. 
 Denis and the Rue aux Fers ; but in that year it was 
 doomed. The Government had determined to carry 
 out certain demolitions in the neighbourhood. The 
 fountain, which, it is supposed, had been originally 
 intended to form an independent monument, had, in 
 the lapse of years, become gradually built into the ad- 
 jacent houses ; it had, indeed, says M. Quatremere de 
 Quincy, itself become part of a house. The project 
 of the Government entailed the destruction of the 
 houses by which it was surrounded and conse- 
 quently the destruction of the fountain itself. It was 
 announced that, as the sculptures of Goujon were, in- 
 deed, all that was worth preserving, they should be 
 removed to a place of safety. In the same way, only a 
 few years before, had the Porte St. Antoine fallen, and 
 the sculptures which decorated it — works certainly of 
 Goujon’s school, if not by his own hand — had been re- 
 moved. 
 
 In the ‘Journal de Paris’ of Feb. 11, 1787, M, 
 de Quincy published an energetic appeal to the public. 
 He urged that to displace work of this kind was to 
 destroy it. Sculptured bas-reliefs destined for distinct 
 architectural service, figures intended to be framed be- 
 tween excessively narrow dividing pilasters, if displaced 
 were indeed destroyed. He remarks of the fountain, 
 looked at as a whole, what is strictly true of all work 
 
198 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 executed during this period, a period rich in the hap- 
 piest inspiration — that the perfect concert of every form 
 and line leaves us in doubt whether the sculptor were 
 the architect or the architect the sculptor, ‘ genre de 
 mdrite dont les ages suivans ne nous retracent plus 
 d’exemple.’ 
 
 In consequence of this appeal, when the houses 
 fell the fountain was left standing. In its isolated 
 position it looked unfinished. Even so, it is open to 
 doubt whether the wisest course would not have been 
 to have let it alone. However, M. de Quincy ad- 
 dressed to the authorities of the town a proposal for 
 transplanting it to the centre of the adjoining space, 
 previously occupied by a cemetery, but then destined 
 to become a market. 
 
 Although convinced that the original intention had 
 been to make of this fountain an oblong detached 
 building, pierced by arcades, two in the sides and one 
 on each front, M. de Quincy proposed to re-erect it 
 on a square ground-plan, employing the existing three 
 arcades to form three sides, and building a fourth in 
 imitation. The project was realised, but its ill-success 
 only illustrated the truth of M. de Quincy’s statement, 
 that to displace work of this class is to destroy it. 
 He himself apologised for the poverty and ungainli- 
 ness of the effect produced, by explaining that the base 
 was too considerable for the superstructure, and that 
 consequently the sculptures which decorated it were 
 
FONTAINE DES INNOCENTS . 
 
 7 99 
 
 carried too far from the eye. The original architec- 
 tural proportions had been in fact completely done 
 away with, but the sculptures were as yet uninjured. 
 
 It was however decided to make this little building 
 the point whence the outflow of the canal from the 
 Ourcq should commence. The volume of water not only 
 looked too much, but was too much for the solidity of the 
 structure, and it soon became evident that the moisture 
 was gradually deteriorating the sculptures. In 1820, 
 the bas-reliefs of the base, which suffered the most from 
 the overflow of the waters, were removed to the 
 Louvre, but the rest of Goujon’s work still remains 
 exposed. 
 
 Those who saw the fountain as it originally stood 
 in the Rue St. Denis had, of course, better means of 
 estimating the probable intention of its projector than 
 we now possess ; but the terms in which it is spoken 
 of by Corrozet and by the author of the text of the 
 ‘Entree d’Henri II.’ imply that in 1550 it was con- 
 sidered a complete work. It would seem, therefore, 
 that it was from the first intended to be built into 
 the neighbouring houses and to form a part of the 
 front of the street in which ’it stood, so that when 
 Goujon, having completed the Caryatides, left Paris for 
 A net, the fountain was really finished. 
 
 At Anet Goujon produced, according to common 
 report, a large proportion of the enormous quantity of 
 decorations with which the chateau was enriched. 
 
200 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 The greater part have been destroyed. Much had 
 perished, in the slow course of the alterations and im- 
 provements made by successive inhabitants, when the 
 great Revolution came, and in one short year brought 
 the vast fabric to the ground. The gateway of the 
 chateau , the carvings of which were from Goujon’s 
 hand, stands now in the court of the Ecole des Beaux 
 Arts at Paris ; smaller gates also executed by him are 
 said to have been removed to the Cathedral of Beauvais. 
 H is Diane chasseresse , which surmounted the fountain 
 of the cour cThonneur , is preserved in the Louvre ; but 
 much even of that which the Revolution spared has 
 since disappeared, and gone no one knows where. 
 
 Two bronze statues of Fame have, indeed, been 
 broken up or lost since the restoration of the property 
 to the Duke of Orleans, and many wood carvings 
 specified by Lenoir are no longer to be found. In 
 consequence of his vigorous representations, the great 
 gateway and two smaller portions were bought by the 
 Government when the chateau was pulled down. They 
 were transported from A net to Paris, and set up in 
 the court of the Museum des Petits Augustins. ‘ On 
 voit d’abord,’ says Lenoir, ‘ dans la premiere cour, un 
 *portail magnifique, soixante six pieds de haut, a trois 
 ordres grecs, orn6 de bas-reliefs, et de sculptures de la 
 plus grande beaute dont l’execution est due a Jean 
 Goujon. On lit encore sur un marbre noir l’inscription 
 en lettres d’or dont il etait charge : Brsezseo haec statuit 
 
DIANE CHASSERESSE J 
 
 201 
 
 pergrata Diana marito lit diuturna sui sint monumenta 
 viri.’ 
 
 After this Lenoir catalogues ‘ deux autres portiques 
 couverts, construits avec les corniches, et les colonnes 
 du chateau d’Anet, les frises et les bas-reliefs en bronze 
 de Jean Goujon seront places dans les archivoltes, 
 ainsi qu’ils avaient ete disposes primitivement par 
 Philibert Delorme.’ 
 
 But admirable as are the sculptures of the great gate- 
 way, they are wholly eclipsed by the celebrated beauty 
 of Goujon’s Diane chasseresse. The position of the 
 fountain which this group surmounted is marked in 
 the bird’s-eye view of the chateau given by Du Cerceau, 
 and a separate sheet is devoted to its reproduction in 
 detail. It was one of the chief ornaments of the chateau . 
 The wide circle of the basin brimmed with sparkling 
 waters, out of which rose in successive tiers, round 
 upon round of decoration, ever increasing in complicated 
 movement, till the final wheel was crowned by the 
 graceful group of Diana and her dogs. 
 
 This group is the single example of ‘ the round * 
 from Goujon’s hand which has remained to us, and it 
 is perhaps the most distinguished and characteristic 
 example of his work, not excepting even the Nymphs 
 of the fountain. After its rescue from destruction by 
 M. Lenoir, it was placed in the Elysee garden, in the 
 centre of a basin of water, a position which recalled 
 at least the purpose for which it was originally 
 
202 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 executed. In this garden it was seen by Cicognara, 
 who has given engravings of the group from two 
 different aspects. He admired it so much that he 
 could not convince himself that it was really the work 
 of a French sculptor, 'non sappiamo con quanta 
 ragione si dicesse appartenere a questo scultore ; ’ it is, 
 he adds, ‘ gentile e severo ad un tempo, ed il contorno 
 di questa figura con ardimento unito a moltissima 
 scienza di disegno.’ 
 
 It is, indeed, a work elegant and severe at the 
 same time ; although this elegance has an air of fashion, 
 and the severity something of constraint. The artist 
 has sought to accentuate features selected by the caprice 
 of taste rather than to realise the most abstract natural 
 forms. Consequently, though he has succeeded in 
 giving much of beauty and nobility to his work, it is 
 a beauty which has an artificial cast, a nobility which 
 has a slight touch of effort. This, indeed, may be said 
 of all French work of this time. 
 
 Of Goujon it is true in a less degree than of most 
 of his contemporaries. But to appreciate fairly his or 
 their work requires intimate knowledge of their epoch. 
 The Christian sentiment with which their worship of 
 classic antiquity was imbued, complicates the peculi- 
 arities of a frame of mind and temper in itself difficult 
 for us to realise. To those who have comparatively 
 direct communication with Greek thought and art, it is 
 not so easy to enter into the passionate enthusiasm 
 
DIANE CHASSERESSE. 
 
 203 
 
 which welcomed its Latin dress ; to those who have 
 known the teaching of Voltaire and Comte, this 
 mingled accent of superstition and moral indifferentism 
 has a foreign sound. The mystic worship of life, the 
 melancholy and mad horror with which death itself is 
 regarded solely as fixing the end and term of the 
 pleasures pursued beneath its shadow — this horror and 
 this worship tinge both poetry and art. The most 
 voluptuous moments are so full of sadness that they 
 never reach directly sensual expression. But if Venus 
 herself has lost her air of frank expansion, Diana, on 
 the other hand, sits reflecting, 
 
 L’homme trop sobre ne vit pas : 
 
 Luy mesme en vivant il s’ennuye. 
 
 Goujon’s Diana has been traditionally supposed to 
 wear the traits of the Duchess de Poitiers. It is 
 possible, therefore, that the struggle of the voluptuous 
 element against a self-imposed restraint, a struggle 
 which seems to be reflected in the very outlines as 
 well as in the general sentiment'of the figure, is simply 
 transferred from the individual model. The desire 
 which questions in the eyes and mouth is contradicted 
 by the conscious dignity of the attitude and the general 
 severity of form and line, and this combination yields 
 a type which corresponds precisely to that which we 
 should expect to find enshrining the narrow energy 
 which at once animated and controlled the wishes and 
 conduct of Diane de Poitiers. 
 
204 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 In point of workmanship the group deserves even 
 the high encomiums of Cicognara. The position of 
 the lower limbs is ill-chosen ; they do not compose 
 well when viewed from the right hand or from the 
 back, and this blemish conveys to the movement of 
 the entire figure something of constraint and awkward- 
 ness ; but over these defects is cast the charm of 
 supreme elegance which is the endowment of Goujons 
 style. He is here, as always, perfectly sure ; every 
 line flows out free and certain, and the pose of Diana 
 suggests the utmost suppleness of body and lissomeness 
 of limb. 
 
 The execution is full of ease and spirit. The 
 accent of the chisel is sharp, % and the edge of the blow 
 is made to give value and variety to the surface with 
 unsurpassed dexterity. The insertion of the nails and 
 hair, and the touch on the coat of the accompanying 
 dogs, are small points of treatment but great proofs of 
 skill, of skill which was now at its height. M. Pottier, 
 who himself had seen much that was rescued when 
 Anet fell — rescued, indeed, but not to be preserved — 
 speaks of many other works by Goujon as equally 
 worthy of honour and fame, as rivalling in grace and 
 style with the famous Diana herself. 
 
 If we may trust a drawing now preserved in the 
 collection of the Grand Duke Albert at Vienna, some 
 of these lost treasures must have been of very great 
 importance. This drawing represents, I think, the upper 
 
SCULPTURES OF THE LOUVRE. 
 
 20 5 
 
 portion of a main entrance or portico seen in perspec- 
 tive from below. Three figures in full relief, and appa- 
 rently of colossal size, form the principal feature of the 
 decorations. One stretches across the centre of the 
 broad cornice which runs above the first order, the 
 other two are placed to right and left, supporting the 
 entablature which surmounts a kind of loggia formed 
 by the pillars of the second. The architectural lines 
 and the foliage of the frieze are penned, but the figures 
 are delicately modelled in black and white chalk. The 
 two placed in the upper portion of the design recall by 
 their attitude the Slaves of Michel Angelo set up by 
 the Constable of Montmorency on either side of the 
 gateway on the west side of the court at Ecouen, but 
 on the drawing, which was apparently executed at 
 some time during the preceding century, is written, 
 ‘ Jean Goujon, execute au chateau d’Anet.’ 
 
 Having spent probably something like five years 
 working under De l’Orme at Anet, Goujon returned to 
 Paris, to the Louvre, to the familiar employment of his 
 early friend Lescot. In the year 1555-56, he is paid, 
 by order of the Abbe de Clagny, 560 livres , and, up to 
 the close of the year 1560, payments made to him 
 pour ouvrages de sculpture par luy faits audit chateau — 
 probably the south-west angle — are entered uninter- 
 ruptedly in the Louvre accounts. His fame had been 
 greatly extended by his work at Anet, and in the 
 ‘Epitome de Vitruve, etc., par Jean Gardel et Domi- 
 
206 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 nique Bastien,’ published at Toulouse in 1556, the very 
 year after Goujons return to Paris, he is mentioned 
 as ‘ sculpteur et architecte de grand bruit.’ After 
 1560-61 his name drops out of the list of maitre 
 masons working under Lescot. 
 
 Goujon, as has been said, is supposed to have 
 shown Huguenot tendencies, to have been, perhaps, an 
 avowed Huguenot. If so, his disappearance from the 
 list in the beginning of the year 1561 may be explained 
 by the attempt made in the course of that year to turn 
 out of the royal service any persons who might be 
 suspected of sympathy with ‘ la religion.’ A certain 
 Jean Durant was then holding an important place as 
 one of the Treasurers of Works, and, in September 
 of the same year, letters patent were signed by Charles 
 IX. at Etampes, by which the said Jean Durant and 
 others ‘ ayant pour le cas, et dont ils ont est6 attains, 
 et convaincus, este prives de leurs estats ; ’ — the office 
 of treasurer, or paymaster, was bestowed on one 
 named Etienne Remy. Durant protested, and the 
 matter was not finally decided until March 16, 1569, 
 when fresh letters patent were given at Paris, from 
 which we learn the exact reasons for Durant’s removal. 
 H e is dismissed ‘ pour estre de la nouvelle opinion, et 
 n’avoir pas satisfait aux edits,’ and he is replaced by 
 Pierre Regnault, who gives ‘ preuve de bonne vie, 
 mceurs et religion catholique et romaine.’ 
 
 Whether or no Goujon himself was numbered 
 
SCULPTURES OF THE HOTEL CARNAVALET. 207 
 
 amongst these ‘ others deprived of their posts for 
 cause,’ we cannot tell, but it is not likely that it was 
 by his early death that (as M. de Laborde has sup- 
 posed) his connection with the Court was severed 
 in 1561. The tradition of his murder during the 
 hideous massacre of 1572, is not the only reason for 
 placing the date of his death some ten or a dozen years 
 later. We cannot fix, it is true, the year in which he 
 was employed by the Constable’s nephew, Admiral 
 Coligny, at Chatillon sur Loing, and the two Caryatides 
 which he there executed as supports for a chimney- 
 piece, and which occur in a drawing done at the 
 beginning of the present century by Girodet, are lost : 
 but certain decorations of the Hotel Carnavalet at 
 Paris have all the characteristics of very late work. 
 They cannot certainly have been executed before the 
 sculptures of A net and the Louvre, and it seems 
 most likely that they, as well as numerous less im- 
 portant undertakings now known to us only by chance 
 mention, or by broken fragments, must date between 
 1560 and 1570, that is to say, after his retirement or 
 dismissal from the royal service in 1561. 
 
 The Hotel Carnavalet, with the exception of the 
 lower portion of the street front, was entirely re- 
 modelled by Mansard ; but the character of the un- 
 touched portion, of the entrance gateway, and the lions 
 which decorate it, are sufficient evidence of Goujon’s 
 co-operation in the original building. The small 
 
208 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 figures, lions, coats of arms, and trophies, which 
 decorate the exterior are not, however, the most im- 
 portant of the still remaining decorations by his hand. 
 
 The interior court is decorated by large bas-reliefs 
 built into the upper story. Four of these bas-reliefs, 
 which represent the Four Seasons, are attributed to 
 Goujon. They occupy spaces in the left wing ; and 
 the remainder were filled in by an inferior workman, 
 at a later date, when the court was re-handled by 
 Mansard. The four reliefs ascribed to Goujon have 
 neither the refinement nor the precision of his earlier 
 work. If they are his, then it is clear that in his later 
 years Goujon also suffered from the fatal influence of 
 the School of Fontainebleau. I think that they are 
 his, and that they belong to the final period of his 
 activity. 
 
 They show the same peculiarities of manner as the 
 bas-reliefs of the attic of the Louvre, which I take to 
 be the work for which Goujon was paid in 1560. The 
 drawing, the arrangement of the draperies, and the 
 general treatment, are also marked by the same fea- 
 tures. Throughout, the tendency is towards pictorial 
 rather than sculpturesque effect, and the handling, 
 always certain, has the confident assurance of long 
 practice. It is, indeed, too large and free, and con- 
 sequently lacks the distinction, although it retains the 
 elegance, of Goujon’s best work. 
 
 Besides the Four Seasons, there remain one or 
 
MINOR WORKS BY GOUJON 
 
 209 
 
 two less important, works to which no certain date can 
 be affixed. For the most part they do not present fea- 
 tures of especial mark. The Louvre preserves, together 
 with a bust of Henri II. (which, if by Goujon, be- 
 longs to an early date), four Nymphs, which recall, in 
 a slighter and more decorative form, the guardians of 
 the Fontaine des Innocents, and also a small marble 
 bas-relief (ill-engraved by Dusommerard) representing 
 three other Nymphs, awakened by Fauns and Cupids. 
 Alexandre Lenoir believed that this subject was a pro- 
 found allegory of Death and Resurrection, and inserted 
 the relief in the pedestal of a monument erected to 
 the memory of Henri III., which he had obtained 
 from the Church of St. Cloud, but the work, which 
 belongs to the erotic class, was probably part of the 
 interior decorations of one of the houses on which 
 Goujon was employed after leaving the Louvre. 
 
 Sauval has noticed, as by Goujon, two Tritons 
 placed above the gateway of the fish-market in the 
 Marchd neuf Germain Brice saw in the Church of 
 St. Magloire a memorial tablet to Blondeau, Iniendant 
 des Finances , who died in 1555. This, he adds, is the 
 work of Goujon — a bronze figure in bas-relief, as large 
 as life, and of marvellous workmanship. Behind the 
 Church of St. Opportune, on the side towards the 
 Rue St. Denis, Brice also notes the cross erected out 
 of the proceeds of the property of Gatine Marchand, 
 who was burnt, with his brother, July 30, 1571, for 
 vol. 1. p 
 
210 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 having communicated after the Calvinist fashion. 
 And this cross, on which was sculptured the Triumph 
 of the Blessed Sacrament, Brice also attributes to the 
 hand of Goujon. 
 
 At the Arsenal, he remarks, ‘ some people say that 
 the gateway of the second court is by Jean Goujon ; ’ 
 and at the Porte St. Antoine (demolished 1778) he 
 adds, with greater confidence, ‘ On estime dans l’ouv- 
 rage de l’ancienne porte deux fleuves couchez sur un 
 espece de fronton arraze qui sont de Jean Goujon 
 sculpteur excellent.’ Finally, in the Hotel de la Reine 
 (commenced 1571), in the little garden, Brice says, ‘on 
 peut voir une Venus couchee en marbre au milieu 
 d’un bassin de fontaine soutenu de quatre consoles, 
 de l’ouvragede Jean Goujon, qui est d’une rarebeaute.’ 
 Millin, also, attributes to Goujon a bas-relief above the 
 great gateway of the Feuillans, which represents a 
 scene in the life of Henri III. 
 
 Of these numerous attributions, many are ob- 
 viously ill-founded. It may indeed be supposed that 
 Goujon, although of Huguenot opinions, yet dared not 
 refuse his aid in commemorating the judicial murder 
 of Marchand and his brother ; but it is impossible to 
 admit the bas-relief of the Feuillans gateway into 
 the list of his works, for it could not have been exe- 
 cuted until after 1574; and as the defences of the 
 Porte St. Antoine, with its ‘ avant portail,’ were not 
 begun till 1583, it is scarcely likely that Goujon can 
 
VENUS OF THE HOTEL DE LA REINE. 
 
 211 
 
 have executed the river-gods with which it was 
 decorated. 
 
 The marble Venus of the Hotel de la Reine is 
 indeed the only important object in this group of frag- 
 ments. M. Dussommerard, who has engraved it, 
 mentions that before coming into his collection it had 
 been carefully preserved as ‘portrait de famille pour 
 avoir ete, dit-on, l’image dune maitresse d’un des 
 Guise.’ It has now become the property of the nation, 
 having passed into the Hotel Cluny. If executed by 
 Goujon, it was probably produced during the period 
 of his employment at the Louvre, for the clearing of 
 the ground, necessary before the foundations of the 
 Hotel de la Reine could be laid, was not commenced 
 until the year before the St. Bartholomew ; nor was it 
 likely that Catharine would at this epoch have straight- 
 way taken Goujon into her service if he had been dis- 
 missed from that of the King as a suspected Huguenot. 
 
 The Venus itself is a graceful conception, but it 
 has neither the quality of style which distinguishes 
 Goujon’s work, nor the accent of individual character 
 which stamps the Diana of Anet. There is nothing 
 in the handling to justify a positive attribution. 
 The broad characteristics of Renaissance treatment 
 and execution, Goujon shared in common with Pilon, 
 with Prieur, with other and less celebrated contem- 
 poraries. The finer differences, which at first sight 
 seem to indicate quite different hands, often result 
 
212 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 only from the modifications which have been imposed 
 on the same artist by change in the size or purpose 
 of his subject. 
 
 During the black days of St. Bartholomew, Goujon, 
 it is said, died with his chisel in his hands. But tra- 
 dition varies as to the exact spot. Some say in the 
 Court of the Louvre ; others at the Hotel of the 
 Comte de Poitou, Rue de la Harpe ; others that he 
 was retouching a still unfinished portion of the Fons 
 Nymphium. Yet all agree that it was the second or 
 third day of the great massacre, when he thought he 
 might with safety return to his work. He was on his 
 scaffolding, when he was struck by a ball from a har- 
 quebus, and fell dead. It must, however, be remem- 
 bered that there is no evidence as to these facts. The 
 story of his death rests on mere tradition, and his 
 name does not occur in the lists published by the 
 Huguenots of their slaughtered brethren. These lists 
 record the fate of persons of infinitely small importance, 
 and it seems unlikely that the murder even of a humble 
 sculptor would have been left unnoticed. 
 
 M. de Clarac, indeed, a propos of one of the trum- 
 peting figures which ornament an oeil-de-boeiif in the 
 south-west angle of the Court of the Louvre, makes of 
 Goujon a great personage, and tells a charming story 
 in which he introduces him to us dining with Henri 
 II. It does not require a very intimate acquaintance 
 with the state of society in France in the sixteenth 
 
RENOMME OF THE LOUVRE. 
 
 3i 3 
 
 century to be sure at once that here is some mistake. 
 M. de Clarac quotes from Sauval, and Sauval refers 
 us to Claude Binet, one of the commentators of Ron- 
 sard, and author of the Life appended to Galland’s 
 edition of his works. 
 
 Claude Binet was a contemporary of Goujon, and 
 Claude Binet tells the story rather differently. In the 
 sixth ode of his ‘ Thirteenth Book,’ Ronsard speaks of 
 ‘ la deesse qui trompette les renoms ; ’ and it was this, 
 says Binet, which moved the 4 Sieur de Clany ’ (Pierre 
 Lescot) ‘ de faire engraver en demy-bosse sur le haut 
 de la face du Louvre, une Deesse qui embouche une 
 trompette, et regarde de front une autre Deesse por- 
 tant une couronne de laurier et une palme en ses 
 mains avec cette inscription en table d’attente et 
 marbre noir, “ Virtuti Regis invictissimi. ,, Et comme 
 un jour le Roi estant a table lui demandait ce qu’il 
 voulait signifier par cela il luy repondait qu’il enten- 
 dait Ronsard par la premiere figure, et par la trom- 
 pette la force de ses vers, principalement de la Fran- 
 ciade qui pousserait son nom et celuy de la France 
 par tous les quartiers de l’univers.’ Goujon was the 
 unnamed sculptor to whom had been entrusted the task 
 of carving the figure which should symbolise the genius 
 of Ronsard ; the honour, not of sitting at the King’s 
 table, but of seeing the King dine, was reserved for 
 Pierre Lescot, Abbe de Clagny, de Clermont, &c., the 
 architect under whom he worked. 
 
214 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 The sculptor of the sixteenth century was but a 
 workman taking his orders from the architect who 
 employed him. Even when his work seems all his 
 own, when it stands complete in itself like the Fons 
 Nymphium, or the Gallery of the Caryatides, the 
 sculptor passes unnoticed and unremembered. Ron- 
 sard has not forgotten M. Albert, the Court lute- 
 player, nor Janet, the Court painter ; he attacks De 
 rOrme with bitter satire, and eulogises Lescot ; but 
 though he sings the glories of A net, the ‘ Thermes, 
 piliers, chapiteaux, frontispices, voutes, lambris, can- 
 nelures,’ the name of the man to whom those glories 
 were in chief due is passed over in silence. With the 
 exception of the passage which occurs in the preface to 
 Jean Martin’s translation of Vitruvius, and the sub- 
 sequent allusion (possibly suggested by Martin’s words) 
 made by Gardel in his 4 Epitome de Vitruve,’ Goujon’s 
 name is unmentioned by any of his contemporaries. 
 He lives for us in his work alone. 
 
 His special gift was the unerring certainty with 
 which he divined the decorative lines required by the 
 structural lines within which he had to work. If, 
 therefore, we detach a figure from its place, and isolate 
 it from the lines in unison with which it was con- 
 ceived, we at once destroy the very relations which 
 constituted its peculiar charm. Drawing and propor- 
 tions which were admirable in point of decorative treat- 
 ment suddenly appear to be faulty in design ; drapery, 
 
APPARENT MONOTONY OF TYPE . 
 
 215 
 
 the folds of which, but duly spaced the surface, be- 
 comes superabundant, movement is unexplained ; and 
 lissome limbs take an ungracious shade of constraint 
 and awkwardness. Defects of ensemble come to light, 
 which even the charm of the composition fails to cover. 
 Attitudes seem uniform, and individual character is 
 lost in the wearisome air of family likeness which per- 
 vades the heads. 
 
 This apparent monotony of type in structure and 
 expression is common to all French sixteenth-century 
 work. It was the reflection of the ideal, set up by the 
 fashion of the day. Even in the poor little cuts of 
 the ‘ Hecatongraphia’ of Corrozet, there is a far-off 
 echo of the style of Goujons Nereids, and it is not 
 confined to ideal figures, but shows itself in pictures of 
 ordinary life. The woman of ‘Feu d’amour,’ for 
 example, shows the same character of style and air as 
 the figure which stands for an heroic ‘Ymage de la 
 Fortune.’ And, indeed, no matter what may be the 
 peculiarities of individual types, they always to some 
 extent receive the stamp made current by the temper 
 of their age. The stamp of Goujons day was not 
 heroic, but it was dignified, refined, elegant ; and this 
 dignity, elegance, and refinement are to be seen in all 
 he did. 
 
 One quality of his work remains all but uninjured. 
 Even detached fragments show the beauty and per- 
 fection of the original execution, — the value of the 
 
216 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 touch of his chisel. It is always delicate, precise, and 
 justly calculated, whether he works in ronde or demy- 
 bosse , whether the object is destined for some con- 
 spicuous position, or to remain half obscure, patiently 
 filling a quiet corner. In rendering the contours of 
 the body, and the modelling of flesh, he is far, indeed, 
 from that breadth of handling which distinguished the 
 nobler period of Greek art, and which did not even 
 forsake the luxurious magnificence of the Alexandrian 
 epoch, nor does his chisel confer the loose and yielding 
 softness of Florentine work. The touch has a spirit 
 and sharpness of accent which is eminently French, 
 swift and ready, with a directness in attack specially 
 serviceable for works of ornament. Delicate and re- 
 fined when caressing the childish forms of the boys 
 who wreathe the garlands of the Henri II. staircase, 
 it knows neither languor nor slackness ; impetuously 
 vigorous in the large bas-reliefs of the court, the keen 
 edge is tempered by an exquisite discretion ; in turn 
 he meets each different requirement, and shows a per- 
 fect intelligence of the limits within which he has to 
 work. 
 
 The staircase of Henri II. has lost nothing of its 
 early charm, but out in the court the upper reliefs of the 
 south-west angle have not gained in effect by the altera- 
 tion and elevation of the roof-line. The Caryatides 
 still exercise, from their Gallery in the Louvre, their 
 gracious and mysterious influence, but Diane, couched 
 
DIANE IN THE LOUVRE . 
 
 21 7 
 
 on a clumsy pedestal in the gallery, cannot be to us 
 the Diane who, at a very different elevation, crowned 
 the fountain in the cour d'honneur of Anet, whilst 
 every figure, every ornament beneath her, fulfilled 
 some designed office of subtle service to the eye. 
 
21 8 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 SCULPTURE (1542-1598). 
 
 Germain Pilon . — The Three Graces . 
 
 L’an mil cinq cens quatre vingts cinq fut retably le Cadran de Phor- 
 loge du Palais de Paris, le conducteur et inventeur de Pouvrage est 
 Germain Pillon, maistre statuaire, et l’un des premiers hommes de ce 
 temps qui par son art et industrie a rendu des ouvrages cy parfaites et si 
 bien elaborees, en nostre ville de Paris, et autres lieux de France que la 
 memoire en sera perpetuelle . — Antiquit fo de Paris. 
 
 In 1558, when Philibert de l’Orme employed Germain 
 Pilon on the sculptures of the tomb of the Valois, he 
 thought it necessary to tie him down by written agree- 
 ment to do his work thoroughly. Twice over in the 
 same document does the stipulation occur, that the 
 said eight figitres de fortune (allegorical figures) shall 
 be polished well, and finished completely au dit 
 d'ouvriers et gens a ce connoissans. 
 
 This sort of stipulation, although it is occasionally to 
 be found in written compacts made with inferior work- 
 men, is unusual in a contract made with a maitre mafon. 
 It is perhaps, partly explained by the concluding sen- 
 tence, which sets forth that Pilon shall execute these 
 reliefs as soon as possible, giving up other work, he 
 being required for the King’s service. Pilon, there- 
 
GERMAIN PI LON. 
 
 219 
 
 fore, who became eventually the most popular French 
 sculptor of his day, would seem to have been already 
 so much in vogue as to be in danger of slurring his 
 work in order to get through his numerous commis- 
 sions. 
 
 Germain Pilon, a Parisian, says La Croix du Maine, 
 came from the land of the Maine, for his father was born 
 in the parish of Loue, about six leagues from Le Mans, 
 and Corvaisier, writing in 1648, speaks of him as 
 originaire de Loud. By and by, however, it came to be 
 said that Pilon not only came of a family residing at 
 Loue, but that he himself was born there, and had 
 worked for many years in the neighbourhood. Near 
 to Loue stood the abbey of Solesmes, and the famous 
 sculptures which decorated the abbey chapel, still 
 known as the Saints de Solesmes, were conjectured to 
 have been for the most part the work of Pilon, the 
 father, by whom his more celebrated son was trained. 
 
 In 1801, M. Renouard, a citizen of Le Mans, writing 
 to Alexandre Lenoir, describes these statues, which had 
 been preserved by a M. Lenoir de la Fleche (to whom 
 in 1791 the chapel in which they stood had been sold), 
 and goes on to quote at length concerning them from an 
 MS. then in his possession. The writer of this MS. was 
 Louis Maulni, conseillier au prdsidial du Mans , in the 
 early part of the eighteenth century, and he asserts that 
 Germain Pilon was born at Loue, where his father had 
 married and settled, and ascribes to him not only a 
 
220 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 share in the decoration of the chapel of Solesmes, but 
 the entire execution of the tomb of Guillaume Langei 
 du Bellay, in the Cathedral of St. Julien, and also much 
 work in many neighbouring churches. On the 
 pedestal, he adds, of a statue of St. Bernard in the 
 abbey church of the Bernardins at Iipau, the name 
 of Germain Pilon was actually cut. This statement was 
 also confirmed by M. Renouard, who tells us that in 
 1793, the figure was broken to pieces, the head only, 
 which fell into the possession of M. Clairsigny, a banker 
 of the town, having been rescued from amongst the 
 broken fragments. It is, however, more than doubtful, 
 whether Maulni’s assertions were correct. 
 
 The tomb of Guillaume du Bellay was destroyed 
 during the Revolution ; the pieces collected by Lenoir 
 were, on the breaking up of his museum, put together 
 and set up again in the Cathedral of St. Julien, but 
 even if the tomb were proved to be the work of Pilon 
 this would furnish no clue as to where he spent his 
 earlier years, for the original inscription cited by M. 
 Renouard says, ‘ Positum est hoc mausoleum, anno 
 1557/ and at that date Pilon was certainly settled in 
 Paris. 
 
 ‘ From the moment, however,’ says M. Barbet de 
 J ouy , ‘ that an attentive examination has placed it beyond 
 doubt, that not one of the justly celebrated statues 
 of Solesmes can be by his hand ; from the moment 
 that we see that they cannot be supposed to have 
 
BRONZES IN ST. GERMAIN L'AUXERROIS. 22 
 
 influenced his style or to have served him as models, 
 it matters little indeed, whether Germain Pilon were 
 born at Loue, or only came of a family once 
 residing there.’ Every authentic work by his hand 
 shows the training of Paris. For nearly fifty years he 
 must have lived and worked there, coming into notice 
 about 1542, if indeed it is true that he was engaged 
 with Goujon, under Pierre Lescot, on the restorations 
 of St. Germain l’Auxerrois, and continuing to labour 
 with unremitting diligence up to the very year of his 
 death, which took place in the course of the year 1598. 
 
 It is Germain Brice who first records the tradition 
 attributing to Pilon ‘ quatre anges de bronze,’ the 
 ornaments of the high altar of St. Germain l’Auxerrois, 
 and he is followed in 1772 by Rigollet de Juvigny, who 
 in his edition of La Croix du Maine, adds a note to the 
 brief biography of Germain Pilon. ‘ These angels,’ he 
 says, ‘ are of the greatest beauty, and are placed upon 
 the balustrade which shuts in the sanctuary.’ So far 
 tradition is probably correct, but Brice, it must be re- 
 membered, in his description of the church, went on to 
 give Pilon credit for the bas-reliefs and figures of the 
 altar screen, and much other work which was, as we now 
 know, most certainly not by him, but by Goujon. 
 
 The Pere Dan also, writing in 1642, of the statues 
 which decorated the Cour de la Fontaine at Fontaine- 
 bleau, mentions two placed above the frontispiece, ‘ qui 
 sont du Sieur Pilon.’ Now the Cour de la PAntaine, 
 
222 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 begun by Francis I. in 1528, was finished when in 1539 
 Charles V. and his suite were lodged in it. Therefore, 
 if it were possible to identify the figures noticed by the 
 Pere Dan, as being the work of Pilon, we should not 
 only be able to ascertain the character of his early 
 work, but also to fix the date of his employment by the 
 Court some twenty years earlier than at present. Un- 
 fortunately none of the sculptures at Fontainebleau 
 show any signs of his style, and we must, there- 
 fore, be content to start from the year 1560, when we 
 know, from the Royal Accounts, that he was engaged 
 on the tomb of Francois I. 
 
 M. Lenoir describes St. Denis, in 1793, as 
 blackened from roof to floor, and presenting the 
 appearance of a place that had been gutted by a great 
 fire. As a crowning act of revolutionary vengeance it 
 had been decreed by the Assembly that the royal 
 tombs should be destroyed. Nothing escaped ruin, 
 and from the midst of this wreck, piece by piece had 
 to be collected all that remained of some of the 
 noblest monuments of French art. 
 
 The royal tombs had early suffered from neglect 
 and ill-treatment. Nicolas Bonfons, continuing, in 
 1588, the work of Corrozet on the antiquities of 
 Paris, complains that at St. Denis people were 
 allowed at all times to clamber on the tombs, breaking 
 and smashing just as if they were of no account. 
 To the reckless injuries of a careless populace was 
 
TOMB OF THE VALOIS. 
 
 223 
 
 superadded the calculation of official vandalism. The 
 transactions to which M. Guiffrey has recently devoted 
 his researches show us the clergy themselves, to whose 
 care the national monuments had been committed, 
 eagerly seeking an authorization for their removal from 
 the government of Louis XVI. The fall of the King 
 himself alone prevented them from successfully getting 
 rid of the tombs which were supposed to disfigure the 
 Cathedral in which they stood. The magnificent 
 sepulchral chapel, the Tour or Tombeau des Valois, 
 designed by Primaticcio, which formed an independent 
 monument attached to the cathedral itself, had been 
 previously demolished by the Regent Orleans, who 
 carried off to his own chateaux the precious marbles 
 with which it was enriched. ‘On voit,’ says Lenoir, 
 
 ‘ a Monceaux un cirque construit en forme de mine 
 avec des colonnes corinthiens, et un temple rond 
 compose avec des colonnes de marbre blanc, pro- 
 venant de la demolition de la chapelle des Valois.’ 
 The only memorial of the magnificent edifice, now 
 remaining in St. Denis, is the remarkable group by 
 Pilon of Henri II. and Catharine de Medicis sculp- 
 tured in marble, and lying on a bed of bronze. 
 
 The separate monument of Francois I. and 
 Claude of France, which is now put up again in the 
 choir, was designed by Philibert de FOrme, and that 
 of Henri II. and Catharine de Medicis by Primaticcio, 
 with whom in 1560 Germain Pilon signs his contracts 
 
224 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 for work to be done. Pilon, though employed on 
 the construction of this magnificent mausoleum, had 
 not a principal share in the work. Pierre Bontemps, 
 aided by Chantrel, Galles, and others, executed the 
 effigies of the King and Queen, and the important 
 portions of the tomb ; to Pilon were allotted eight 
 allegorical figures in bronze, and a part of the canopy, 
 decorated with bas-reliefs, arabesques, and small 
 statues, which was raised above the recumbent 
 figures. 
 
 In extracts from the ‘ Memoires de la Chambre des 
 Comptes,’ first quoted by M. Lenoir, and all of which 
 have been now printed by M. de Laborde, we find 
 ‘ huit figures de fortune en bosse ronde sur marbre 
 blanc,’ specially mentioned. But it is impossible 
 to make out exactly how much Pilon got for any 
 particular work, for he generally receives small sums on 
 account; sometimes one object only is specified, some- 
 times more, and now and then his name appears with 
 those of many others, and only the total paid to the 
 whole band is mentioned. For example, there are 
 four separate entries of payment in which these eight 
 allegorical figures by Pilon are named, the first occurs 
 in 1558, the last in 1562. But of the last, which 
 records his receipt of the not inconsiderable sum of 
 850 livres, we find that a part went on account of his 
 group of Graces, then already commenced, and the 
 remainder only (but how much is not stated) completed 
 
TOMB OF FRANCOIS /. 225 
 
 the amount due to him for the figures of the tomb of 
 Francis I. 
 
 The monument, as far as can be judged from 
 the mutilated state in which it at present exists, is a 
 work which represents the central point of the Renais- 
 sance as it touched sculpture and architecture in 
 France. The architectural part of the design has 
 here assumed an importance more considerable, in 
 relation to the figures which it enframes, than it was 
 ever permitted to obtain in similar works by Columbe, 
 or Juste de Tours. But the bas-reliefs, as in the tomb 
 of Louis XII. and Anne of Brittany, continue to be 
 employed for the purpose of giving space in the design. 
 The broad planes of light are modulated, not broken 
 up by the waves of faint relief which flow over the 
 marble surface without disturbing it. The vigorous 
 channelling of the slender columns, the deep tones 
 of the inlaid marbles and the full relief of the statues 
 by which the tomb is surmounted, strike the eye in 
 forcible contrast to the delicate accent of the inter- 
 posing passages. And the intention in this respect is 
 still plainly visible, although an incalculable injury 
 has been done to the effect of the whole by the 
 destruction of the eight bronzes. 
 
 The eight bronze 4 figures de fortune ’ found their 
 way, during the Revolution, to the melting-pot, and all 
 that now remains of Pilon’s work are some bas-reliefs 
 occupying the compartments in the ceiling of the canopy 
 
 VOL. 1. 
 
 Q 
 
226 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 above the crypt which contains the effigies of the dead 
 bodies of Francois and Claude, and four little winged 
 figures which fill the spandrils of the main arches. 
 
 One of these shows a crown, another uplifts a 
 trumpet with extended arms ; all are distinguished by 
 a wonderful air of life, by naivety and grace of atti- 
 tude and expression, by delicacy of modelling, and by 
 the happy facility with which the sculptor has caught 
 the light uncertainty which characterises childish 
 movement. Goujon’s children, of the Henri II. stair- 
 case, tread heavily and lift their wreaths of woven 
 fruit and flowers in a firm grasp ; they look like 
 youthful Titans. In the boy, Goujon seems to have 
 sought the man, whilst Pilon dwelt on the charm of 
 childhood, on its frank simplicity of .gesture and ex- 
 pression. 
 
 His work at once pleased the Court. The entry for 
 1558 was the first record of Pilon’s employment in the 
 royal service, but after that date he was almost ex- 
 clusively absorbed by it. In 1560, two years later, he 
 was carving wooden statues — Mars, Minerva, Juno, 
 Venus — for Queen Catharine’s garden, and after this he 
 was entrusted by Primaticcio with the chief part in the 
 erection of the mausoleum of Henri II. and his queen : 
 ‘ savoir, deux gissants en marbre blanc, quatre tableaux 
 en basse taille, deux prians de bronze, quatre figures de 
 fortune aussi de bronze ainsi que les masques qui 
 ornent la dite sepulture.’ Attached to one of the 
 
TOMB OF HENRI II. 
 
 22 7 
 
 receipts, signed by Germain Pilon himself in 1586, M. 
 de Laborde found a list of several blocks of marble, 
 the first of which, ‘ un gros bio,’ had been employed to 
 make the ‘pourtraict gisant du feu roy Henry, que 
 Dieu absolve, et de la Royne mere du roy ; ’ next 
 comes ‘ un asse gros bio, un moien, et un petit qui a 
 este employe pour faire une Nostre Dame de Sept 
 Douleurs, et un Saint Frangoys de l’ordre des 
 Capuchins qui est pour le Roy.’ ‘ Le Roy/ here means, 
 probably, Charles IX. ; for, as the recumbent figures of 
 Henri and Catharine are spoken of as finished, this 
 list, which is undated, cannot have been drawn up earlier 
 than 1566, in March of which year Pilon was paid by 
 order of Primaticcio for a second ‘ gisant ’ for the tomb 
 of Henri II. 
 
 On this monument Pilon seems to have worked at 
 intervals for nearly twenty years, for from 1564 to 
 1583 there are frequent entries concerning it in the 
 Royal accounts. It has come down to us free from 
 any considerable injury. In arrangement the tomb 
 is very simple. The form is oblong ; from each of 
 the corners project two columns, the angles between 
 which are filled by the four ‘ figures de fortune.’ The 
 proportions, like those of the mausoleum of Frangois 
 and Claude, are far more lofty than those of the 
 tomb of Louis and Anne. Side by side, in the crypt, 
 lie the dead bodies of the king and queen ; and above, 
 on the flat roof, the bronze figures of Henri and 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Catharine, in full court dress, are seen kneeling in 
 prayer. 
 
 The four bas-reliefs, Charity, Good Works, Faith, 
 and Hope, carved in strong relief, are inserted at the 
 four sides in the base. The pedestal which supports 
 the bronze allegorical statues, and the columns which 
 flank these statues to right and left, are inlaid with slabs 
 of deep-toned marble. These slabs serve a double 
 purpose, they prevent the forcible light and shade of 
 the interposing bas-reliefs from too obviously attracting 
 the eye, and they carry off the hue of the bronze 
 statues standing above them, so that their sombre 
 colour does not tell too trenchantly against the white 
 marble in which they are embedded. 
 
 An equally skilful use of inlay is also to be noticed 
 in the tomb of Francois and Claude. There the 
 figures on the top are not of bronze but of white 
 marble, and it was necessary to detach them from the 
 lines of the cornice. This has been done by inlaying 
 with black and green, and by the introduction into the 
 cornice of a band of a bluish-grey tint, which instantly 
 throws up the clear white of the figures above. In the 
 tomb of Henri II., on the other hand, the inlay is 
 entirely confined to the base ; and the band of colour 
 which it affords, taken in conjunction with the rich 
 variety of light on the reliefs, tells out against the 
 absolute simplicity of the shafts and mouldings, and 
 the severe architectural lines of the broad cornice above. 
 
TOMB OF HENRI II. 
 
 229 
 
 The light foliage of the rich Corinthian capitals which 
 surmount the pillars of the sides is the only touch of 
 decorative enrichment allowed in the upper portion of 
 the tomb, which is covered in by a broad slab of white 
 marble, on which the two bronze figures kneel. 
 
 Great solemnity of effect is thus obtained in these 
 figures, isolated as they are, both by the deep tone of 
 the bronze of which they are composed, and by the 
 strong contrast between the brilliant elaboration of 
 their magnificent costume and the simplicity of the 
 base on which they rest. The movement of both is 
 carefully felt through the closely pleated folds of their 
 state robes ; and though neither king nor queen show 
 nobility of form or character, a style of courtly dignity 
 distinguishes both. In the treatment of the extremities 
 and in the details of the modelling throughout, there is 
 evident both in the portrait statues, and in the ideal 
 figures, a supreme desire for elegance, but although its 
 satisfaction is ensured at the sacrifice of characteristic 
 peculiarities of conformation, Pilon has succeeded in 
 imparting an extraordinary vitality to his work. 
 
 This in part no doubt results from the brilliancy of 
 the handling. As we see in the tomb of Louis XII. 
 which stands side by side with that of Henri II. and 
 Catharine, the masters of the earlier epoch masked 
 their frequent exaggeration of form with a surface the 
 polish of which undulates without a check. Pilon 
 leaves the edge on his touch. It is seen alike on 
 
230 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 bronze and marble, everywhere applied with judgment 
 and intention, imparting a vivacious accent to every 
 plane of light and significance of outline to every depth 
 of shadow. 
 
 Although this tomb has always been the object of 
 much attention, it has never been so widely popular as 
 the more ornate monument of Francois I. and Claude. 
 The earliest reproduction of it is one of the rude wood- 
 cuts given by Bonfons, at page 92 of his continuation of 
 Corrozet’s ‘ Antiquites de la Ville de Paris.’ M. 
 Lenoir has given separate drawings of the different 
 parts in elaborate detail made whilst the tomb was in 
 course of reconstruction at the Musee des Petits Au- 
 gustins. He was also at that time in possession of an 
 anatomical figure which he attributed to Germain Pilon, 
 and which he supposed to have been his first project 
 for the one afterwards completed. But this figure 
 seems to have been lost sight of at the dispersion of 
 the monument collected by Lenoir ; at any rate, it is 
 not now in the Louvre. 
 
 When these tombs, or what remained of them, were 
 set up again in St. Denis, the group of the Graces, 
 designed by Pilon to bear the bronze vase in which was 
 preserved the heart of Henri II., was retained for the 
 Louvre. In 1562 it had been placed by Catharine de 
 Medicis in the chapel of the Dukes of Orleans in the 
 Church of the Celestins at Paris, ‘ trois figures de 
 marbre en une piece , formani group e, qui portent un 
 
REPLICA OF THE THREE GRACES . 
 
 231 
 
 vase dedans lequel est mis le coeur du feu roy dernier en 
 Vdglise des Celestins .’ At the Celestins, it was seen by 
 Bonfons in 1588, and near to it, in the same chapel, 
 was standing a like monument (which has also found its 
 way to the Louvre), designed by Pilon’s pupil Bartelemy 
 Prieur to serve a like purpose. It contained the heart 
 of the Constable de Montmorency, for, as one of its 
 inscriptions set forth, ‘ voluit Henricus amborum cor da 
 in eadem jacere cede! 
 
 The pedestal which still carries the group of 
 Graces, and the bronze vase which they once supported, 
 were the work of Domenico del Barbiere (Dominique 
 Florentin), who was also employed in conjunction with 
 Pilon, on the tomb of Henri II. The vase has been 
 destroyed or lost, and its place is now occupied by a 
 recent substitute of gilded wood. A complete replica 
 of this monument, supposed to have been executed by 
 one of Pilon’s pupils, possibly by Bartelemy Prieur 
 himself, is reported to have been standing in 1802, in 
 the garden of the Musde nationale d' Histoire Naturelle 
 at Paris. M. Renouard writes to M. Lenoir, that it 
 had originally been placed in the church of the 
 Camaldules at Besse, the heart of the founder of the 
 house having been placed in the vase; but in 1775 
 it disappeared suddenly. Some say that Grimaldi, 
 Bishop of Mans, carried it off : others maintain that a 
 pious prior, finding that his devotions were disturbed 
 by the feminine beauty of the figures, threw them into 
 
232 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 a well. The only thing certain is, that at the close of 
 the last century this replica was known to be in the 
 possession of an architect, M. Dewailly, from whose 
 widow it passed to the nation. 
 
 In i 571, Charles IX., accompanied by his Queen, 
 made a triumphal entry into Paris in celebration of the. 
 restoration of peace. Ronsard, aided by his pupil 
 Amadis Jamyn and his master Dorat, then an old 
 man, planned the decorations by which the city 
 welcomed the king’s return. Those at the gate of St. 
 Denis were carried out by Nicolas Labbe (Nicolo dell’ 
 Abate), then living at Fontainebleau, and by Germain 
 Pilon, ‘demourant a l’hotel de Nesle,’ and between 
 them they shared the sum of 3,500 livres paid by the 
 ‘ prevot des marchands et eschevins ’ for the work. 
 
 The false peace, thus gaily celebrated, was quickly 
 followed by the fatal treachery of the St. Bartholomew ; 
 but the Court was soon absorbed by the intrigues which 
 heralded the election of the Duke of Anjou to the 
 throne of Poland, and by the costly preparations for 
 the triumphal entry which he made into Paris previous 
 to his departure. 
 
 This entry is said to have surpassed in magnifi- 
 cence everything of the kind before attempted, and 
 again amongst the names of those ordered to attend at 
 the office of the ‘ prevot des marchands,’ we find on 
 the same day, August 16, 1573, the names of Dorat, 
 
 ‘ excellent poete ez langues Grecque, Latine, et 
 
CARDINAL DE BIRAGUE. 
 
 233 
 
 Frangoise,’ and of ‘ Germain Pillon, architecte et 
 sculpteur de la sculpture/ The entry took place on 
 September 14, Henri left France shortly after for 
 Poland, but before a year had passed, Charles IX. was 
 in his grave, and his brother was on his way back to 
 take possession of the throne. 
 
 The new reign brought to Pilon another and a 
 wealthy patron. The Milanese, Rene de Birague, an 
 old favourite of Henri II., had been naturalised and 
 made keeper of the seals by Charles IX. Finally, it 
 is said as a special acknowledgment of his services in 
 the instigation, or at least in the execution, of the St. 
 Bartholomew, he succeeded l’Hopital as Chancellor of 
 France. With Henri III. he enjoyed the highest 
 favour, and took a conspicuous share not only in his 
 criminal follies, but also in his religious masquerades. 
 
 Public processions and penitences seem to have 
 aroused in the breast of De Birague a desire for the 
 possession of ecclesiastical dignities. The Chancellor 
 was married, but the opportune death of his wife, 
 Valentina Balbiani, relieved him from his disabilities, 
 and relinquishing the seals to Chiverni, he at once 
 took orders, became Bishop of Lavaur, and eventually 
 Cardinal. His first care was to erect a monument 
 to the woman who had died at a moment suspiciously 
 convenient. Pilon was chosen to erect her tomb 
 in the Church of St. Catherine du Val des Ecoliers. 
 According to custom, the monument of Madame 
 
234 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 de Birague was crowned by her own statue in 
 marble. She was represented half reclining, and 
 holding in her hands a small book. The stiff folds of 
 the heavy brocade, out of which is fashioned her mag- 
 nificent dress, dissemble without concealing the long 
 and meagre lines of her body. One of the little lap- 
 dogs, which her husband is said to have brought into 
 fashion at Court, is placed before her ; on either side 
 marble ‘ genies funeraires ’ reverse their torches and 
 display their grief ; and beneath was inserted a bas- 
 relief showing the dead body partly veiled by its 
 shroud. 
 
 Near the tomb of Valentina, stood of old that of the 
 Cardinal her husband, erected by his daughter, the 
 Marquise de Neelle in 1585, but when the monks by 
 whom this church was served obtained the ‘ maison 
 professe’ of the Jesuits in the Rue St. Antoine, they 
 took with them both the monuments, casting them into 
 one at their re-erection. Ini 793, Lenoir removed them 
 to his museum, whence they passed into the Louvre. 
 
 The contemporary engraving of the tomb of 
 Valentina by Bonfons is full of mistakes and omissions. 
 M. Lenoir says positively that when he removed 
 it from the Rue St. Antoine the bas-relief ‘ dune 
 femme morte d’ethisie ’ formed a part of the mauso- 
 leum, while the marked resemblance which it presents 
 to the proportions of the portrait-statue would alone 
 lead us to conjecture that it had formed a part 
 
TOMB OF CARDINAL AND MADAME DE BIRAG UE. 235 
 
 of her monument. Yet, where it should figure in 
 Bonfons’ engraving, we find but the indication of a 
 blank tablet, and it cannot but be supposed that this 
 is due to mere carelessness when we see Madame de 
 Birague represented as naked except for the drapery 
 cast about her legs ; — a figure which resembles indeed 
 the attitude and proportions of the statue now in the 
 Louvre, but differs from it in every detail of dress, 
 and ornament. 
 
 Before Lenoir interfered, and even before the re- 
 moval to the Rue St. Antoine, the De Birague mau- 
 soleum had suffered severely. Germain Brice says, 
 ‘ depuis quelques annees on a ote la plupart des 
 ornemens de bronze qui y etaient * (on the Cardinals 
 tomb) ‘ dont on s’est servi pour le tabernacle du 
 grand autel de cette eglise ; ’ but in spite of these 
 ravages, he adds, les curieux go to look at the work, for 
 Pilon never did anything finer. In more than one 
 respect, even as it stands at present, this monument 
 is indeed worth serious examination, but it is as a 
 portrait-statue, carried out with scrupulous exactness 
 of minute detail, yet preserving the dignity and sim- 
 plicity of line becoming monumental intention, that the 
 figure of Valentina, especially, is remarkable. 
 
 M. Michelet has written of it a passionate and fanci- 
 ful description. For him, the monument of Valentina 
 is the conscious analysis of the social corruption of the 
 Catholic world of that day — an embodiment of the 
 
236 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 dreary inanity of a life absorbed in frivolous pleasure 
 and the companionship of lap-dogs, whilst desires and 
 aspirations were put to sleep by the easy anodyne of 
 an enervating mysticism. But Pilon was most surely 
 free from any intention of preaching a sermon when 
 he placed beneath the effigy of the great Court lady as 
 she lived in state, ‘ it/ that other terrible outline which 
 appears to us from within the shroud. In doing so 
 he but conformed to the general practice of his day. 
 All the royal tombs which have been already men- 
 tioned were furnished with these images, and there 
 was a twofold reason for the custom. There was the 
 peculiar Renaissance terror of death which expressed 
 itself in an attitude of cynical familiarity, and which 
 makes the appearance of these figures in ghastly 
 proximity to the life-effigy seem but the counterpart in 
 art of the sentiment which prompts Ronsard to invoke 
 ‘ testes de cimetiere ’ and images of decay in the mid- 
 rapture of a passionate love- song. And there was also 
 the intense interest felt at this moment by every artist 
 in anatomical study, accompanied by the desire to turn 
 to account, whenever possible, his newly acquired know- 
 ledge. But the fact that the sculptor had no intention 
 of moralising his subject, in the special sense supposed 
 by M. Michelet, does not deprive his work of moral 
 significance. In Valentina Balbiani, Pilon encountered 
 a complete type of artificial elegance both in form and 
 sentiment, to the reproduction of which his own talent 
 
THE STATUE OF MADAME DE BIRAGUE. 237 
 
 lent itself with the facility of perfect sympathy. Body 
 and soul had in her wrought themselves into an accord, 
 the outward signs of which it was not possible to render, 
 without at the same time telling the history of a life. 
 
 Not the minutest indication, physical or moral, has 
 escaped the sculptor s eye. All is revealed, — the pride 
 of race, the egotism of caste polished only by the re- 
 quirements of courtly conduct, the empty habits of 
 undeserved ease and command, the pressure of age, 
 the weariness of life no longer stimulated by the excite- 
 ments of passion and vanity, and over all lies the 
 exquisite exterior finish, acquired by sedulous practice, 
 of dress, of attitude, of movement. Madame de Birague 
 comes before us in the perfection of her kind. Her 
 portrait is the last work of Pilon’s best time. It de- 
 serves to be ranked with ‘ The Three Graces,’ not 
 as an embodiment of life and beauty, but as a complete 
 expression of his special qualities of skill and insight. 
 When twelve years later it fell to his lot to erect the 
 tomb of De Birague himself, Pilon was no longer in his 
 full force. The bronze statue of the Cardinal does not 
 possess, either as an historical monument or as a work 
 of art, the interest which attaches to that of his wife. 
 
 It seems strange, at first sight, that Pilon, who had 
 been for more than sixteen years wholly absorbed by 
 the royal mausoleums at St. Denis, should have found 
 time, whilst they were yet incomplete, to undertake so 
 important a work as the funeral monument of Madame 
 
238 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 de Birague. But the tombs at St. Denis which had 
 been previously the object of unceasing solicitude seem 
 to have been neglected during the earlier years of the 
 reign of Henri III. On May 14, 1575, the Grand Prior 
 of St. Denis delivers to Pilon, by royal command, a piece 
 of marble then lying in the cemetery of St. Denis, and 
 this is to be employed on the tomb of Henri II., but 
 we have no after entry on this account up to 1583, seven 
 years later. This neglect seemed the more shameful 
 when in 1579 Henri began to spend lavishly on three 
 monuments which he employed Pilon to erect in the 
 Church of St. Paul, to the memory of Queslus, 
 Maugiron, and Saint Megrin. Ronsard indignantly 
 calls attention to this fact in a sonnet written during 
 the course of the same year : 
 
 Quatre rois ont regne depuis ma cognoissance : 
 
 Henry, Francois second, et Charles regrette, 
 
 Henry trois de ce nom, k present muguette 
 
 D’un quart mignon restant des trois mignons de France. 
 
 Henry, pere des trois a monstre sa vaillance ; 
 
 FranQois a trop tost vue son terme limite ; 
 
 Charles, k grand regret, mort le regne a quitte. 
 
 Les monumens desquels leur successeur ri advance. 
 
 Ains a present confist en molle oysivete, 
 
 Oubliant ses ayeuls, sa race et l’equite, 
 
 A de trois mignons morts erige des trophe'es. 
 
 The Guisards, who found the influence of the four 
 minions with Henri III. an obstacle to their own 
 power, had determined to be rid of them. Queslus 
 
THE MINIONS OF HENRI III. 
 
 239 
 
 and Maugiron were disposed of in a preconcerted duel, 
 Saint Megrin fell assassinated at the very gates of the 
 Louvre, but these crimes were useless, for the fourth, 
 Antraguet, escaped, and he became more powerful 
 than ever, supported by the Dukes d’Epernon and 
 de Joyeuse. The King consoled himself for the loss of 
 his old favourites by constructing monuments destined 
 to commemorate the courage they had displayed in 
 the fatal encounter. The epitaph of Queslus tells us, 
 
 ‘ non injuriam sed mortem patienter tulit,’ a motto 
 which Bonfons translates, ‘ II ne peut souffrir un out- 
 rage et souffrit constament la mort.’ 
 
 Of the nature of the intimacy which endeared 
 these men to the King there can be little doubt. 
 Even if we reject the coarse assertions of the poems 
 printed in the ‘ Gayetez de Ronsard,’ the spirit and 
 style of which seem fully to justify their attribution to 
 his pen, there still remain grave allusions, as for 
 instance in the ‘ Sonnets d’Estat,’ which come to us 
 with authority. These ‘Sonnets d’Estat,’ ‘ publies 
 a la Cour es annees 1577 et 1578,’ if not written by 
 Ronsard himself (as there is every reason to suppose), 
 are written by a person equally well acquainted with the 
 private manners and intrigues of Henri III.’s Court : 
 and minions are here addressed as ‘ Ganimeds effrontes, 
 impudique canaille.’ 
 
 The public hate which their lives excited was not 
 only strong, but enduring. Ten years after their death, 
 
240 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 when the wars of the League had diminished the 
 respect for the royal authority in Paris, one of the 
 first acts of the populace was the complete destruction 
 of the splendid monuments which Henry III. had 
 raised to their memory. 
 
 The rude wood engravings given by Bonfons are 
 the only authentic record of these tombs now existing. 
 Lenoir, indeed, professes to reproduce a design by 
 Pilon himself. This drawing differs in many important 
 particulars from the cuts in Bonfons. The proportions 
 and shape vary considerably, nor can the details be 
 identified with those of either of the three monuments 
 as engraved by Rabel. In these engravings, the 
 figures have an air of naivete , each kneels before 
 a prie-dieu , his gauntlets on the ground before him, 
 his helmet at his heels ; above the unwieldy shoulder- 
 pieces of the cuirass appears an enormous ruff, the 
 hands are joined, and uplifted as in prayer. The 
 attitude recalls the lines written by Philippe Desportes 
 at the end of the ‘ Prayer for the Dead ’ in Henri 
 I II.s ‘ Book of Hours.’ 
 
 Donne que les esprits de ceux que je soupire 
 N’esprouvent point, Seigneur, ta justice et ton ire. 
 
 Fay leur part en ta gloire, ainsy qu’a tes esleus : 
 
 Cancelle leurs peches et leurs folles jeunesses, 
 
 Et regoit s’il te plait, en suyvant tes promesses, 
 
 En ton sein, Maugiron, Saint-Megrin, et Queslus ! 
 
 But though a close similarity of attitude and 
 general outline is thus maintained, Pilon (according to 
 
CADRAN DE L'HORLOGE DU PALAIS . 
 
 241 
 
 Rabel, has carefully varied all the small details. Lenoir’s 
 drawing shows no prie-dieu , the plumed helmet lies at 
 the knees of the figure, and the general effect is 
 decidedly not monumental in character. If chance 
 has here preserved for us Pilon’s first project, it affords 
 a curious illustration of his mode of work, beginning 
 with a picturesque sketch, to be afterwards wrought 
 into accordance with the conditions of sculpture, 
 
 Pilon was at this date more than sixty years old, but 
 he continued to labour with unremitting activity. In 
 1583 and in 1584, payments were again made to him 
 on account of the tomb of Henri II. and Catharine de 
 Medicis. His reputation was now widely established, 
 and La Croix du Maine mentions him as one of ‘ les 
 plus excellens statuaires de Paris, voire de toute la 
 France, comme il se veoit par tous ses ouvrages tant 
 a Paris qu’en divers lieux de la France, tant inge- 
 nieusement elaboures. Je d^sirerais’ (he adds) ‘qu’il 
 voulut mettre en lumiere les secrets de sa science pour 
 servir a ceux qui font profession de cet art. II florit a 
 Paris cette annee, 1584.’ 
 
 In the following year (1585) Pilon’s name appears 
 on the list of the Household, and Corrozet chronicles his 
 execution of the ‘cadran del’horlogedu Palais de Paris.’ 
 The motto ‘ Qui dedit ante duas, triplicem dabit ille 
 coronam,’ was inscribed on this work — a motto which, 
 taken with the carvings by which the face was sur- 
 mounted, makes an elaborate and not very clear 
 
 vol. 1. R 
 
242 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 allusion to the recent creation by Henri III. of the 
 order of the St. Esprit. 
 
 In these carvings the Holy Ghost was seen de- 
 scending with a crown of laurel, and beneath appeared 
 two other crowns surmounting the arms of France and 
 Poland, the whole being encircled by a collar of the 
 order. The figures of ‘ Justice ’ and ‘ Law ’ supported 
 the clock on either side, and were illustrated by a 
 second motto : 4 Machina quae bis sex, tarn juste dividit 
 horas, justitiam servare monet, legesque tueri.’ These 
 carvings were all but entirely renewed in 1868, by 
 reproductions from casts taken before the work itself 
 had been deteriorated by time and weather. These 
 reproductions, together with what still remained of the 
 original work, perished in the fires of 1871. 
 
 In the month of June of the same year in which 
 Pilon executed the sculptures of the Hotel de Ville, he 
 completed the tomb of the Cardinal de Birague. 
 In April of the year following (1586) he was com- 
 missioned by the Queen-mother to execute for her an 
 ‘ image de la Vierge Marie.’ She had determined to 
 appropriate for this purpose a piece of white marble 
 then lying at St. Denis, and Pilon was furnished with 
 a letter written in her name to the Grand Prior, 
 directing him to give up the said piece of white marble 
 then in his possession. The Grand Prior yielded, 
 for on the back of the Queen’s letter Pilon writes : 
 
 ‘ Ce jour d’hui iii. jour d’avril 1586 moy Germain 
 
VIERGE DE PITlt, 
 
 243 
 
 Pilon confesse avoir pris .... pour faire le dit 
 ouvrage.’ 
 
 The original clay model of this figure, and the 
 figure itself, are still in existence. Both were shel- 
 tered during the Revolution in the Musee des Monu- 
 ments Frangais, and when the museum was dispersed 
 the clay model took its way to the military school of 
 St. Cyr, whilst the marble figure was placed in a 
 chapel of the church of St. Paul in the Rue St. 
 Antoine. It is conjectured to be the statue ‘ une 
 Mere de Pitie en marbre, par Pilon,’ mentioned by 
 D’Argenville in his ‘ Voyage Pittoresque ’ as standing 
 in the Salle des Cent Suisses in the Louvre, and the 
 defects of which are twice severely criticised by Sauval. 
 
 ‘ La tete,’ he says, ‘ de la Vierge de Pitie est tres 
 belle, les mains trop belles, et trop delicates, les pieds 
 trop gresles, la coeffure fort simple, la robe trop vaste,’ 
 and again in his third volume, there is a similar pas- 
 sage, in which he refers to the ‘ modele en terre qui 
 se voit sous les orgues de la Sainte Chapelle.’ 
 
 If the figure of which Sauval speaks is the Virgin 
 now in the Rue Saint Antoine, the severity of his 
 language is but too fully deserved. The statue has 
 suffered much from ill-usage, but its total destruction 
 would have been the happiest accident for the fame 
 of its author. What remains shows but the pitiable 
 interval which separates the work of Pilon’s maturity 
 from that of his old age. 
 
244 
 
 RENA ISS A NCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Many times in the course of his long career, 
 Pilon had been employed in the decorations and re- 
 storations of the churches of Paris. Germain Brice 
 mentions a great variety of works out of which only 
 one or two have come down to us. In the church of 
 St. Estienne du Mont, over the altar of the Holy 
 Sacrament, he notes an Entombment and a marble 
 bas-relief 'dime excellente beautd' representing the 
 Agony in the Garden. In Saint- Gervais in the 
 Fourcy Chapel, he says, stood an 4 Ecce Homo’ 
 ‘ qu’on croit etre de Germain Pilon.’ At the Grands 
 Augustins he describes the celebrated pulpit : 4 la 
 chaire du predicateur . . . autour de laquelle sont 
 quelques bas-reliefs de Germain Pilon, sculpteur tres- 
 habile, on a cru les embellir en les faisant dorer mais 
 on s’est trompe.’ 
 
 This work is said to have been finished by Pilon 
 about 1588. It was broken up during the Revolution, 
 but some portions which were rescued by Lenoir 
 have found their way to the Louvre, and a general 
 impression of the design may be obtained from 
 a cut given by Millin. In the cloister of the same 
 convent, Millin tells us, stood a celebrated terra-cotta 
 statue of Saint Francis, ‘ represent^ en habit de 
 Capucin agenouille devant un crucifix, dans l’attitude 
 ou i! devait etre lorsqu’il recut les pretendus 
 stigmates de J£sus Christ,’ and he adds, ‘ce Saint- 
 Frangois de Germain Pilon a et6 execute en marbre ; 
 
I 
 
 WORKS IN TERRA-COTTA AND WOOD. 245 
 
 on le voit ainsi dans la Salle des Antiques ’ (the 
 marble replica executed for Charles IX.). The 
 terra-cotta figure was first noticed by Raoul de 
 Boutray in his poem ‘ Lutetia,’ and later on, in 1772, 
 in Rigollet de Juvigny’s edition of La Croix de 
 Maine’s ‘ Bibliotheque Frangoise’ there occurs the 
 following note added to the former brief biography of 
 Germain Pilon : ‘ La figure en grandeur naturelle de 
 Saint Frangois stigmata qu’on voit sous le cloitre des 
 Grands Augustins a Paris, ouvrage admirable, que la 
 negligence laisse detruire par le temps.’ 
 
 In the Abbaye Royale of Ste. Genevieve du Mont, 
 Brice singles out other works in terra-cotta, from 
 Pilon’s hand — a dead Christ, and a Resurrection, both 
 in bas-relief. They were then, he says, carefully pro- 
 tected with wire, but had previously suffered much by 
 having casts incessantly taken from them. 
 
 The reliquary, which contained the remains of Ste. 
 Genevieve, preserved in the same Abbey, was also 
 supported by four life-size figures, representing the 
 Cardinal Virtues, carved in wood by Pilon. Their 
 original position is determined by an existing engrav- 
 ing of Abraham Bosse, which represents a procession 
 bringing out the relics of the Saint, and in which these 
 figures appear surmounting an Ionic order; they are 
 placed to the right of the columns, and support the 
 reliquary with one hand, whilst in the other they bear 
 aloft a lighted torch. 
 
246 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 On their coming into the hands of Lenoir, he in- 
 corporated them into a pseudo-mausoleum, which he 
 erected in the Musee des Monuments Fran^ais to the 
 memory of Diane de Poitiers. At the Restoration they 
 were relegated, to the storehouse of the Musee ; then 
 they were transferred to the Ecole des Beaux Arts, 
 whence they were afterwards removed to Versailles 
 by Louis Philippe. From Versailles they eventually 
 found their way to the Louvre, where they have 
 been arranged together on a pedestal, the details of 
 which are copied from that designed by Pilon to 
 carry his group of Graces. In the Goldsmiths’ chapel, 
 in the Rue des Deschargeurs — a chapel built by De 
 l’Orme in 1550 and served by the chapter of St. Ger- 
 main — Dom Brice also saw certain figures said to be 
 by Pilon, ‘ much esteemed by connoisseurs ; ’ and 
 another work, which he mentions, but of which all 
 trace seems to have been lost, is a bas-relief of the 
 Virgin, placed 4 au lieu de tableaux ’ in a little chapel 
 attached to the house of Maximilien Titon, ‘ secretaire 
 du roi.’ 
 
 The corporation of the ‘ Secretaires du Roi,’ who 
 were at first only four in number, possessed an altar in 
 the Church of the Celestins. This church was one of 
 the most richly decorated in all Paris, and Corrozet 
 remarks that the monks took such care of every 
 monument that you would think that all was new, and 
 contrasts the scrupulous order maintained by the 
 
CHURCH OF THE CELESTINS. 247 
 
 Celestins with the indifference shown by the Chapter of 
 St. Denis. The altar of the Royal Secretaries occupied 
 during the sixteenth century a central position at the 
 top of the church behind the high altar, but in 1608 
 they agreed that the high altar should be removed to 
 the place hitherto occupied by their own. The high 
 altar thus became common to them and to the Celestins, 
 and all the masses founded by the Secretaries were 
 said upon it. 
 
 When Dom Brice visited the church this change 
 had long been effected. The high altar was dedicated 
 to the Virgin and Saint John, and on behalf of the 
 ‘ Secretaires du Roi ’ to their patron-saints, the four 
 Evangelists. The four bronze statues of the Evange- 
 lists, which then formed a part of the decorations of 
 the altar, are said to have been given by Henri IV., 
 and were therefore most probably added when the 
 position of the altar was changed ; but the life-size 
 figures of the Virgin with the archangel Gabriel, the 
 balustrade, and the lectern which stood in the centre 
 of the choir, are all attributed by Brice to Germain 
 Pilon. 
 
 Millin also gives a full description of the treasures 
 existing in the church prior to 1793. He too men- 
 tions the vases of the balustrade executed by Ger- 
 main Pilon, the Virgin, and Archangel, and describes 
 and engraves the ‘ lutrin de cuivre ’ previously noticed 
 by Brice. The decorations of this lectern showed the 
 
248 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 same subjects as those of the high altar. At the 
 four corners of the pivot stood the four Evange- 
 lists, and the little group which surmounted the desk 
 repeated the scene of the Annunciation. Millin 
 criticises the figures of the Evangelists, as being small 
 and mannered, but he adds, ‘ ils sont bien jetes et d’un 
 beau mouvement.’ Only a year or two after Millin 
 stood in the Celestins, and saw that all was in perfect 
 order and beauty, the convent unfortunately became 
 the ‘ centre du bataillon des Celestins.’ All those 
 monuments which could not be cast into the melting- 
 pot were broken or defaced. Lenoir again interposed, 
 eager to rescue and preserve, but his efforts, as far 
 as Pilon was concerned, seem to have been unsuc- 
 cessful, for nothing executed by him in this church can 
 now be traced. 
 
 It might, indeed, have been hoped that what Lenoir 
 did save would now be found in the Louvre. This 
 is not the case. After the dispersion of the ‘ Musee 
 des Monuments Fran9ais’ at the Restoration much 
 seems to have disappeared either from the store- 
 houses of the Ecole des Beaux Arts or in the carriage 
 to and from the galleries of Versailles and Paris. Only 
 four out of the six Caryatides of the pulpit of the 
 • Grands Augustins are now to be seen in the ‘ Musee 
 de la Renaissance.’ The bas-relief, of Christ and the 
 Samaritan woman, is not to be found, and neither the 
 Pieta of the ‘ Sainte-Chapelle ’ nor the Saint Francis 
 
DATE OF PILON’S DEATH. 
 
 249 
 
 have obtained a place in the national gallery. On 
 the other hand, it possesses several portrait-busts by 
 Pilon, or of his school, one or two reliefs from Anet, 
 a pair of alabaster reliefs representing Melchisedech 
 and St. Paul, and a relief, also in alabaster, of greater 
 importance, the subject of which is the Agony in the 
 Garden, and which may possibly be identical with 
 that described by Germain Brice in the Church of St. 
 Etienne du Mont. All these works, however, seem 
 to belong to the days of Pilon’s decline. 
 
 As to the date of his death there has been much 
 dispute. M. Renouard, in his letter to Lenoir, asserts 
 that it took place about 1590, and that Pilon was 
 thus prevented from executing in marble the terra- 
 cotta model of St. Francis, which he had made in 
 1588. This cannot have been the case; we know from 
 the document printed by M. de Laborde that the 
 marble reproduction was really executed, and Millin 
 says, ‘ il se voit dans la Salle des Antiques. M. Dreux 
 Duradier/ adds M. Renouard, ‘ a tres-bien prouve par 
 lepitaphe de Pilon, imprimee dans les oeuvres de 
 Menard en 1607, que ce sculpteur mourut au com- 
 mencement de 1606/ The reference given is to the 
 ‘Journal de Verdun/ Feb. 1759. This I have not 
 been able to see, nor have I been able to find any 
 ‘ CEuvres de Menard, 1607/ 
 
 It is by the Three Graces, dexterously chiselled from 
 a single block of marble, that Pilon has become most 
 
250 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 widely known. This group, which was executed about 
 1560, when he was in the very midst of his long career, 
 is, without doubt, the flower of all his work. Perhaps 
 no composition of equal merit has ever been more 
 popular. Millin exclaims, that on discovering the 
 contents of the vase which they bear, one shrinks 
 back in disgust, and Cicognara is annoyed that the 
 Graces should be subjected to bearing so inappropriate 
 a burden as the urn which held the heart of Henri II. 
 But since Cicognara wrote, reproductions of this group 
 have been seen wherever cheap French casts and 
 bronzes penetrate. The Graces of Germain Pilon bear 
 clocks, vases, lamps ; and to all graceful trifling they 
 lend themselves with ease. 
 
 Nature had endowed Pilon with the power of 
 pleasing. A never-failing charm enriched his work 
 which overflowed with dainty affectations, and over- 
 refined elegancies, corresponding exactly to the tone 
 and taste of the Court which Catharine de Medicis 
 had formed. The favourite sculptor of this woman 
 was incapable of giving adequate expression to any 
 male virtue. Diane de Poitiers becomes a true Diana 
 under the fingers of Goujon, a mans dignity was safe 
 in the hands of Cousin ; Germain Pilon turned to the 
 sentiment of emasculate asceticism, or the meretricious 
 modesties of Catharine and her maids. ‘ Gratise de- 
 centes ’ is the quotation perpetually applied to these 
 figures ; they have been commended by French critics 
 
THE THREE GRACES. 
 
 CERMAiN PILON 
 
 SCULPT 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ■ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ' 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 . 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
THE THREE GRACES. 
 
 251 
 
 as types of perfect womanhood. But their praise does 
 not lie in this. They are the highly artificial rendering 
 of a highly artificial product. Both attitude and ex- 
 pression are cultivated, polished, finished ; but without 
 truth, without simplicity, without honesty ; for how 
 should the Court sculptor render qualities which existed 
 neither for himself nor for the women who were his 
 models ? 
 
 That which Pilon saw, he mastered and reproduced 
 with consummate skill. The head of Catharine her- 
 self is a page of personal history. The head is large, 
 and the jaw is powerful, but the form of the brow is 
 poor, and the open nostrils and curling corners of the 
 lips have a sensual snarl which practice has veneered 
 with a polite simper. The facts of her life, the nature 
 of her influence on the fortunes of France cannot be 
 appreciated without the study of that which Pilon has 
 recorded. 
 
 Cicognara rather unfairly reproaches Pilon with 
 the commonness of the forms which he treated in this 
 group, and with the inexpressive and ignoble character 
 of the faces. These women were such as he has pre- 
 sented them, but over every defect he has cast the 
 veil of exquisite grace. There is a charm about the 
 delicate subtlety of Pilon’s touch, which disarms every 
 prejudice, and allures every eye. This charm can only 
 have its full effect in objects of comparatively small 
 scale, for elaborate elegance would be lost in the large 
 
252 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 architectural work of which Goujon was a master. 
 Varnhagen von Ense, when he visited Lenoir’s museum, 
 was struck by the architectonic character of much of 
 the work. ‘ A lies,’ he exclaims, ‘alles in ihr strebt 
 
 zum Gebaude, fugt ihm sich an.’ This is specially 
 true of Goujon, but it is in the decorative toy, which 
 has relations with nothing but itself, that Pilon shines. 
 He blew a lovely bubble which attracted with its shifting 
 play of changeful harmonies the eyes of all the courtly 
 and cultivated men and women of his time. Bonfons 
 passes in review the monuments of Paris without one 
 mention of Goujon’s name, but Germain Pilon is for 
 him one of the foremost men of the age, the memory 
 of whose work will be everlasting. 
 
 Pilon’s best work certainly possesses qualities which 
 deserve eternal fame. Any estimate of his talent 
 which omitted to notice his want of simplicity, which 
 omitted to notice that the sympathies of the man went 
 out most readily to a highly artificial aspect of life, 
 would be not only imperfect but unjust. For these 
 peculiarities, which seem to be defects if we recall the 
 instinct, truly Greek in character, with which Goujon 
 conceived and handled the large and noble lines of the 
 Diane Ckasseresse, are indeed qualities which specially 
 fitted Pilon for the task of realising that form of life 
 which had been perfected in his day. 
 
 The art of sculpture can show nothing more com- 
 plete of its kind than the portrait group of Catharine 
 
JACQUES SARRAZ1N. 
 
 2 53 
 
 and her women, but the school to which France owes 
 the two chief glories of her sculpture died out with 
 Germain Pilon. It has been said that Jacques Sar- 
 razin, who, born in 158.8, was forced to seek his train- 
 ing in Rome, proved, by the Caryatides which he 
 executed on the great central pavilion of the Louvre, 
 his right to continue the work of Goujon. The in- 
 terval which separates Sarrazin from the great sculptors 
 of the French Renaissance is as wide as the interval 
 which divides the Tuileries of Jean Androuet du 
 Cerceau from the Tuileries of Bullant and de TOrme. 
 
254 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 PAINTING (1460-1520). 
 
 Jean Fouquet . — The Josephus of the Duke de Berry . 
 
 Digne pr^decesseur de Leonard de Vinci, d’ Albert Durer,d’Holbein, 
 et de Raphael, Fouquet prend un vol si £levd qu’on doit lui donner place 
 parmi ces grands maitres et le nommer d^sormais avec eux. — AUGUSTE 
 de Bastard. 
 
 Of the works both in architecture and in sculpture 
 produced in France during the sixteenth century, 
 enough at any rate remains for us to form an accurate 
 conception of the nature and character of the progress 
 made in each art. But as regards the art of painting 
 our position is wholly different. Out of all the long 
 list of painters published by M. de Laborde in his 
 ‘ Renaissance des Arts a la Cour de France/ there 
 are scarcely six of whom we know more than the 
 name, whilst out of the scanty number of works which 
 have come down to us, there are but few to which an 
 author can be assigned. We have one or two paint- 
 ings and a considerable number of illuminations by 
 Jean Fouquet, painter to Louis XI. and Charles VIII., 
 a single picture by Jean Perreal dit de Paris, a few 
 portraits executed by Francois Clouet and by his father 
 
ILLUMINATIONS AND PAINTINGS. 
 
 255 
 
 Jean Clouet II., and some half-dozen oil-paintings by 
 Jean Cousin ; as to the remainder, they must either be 
 classed as ‘Ecole des Clouet,’ or conjecturally attri- 
 buted to Etienne Dumoustier, to Corneille of Lyons, 
 or any other name which would seem to have enjoyed 
 more than usual credit. 
 
 With the exception of the subjects treated in illus- 
 trated works, almost all the drawings and paintings 
 which have been preserved are portraits. The same 
 fate which blotted from the walls of Fontainebleau 
 the frescoes and paintings of II Rosso, Primaticcio, 
 and their French assistants, did not suffer the subjects 
 treated by less celebrated artists in less distinguished 
 chateaux to escape. Towards the close of the century 
 materials fail entirely, and we find only a few drawings 
 by Benjamin Foulon, or a sketch or two by Jacques 
 Bunel. But Bunel, of whose incessant activity as a 
 painter there now remains scarcely a trace, worked 
 under Henri IV., together with Martin Freminet who 
 had returned at the beginning of the seventeenth 
 century, after a fifteen years’ training in Italy, and both 
 these men belong to another era — the era in which we 
 find national traditions replaced by the taste of the 
 Italian decadence. 
 
 This change cannot, however, be ascribed to the 
 half-dozen artists whom Francis I. established at 
 Fontainebleau. M. de Laborde has already pointed 
 out that the Renaissance in France took its rise not in 
 
256 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 the sixteenth but in the fifteenth century, that its cradle 
 was not Paris but Tours, that Jean Fouquet occupies 
 in the history of the French school a position identical 
 with that held by Mantegna in Italy, and it may be 
 shown that throughout the course of the whole move- 
 ment up to the close of the sixteenth century, the 
 French preserved in painting as in every other art 
 the character of their original tendencies. 
 
 The special bent of French taste asserts itself with 
 great definiteness in all early work. It shows itself 
 unmistakably in quality of colour. In the painted 
 tombs, in the illuminations, in the stained glass of the 
 fifteenth century we recognise the same predilections 
 which ultimately led the French to achieve unrivalled 
 success in the development and treatment of har- 
 monies lying within a scale of very limited compass, 
 and pitched in a high key. Full combinations are not 
 necessary, to the satisfaction of those whose instincts 
 specially require perfect purity of tone. An infinite 
 variety of pleasure can be afforded them by the mere 
 succession of closely approximate intervals. 
 
 The full beauty of this class of modulations can 
 only be elicited by an exquisitely accurate adjustment 
 of relative values, and work of this class tends in its 
 decadence to become monotonous, thin, obliterate in its 
 very definiteness ; whilst in its infancy it is usually 
 remarkable for a harsh and acrid property, the result 
 of the preponderance of tints which are positive yet 
 
FLEMISH COLONY AT DIJON. 
 
 257 
 
 without depth. Cold acid blues and greens and shrill 
 clear reds are relieved in early French work by long 
 passages of white or whitish grey, and unmodified 
 fawn-colour, and the general effect is sharp and 
 brusque. 
 
 The working out of this earlier stage was gradually 
 brought beneath the action of two distinct and some- 
 what antagonistic influences. The .Court of the Dukes 
 of Burgundy had brought the sober diligence of 
 Flanders into the very heart of France. The traditions 
 which lingered about the palaces of Avignon faded 
 away before the walls of Dijon, and even the changing 
 currents which crossed the French frontier from Italy 
 were not suffered to pass the gates of the Burgundian 
 capital unchallenged. The Flemish colony stood like 
 a sentinel on the road to Paris, but the line of travel 
 between Tours and Rome lay open. From the port 
 of Narbonne by Toulouse, Perigueux, Limoges, and 
 Poitiers a free communication with Italy was main- 
 tained, and thus Touraine received a direct if distant 
 impulse from the southern centres of artistic activity. 
 Very early in the fifteenth century the effect on French 
 work of these two agencies can be distinguished. On 
 the one hand we find the school of Tours passing 
 rapidly through the stages which preceded certain finally 
 determined modifications in style of design, and general 
 scheme of colour ; and we find that these modifications, 
 though the result in some degree of foreign influence, 
 vol. 1. s 
 
2 5 8 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 are ever subject to the control of strongly marked 
 national predilections. The painters of Tours profited 
 by the lessons to be learnt from the harmonious beauty 
 of Italian work, but the languorous sentiment of the 
 Italian model was dispelled by the liveliness native to 
 the French character, and instead of adopting the full 
 measure of brilliant Southern colour they continued to 
 develop their proper scheme. Consequently the work 
 of Touraine, whilst it owed to Italian example increased 
 science and refinement, retained a peculiar physiog- 
 nomy. Each form was defined and each tint was laid 
 with French precision, whilst gradually the general tone 
 became fainter, and the colouring lost positive accent, 
 as day by day national preferences asserted themselves 
 more surely. 
 
 The school of Paris, on the other hand, took 
 precisely that turn which ultimately enabled it to 
 furnish a corrective to the over-development of 
 qualities fostered in the school of Tours. When the 
 moment of coalition arrived, the school of Paris was 
 plainly remarkable for a force of manner and vigour 
 of colour which betrayed the presence of Flemish 
 elements. Starting from much the same point of 
 departure as the artists of Touraine, the painters of 
 Paris had passed under the direct and powerful action 
 of the school of Burgundy, which was itself but an 
 offshoot from the central activity of Flanders. The 
 influence of Dijon on Paris was so powerful that it 
 
SCHOOLS OF PARIS AND TOURS. 
 
 259 
 
 seems to have all but diverted this branch of French 
 art from its natural course of development. 
 
 The illuminations executed in the north of France 
 show in point of colour alone a close approximation to 
 the startling effects popular in Flemish and Burgundian 
 work. Yet, although we can tell at a glance whether 
 the illuminations of a French fifteenth-century MS. 
 have been produced at Paris or at Tours, the Paris 
 MS. will preserve some evidence of a distinct indivi- 
 duality, and trace of its true origin and relationship, 
 beneath the strong superficial resemblance to Flemish 
 art. Flemish teaching gave courage to deal with the 
 most vivid and trenchant hues, and to handle with 
 vigour forms of strongly defined character. But 
 national instinct put a keener edge on the force em- 
 ployed, and communicated a lighter gaiety to the 
 many-tinted pages. The hard and gorgeous brilliancy 
 of Flemish colour was replaced by a fluttering radiance 
 as of flowers opening in the sun. 
 
 The fusion of these two schools, the schools of 
 Paris and of Tours, was finally brought about by the 
 same events which have already been noticed as deeply 
 affecting French art in all its branches during the 
 beginning of the sixteenth century ; for this fusion 
 necessarily took place under the reign of Francois I., 
 when the French Court forsook Touraine, and settled 
 itself in the capital. In the history of painting, too, as 
 in the history of other arts in France, an undue import- 
 
26 o 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 ance is assigned at this moment to Italian teaching. 
 Vasari has preserved for us the story of Andrea del 
 Sartos journey to France, and of his departure again 
 for Italy with the gold of the French king, under a 
 never-fulfilled promise to return. Cellini has himself 
 recorded in his autobiography the honours he received, 
 and the quarrels, vanities, and brutalities which occu- 
 pied him at Fontainebleau. The melancholy death of 
 the great Leonardo drew the eyes of Europe on 
 Amboise. The ten years’ tyranny of II Rosso, to 
 which succeeded the thirty years’ dictatorship of 
 Primaticcio, these are prominent facts which attract 
 attention from the less showy diligence of native 
 artists. 
 
 But native artists were numerous and capable. 
 The long series of extracts from accounts, legal agree- 
 ments, and other papers, published by M. de Laborde, 
 and the documents relative to the arts in Touraine, 
 more recently brought out by M. Grandmaison, testify 
 to their numbers. Both these collections are rich in 
 the names of painters, men to whom no mean tasks 
 were confided. The works themselves have, however, 
 disappeared. M. de Laborde suggests the true ex- 
 planation of this disappearance. ‘ The people ! ’ he 
 says, ‘ do not speak of the enlightened love for the arts 
 of the French people ; the less we say of it the better. 
 They have too often in history left their mark upon 
 our most noble monuments with the hammer and the 
 
DESTRUCTION OF WORKS OF ART. 261 
 
 torch/ During every great social disturbance, this 
 work of destruction has been zealously carried on. 
 The populace, whether composed of bands of Hugue- 
 nots casting down idols in the temple of God, or Red 
 Republicans sweeping the traces of kings and princes 
 from the soil of France, or of Friends of Liberty razing 
 to the ground the very symbols of a bygone authority, 
 the populace have always acted in the same spirit. 
 ‘ Monseigneur, ’ said the Huguenot soldier to Conde, 
 4 laissez-moi abbatir 1’idole et tuez-moi apres.’ 
 
 But the savage passion of the mob has at all times 
 found an invaluable auxiliary in the inexorable logic 
 with which the more educated classes have insisted on 
 the perfect keeping and unity of all their surroundings. 
 Each succeeding age has given us fresh reason to 
 deplore with Diderot that ‘ instinct funeste des con- 
 venances ! tact delicat et ruineux, gout sublime qui 
 change, qui deplace, qui edifie, qui renverse/ 
 
 Whenever enthusiasm for a new style has taken 
 hold upon a generation, that generation has instantly 
 set about remodelling everything which it could touch ; 
 that which it was found impossible to twist into 
 desired compliance with the laws of the new mode has 
 been cast aside without compunction. Death alone 
 prevented Gaston d’Orleans from pulling down the 
 whole of the chateau of Blois, and rebuilding it ac- 
 cording to the designs of Mansard. To hurl down 
 so mighty a fabric was no easy task, and the solid walls 
 
252 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 of a great chateau , or a great cathedral, now and again 
 escaped by a chance delay from the fate which threat- 
 ened them ; but when the destruction of pictures and 
 frescoes was once resolved on it could be quickly 
 accomplished. The leaking roof of some attic cham- 
 ber, or the vapours of the cellar, disposed of unsightly 
 canvases, whilst the active scraper, with a little white- 
 wash, prepared the walls to receive decorations in 
 better keeping with the tastes of their inhabitants. 
 
 The sentiment of family pride in many cases spared, 
 if it did not protect, ancestral portraits ; and to this 
 sentiment is probably due the preservation of much 
 of this class of work. M. de Laborde, in noticing the 
 fact that we have scarcely any subject-painting by the 
 French during this century, suggests in explanation 
 that beneath the admiring confidence inspired by the 
 brilliant facility of Italian artists, which induced the 
 King and his Court to confide all considerable decora- 
 tive works entirely to their hands, there lurked a cer- 
 tain distrust of a freedom and licence unfamiliar in 
 their eyes; this distrust making itself felt whenever 
 the matter in hand concerned the faithful representa- 
 tion of a well-known object. Consequently even those 
 by whom the nobility and grandeur of Italian work 
 was most sincerely appreciated had involuntary re- 
 course to the more literal pencils of native artists if 
 they required a portrait. This sentiment on the part 
 of the employer certainly found a response in the 
 
MURAL PAINTINGS. 
 
 263 
 
 tastes of those employed ; the French painters, and 
 notably the whole family of Clouet, were conscious that 
 in portraiture lay their especial province, their certain 
 path to success and credit. 
 
 French style and character doubtless found their 
 most fitting interpreter in a French artist. Ronsard, 
 enraptured by the charms of a new mistress, does not 
 cry out for Raphael, but for Janet. Yet the well- 
 deserved popularity of the Clouets, and others, as por- 
 trait painters would scarcely justify the supposition that 
 French artists never engaged in any other class of 
 work, even if no evidence to the contrary existed. 
 The glass paintings, the remnants of tapestry, the 
 enamels, the engraved works, and illuminations which 
 have come down to us, show that France herself pos- 
 sessed native artists fertile in design, and the allusions 
 made by contemporary writers would seem to prove 
 that they were perfectly well able to carry out large 
 and complicated compositions either in oil or fresco. 
 
 Brantome frequently refers to paintings decorating 
 the halls of provincial chateaux in places out of the 
 way of Italian workers. In writing the ‘ Life of 
 Charles VIII./ he mentions the hall of a house in 
 Saintonge, belonging to a Seigneur d’Archiac, on the 
 walls of which was painted the battle of Fornova, with 
 portraits of King Charles and his principal nobles. 
 
 ‘ But time,’ he adds, ‘has since completely effaced the 
 whole/ 
 
264 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Again, in a passage in one of his letters, he gives an 
 account of a fine large oil-painting, a hunting scene, 
 which covered one whole side of the great hall at 
 Veiirre, a fortified chateau belonging to the Seigneur 
 de Gondras. Of Frangois Clouet, we also know that 
 he most certainly executed paintings on a large scale 
 which can hardly be classed as simple portraiture. 
 M. de Laborde has himself called attention to the fact 
 that five large pictures by this artist representing con- 
 temporary historical events have been lost since the 
 days of 1793. 
 
 These paintings, one of which was over eight feet in 
 length, decorated an apartment in the Luxembourg 
 called the ‘ Cabinet dore/ and all were minutely 
 described in an inventory made out for the Due 
 d’Antin at the beginning of the eighteenth century. 
 From a second inventory made out in 1793, we learn 
 that they were still in existence, but all traces of them 
 are now lost. One only represented a battle, the others 
 seem to have been records of great state ceremonies in 
 which Henri II. and Catharine de Medicis play a con- 
 spicuous part ; all are described as containing various 
 groups of figures, and all are important in point of size. 
 
 It would seem, therefore, that although portraits 
 only have come down to us from the French painters 
 of the sixteenth century, they most certainly produced 
 much other work. ‘ La Vieillesse/ as Brantome says, 
 soon disposes of frescoes, and it may be remembered 
 
PORTRAITS. 
 
 265 
 
 that of the actual handiwork of Rosso and Primaticcio 
 at Fontainebleau, no veritable touches now remain. 
 For the miserable remains of half-destroyed decora- 
 tions which still appeared on the walls of the Ball- 
 room, of the Staircase, and of the Porte Doree, at the 
 accession of Louis Philippe, were entirely repainted 
 and restored by his orders. 
 
 Large oil-paintings do not, it is true, vanish with 
 the same readiness as fresco, but decisive changes of 
 taste furnished a sufficient motive for the destruction 
 of those which had been spared by the accidents of 
 civil war and revolution, so that instead of being 
 astonished that so little remains, one may rather be 
 surprised to find that a few portraits have indeed sur- 
 vived the ruin of everything equally perishable. The 
 action of family sentiment affords only a partial ex- 
 planation of their preservation, which is probably due 
 to the fact that the numbers originally existing were 
 out of all proportion to the quantity of other work 
 produced. 
 
 This was indeed the case. Portraits were the 
 passion of the day. Not only the nobles, and ladies 
 of the Court, but even members of the bourgeoisie made 
 collections. L’Estoile had his cabinet, as well as ‘la 
 belle Torcy.’ Convents commissioned the portraits of 
 their abbots. The Gaignieres MSS., thirteen volumes 
 of which found their way, during the Revolution, to 
 the Bodleian, show us that the refectory of the Cor- 
 
266 
 
 RENA ISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 deliers was thus decorated, and the custom widely 
 prevailed of putting up memorial portraits (sometimes 
 in character) in churches or chapels to persons lately 
 deceased. Brantome refers to the portrait of his 
 mother, Mdlle. de Vivonne, which was placed ‘in the 
 family mausoleum at D’Amville, as were also those of 5 
 (her relatives) ‘Catherine and Jehanne, the three 
 representing the three Marys.’ But the ‘portrait 
 historiee ’ was not very common ; people, for the most 
 part, were content with a plain representation of the 
 deceased in the habit of his daily life ; and again the 
 Gaignieres MSS. furnish us with an ample number of 
 illustrations. Their pages show many examples taken 
 from the Sacristy of the College d’Autun at Paris, and 
 many from various churches at Poitiers, which seem to 
 have been specially rich in this class of work. 
 
 All this is now lost to us. We have lost not only 
 the valuable materials of history, but we have also lost 
 the inestimably precious record which summed up the 
 aesthetic tendencies of a nation at one of its most 
 brilliant epochs of artistic activity. Painting, which is 
 one of the highest forms of artistic expression, is also 
 one of the most perishable. Every method yet 
 devised by which its durability may be increased, takes 
 away in some sense from the value of its special gift of 
 flexibility and diminishes its readiness of reply to the 
 will. Enamels may endure for ever, but the noblest 
 work executed by this process bears evident traces of 
 
JEAN FOUQJJET. 
 
 267 
 
 the pressure of mechanical necessities, which have 
 imposed varied restrictions, and have interfered 
 seriously with the direct operation of the intention. 
 But enamels last ; whilst too often the sole record of 
 glass-paintings and decorations which formed the glory 
 of a palace, or a cathedral, exists in a hasty drawing, or 
 memorandum made by an unskilled hand. 
 
 The documents published by M. Grandmaison 
 establish the fact that in the fourteenth century there 
 existed at Tours a body of painters whose numbers 
 continued from that date steadily on the increase, but 
 the illuminated MSS. which have been gathered into 
 the library of that town out of the ruined monasteries 
 of Touraine prove that their activity goes back even 
 into the ninth century. The greater part of these 
 MSS., some of the most beautiful, and the most 
 ancient, were once the property of the collegiate 
 chapter of St. Martin, and it is probable that they 
 were produced by a school established and maintained 
 within the walls of this wealthy and celebrated foun- 
 dation. It is not, however, until the middle of the 
 fifteenth century that the character proper to the school 
 of Tours begins to define itself distinctly. At this 
 moment the name of Jean Fouquet appears, and the 
 movement of the French Renaissance commences. 
 
 It is conjectured that Fouquet was a native of 
 Tours, and that his birth took place at some time 
 between the years 1415 and 1420. This conjecture 
 
268 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 hangs by the tradition that in 1440-43 Fouquet was 
 in Italy, and already distinguished as an artist, since 
 he was then entrusted by Antonio Filarete with the 
 task of painting the portrait of Eugenius IV. Fouquet 
 was indeed the pupil of Filarete, though no one has 
 noticed that this fact is implied by the words which 
 Vasari uses in speaking of that master’s death : 1 fu 
 sepolto nella Minerva, dove a Giovanni Foccora’ 
 ( Fochetta , in first edition) ‘assai lodato pittore aveva 
 fatto ritrarre Papa Eugenio, mentre al suo servizio in 
 Roma dimorava.’ 
 
 The portrait itself is mentioned in a letter written 
 by a certain Francesco Florio, who was probably a 
 member of the household of Guilhermy Tardif, Arch- 
 bishop of Tours, for in a note appended to his ‘ Liber 
 de Amore Camilli et yEmiliae/ published by Pierre de 
 Keysere in 1467, Florio says that the book ‘feliciter 
 expletus est turonis, editus in domo domini Guillermi 
 archi-episcopi turonensis.’ Florio’s letter is addressed 
 to Jacopo Tarlati di Castiglione, and in describing the 
 Church of Notre Dame la Riche, he says, ‘Hie turn 
 imagines sanctorum prisci temporis compare cum 
 modernis, et quantum Joannes Fochetus CEeterorum 
 multorum saeculorum pictores arte transcendat mente 
 pertracto. Est autem hie de quo loquor Fochetus 
 vir Turonensis, qui facile, pingendi peritia, non solum 
 sui temporis, sed omnes antiquos superavit . . . Ne 
 vero poemata me fingere arbitreris, in sacrario nostro 
 
ENAMEL PORTRAIT OF FOUQUET. 
 
 269 
 
 in Minerva poteris de hujus viri arte aliquid prte- 
 gustare, si ibi in tela pictum Eugenium pontificem 
 advertere curaveris quern tam in ipsa adhuc juventa 
 existens, sic vere transparent visione voluit in talem 
 efifigiem deducere : ne dubita, nam vera scribo, potens 
 est hie Fochetus vivos penicillos effingere vultus ac 
 ipsum pene Prometheum imitari.’ 
 
 On his return to his own country Fouquet seems at 
 once to have risen into notice. One of the early 
 Limoges enamels now in the Louvre represents a man 
 of about thirty years of age., soberly dressed in a gown 
 with a high collar, and wearing a close cap, round 
 whose head runs the inscription, ‘ Johes Fouquet.’ This 
 must have been executed in all probability about 1450, 
 but it is not until 1461 that we get any mention of his 
 life and work. In this year the death of Charles VII. 
 took place, and in the account of the expenses of his 
 funeral obsequies is entered a payment of forty sols 
 tournois to Pierre de Hennes for his journey from 
 Bourges to Paris, whither he went, bearing a cast of 
 the dead king’s face, thinking to find there ‘ Foulquet 
 le paintre.’ 
 
 In the same year Charles’s successor, Louis XI., 
 made his formal entry into the town of Tours, and, 
 as in all like cases, the clergy and inhabitants of the 
 town assembled beforehand in order to make arrange- 
 ments for pomps and ceremonies befitting the occa- 
 sion. Jean Fouquet stands first on the list of those 
 
270 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 employed to furnish designs ‘ d’aucuns chafaulx, mis- 
 teres et farces a la venue et entree nouvelle du roy 
 nostre sire en ladite ville.’ But these brilliant pro- 
 jects were never realised. The register of the 
 accounts of the town for this year further states that 
 the king being at Amboise, it was thought advisable 
 by certain persons to inquire, through the bailly of 
 Touraine, and Messire Pierre Berart, whether he 
 would really like the said ‘ fainctes et misteres faictz en 
 chaffaulx/ To which question Louis XI. answered 
 briefly, ‘ Non, et qu’il ny prenoit nul plaisir.’ 
 
 Consequently all preparations were abruptly 
 stopped, upon which Fouquet and his companions, who 
 had already begun their work, complained and were 
 indemnified for their loss of time by a sum of one 
 hundred sols tournois , paid out of the common revenue. 
 In 1470, nine years after the accession of Louis XI., 
 the royal accounts contain the entry of a payment 
 made to Fouquet on a sum due to him for ‘la fagon 
 de certains tableaux ’ ordered by the king, for the 
 knights of the order of St. Michel, which he had insti- 
 tuted when at Amboise in the August preceding. Two 
 years later, again, we learn from an agreement under 
 the seal and signature of Jean Bastard Fricon, ‘escuier 
 de Tescuierie de Mdme. la Duchesse d’Orleans,’ that 
 Fouquet had been employed by the Duchess to illu- 
 minate a 4 Book of Hours/ for which and for other 
 service, and for his journey from Tours to Blois, he 
 
HOURS OF MARIE DE CLEVES. 
 
 271 
 
 received four golden crowns, worth one hundred and 
 ten sols tournois. 
 
 Marie de Cleves, Duchess of Orleans, and Milan, 
 was the widow of Charles of Orleans, the celebrated 
 poet. His Court resided chiefly at the chateau of 
 Blois, and Marie de Cleves, who was his third wife, 
 rivalled her husband in the magnificence of her taste 
 for literature and the fine arts. After his death in 
 1453, she continued to live at Blois, keeping up a 
 numerous retinue of attendants and domestics, among 
 whom were reckoned several painters. 
 
 The ‘ Book of Hours ’ decorated for her by Fouquet, 
 cannot now be identified. The forty miniatures which 
 once adorned a similar work, and which are now in 
 the possession of M. Brentano Laroche, at Frankfort, 
 belonged originally, it is supposed, to the magnificent 
 volume executed by Fouquet for Etienne Chevalier. 
 It is known to have remained intact up to the middle 
 of the eighteenth century, for M . Gaignieres has repro- 
 duced miniatures from it in his volumes on Charles 
 VII., Louis XI., and Charles VIII. Two other leaves 
 have been identified by M. de Laborde, as belonging 
 to the same set. One belonged to Mr. Rogers, and 
 the other, which still bore among the minor decorations 
 the initials of Etienne Chevalier, was discovered at 
 Paris in the collection of M. Feuillet de Conches. 
 Yet another ‘ Book of Hours’ is known to have been 
 illuminated by Fouquet for Jean Moreau, a citizen of 
 
272 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Tours. It is mentioned in a document in the posses- 
 sion of M. Fillon, but of the volume itself nothing is 
 known. 
 
 The accounts of Louis XI., in the year 1474, again 
 contain a reference to Fouquet. Throughout this 
 year, day by day, Louis was slowly elaborating the 
 measures which should result in the fall and utter ruin 
 of the formidable power of Charles the Bold. Even 
 time of truce brought no respite to the intricate 
 activity of his secret schemes, but in this year he 
 ordered Michel Columbe to prepare a little stone model 
 for his tomb, and ‘Jehan Fouquet, peintre a Tours,’ 
 received 22 liv. for having ‘tire et peint sur parchemin 
 un autre patron.’ At about this date, Fouquet seems to 
 have been taken definitely into the service of the king, 
 for he is mentioned in the accounts for 1475 as ‘ peintre 
 du roy,’ and receives wages ‘ pour entretenir son estat.’ 
 
 In the following year he was again employed by 
 the town of Tours, to paint the inside of a canopy 
 which had been made to carry over the King of 
 Portugal, Alfonso V., at his entry. The King of 
 Portugal had sought refuge in France after his defeat 
 at Toro by Ferdinand of Aragon, and, coming to 
 solicit the aid of Louis XI., was detained by him for 
 some time rather as a prisoner than as a guest. This 
 note concerning his formal entry into Tours contains 
 also the last mention made in contemporary documents 
 of work done by Jean Fouquet. 
 
DEATH OF FOUQUET. 
 
 2 73 
 
 Five years later, in 1481, his widow and his heirs 
 are named in a report rendered by Geoffroi Chiron, 
 chamberlain of the Monastery of St. Martin at Tours, 
 to the treasurer Jean Okegham. His death probably 
 took place during the preceding year, and if we accept 
 the hypothesis which furnishes the year 1415 as the 
 date of his birth, he must have been in 1480 just sixty- 
 five years of age. 
 
 All that we know of Fouquet’s life is summed up in 
 these few and meagre details. As much may be told 
 of the lives of many other artists his contemporaries ; 
 but, with singular good fortune, his fame rests secure 
 and justified beyond the possibility of reproach by the 
 numerous and important works which have come down 
 to us. The Bibliotheque Nationale of France pre- 
 serves two MSS., French translations of Livy, and 
 one of Josephus, each of which is enriched with the 
 paintings of Fouquet, and another Livy also illumi- 
 nated by him is preserved in the library of his native 
 town of Tours. A note written by Florimond- 
 Robertet on the first page of the Paris Josephus states 
 that the volume is the property of Pierre II., ‘due de 
 Bourbonnoys et d’Auvergne,’ the husband of Anne 
 de Beaujeu, daughter of Louis XI., in whose service 
 Robertet had lived until he became treasurer of France 
 under Charles VIII. 
 
 Robertet adds, ‘ En ce livre a douze hystoires, les 
 trois premieres de Fenlumineur du due Jehan de 
 
 VOL. 1. T 
 
274 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Bery, ct les neuf cle la main du bon peintre et enlumi- 
 neur du Roy Louis XI., Jehan Fouquet, natif de 
 Tours.’ The Livy at Tours also contains a note from 
 which we learn that the book was begun for Cardinal 
 Balue. At his fall, however, it came with the rest of his 
 library into the hands of Louis XI., for whom it was 
 completed and illuminated in 1470. The library of 
 Dijon possesses a Vergil, of Fouquet’s school, if not 
 from his hand, and Geneva boasts a copy of Boccaccio, 
 the paintings in which rival in importance those with 
 which Fouquet decorated the work by which he is 
 most widely known, the Boccaccio of Etienne Cheva- 
 lier, now preserved at Munich. 
 
 The Boccaccio of Etienne Chevalier has been 
 admirably commented and described by M. Grand- 
 maison in a paper read before the Societe Archeo- 
 logique de Touraine in 1858. The Josephus of 
 Pierre de Beaujeu and the Livy of the Sorbonne have 
 furnished M. de Laborde with the subject of one of his 
 most brilliant and delicate passages of appreciative 
 criticism. The Livy now in the library of Tours is 
 not so well known. It contains, besides numerous 
 small ornamental decorations, two full-page paintings, 
 one of which serves as frontispiece to the whole 
 volume. Pasquier Bonhomme, ‘ priseur jure des livres 
 de 1 ’ University de Paris,’ got this part of the work 
 done cheaply for the small sum of 9 liv. toicrn., and the 
 minor subjects are very inferior to the frontispiece, 
 
THE LIVY OF LOUIS XI. 
 
 2 75 
 
 which alone can be attributed with justice to the hand 
 of Fouquet. 
 
 The principal events of early Roman history are 
 all represented in one great combination on this single 
 page. Romulus and Remus tightly swaddled lie side 
 by side beneath the fostering wolf ; the building of 
 Rome occupies the centre, and in the left hand corner 
 stands Louis XI., in the dress of a mason, trimming 
 a block of stone. On the right hand in the upper 
 corner the Horatii and Curiatii fight, arrayed in armour 
 as French knights. They ride full tilt in lists duly 
 ordered for a gallant tournament, and above from be- 
 neath a splendid canopy look out a crowd of noble 
 ladies richly attired. 
 
 This painting is the only important one in the Livy 
 of Louis XI., but both the copies preserved at the 
 Bibliotheque Nationale are richly illustrated. There is 
 also a further difference. The volume at Tours is a 
 Latin MS., whilst those at Paris both give the French 
 translation which the Benedictine monk Berchorius, 
 
 * frere Pierre Berceure,’ prior of St. Eloy, dedicated to 
 King John of France. One of these (No. 260) is in 
 two volumes : it comes from Versailles : no account of 
 it has ever yet been made public, and the very know- 
 ledge of its existence is almost confined to those to 
 whose keeping it has been entrusted. The first volume 
 contains nineteen small paintings, each of which is 
 elaborated with the utmost skill and delicacy. The 
 
276 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 second opens with a very splendid design which occu- 
 pies nearly the whole page, and in addition to this, the 
 number of small illustrations amounts to forty-one. 
 
 The subject of the large design is very simple. 
 A many-towered, well-defended city rises against the 
 sky ; the river which flows about the ramparts rolls to- 
 wards us in rapid flood and divides the green meadow 
 of the foreground. On the right hand is a little wooden 
 canopy beneath which sits the prior of St. Eloy busy 
 in writing his translation, on the other side stand Han- 
 nibal and his father. Asdrubal, crowned with a golden 
 circlet, leads by the hand his little son, to whom he 
 speaks with a grave tenderness ; the child raises his 
 arm, and gazing across the rapid waters indicates with 
 a gesture of serious intelligence the unseen Rome of 
 which he swears to be the scourge. 
 
 The other copy, commonly called the Sorbonne 
 Livy, the paintings of which have been eloquently 
 described by M. de Laborde, is even more remarkable. 
 There are fifty-two illustrations, four of which are of 
 great size, occupying nearly the whole of the large 
 folio page. The small ones are scattered through the 
 text, but the large are reserved to head the opening 
 lines of the first, third, fourth, and fifth books. The 
 subjects of these are : The Building of Rome ; The 
 Embassy sent by Quintus Fabius to the Esques leaving 
 Rome; Camillus addressing the People; and The 
 Nomination of the Tribunes. 
 
THE SORBONNE LIVY. 
 
 2 77 
 
 Of these, the second and third challenge particular 
 attention. Both are equally splendid in respect of 
 colour, both are triumphs of illusive perspective, and 
 present a fertile source of interest in the study of 
 characteristic types and expressions. It would be im- 
 possible to point to a more successful rendering of 
 martial march movement than that given in the on- 
 coming sweep of the mounted troop, which, issuing 
 from a magnificent triumphal arch in the central dis- 
 tance, escorts the consul. He, mounted on a white 
 horse and accompanied by his officers, gallops in front 
 and turns to the left, preceded by a detachment which 
 passes out beneath the gate of the city. A group of 
 staid senators, solemnly seated on their mules, are 
 drawn up on the right ; and above, from an open 
 tribune, other patricians watch the troop defiling before 
 them. 
 
 As the horsemen come onwards keeping their ranks 
 close serried, and, bearing towards the right until they 
 swing round in front and wheel through the gateway, 
 they leave a quiet space vacant on the left. This 
 space Fouquet fills with a long street, a row of little 
 houses running into the distance with successive 
 pointed roofs, past even the triumphal arch whence the 
 soldiers are pouring forth ; and he lets us see between 
 their slender spears the groups of gossiping citizens^ 
 men and women, who have come out to watch the 
 show. But the architectural forms which Fouquet 
 
2 7 8 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 employs in the houses out of which these good people 
 step, he discards as soon as he has to deal with official 
 buildings, the proportions of which show an ardent 
 enthusiasm for classical design. Each is enriched with 
 friezes, and the lines are large and nobly felt, although 
 their dimensions are actually those of miniature. 
 
 The tint which gives the key to the whole scheme 
 of colour is a vivid soft vermilion much affected by 
 Fouquet in all his more complicated and gorgeous 
 combinations. The banners borne by the horsemen 
 coming through the distant arch, are dyed in this hue. 
 These banners expand like flaming wings to right and 
 left, until the note is taken up by the shields of the 
 advancing troop, and reflected in the golden armour of 
 their leader. Fouquets almost invariable practice is 
 to spread the clear brightness of this tint by passages 
 of buff, and for this purpose he generally avails himself 
 of the leather tunics of the men-at-arms, whilst he 
 elicits an infinite number of lovely tones of grey out of 
 the chain mail or steel armour, so that the positive 
 colour tells against an expanse of yielding neutral hues. 
 Camillus, Tribune of the People, is a subject of a wholly 
 different order to that of The March of the Legates. 
 There, Fouquet sets in motion a gorgeous troop of 
 mounted knights ; the whole picture is full of stir and 
 glitter, but the still figure of Camillus speaking is the 
 sole point of action in the composition which heads the 
 fourth book. The vast crowd watch rapt in intense 
 
THE SORBONNE LIVY. 
 
 279 
 
 listening, there is no by-play, nothing to disturb the 
 unity of the impression. 
 
 The numbers who are thus brought together by 
 one common impulse of curiosity are marshalled with a 
 wonderful ingenuity, every group is bound up with 
 the general movement of the crowd in which it forms a 
 part. The figures detached along the line in front are 
 studies of individual character; amongst the most re- 
 markable of which is the imposing figure of a wealthy 
 old man, who wears a gown of blue over a dull gleam- 
 ing coat of cloth of gold. In him, as in the rest, Fou- 
 quet has shown us the actual man with uncompro- 
 mising truth, yet every touch is instinct with a searching 
 desire for the deepest signs of life, so that the render- 
 ing is quickened by a spirit and dignity not to be 
 reached by mere empirical realism. Over the whole 
 scene plays the fitful iridescence of colour, fiery in its 
 purity. From the figures standing in the first rank, 
 the brilliant radiance flashes out, then flits here and 
 there, enlivening the thronging mass, and loses itself 
 gently in the airy haze, which recedes into the lumi- 
 nous serenity of the illimitable distance. 
 
 Perfect as these two pages are, each in their way, 
 they do not show us one important characteristic of 
 Fouquet’s genius. They represent his talent as a 
 colourist and as a draughtsman, and give evidence, by 
 their delicate aerial perspective and by the finished 
 skill and grace of their general disposition, of the high 
 
28 o 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 quality of the practical training which he received from 
 Filarete; but they scarcely show us the depth of feel- 
 ing which he displays in the Munich Boccaccio. In 
 this respect also, the illuminator of the ‘Judgment and 
 Fall of Manlius’ is superior. 
 
 This painting forms one of nine large illustrations 
 which decorate a copy of Jean de Premierfait’s transla- 
 tion of Boccaccio’s ‘ De casibus virorum et fceminarum 
 illustrium’ preserved in the library of Geneva. If in- 
 deed these drawings are by Fouquet, and not, as I am 
 inclined to suppose, by a later disciple or continuator of 
 his school, he here gives proof of a force of serious 
 passion for which the serene and complete beauty which 
 distinguishes most of his work does not prepare us. 
 
 Across the lower half of the picture stretch the 
 towered battlements of Rome. In a vacant space 
 edged by the frowning ramparts, in the very centre of 
 the picture, Manlius fronts us, standing in the midst 
 of his accusers ; he is bound and already condemned, 
 but is still robed in ermine like a prince, and carries 
 himself with an air of proud despair. At last the 
 people have pronounced, and do not relent. The ex- 
 pression of his face, as he looks out and away from all 
 about him, is weighted with a terrible consciousness of 
 forsaken desolation. Beneath the ramparts, crowding 
 out from an open gate, a group of gorgeously clad 
 patricians press forward to the shore of the broad 
 slowly-running Tiber. They are all gazing eagerly 
 
THE GENEVAN BOCCACCIO. 
 
 281 
 
 upwards, each figure showing some defined variety of 
 interest. 
 
 Following the direction of their eyes, we see high 
 above the distant waters the grim outline of the fatal 
 Tarpeian rock, surmounted by the figure of the 
 executioner. His hands are still outstretched, the last 
 deadly thrust has but just communicated the necessary 
 impulse to his victim ; the body of Manlius Capitolinus 
 falls with headlong plunge into the flood below. 
 Behind the executioner, the judges whose task it is to 
 see the sentence carried into effect stand with folded 
 arms. The oppressive weight of the dread retributive 
 justice which they bear, seems to bow down their 
 heads, and burden their limbs. Their garments are 
 dyed in the blood-red reflections of the angry setting 
 sun, which sinks on the horizon at their back. The 
 crimson splashes fall all along the meeting line between 
 the cloud and water, interspersed with dismal indica- 
 tions of sedgy marshland ; the rest of the sky is dull, 
 cold as the water in which Manlius finds his grave. 
 
 But if the Boccaccio of Geneva shows us that 
 its author commanded something of tragic passion, the 
 Vergil of Dijon gives evidence of one who possessed 
 that happy temper, that appreciation of refined sim- 
 plicity which make the charm of the pastoral. The 
 opening page of the ‘Bucolics/ like the first leaf of the 
 Livy of Louis XI., combines in one large illustration 
 allusions to the contents of the whole volume. The 
 
282 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 ‘Aindd’ is represented in the foreground. The walls 
 of Rome rise to the left, and ^Eneas surrounded by his 
 warriors appears on the right. As if to keep in har- 
 mony with the peaceful sentiment which pervades the 
 rest of the picture, the prince is not set before us in 
 any moment of turmoil or distress, but sits at ease in 
 the opening of his golden tent. The painter has given 
 him the bloom of youth, his blue eyes are dreamily 
 wistful, and the lines of the features beneath the crimson 
 cap are touched with innocent serious beauty. 
 
 The green country which stretches out wide and 
 far behind this principal group, affords the scene of the 
 pastoral incidents which serve as an introduction to the 
 subjects of the ‘ Georgies ’ and ‘ Bucolics.’ Sheep and 
 lambs, goats and oxen, are feeding in peaceful flocks on 
 the hill sides. Over all, from a high pedestal, presides 
 a golden statue of Diana, which is approached by a 
 band of shepherds dancing jollily hand in hand. 
 
 The wonderful truth to nature with which the 
 rustic clumsiness of their movements has been rendered, 
 recalls at first sight the peasants of Teniers; only 
 these men are neither boors nor sots ; if they move 
 stiffly, it is not that they are oppressed by drinking 
 and gross feeding, but that their muscles have hard- 
 ened and their sinews grown tough in the daily war- 
 fare waged with inclement skies. The waters have 
 fallen on them from above, the winds have buffeted 
 them, the heavy earth has weighted their feet ; yet, 
 
THE DIJON VERGIL. 
 
 283 
 
 in the spring morning under the welcome sun they lift 
 them gaily enough in honour of their goddess, and 
 come forth fresh and bright as the dew on their 
 meadows. 
 
 The same happy pastoral accent is found again in 
 the little figures of Vergil which head the different 
 divisions of the ‘ Georgies.’ In the larger picture 
 which heads the series, Vergil, clothed in a flowing 
 pale-reddish gown, delicately hatched on the lights 
 with gold, his hair bound by a white-berried wreath, 
 kneels, bearing in his hand a book, which he offers to 
 Augustus, ermine-robed and enthroned. Both faces 
 wear the same look of serious spiritual sentiment which 
 gives so much beauty to the head of ^Eneas, as if the 
 inspired silence of a joy not to be revealed lay upon 
 the lips. Each succeeding drawing shows us the poet 
 clad in the same golden gleaming reddish gown, stand- 
 ing at a high writing-desk, set in grass thick with 
 spring flowers, in the very midst of the pleasant sights 
 and sounds of which he writes. First the young lambs 
 come about him, and then the bees fly round, passing 
 to and from their hives. The air is fresh in the early 
 morning, and Vergil has brought with him into the 
 fields a little black hooded cloak, which as the day 
 advances he throws over his shoulder. 
 
 Neither the Dijon Vergil nor the Geneva Boccaccio 
 contain any memorandum concerning the painter by 
 whom they were illustrated. They are only known to 
 
284 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 those in whose hands they rest as belonging to the 
 ‘ ecole de Tours.’ But the style of the Vergil closely 
 resembles that of Fouquet. Although he had many 
 imitators, possibly pupils, they never succeeded in 
 giving their work more than a certain superficial 
 resemblance to that of their master. The Library of 
 Paris possesses a copy of Mamerot de Soissons’ 
 ‘ Traite des Passages d’Outremer,’ which is illustrated 
 by sixty-four considerable paintings, all of which have 
 a superficial resemblance to Fouquet’s work. They 
 show the same system of colour, the same method of 
 marking out the different plans by little groups dis- 
 posed with skilful calculation. The actual finish (take, 
 for instance, the portrait on the title-page) is even more 
 minute ; the general marshalling of the large composi- 
 tions, such as Charlemagne received at his entry into 
 Constantinople by the Emperor Constantine, is decep- 
 tive i.n its close imitation of the broader features of 
 Fouquet’s design. Everything, in short, which could 
 be taught has been learnt. But we miss the character 
 which the master puts into every lineament, the truth 
 which makes every gesture significant, the intelligence 
 which inspires every line. If we place beside these 
 pages the paintings of the Sorbonne Livy, or the 
 noble volume of Josephus, we see work infinitely less 
 elaborate in labour, but every stroke of which is 
 fraught with meaning. 
 
 The illustrations of the Paris Josephus, although 
 
THE PARIS JOSEPHUS. 
 
 285 
 
 finely appropriate and dignified, do not show the rarer 
 and more poetic side of Fouquet’s talent. They 
 possess, however, predominant interest, because, as in 
 the case of the Livy of Tours, contemporary testimony 
 to the genuineness of their authorship has come down 
 to us. They are the touchstone by which we are 
 enabled to give Fouquet his own, and as such they 
 claim an importance to which the Livy cannot pretend. 
 
 The note written by Florimond Robertet on the 
 last page has already been quoted, but it should be 
 noted that the paintings which follow the three, executed 
 by the illuminator of the Duke de Berry, are not nine, 
 but eleven in number, and they all seem to be the 
 work of Fouquet himself. They are less spontaneous 
 than the graceful pastorals of the ‘ Georgies ; ’ but on 
 the other hand, all those qualities which may be 
 ripened by time and practice are displayed in full 
 development. 
 
 One habit which is always remarkable, which 
 strengthens with time, and which directly affects the 
 balance and character of every design, is that of 
 seeing the figures of the composition in pattern, as it 
 were, upon the surface of his picture. All else, all 
 accessories of architecture and landscape, things near 
 and far, are treated in mass as making up one common 
 ground, on which the figures lie. The tints of build- 
 ings tawny or grey, broken by reddish roof-tiles or 
 bluish slate, are kept at much the same depth of tone 
 
286 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 as the green meadows far-spreading behind them ; 
 the meadows, again, are chequered with tawny pas- 
 sages where the earth breaks through the thin grass, or 
 are spotted by faintly-appearing distant hamlets or 
 chateaux , till the uttermost lines melt into the sky as 
 it fades towards the horizon. Then the sky strengthens 
 in tone again broadly luminous till the grey haze of 
 distance becomes the blue of upper ether. 
 
 The figures on this sheet of softly variegated hue 
 gleam forth like jewels fitly set. The whole effect is 
 as of the gentlest radiance, even the most tender tints 
 acquiring their full value, and never becoming fade , 
 because always so pure in tone, always so full of light. 
 And just as the delicate neutral tones, the greys and 
 greens and blues, which form the ground-work, are 
 wrought into each other in fitful interchange, even so 
 the more gorgeous hues which clothe the figures relieved 
 upon this network of uncertain pulses, are intermingled 
 and repeated in ever-varying quantity, until the whole 
 page is full of lustre. 
 
 The colour which Fouquet seems to hold as most 
 precious is that peculiar tint of orange-vermilion 
 which gives the keynote in most of the paintings of the 
 Sorbonne Livy. Unlike most of the other tints which 
 are laid on, and hatched if necessary in solid body 
 colour, this brilliant vermilion is skilfully glazed, pos- 
 sibly with madder, and thereby acquires a tone of 
 velvety depth and softness. 
 
THE PARIS JOSEPHUS. 
 
 287 
 
 In the ninth small illustration, which represents 
 Servius organising civil and military orders, the golden 
 armour of the king is shaded in dull crimson, which 
 harmonises the trenchant vermilion of his scabbard. 
 Right and left are ranged the representatives of the 
 different orders. Everywhere points of red detach 
 themselves like flames on a ground of varied neutral 
 greys, fawn, brown, gold, and intermediate soft reds, 
 the armour of the warriors affording that preponder- 
 ance of dull iron-grey necessary in order to elicit from 
 the principal crimson its full value. 
 
 Sometimes white is substituted for vermilion, as in 
 the painting which heads the fifth book of Josephus. 
 The Levites are here seen bearing the ark round the 
 walls of Jericho. Their white robes form the chief mass, 
 and are relieved upon the brilliantly-tinted dresses of 
 the attendant personages. These gaily-variegated 
 draperies all present the lighter tones of the colours 
 employed, clear blues, and green, lemon yellow, golden 
 brown, pale red, pure orange ; after this first belt of 
 motley hues, come the falling grey walls, then the 
 streets of the beleaguered city, grey with reddish and 
 bluish roof tiles, all the ways crowded with dim, hurry- 
 ing figures of armed men. Far beyond, the soft tones 
 of the surrounding landscape spread themselves out, 
 until crowned by the distant village, with its chateau 
 and its church, nestling in the quiet hedgerows against 
 the blue sky. 
 
288 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 The glad triumph of gay colour is here supreme, 
 but Fouquet was as great a master in sobriety as in 
 brilliance. In the ninth small painting of the Versailles 
 Livy, he shows us Quintus Fabius appeasing the 
 quarrels of the patricians and the people. A wall 
 runs right across the picture at a level a little below 
 that of the head of the chief figure ; above this wall is a 
 range of buildings decorated with great magnificence ; 
 in front of it, to right and left of Fabius, are grouped 
 those who represent the different classes. The sky, 
 against which the buildings rise, is dull grey ; the 
 buildings themselves are even colder in tone, but 
 relieved by tiles of deep red, the wall becomes a little 
 warmer; then the stones on which Fabius and the 
 other actors stand keep up the same force of tint. On 
 this sober ground he lays a broad mass of deep violet, 
 which passes through various bluish shades to blue, the 
 blue modifies into pale lilac, the lilac deepens into puce, 
 or reddish purple, then the red disengages itself in one 
 pure tone, which is again spread by a depth of warm 
 brown, and finally two little passages of black arrest the 
 eye with trenchant force. A few points are touched 
 here and there, gravely still, with gold. 
 
 These brilliant schemes of colour are carried out 
 with the most severe realism. Take for example the 
 painting at the commencement of the eleventh book of 
 Josephus, which gives us ‘ Cyrus sitting on his throne, 
 receiving a deputation of captive Jews.’ The render- 
 
THE VERSAILLES LIVY. 289 
 
 ing of the golden rings which encircle the columns of 
 the throne, and the beauty of texture given to the 
 delicate white and gold Persian-patterned hanging 
 which drapes the back of the royal seat, are perfect 
 achievements of imitative art. Fouquets technical 
 skill is in this respect so consummate, and shows traces 
 of discipline so serious, that M. de Laborde has sought 
 to explain it by supposing the strict influence of an 
 early Flemish training. 
 
 To Flanders, however, Fouquets debt was small. 
 The quality which specially differentiates his work from 
 that of his predecessors is in truth a superior sentiment 
 of art, and in this respect he probably owed much to 
 Italy. Even if tradition were silent as to his visit to 
 Rome, his works themselves would proclaim the fact 
 of his having been brought early in life within the 
 immediate circle of Italian activity. The architectural 
 backgrounds which he employs are often thoroughly 
 Italian. France offered no similar types in the reign 
 of Louis XI., and they are rendered with that assured 
 comprehension of constructive detail, with that intimate 
 possession of the actual aspect, which cannot be ac- 
 quired at second-hand. In the general treatment also 
 there is evidence of Italian influence ; the symmetrical 
 elegance of the composition, the grace which disposes 
 the limbs and softens the gestures of his actors, rivals 
 the peculiar excellences of Italian design. 
 
 Fouquet is, however, no close imitator of an ac- 
 vol. 1, u 
 
290 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 cepted model, he abides by national instincts and 
 predilections. The motives of the landscape back- 
 grounds, which he renders with amorous fidelity, are 
 furnished by the river scenery of Touraine; the French 
 vivacity of impulse which animates each turn of pose, 
 the accent of dramatic energy which gives point to the 
 involved and busy action, the lively meaning which 
 sharpens the variety of expression, offer a contrast to 
 the measured movement of the Italian scene, to the 
 gracious dignity of its actors, to the ethereal simplicity 
 of their regard and bearing. 
 
 Just as Fouquet preserves the independence of his 
 nationality in the presence of the magical seductions of 
 southern style, even so the spirit of his uncompro- 
 mising realism catches no Flemish accent. The battle- 
 scenes which lie thick upon the pages of the Sorbonne 
 Livy are rendered with unflinching truth. The madly 
 rearing horses, the agonising struggle of the fight, the 
 terrible accidents of death, are faithfully set down ; but 
 the wonderful breadth of light and air which floods the 
 scene, the feeling which invests with grace the most 
 tense and nervous movement, the harmony of line, the 
 symmetrical disposition of the various groups, the opal- 
 escence of the delicate tints, the purity of tone, have a 
 charm which was never the gift of Flemish teaching. 
 
 Fouquet’s method in oil painting, as shown by the 
 two or three pictures which we possess from his hand, 
 may have induced M. de Laborde to attach a greater 
 
HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER. 291 
 
 importance to his relations with the school of Bruges 
 than is justified by the style of his other work. For 
 this method is evidently that of the Van Eycks, the 
 secret of which drew Fouquet’s contemporary Anto- 
 nello da Messina from Naples to Bruges. Antonello, 
 in the year of his return from Flanders to his native 
 town (1465), painted a ‘Salvator Mundi’ which is 
 possessed by the National Gallery. The texture of 
 its surface, and its warmth of tone, evidence the extent 
 of Antonello’s obligations to his Flemish teachers. 
 Just the same texture of surface, the same warmth of 
 tone, are to be seen in a small head cut apparently from 
 a larger work which is now in the gallery of Prince 
 Lichtenstein at Vienna ; and Dr. Waagen notes the 
 same qualities in a painting, by Fouquet, in the collec- 
 tion of M. Brentano Laroche at Frankfort, and in a 
 large half-length portrait at Versailles, which he also 
 attributed to him. 
 
 The painting which is now at Frankfort is a full- 
 length portrait of Etienne Chevalier. It is a reproduc- 
 tion on a large scale of one of the forty miniatures cut 
 from Chevaliers ‘ Book of Hours,’ also in the posses- 
 sion of M. Laroche, and reproduced in M. Curmer’s 
 ‘ CEuvre de J. Fouquet,’ printed at Paris in 1857. 
 The panel on which the figure is painted has been the 
 cover of another picture, and the picture which it once 
 protected is now in the Museum at Antwerp. 
 
 The subject is a Virgin and Child. The colouring 
 
292 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 of the painting has neither the depth nor the force 
 which distinguishes the other three pieces ascribed to 
 Fouquet, and Dr. Waagen has on this account refused 
 to admit of its authenticity. But M. de Laborde has 
 since shown in a carefully-elaborated argument (pub- 
 lished in his ‘ Renaissance des Arts a la Cour de 
 France ’) that there can be little doubt that the Virgin 
 and Child at Antwerp, and the portrait of Etienne 
 Chevalier possessed by M. Brentano Laroche, once 
 together formed an ex voto which hung in Notre 
 Dame of Melun. 
 
 In 1661 this picture was mentioned by Denis 
 Godefroy, who speaks of the chief subject as ‘ Agnes 
 Sorel en Vierge/ and refers to the portrait which ac- 
 companied it as that of the donor, of whose name how- 
 ever he seems to have been in ignorance. The 
 tradition which sees in the figure of the Virgin the 
 traits of Agnes Sorel, the mistress of Charles VI., has 
 been questioned, but Etienne Chevalier had not only 
 received substantial benefits from Agnes Sorel during 
 her lifetime, he was also her executor, and was there- 
 fore likely to have dedicated an ex voto to her memory. 
 
 The life-size half-length portrait at Versailles which 
 Dr. Waagen attributed to Fouquet, on account of the 
 similarity which it presented with the treatment and 
 handling of the portrait of Etienne Chevalier at Frank- 
 fort, is well known. The small portrait in the collec- 
 tion of Prince Lichtenstein has attracted less atten- 
 
WORKS IN OIL. 
 
 293 
 
 tion. It is nevertheless a noticeable portrait. The 
 head of the man represented is striking, the features 
 are strongly marked, and the expression indicates a 
 consciousness of power. A brown cap fits close to the 
 hair ; and the dress, which covers the shoulders and 
 comes high up round the throat, is likewise brown. 
 
 The face is solidly modelled, and it is remarkable 
 that one employed chiefly in miniature painting and in 
 water colour should have, at the same time, used the 
 totally different medium with so much effective mastery. 
 But the frequent use of the larger method, and broader 
 scale, probably explains those very qualities which give 
 unusual dignity and importance to the smallest figure 
 by his hand. 
 
 None of the works in oil attributed to Fouquet are 
 signed, but on the background of the painting in ques- 
 
 tion occur certain letters 
 
 ^ 0 . The 
 
 two first are traced to the left, and the two last are con- 
 tinued to the right of the head which occupies the 
 centre. The way in which the fourth letter is abridged 
 and the tail of a fifth apparently cut off, make it likely 
 that the inscription has been curtailed by the portrait 
 having been cut out from a larger picture, of which it 
 once formed part. Its subject may yet be identified, 
 as the portrait of Etienne Chevalier has been identified, 
 with the help of some miniature painting by Fouquet 
 
294 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 already known to us. It decidedly resembles his head 
 of Louis XI., in the frontispiece to Livy, and the 
 letters might, I think, read ‘ Loys/ 
 
 The title of peintre du roi granted to Fouquet 
 during the later years of his life, his employment by 
 Charles VII. and Louis XI., and by an amateur so 
 distinguished as the Duchess of Orleans, sufficiently 
 testify to the esteem in which he was held by his con- 
 temporaries. The lustre of his renown remained un- 
 dimmed after his death. Up till a late date Fouquet s 
 works were preserved and Fouquets name was men- 
 tioned with reverence. The inventory of Margaret of 
 Austria (1516) minutely notes a little painting of Our 
 Lady by Fouquet’ s hand preciously treasured in case 
 and cover. Her librarian, Jean Lemaire, who after- 
 wards passed into the service of Louis XII., has twice 
 sung the praises of Fouquet. In his ‘ Legende des 
 Venitiens,’ printed at Paris by Jane de Marnef in 
 T509, he exclaims, ‘Fouquet qui tant eut gloires 
 siennes ! ’ and in the ‘ Couronne Margaritique,’ a long 
 piece written in honour of his mistress, but which did 
 not see the light till after his own death {circa 1545), 
 he again refers to Fouquet, ‘ en qui tout loz s’employe.’ 
 Both these quotations have been already cited by M. 
 de Laborde, and lately M. Grandmaison has had the 
 good fortune to find another allusion in a letter written 
 from Italy by an officer of the suite of Charles VIII. 
 This letter forms one of a small collection of similar 
 
FOUQUETS HOUSE AT TOURS . 
 
 295 
 
 documents which were reprinted at the time of their 
 publication under the title of ‘ Pluseurs (sic) nouvelles 
 envoyees de Naples.’ From a copy of the reprint 
 belonging to M. de Lignerolles, M. Grandmaison 
 quotes the following passage : — ‘ Avant que le roy 
 entrast en la ville (Naples), il coucha une nuyt a 
 Poge-Royal, qui est un maison de plaisance que le roy 
 Ferrand et ses predecesseurs ont fait faire, qui est 
 telle que le beau parler de maistre Jehan Chartier, la 
 suttilite de maistre Jehan de Meun, et la main de 
 Foucquet ne sauroyent dire, escrire ne paindre.’ 
 
 To M. Grandmaison also belongs the honour of 
 having determined the site of Fouquet’s house at 
 Tours. In 1481, the painter’s widow and heirs pay 
 certain dues to the collegiate chapter of Saint Martin 
 for part of the Tour des Pucelles, and for a house 
 and garden attached to it, the whole property being 
 situated in the neighbourhood of the Tour Foubert, 
 and having been let on lease to the family in 1448. 
 Both the Tour des Pucelles and the Tour Foubert 
 have been long destroyed, but their ancient position 
 has been definitely ascertained, and thus we are en- 
 abled to fix on the angle formed by the present Rue de 
 Jerusalem with the north side of the Rue des Fouquet 
 as occupying the spot on which Fouquet’s house and 
 garden formerly stood. His sons Louis and Francois 
 continued to occupy the habitation of their father, but 
 before the close of the next century the family would 
 
296 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 seem to have been extinguished in the male line, and 
 their connection with the Tour des Pucelles was 
 brought to an end. In 1571 the Sieur Fortier and 
 Marie Fouquet his wife sell their share of the tower, 
 and two houses adjoining, and in the year following 
 Rene Grebrunet and Madeleine Fouquet his wife cede 
 to the chapter the remaining portion, together with the 
 other houses originally leased in 1448. 
 
 The sons and pupils whom Fouquet left behind 
 him continued to maintain the tradition of his teach- 
 ing, and to keep alive the traditions of French art. 
 Paris continued under the rule of Flanders, and her 
 work throughout the fifteenth century showed the per- 
 sistent strength of northern traditions. The Valerius 
 Maximus of the British Museum (No. 4,734) is a fair 
 example of the style which was consequently deve- 
 loped. The drawing of movement is good, the faces 
 have character, but the proportions are short and 
 clumsy, and the treatment of the hands and feet always 
 inadequate and often inexpressive. In respect of colour 
 and tone a remarkable contrast is presented to the 
 painters of Tours. Everywhere vivid scarlet pre- 
 dominates in close proximity to fresh tints of green. 
 There is no pause, no rest in the glare of the burning 
 pages. 
 
 The Valerius Maximus was illustrated probably at 
 the close of the fifteenth century ; the Froissart (No. 
 4,380)— two volumes of which form part of the same 
 
ILLUMINATED FROISSART. 
 
 297 
 
 collection, whilst the rest have remained in the 
 National Library of Paris — should date perhaps from 
 the commencement of the sixteenth. In this work the 
 scale of colour is still very full, but the tints are fainter, 
 and palpitate with a less positive intensity ; in place of 
 the cruel scarlet, glows the rose-red of Tours, carried 
 through by the tender reddish hues beloved of Fou- 
 quet, and clear spaces of white are introduced, modi- 
 fied and spread with skill. 
 
 The first volume is by no means wanting in fine 
 examples of what may be called transitional work, but 
 the second is by far the richer of the two. Many of its 
 miniatures are not only harmonious in colour, but are 
 touched with something of the delicate sentiment 
 proper to the school of Tours. The various scenes 
 are delineated with great directness of purpose, and a 
 strong sense of drama. When the King of England 
 bestows the Duchy of Aquitaine on the Duke of 
 Lancaster, and the people send deputies to protest 
 against the gift, the painter represents them on the 
 road, and the very horses which the deputies ride are 
 serious and resentful ; again, in the drawing which sets 
 before us the Duke and Duchess of Burgundy solicit- 
 ing aid from their subjects for the ransom of their son, 
 who was taken prisoner at Nicopolis, the characteristic 
 self-sufficiency and hauteur of the duke’s pose is given 
 with quaintly felicitous justice. Equally fine is the 
 discrimination with which King Richard I I/s attitude 
 
298 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 is rendered at the moment when his treacherously 
 planned arrest of his uncle the Duke of Gloucester has 
 been put into execution. The air of cowardly satis- 
 faction with which the king rides off, turning his back 
 on his victim, furnishes an intelligent commentary on 
 the very words of the text. 
 
 The author of these illustrations to Froissart did 
 not, however, possess the same knowledge of the art 
 which constitutes a picture that distinguishes the 
 work of another painter, whose existence is also 
 shrouded in mystery. In the library of Corpus Christi 
 College at Oxford are preserved two volumes of an 
 illustrated Bible given by General James Oglethorpe, 
 who had been educated there. The book, which 
 originally consisted of three volumes, was purchased 
 by General Oglethorpe in Paris, but on his return to 
 England it was seized and detained by the officials of 
 the Dover customs. Some time elapsed before any 
 satisfaction could be obtained, and when at last General 
 Oglethorpe’s property was restored to him, the third 
 volume had disappeared, having, it is supposed, been 
 cut to pieces by some dishonest official in order to 
 extract the paintings with which it was enriched. The 
 third volume was the one abstracted ; the second and 
 first fortunately escaped mutilation, for from the frontis- 
 piece of the first we learn for whose use these splendid 
 volumes were intended, and consequently the exact 
 epoch of their production. 
 
JEAN PERREAL . 
 
 299 
 
 The subject of this frontispiece is the Creation, and 
 the scene is invested with an air of magnificent state 
 and ceremonial, which, judging from the rest of the 
 work, expresses the special preferences of the artist. 
 The Almighty, robed with papal pomp, advances, at- 
 tended by the works of His hands. The first parents 
 stand before Him, and conspicuous amongst the 
 animals by which they are surrounded is the ermine of 
 Anne of Brittany, accompanied by the porcupine of 
 Louis XII. The volumes therefore were executed 
 during their reign, and from the excessive use of the 
 corcieliere , which occurs one or more times on every 
 page, it is probable that they were intended for the use 
 of the queen, who had founded during the lifetime of 
 her first husband, Charles VIII., an honourable order 
 for women, of which the coi'deliere was the badge. If, 
 then, these volumes were expressly executed for Queen 
 Anne, they would most likely be the work of some one 
 of the peintres die roi flourishing at that time. There 
 is, indeed, a name, which at once suggests itself — that 
 of Jean Perreal, whom Lemaire, in his ‘ Legende des 
 Venitiens,’ speaks of as ‘mon singulier patron et bien- 
 faiteur, nostre second Zeusis ou Apelles en painture, 
 maistre Jeha Perreal de Paris, paictre et varlet de 
 chabre ordinaire du roy.’ 
 
 Throughout the reigns of Charles VIII. and Louis 
 XII. Jean Perreal constantly comes before us. He has 
 been supposed to be one and the same as a certain Jean 
 
300 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 de Paris living at Orleans in 1472, and employed in that 
 year by the Archbishop of Bordeaux to execute a 
 glass-painting for the church of the Carmelites at Tours. 
 In 1490, and again in 1494, Jean Perreal was certainly 
 employed on the state entries made by Charles VIII. 
 into Lyons, and the very words in which he was, on 
 the second occasion, solemnly addressed by the Town 
 Council have been preserved. ‘Jean de Paris,’ they 
 begin, ‘ nous nous fions en vous, et tout nostre honneur 
 gist sur vous, nous vous le remettons et vous pro- 
 mettons que nous vous contenterons bien.’ In the 
 following year his property at Lyon was exempted 
 from all dues and taxes by order of the King, ‘ pource 
 qu il est presentement en nostre c 
 
 which has been supposed to have 
 rary title. A charter, given by Charles VIII. at Lyon 
 in 1496, to a corporation of painters, also contains his 
 name ; it is not, however, till the year 1499 that he 
 begins to be cited as peintre ordinaire du roi. In 
 1 504 he was taken into the pay of Margaret of Austria, 
 and in the following year he is styled ‘ garde de la 
 vaisselle d’Anne de Bretagne.’ We learn also from 
 Lemaire that he accompanied Louis XII. in his Italian 
 campaigns, and in 1508 his horse is mentioned for the 
 first time in the royal accounts of stable allowances. 
 Three years later (15 11), when Michel Columbe was 
 employed by Margaret of Austria to design the tomb 
 
 he is styled in this document 
 
JEAN PERREAL. 
 
 301 
 
 of 4 Monseigneur le due Philibert de Savoie mary de 
 ladite dame/ he was required to follow the ‘ pourtraict 
 et tres belle ordonnance faicte de la main de maistre 
 Jehan Perreal de Paris, peintre et varlet de chambre 
 ordinaire du roy.’ 
 
 The year 1514 finds Perreal in England, whither he 
 was sent by Louis XII. to superintend the trousseau 
 of his bride Mary Tudor, sister to Henry VIII. The 
 King himself in a letter to Wolsey mentions that Perreal 
 and his companion, a sieur de Marigny, were to remain 
 in London ‘pour aider a dresser ledict appareil a la 
 mode de France.’ To the deep affliction which had 
 overwhelmed him at the death of Anne of Brittany 
 had succeeded the utmost impatience for the arrival of 
 Princess Mary ; but Louis celebrated his marriage at 
 the cost of his life. He died on January 1, 1515, 
 about a year after the death of Anne, and four months 
 from the arrival of her successor; and Jean Perreal, 
 who had assisted in preparing the bride’s wedding 
 clothes, was summoned to direct the bridegroom’s 
 funeral obsequies. 
 
 The next reference to him in the accounts does not 
 occur till six years later : his horse is again entered in 
 the stable allowances for 1521. In the course of the 
 year after, he and his wife were at Lyon, and selected 
 a spot for their graves in the Church of St. Nizier; 
 in 1523, wages were again paid to him as ‘valet de 
 chambre du roy,’ and as late as 1527 his presence with 
 
302 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 the Court at St. Germain en Laye is alluded to in a 
 letter of Cornelius Agrippa. 
 
 With the exception of a single oil painting in the 
 collection of M. Bancel at Paris, nothing can be 
 identified as the work of Jean Perreal. This picture, 
 which has been engraved in M. Charvet’s ‘Jean 
 Perreal/ and in M. Fillon’s ‘ L/Art flamand dans l’Est 
 et le Midi de la France/ represents the espousals of 
 Charles VIII. and Anne of Brittany. In the centre 
 the Virgin and Child are enthroned, on the right 
 kneels the young King ; the Duchess, also kneeling, 
 faces him from the left ; on the arms of the throne are 
 the initials J. P. twice repeated. Lemaire, in the poem 
 in which he apostrophises Fouquet, adds, ‘ Vien voir 
 nature avec Jehan de Paris/ and these portraits are 
 studied with a minute attention to small points of 
 character, which justifies the encomium of the poet, 
 and recalls the care with which the heads and hands 
 of the figures of the Corpus ‘ Bible Historiee’ are 
 individualised. 
 
 The first volume of the ‘ Bible Historiee’ contains 
 six, the second, eight illustrations ; all show the same 
 ceremonious courtliness in the disposition of the com- 
 position, in the movement of the personages, in the 
 ordered arrangement of their splendid habits, in the 
 touch of forethought which composes their bearing 
 as if of those accustomed to appear in public state. 
 Even the brilliant cheerfulness of colour which floods 
 
. BIBLE HI S TORI EE. . 303 
 
 the pages with gay hues has an air of pomp which 
 serves to keep it from running into a too spontaneous 
 liveliness. The technical process has nothing to dis- 
 tinguish it from that employed by Fouquet and other 
 illuminators ; the colour is laid on in solid body, and 
 in after-touches of solid body the modelling is com- 
 pleted. The artist follows the use of Fouquet in em- 
 ploying gold. He dispenses it with even a stricter 
 economy, reserving it for the expression of gilded 
 armour, for the setting of jewels, or for tracery work 
 on the borders which hem the garments of the more 
 richly clad. The transformation of the decorative 
 illumination into a realistic representation had been 
 well-nigh accomplished by Fouquet, and the painter of 
 the Corpus MS. continues to work in this direction. 
 His pages bring us into the full tide of the Renaissance, 
 and make a connecting link between the manner of 
 Cousin and the more naive strength and grace of the 
 great master who illustrated the school of Tours during 
 the reign of Louis XI. 
 
 The fashion of Mary Tudor’s wedding robes was 
 superintended by Jean Perreal, and in like manner the 
 order and decorations of all solemn entries, and other 
 state pageants, were referred to the discretion of artists 
 specially attached to the service of the royal household. 
 The influence of this occupation would seem to furnish 
 an explanation of the manner of the painter of this 
 ‘ Bible Historieefl The subjects of Esdras before 
 
3 ° 4 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 Cyrus, and of Esther before Ahasuerus, are handled 
 by one to whom the circumstances of royal state were 
 familiar. In the ‘ Fleece of Gideon,’ one of the most 
 beautiful drawings of the book, the attitude of Gideon 
 is full of distinction. The fingers of the uplifted hands 
 part and taper with the pliant elegance which comes 
 of long-transmitted ease. He kneels, splendid in youth 
 and beauty, shining in his golden armour like a royal 
 prince, and the completeness of each appointment 
 enhances the effect of the impression. The figure is 
 placed on a little eminence ; the woods by which it is 
 crowned rise far above the banks of the river, which 
 wind into the distant landscape. Beneath the steep 
 sides of lofty cliffs nestles a well-defended town. The 
 central figure, — Gideon kneeling, commands the whole ; 
 the wide champaign is but a part of his dominions, the 
 distant city is his, his too the gathering bands of 
 armed men whose tramp echoes back from the bridge 
 over the river at his feet. It is plain that, like Fou- 
 quet, this painter also knew the manner of princes, 
 and had seen the warrior in his wrath. 
 
 The architectural forms and decorations employed 
 do not display the exuberant fertility of resource, the 
 impossible magnificence which stamps the brilliant in- 
 ventions of Fouquet. A sober accent of reality marks 
 every construction. The marble fountain in which 
 Susanna takes her bath is noticeable only for the rich- 
 ness of its material and for the elegance of its propor- 
 
cideon’s fleece. 
 
 J. PERREAL F. I ? I 
 
BIBLE HISTORIEE. 
 
 305 
 
 tions. A palace rises beyond the strict enclosure of 
 squared and levelled garden plots into which the elders 
 have found their way, and this palace, half hidden in 
 the thick leafage of sheltering trees, is no fantastic 
 dream of unrealisable excellence, but a house adapted 
 to fulfil the needs of country life. 
 
 The building is in two detached blocks, that near- 
 est to us being the gateway by which the court is 
 approached, within which the palace stands. The 
 palace itself consists only of a single corps de 
 logis . Like the gateway it has but one upper story. 
 The division between this upper story and the base- 
 ment is strongly marked by a projecting moulding, 
 another moulding of equal projection and importance 
 being also carried along the line indicated by the 
 sills of the upper windows. Superimposed columns 
 divide each set of openings from the roof to the 
 ground, and the wall space between is filled with arab- 
 esque ornament. The story above the gateway is 
 crowned by architrave, frieze, and cornice ; that above 
 the main building terminates in gable elevations over 
 each perpendicular line of openings intersected by the 
 capitals of the columns running up between them. 
 The whole building is ready for living use. The 
 palaces of Fouquet were glorious with the mystery of 
 prophetic vision, but the magic days of promise are 
 overpast, and the painter of the Corpus MS. represents 
 the constructions which he actually saw rising around 
 
 VOL. 1. 
 
 x 
 
306 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 him. The Hotel de Beaune, the Hotel Pince, the 
 cloister of St. Martin at Tours, were already in being, 
 but T ours claims special consideration no longer. T ours 
 was no longer the central point of French tradition. 
 The French Court had settled in Paris, and the French 
 school settled there also. In the hotel of the Tour- 
 nelles Louis XII. breathed his last; and Francis I., 
 although his restless energy carried him often to his 
 more distant chateaux , lived for the most part in Paris, 
 or its neighbourhood. When we close the leaves of 
 this 1 Bible Historiee,’ we pass into the new order of 
 things. 
 
307 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 PAINTING. 
 
 The Four Clouets. 
 
 Je sens portraits dedans ma souvenance 
 Tes longs cheveux, et ta bouche, et tes yeux, 
 
 Ton doux regard, ton parler gracieux, 
 
 Ton doux maintien, ta douce contenance, 
 
 Un seul Janet, honneur de nostre France, 
 
 De ses crayons ne les portrairoit mieux. — Ronsard. 
 
 The name of Jean Clouet, painter and ‘varlet de 
 chambre’ to Francis I. of France, again reminds us 
 that the fall of the house of Burgundy had sent a 
 contingent to swell the ranks of those artists who 
 worked for the French Court. In the very year in 
 which war finally broke out between Louis XI. and 
 Charles the Bold, in 1475, a certain Jean Clouet 
 signs in company with one Henry Bonem (both living 
 at Brussels) a receipt for the sum of 37 liv. 4 sols, re- 
 ceived by them in payment for work done for the 
 Duke. Bonem is described as carpenter and cabinet- 
 maker (charpentier et huchier ’ ), Clouet as a painter, 
 and his share in the work is the painting of ‘ vingt-six 
 pans de paveillons ... a chacun pan une creste de fin 
 or, et deux y mages de sains, armoiriez aux armes de 
 
 x 2 
 
3°8 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 mondit seigneur . . . ensemble une teste doree a 
 quatre fusils dor montes.’ The fusil was employed in 
 these decorations (I believe) in allusion to the Order 
 of the Toison d' or , founded by Philip the Good, the 
 collar of which was composed of ‘ fusils et cailloux ’ 
 (flint and steel). 
 
 The interest which attaches to this obscure record 
 of obscure work done by an artist of whom nothing 
 else is known, is derived from the conjecture which 
 sees in the Jean Clouet employed by the last of the 
 Dukes of Burgundy, the father of Jean Clouet, painter 
 to Francois I. of France. The name of this Jean 
 Clouet, who is for convenience’ sake called the second, 
 appears in the accounts of the French royal household 
 for the year 1518. He is entered as ‘paintre ordi- 
 naire,’ and receives ‘ neuf vingts livres tournois ’ as 
 ‘ gaiges de cette presente annee.’ The other entries of 
 sums paid to Jean Clouet as a member of the house- 
 hold ; whether as on the staff of ‘ gens de mestier,’ or 
 as ‘varlet de chambre’ which he ultimately became, 
 state his yearly wages as ‘ deux cens quarante livres 
 tournois.’ The phrase ‘neuf vingts ’ does not again 
 occur, and the amount which it is employed to desig- 
 nate is not clear. 
 
 The document in question was communicated by M. 
 Leroux de Lincy to the ‘ Moniteur’ of April 17, 1851, 
 together with a second piece of the same character in 
 which we find the same phrase. The second piece 
 
JEAN CLOUET. 
 
 3°9 
 
 bears date 1547. Jean Clouet II. had long been dead, 
 but his son Francois had succeeded him in his offices 
 of ‘ peintre et valet de chambre du roy.’ He it is, whom 
 we now find, acknowledging to have received ‘ neuf 
 vingts livres tournois ’ — not as the wages of a year’s 
 service, but, as is expressly stated, in payment for 
 the three quarters commencing with April, July, and 
 October. M. de Freville, taking these two statements 
 as his base, has computed the wages of the father at 
 1,800 liv. yearly, and those of the son at 600 liv. per 
 quarter. There is evidently some error in these 
 figures. For, if we take ‘neuf vingts ’ to mean ‘nine 
 twenties,’ we should then read instead of 1,800, 180, 
 and instead of 600, 60, and this calculation is probably 
 correct. Francois Clouet not only succeeded to the 
 same posts, but received the same emoluments as were 
 enjoyed by his father Jehan at the time of his death, 
 namely two hundred and forty livres a year. This 
 amount divides exactly into quarterly payments of 60 
 livres, and the sum due for three quarters of a year 
 would thus be exactly one hundred and eighty, or 
 ‘ nine twenties ’ of livres. 
 
 During the earlier part of his life Jean Clouet II. 
 is supposed to have resided at Tours. A tradition, 
 always current, yet never positively confirmed, fixes on 
 that town as the birthplace of his celebrated son 
 Francois, but the date of the father’s arrival in France 
 has not been ascertained. The fact of his foreign 
 
3 io 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 birth is established by the grant of letters of natural- 
 isation made to his son Francis in 1541. In these 
 letters the reasons for the grant are stated at length. 
 Jehannot was dead, and his ‘biens meubles et im- 
 meubles ’ had fallen to the Crown, ‘ au moien que ce 
 que le diet deffunt estoit etranger et non natif, ne 
 originaire de nostre royaume.’ 
 
 Jean Clouet II. had probably left his own country 
 whilst yet a young man, for at Tours he married 
 (at some time previous to the year 1522) Jeanne 
 Boucault, daughter of Gacien Boucault, a goldsmith of 
 the town. These facts are established by a contract 
 of sale bearing date June 6 , 1522. The purchasers 
 whose names figure in this deed are Jeanne Boucault, 
 and her husband Jean Clouet, who is described as 
 painter, and ‘ valet de chambre ordinaire du roy nostre 
 dit seigneur.’ The discovery that Jean Clouet II. had 
 married at Tours, and that he had there become the 
 purchaser of a rent annually to be paid in grain at 
 Michaelmas, encouraged the hope that the archives of 
 the town would reward further search with further 
 information. But the diligent examination made by 
 M. Grandmaison (Keeper of the Archives at Tours) 
 of every class of register or record has failed to bring 
 to light any other mention of his name, and the ex- 
 planation of this silence is, again, to be found in the 
 abandonment of the city by the Royal Court. This 
 was completely effected by the end of the first quarter 
 
JEAN CLOUET II. 
 
 3i 
 
 of the century. The Court was followed by the artists 
 in its employ, and Jean Clouet quitted in his turn a 
 town which had ceased to be a capital. 
 
 A second document, however, exists concerning 
 this same purchase of corn-rents, from which we obtain 
 proof that Clouet was actually absent from Tours in 
 the year following (1523), and that his absence, if not 
 final, was considered likely to be of some duration. 
 The rents which he and his wife had so recently 
 purchased they then renounced, but the two did not 
 appear as conjoint parties. The whole negotiation is 
 conducted and concluded by Jeanne Boucault as ‘pro- 
 curatrice de son dit mary comme elle a faict apparroir 
 par lettres de procuration.’ 
 
 This fact would seem to authorise the conjecture 
 that Clouet had now determined to reside at Paris. 
 Corn-rents to be received at Tours every Michaelmas 
 would therefore be an inconvenient investment ; and 
 accordingly he intrusted to his wife the sale of their 
 recent purchase. This conjecture is confirmed by an 
 entry of the same year (1523) which occurs in the list 
 of payments made to officers of the Royal Household. 
 It commences thus : ‘A Jehannot Clouet, painctre et 
 varlet de chambre ordinaire du Roy, pareille somme de 
 deux cens quarante livres tournois.’ Now in the first 
 document before us, the extract from the royal accounts 
 for the year 1518, Clouet was entitled only 'painctre 
 ordinaire,’ and received as salary 180 liv. 6 sols. — here 
 
312 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 we find that not only have his appointments been 
 augmented by a full third, but he has become ‘ varlet 
 de chambre ’ and is incorporated into the household. 
 
 The sum of 240 livres received as yearly wages by 
 Jean Clouet, in his twofold capacity of court-painter 
 and valet de chambre , must be considered only as a re- 
 taining fee, or allowance made on account of the ex- 
 penses incident to his posts, for, in 1528, after the due 
 entry of this amount as paid to J ehannot Clouet, ‘ pour 
 ses gaiges de paintre,’ we find other payments made 
 in addition on account of work done. The first 
 of these occurs on January 16. Clouet receives 
 200 liv. 10 sols, as part payment on a larger sum due 
 to him for several works and portraitures which he 
 has already executed for the King, or on which he is 
 still at work, and these said works and portraitures * le 
 diet seigneur ne voulleu estre cy aultrement declairees 
 ne speciffiees.’ Again, in the month of March, Clouet 
 receives 41 liv. for ‘plusieurs portraits, et effigiees au 
 vif qu’il a faites pour le service du diet seigneur, et 
 selon le devis et l’ordonnance du diet seigneur.’ This 
 entry is immediately followed by a second, from which 
 we learn that Clouet at this date was certainly living 
 in Paris. The King was at Blois, and desirous of 
 getting into his hands as soon as possible these paint- 
 ings, the subject of which was to be kept secret. Ac- 
 cordingly, a certain Loys de Moulin is despatched from 
 Blois; he makes his journey ‘en dilligence,’ and ‘ sur 
 
JEAN CLOUET II. 
 
 3i3 
 
 chevaulx de poste,’ goes to Paris and seeks the said 
 paintings, which he bears back with him to the King 
 at Blois, ‘ en semblable diligence/ All which particu- 
 lars are exactly noted in the accounts along with the 
 sum of 41 liv. paid to the messenger for his expenses. 
 
 In course of time Clouet gradually ceased to be 
 called by his family name, and acquired the popular 
 appellation of Jannet, which descended to his son, 
 Francois Clouet dit Jannet, and caused the confusion 
 which has merged these two lives in one. In the 
 letters of Marguerite, sister of Frangois I., we find one 
 written from Fontainebleau in 1529 to the Chancellor 
 of Alengon, in which she tells him that she has 
 arranged with the King of Navarre (to whom she 
 had been married in January of the previous year) 
 to take into their service ‘le peintre frere de Jannet, 
 peintre du roy.’ 
 
 It has been supposed, by M. de Laborde, that this 
 was the son, and not the brother, of Jean Clouet II., 
 but as Frangois Clouet dit Jannet did not become 
 ‘peintre du roy’ until after his fathers death in 1541, 
 it is more probable that the word Jannet designates 
 his father, and that the ‘peintre frere de Jannet’ was 
 an uncle, and not a brother, of Frangois Clouet. 
 The Queen’s letter states that the King of Navarre 
 would pay to the painter 100 liv. and that he should 
 receive the like sum from herself, so that his yearly 
 wages would amount to 200 liv., which seems in fair 
 
3H RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 ‘proportion to the wages received by his more distin- 
 guished brother at the Court of France. Punctual pay- 
 ment could not, however, be relied on. The means of 
 the Queen were not equal to the burdens she would 
 willingly have imposed upon them. 1 Elle s etoit faite 
 le port et le refuge de tous les desoles ; ’ and the 
 number of those who flocked to her made it impossible 
 to provide for their wants regularly and adequately. 
 
 Many passages in the writings of Bonaventure des 
 Periers, who was now in her service as valet de 
 chambre , show the occasional neglect which was the 
 necessary portion even of the more distinguished 
 amongst her servants. One of his poems is addressed 
 to the Chancellor, whose duty it was to make up, each 
 year, the accounts of the Household, and he thus 
 entreats him : 
 
 Prudent Chancelier de renom, 
 
 Avant que faire la cloture 
 De l’estat n’oubliez pas le nom 
 Tant joyeux de Bonaventure. 
 
 Marguerite herself seems to have been aware that her 
 credit was not sure, for in the letter before us, after 
 imperatively insisting that the painter shall be sent off 
 at once, and that he may be at Fontainebleau by the 
 following Monday, she adds, 'et vous prie luy faire 
 delivrer quelque argent pour commencer pour luy 
 donner courage de bien besogner.’ 
 
 Many years now elapse before we again find men- 
 tion of ‘Jannet.’ II Rosso arrived in 1530, and the 
 
IL ROSSO. 
 
 3i5 
 
 eyes of all the world were fixed on the man whom the 
 King treated with great magnificence. Pensions were 
 at once bestowed, and a house in Paris where he lived 
 in princely state, keeping up a great establishment, 
 horses, and servants. But he preferred his apartments 
 at Fontainebleau. There, ‘ la galerie de Francis 1 / was 
 constructed under his direction ; there, he painted in the 
 rooms of Madama Temp (Madame d’Estampes) inci- 
 dents from the life of Alexander the Great, with allusions 
 to the qualities which distinguished his royal patron. 
 
 Fontainebleau to-day cannot show a line laid by his 
 hand, and the triumphal arches which he erected in the 
 year before his death (1540), to honour the coming of 
 Charles V., had as lasting an existence as the labours 
 on which he staked his reputation and his hopes of 
 fame. Much was immediately and totally destroyed 
 to make way for the execution of the more imposing 
 designs of his rival and successor, the Bolognese Pri- 
 maticcio. The room once occupied by the Duchesse 
 d’Estampes became a staircase, and the frescoes which 
 were permitted to linger on its walls were gradually 
 destroyed by neglect, and careless usage. The traces 
 which remained at the beginning of the present cen- 
 tury finally disappeared beneath the skilful restorations 
 of M. Abel de Pujol. The Gallery of Francois I. 
 suffered the same fate. The paintings which deco- 
 rated it were first re-handled by Primaticcio ; the course 
 of years next brought with it the usual train of injuries. 
 
3 l6 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 At last, all but obliterated, they were put into the hands 
 of M. Auguste Couder, and the wreck of the Porte 
 Doree, which still preserved the fading outlines of four 
 of Rosso’s designs, was entrusted to M. Picot. 
 
 MM. de Pujol, Couder, and Picot were called to 
 this task of renovation during the reign of Louis 
 Philippe. They brought to the work a generous zeal, 
 high training, and abilities of no mean order. They 
 executed with skill and care the labours imposed on 
 them, but the new life which they brought to the crea- 
 tions of the past carried with it the penalty of death 
 as the price of transformation. The colour, the senti- 
 ment, the accent of the Florentine master are replaced 
 by a wholly foreign character, and these frescoes are 
 now destroyed for the purposes either of artistic study 
 or antiquarian research. The graceful ornaments in re- 
 lief by which they were enframed have also lost their 
 early charm. As is invariably the case with all resto- 
 rations undertaken by Louis Philippe, the stamp of 
 bourgeois wealth has effaced the previous refinements of 
 princely magnificence. 
 
 In the execution of these designs Rosso was aided 
 largely by his pupils. Foremost on the list of those 
 to whom he entrusted works in relief Vasari places 
 Domenico del Barbieri ; his name is followed by those 
 of no less than four French artists, 'maestro Fran- 
 cesco d’Orleans, maestro Simone da Parigi, e maestro 
 Claudio similmente Parigino, maestro Lorenzo Pic- 
 
JEAN CLOUET II. 
 
 3i7 
 
 cardo,’ but on the list of the painters whom he employed 
 we find Italians only. The brilliant successes of II 
 Rosso did not, however, deprive Clouet of the favour of 
 the King. The list of payments made, in 1536, to 
 * painctres et gens de mestier ’ contains his name, and 
 again he receives as wages ‘ par lui desservis ’ the 
 customary 240 liv. 
 
 In 1537, the wife of a certain ‘ Janot’ is mentioned 
 in another letter written by the Queen of Navarre 
 from Fontainebleau. It is not, however, clear, who 
 is the person meant. The wife visits Marguerite on 
 Sunday, and tells her that ‘ tous les serviteurs de son 
 mary sont malades de fievres continues, quotidiennes, 
 ou tierces . . . Apres six ou sept reverences, elle me 
 conta quelle n’ousoit aller a sa paroisse de Moret pour 
 ce qu’il y a encore plus de malades.’ In the letter pre- 
 viously quoted, the Queen, writing of Jean Clouet II4 
 abbreviates his name into Janet. When it appears in full 
 in the accounts accompanied by the surname, it is spelt 
 variously Jannet, Jehannet, or Jehannot. The letter 
 which precedes the final t might, therefore, be written 
 indifferently e or 0, and, accordingly the abbreviation 
 might be either Janet or Janot, as happened best to 
 please the writer. Marot, in his ‘ Epitre au Roy,’ pre- 
 fixed to his translation of the Psalms, speaks of Jean 
 Clouet II., as ‘ le tiers Janet,’ but alluding to his father 
 Jean Marot in his ‘ Eclogue au Roy,’ he calls him ‘ le 
 bon Janot mon pere.’ 
 
318 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE . 
 
 It does not seem likely that the Queen was 
 writing of that brother of J anet, ‘ peintre du Roy,’ 
 whom she and the King of Navarre took into their 
 service in 1521, for the abbreviation of the Christian 
 name, Janet, does not seem to have been substituted 
 for the surname, Clouet, until the third generation. In 
 official documents Francois Clouet the son of Jean 
 II. is always styled in full, but Vincent Carloix, for 
 instance, having to allude to him in writing the memoirs 
 of his master — the Marshal de Vieilleville — calls him 
 simply 4 Janet/ When Marguerite wrote, however, his 
 father, the true Jehannot, was still alive; and if, as 
 seems probable, she speaks of his wife, Jeanne Boucault, 
 her letter proves that Jehan Clouet II. sometimes lived 
 with his family at or near Fontainebleau. 
 
 Although Paris was his place of regular residence, 
 Clouet occasionally visited Tours; for in 1537, he 
 executed paintings there which he sent to Paris in 
 charge of his wife. In Paris he died, for the formali- 
 ties necessary to be accomplished at the death, on 
 French soil, of a foreigner possessed of property, took 
 place before the ‘ prdvost de Paris/ The exact date 
 is uncertain. Letters of naturalisation were granted 
 to Francis Clouet in 1541, and in these the King re- 
 nounces his right to the property of Jean Clouet then 
 deceased in favour of his son. It is also stated that 
 the 4 adjudication, et declaration sur ce faite par le 
 prevost de Paris/ is attached, ‘ soulz le seel de nostre 
 
JEAN CLOUET II. 
 
 3i9 
 
 chancellerye,’ to the document in question, but this 
 piece has disappeared. Its loss is the more to be re- 
 gretted as it must have contained an inventory of the 
 ‘biens meubles et immeubles ’ amassed by Jean Clouet 
 during a life-time of labour, and would have enabled 
 us to form an idea of the fortune then possible to a 
 successful French artist. 
 
 The amount of the yearly wages furnish us with 
 no adequate gauge of his receipts, since work done 
 was paid for in addition. The emoluments of a 
 painter * varlet de chambre ’ were thus rendered far 
 better than those of a man of letters who held the 
 same post, unless he took orders, and could receive 
 ecclesiastical preferment ; and it may be noted that 
 whilst Bonaventure des Periers was but too thankful if 
 he could get his yearly due of 140 liv. as valet de 
 chambre to the Queen of N avarre, the painter — brother 
 of Janet — is offered 200 liv., a sum which would not 
 have been the limit of his earnings, whilst the incessant 
 toil and abject petitions of the poet brought him but a 
 precarious maintenance, ended by a despairing death. 
 
 Of all the pictures painted by Jean Clouet II., not 
 one can be positively identified. A portrait of Francis 
 I., now in the Louvre, is perhaps the work which has 
 the best claim to be considered authentic. Le Pere 
 Dan, writing in 1642, closes his notice of the ‘ Cabinet 
 de Peintures’ in the Pavilion of Charles IX. at Fon- 
 tainebleau, with these words : ‘ la sont aussi les por- 
 
320 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 traits de Frangois I. et de Francois II., qui sont de 
 Janet, peintre fort renomme par la Muse du Prince 
 de nos poetes.’ Of the portrait of Francis II., there 
 can be no question, for the Prince was born at Fon- 
 tainebleau in January 1543, two years after the death 
 of Jean Clouet II. ; but that of Francois I. might be 
 by his hand. In 1731, it is again mentioned by the 
 Abbe Guilbert, who is followed by Felibien, who both 
 attribute the work to Janet, but in the inventory of 
 the royal collection, made in 1 709, this portrait, which 
 is described as then hanging in the ‘ Cabinet dore ’ 
 at Fontainebleau, is placed on the list of painters un- 
 known. In an inventory of 1784, the same painting 
 is again similarly described. Under the Empire, 
 Vivant Denon attributed it to Mabuse. In 1830, Louis 
 Philippe removed it from the warehouses of the 
 Louvre to the Salle des Rois of Versailles, but in 1848 
 the Louvre again received it, and the portrait still 
 has a place in its Galleries. 
 
 This is a pedigree of some value, but whether the 
 picture was executed by father or son is a question 
 only to be determined by internal evidence. It is in- 
 jured, and has been repainted in various places ; but in 
 spite of the damage which it has sustained the minute- 
 ness with which the smallest particulars are detailed 
 speaks of the effort made to pourtray faithfully a per- 
 son with whose features the painter was familiar. 
 
 If the painter is Jean Clouet II., then Jean Clouet 
 
PORTRAIT OF FRANCOIS /. 
 
 321 
 
 II. must have quitted Flanders in his youth. The 
 accent of form throughout is sharp, the tones of colour 
 are clear ; even the background, which is hung with 
 damask royally red, is painted over some metallic 
 preparation, which lends to the hues a shimmering 
 brightness, such as the enamellers of the day obtained 
 by means of foil. The sheen of the King’s white 
 satin dress is enhanced by the gleaming of gold 
 ornaments and pearls. These are rendered with the 
 most precious exactness, not a thread is suffered to 
 escape, and this curious and patient finish derives more 
 remarkable effect from the breadth with which the 
 parts on which it finds place are, on the whole, seen. 
 The green velvet stand on which the left hand rests, 
 the large slashed sleeves, the black cap with its white 
 plume, are spaces of repose. The tint of the face it- 
 self is given in one determined sheet, on which the 
 modelling is wrought up by a succession of touches 
 matched in faint degrees, so that here also the sense 
 of relief is carefully subordinated to the feeling of local 
 colour. The head is seen in a flood of broad daylight. 
 
 There is a striking contrast between the breadth 
 and solidity of the portions which form the base of 
 the whole, and the excessive care taken to elaborate 
 the minutest facts which could be detected either in the 
 face or in the ornaments of the person. This contrast 
 is precisely that which may be observed in all noble 
 miniature painting. Fouquet, too, used his draperies 
 
 VOL.' 1. y 
 
322 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 as spaces of rest, the folds were laid largely, and fell in 
 unbroken quiet. As a rule, he did not even attempt 
 to give the texture of different stuffs, except when the 
 secret glow of a velvet surface offered the opportunity 
 of modulating a tone without disturbing the breadth 
 of the general impression. Exquisite elaboration of 
 detail was reserved, as in this portrait, for the orna- 
 mental enrichments of jewelled collars and tracery work 
 of weaving lines. 
 
 This portrait of Francis, then, is evidently one for 
 which the King must have given many sittings. The 
 artist, if not a Frenchman by birth, had been early 
 nourished in the traditions of French art. The King 
 is represented as about thirty-five or forty years of age ; 
 so that the picture must have been executed between 
 the years 1535 and 1540 — at some time, therefore, 
 during the last ten years of Jean Clouets life. At 
 that date we do not see on the list of those about the 
 royal household the name of any other French painter 
 who could claim a work of this importance. When 
 Jean Clouet II. died, the man thought fit to succeed 
 him in his office was his son Francis, but he was a 
 far more accomplished artist than the painter of this 
 portrait. 
 
 It is true that at the epoch of its production 
 Francois Clouet was yet a young man, but the imper- 
 fections of its execution are not those of youth and 
 inexperience, but such as would result from habits 
 
PORTRAIT OF HENRI II. 
 
 323 
 
 settled by long practice, and stiffened by age. The 
 portraits undoubtedly executed by Francois Clouet are 
 also always free from the peculiarities which stamp the 
 picture in question as the work of one early trained in 
 the practice of miniature, still it must be admitted that 
 the attribution to Jean Clouet II. is purely hypothetical. 
 
 M. de Laborde, taking this portrait as certainly 
 his work, attributed to him also two other paint- 
 ings, in which he thought he recognised traces of the 
 same hand. These are the equestrian portrait of 
 Francis I. in the Gallery of the Uffizi at Florence, and 
 a portrait of his second wife Eleonora, sister to Charles 
 V., which is now at Hampton Court. 
 
 The equestrian portrait at Florence, which I have 
 not seen, is a reputed Holbein, but Dr. Waagen con- 
 curred with M. de Laborde in assigning it to a French 
 painter. An equestrian portrait of Henri II. also 
 forms part of the same collection, and the two would 
 seem to have been intended as companions, and to 
 have been executed by the same hand. The portrait 
 of Henri II. represents him at the age of thirty at 
 least, the age which he attained in 1548; it cannot, 
 therefore, be by Jean Clouet II., who died seven years 
 before that date. It is possible that the same copyist 
 has here reproduced two portraits by different hands, 
 and that the original of the Francois I. was actually 
 painted by Jean Clouet II., whilst that of Henri II., 
 which is said to be weaker in tone, and feebler in 
 
324 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 design, was the work of some inferior pupil or 
 descendant. 
 
 Matched with recollections of the Francois I. of the 
 Louvre, the Eleonora of Hampton Court, though pre- 
 senting the same characteristics, appears the more 
 vigorous work ; the hands, which hold a paper, ad- 
 dressed, ‘ A la Reyna my Senora,’ are drawn with some 
 truth, but the general effect is flat and chill. The 
 background is green, and the Queen wears green bro- 
 cade and white fur ; her large black sleeves are re- 
 lieved with white puffs. The exertions of the cleaner 
 have carried off the modifying touches, which once 
 gave variety to the surface, for in all works of this 
 class the modelling is, as it were, washed in, in thin 
 diluted colour upon the flat, well-hardened under-tint. 
 All detail of jewels and embroidery, all fine play of 
 shadow is trusted to this after-process. The operation 
 of stripping at once removes the upper layer, and the 
 finish of the painting being thus taken away, only the 
 hard unbroken mass remains in which the local colour 
 has been laid. 
 
 In the Museum of Dijon hangs what was once a 
 fine portrait of a woman wearing a rich black and yel- 
 low court-dress covered with gold embroidery. Round 
 her neck hangs a broad gold and jewelled pendant, to 
 which is attached a chain of pearls. This portrait hasi 
 been stripped. Of the chain, and of the greater part of 
 the jewelled pendant, the empty outline alone remains. 
 
PORTRAIT OF QUEEN ELEONORA. 
 
 3 25 
 
 Ghostly spots faintly show where once lay rows of 
 pearls in solid shining globes. The face probably told 
 the tale of destruction too plainly, for the modelling, 
 which had been cleanly taken off, has been restored 
 by a full brush, and the whole is now securely pre- 
 served beneath a coat of varnish of unknown depth. 
 
 The portrait of Eleonora at Hampton Court has 
 indeed been over-cleaned, but it has not been re- 
 painted ; traces, at least, remain of the original work. 
 It was executed apparently soon after her marriage 
 with Francis, which took place in 1530, shortly after 
 her arrival in France. Eleonora was then, as she is 
 there represented, a woman of about thirty-two years 
 of age, and Jean Clouet II. was some five or six years 
 younger than when he painted the Louvre portrait of 
 her husband, a fact which may account for any greater 
 breadth and energy to be seen in his picture of the 
 Queen. 
 
 There remain also two more portraits which present 
 certain points of resemblance to the two above de- 
 scribed. They are classed at the Louvre as c Iicole 
 des Clouet.’ One is a so-called likeness of Francis I., 
 the other bears the name of Charles de Coss6, Count 
 de Brissac, and Marshal of France. Both paintings 
 are evidently by the same hand. The head of the 
 so-called Francois is turned in three-quarter profile to 
 the right. The features are wholly unlike the strongly- 
 marked countenance of the King. The head of the 
 
326 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Marshal, presented in the same proportions, is turned 
 to the left. Both figures are robed in black, and stand 
 out from a background of clear blue green. A black 
 cap, ornamented with a falling white plume, covers the 
 heads of each. 
 
 The inscriptions on both these portraits would 
 seem to have been placed on them some years after 
 the date of their execution. * Francois I. Roy de FV 
 occurs at the foot of one ; on the other the lettering is 
 on the right hand at the top of the picture. It was at 
 first taken to be ‘M. de Brissac estant Due,' but was 
 finally read by M. de Laborde, ‘ M. de Brissac estant 
 Jeun.’ This last reading is correct. There was no 
 Due de Brissac in the sixteenth century, for the ‘conte' 
 was not erected into 4 duch6-pairie ’ until 1 6 1 1. Charles 
 de Coss6, the subject of this portrait, was brought up 
 in attendance on the Dauphin, Francois, brother of 
 Henri II. He was born in 1505, and may have been 
 five-and -twenty or thirty when the painting was ex- 
 ecuted, which would fix the date of its production 
 between the years 1530-35. So that the only paint- 
 ings which are ascribed, and that doubtfully, to Jean 
 Clouet II., a man whom we know to have been em- 
 ployed for more than twenty years by the French 
 Court, are these five portraits, all of which must have 
 been produced during the last ten years of his life. 
 
 There are, it is true, other works which ought 
 possibly to bear his name. Hampton Court is rich in 
 
FRANCOIS CLOUET BIT 'JANET: 327 
 
 examples of this school, and, amongst these, another 
 portrait of Francois I., attributed to Holbein, is evidently 
 by a French hand, and at Vienna the collection of 
 Prince Lichtenstein contains several paintings of this 
 date, and some which call for special attention. M. de 
 Laborde also attributes to Jean Clouet II. the Eleonora 
 and Francis formerly in the Bernal collection, 
 which were bought by Mr. John Webb at the Bernal 
 sale together with other works of the same class. 
 Some were resold immediately, and the rest came to 
 the hammer at Christies at the Webb sale about ten 
 years ago. The chateaux of the Loire are still excep- 
 tionally rich. Azay le Rideau and Chenonceau over- 
 flow with treasures, and both contain collections of 
 portraits, many of which are not improbably by the 
 father of Francis Clouet. It is much to be desired 
 that they may at some time be brought together, for it 
 is impossible to carry impressions from one place to 
 another, with accuracy sufficient for positive judgment. 
 
 Francis Clouet, the son of Jean II., is supposed 
 to have been at Tours at some time previous to 1523, 
 at which time his father left for Paris. He was pro- 
 bably between twenty and thirty years of age when he 
 received letters of naturalisation on the occasion of his 
 father’s death, and succeeded to his father’s office of 
 ‘ painctre ordinaire du Roy.’ The earliest known 
 work by his hand is a portrait of the Dauphin Francois, 
 eldest son of Francois I., now in the Museum of 
 
328 
 
 RENAISSA NCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Antwerp. It represents a child of about six or seven 
 years of age, and must therefore, since the Dauphin 
 was born in 1517, have been painted about 1524. 
 
 In this portrait, which has been minutely described 
 with great enthusiasm by M. de Laborde, Frangois 
 Clouet shows an unusually delicate intelligence of the 
 value of childish forms. Whilst dwelling on the ob- 
 vious softness and roundness of the waving outlines, 
 none of the faint accents which betray the underlying 
 structure are suffered to escape. The execution still 
 presents the familiar combination of solid under-painting 
 of the local colour, modelled up by the point of the brush 
 with excessively-diluted material. There are, how- 
 ever, signs of some modification of the earlier practice, 
 though both in freedom of hand, and in the expres- 
 sion of intellectual force, this painting is inferior to the 
 portrait of Frangois I., now in the collection of Lord 
 Dudley. 
 
 This portrait is one of the earliest, and one of the 
 most remarkable works which we are able to attribute 
 to Frangois Clouet. It was probably executed about 
 1534, as it represents the King at an age which can 
 scarcely be less than that of forty years. An inscrip- 
 tion on the back, signed ‘ Berger de Ressie, Due de 
 Valentinois, 1749,’ names Leonardo da Vinci as the 
 painter, and this attribution is still reproduced in the 
 label of the frame. There can, however, be no ques- 
 tion here of Leonardo, for the great master died in 
 
PORTRAIT OF FRANCOIS I 329 
 
 1519, when Frangois was but five-and-twenty years of 
 age. The Duke de Valentinois was probably misled 
 by the deceptive appearance of a manner which will 
 probably be found common to all the earlier work of 
 Frangois Clouet. 
 
 M. Lenoir, who, in the enormous number of simi- 
 lar works which he brought together in one place, had 
 opportunities of observation and comparison which no 
 one else has since possessed, says of Frangois Clouet, 
 
 ‘ il a cherche dans ses ouvrages a imiter la maniere de 
 Leonard de Vinci/ The manner of Leonardo, in its 
 peculiar refinement, its inexorable positiveness, in its 
 logic undisturbed by the dreams of imagination, or by 
 the appeals of purely physical pleasure, offered an ideal 
 exactly calculated to attract the admiring emulation of 
 the French. 
 
 Frangois Clouet never probably saw the man, but 
 he knew the master, and this portrait of Frangois I. 
 shows what he learnt from him. He learnt to look for 
 the signs of nobility in his subject, he gained a deeper 
 insight into life, and, over and above this training of 
 the intellect he was taught by the perfection of his 
 master’s style to seek for an accent which should ex- 
 press these newly-acquired powers ; — which should be 
 perfect and precise in rendering conceptions equal in 
 perfection and precision. 
 
 It is a young work. There is a difficulty in the 
 drawing of the right hand as it holds the gloves, an 
 
33 ° 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 effort in the foreshortening of the fingers, which to 
 Leonardo would have come with the easy certainty of 
 long experience and practice. The first impression, 
 also, in spite of the modification of style and intention 
 apparent on close inspection, is that of a work incon- 
 testably and purely French. The head rises out of 
 the thick fur of the surrounding sables against a back- 
 ground of the peculiar water-green, dear to every 
 member of the ftcole des Clouet. In the rendering 
 of the device which fastens the white plume of the 
 toque, and the tracery of pearls which borders the 
 black velvet of the heavy coat, in the twisting of the 
 golden knots which tie the intricate lines of the myriad 
 grey and yellow crowns which cover the grey velvet 
 4 juste au corps/ in the unembarrassed skill which plays 
 with these overwhelming riches of decorative detail, 
 we see a habit of hand, a tradition of craft inherited 
 rather than learnt. 
 
 This habit of hand, this craft, had been adjusted 
 to meet the requirements of men whose simple aims 
 were untouched by the all-embracing science which 
 at once stimulated and embarrassed the calculations 
 of Leonardo. The northern manner which has pos- 
 sibly given to Holbein much of the work of Jean 
 Clouet II. has indeed disappeared from the work of 
 his son, but he still retains the practice of his father’s 
 training, and the technic of his immediate predecessors. 
 Both are slowly modified, the influence of Leonardo 
 
FUNERAL OF FRANCOIS /. 
 
 33 
 
 himself is plainly visible only for a time ; finally Fran- 
 cois Clouet shows himself not independent of his past, 
 but as one possessing his own manner of sight, and 
 mastery of the symbols suited to its expression. In 
 the portrait of a boy ascribed to ‘Janet' at Hampton 
 Court, and which was probably executed by him in the 
 full maturity of his power, he uses the brush with a 
 perfect intelligence of its capabilities, and his method 
 has a naif character analogous to the nature of his 
 impressions. 
 
 On the last day of March, 1547, Francois I. died at 
 Rambouillet. He had been restlessly dragging himself 
 from place to place, worn by an intermittent fever which 
 had suddenly laid hold on him. To Francis Clouet 
 fell the task of modelling the effigy which was to be 
 employed in the funeral ceremonies. He came to 
 Rambouillet accompanied by his servant, and received 
 for travelling money 10 liv., but speedily he had to return 
 to Paris, possibly to seek necessary materials, and again, 
 for his journey there and back, he receives the like sum. 
 His own labour, and that of his servant, was not suf- 
 ficient to accomplish the work before him ; for eight 
 days he had three men also, under his orders, and then 
 other two who were employed for two days. 
 
 There was not, indeed, one effigy to make, but 
 three. The body of Charles, Duke of Orleans, the 
 youngest son of Francois I., who died at the age of 
 three and twenty in 1544, and that of his elder brother 
 
332 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 the Dauphin Francois were now to be interred with 
 that of their father. In a second passage also, printed 
 by M. de Laborde, an extract from ‘ Payement de 
 Peintres,’ we find a charge of 20 sols, for ‘ la terre a 
 poictiers qu’il a convenu avoire pour faire les trois 
 effegies du feu roy, et de messeigneurs les dauphin et 
 due d’Orleans.’ It would seem that there was also 
 a second repetition of the effigy of the King, for 
 amongst the items specially mentioned under this head 
 are two pairs of hands ; and in the general payments 
 mention is made of four wooden cases in which the 
 four models are to be placed for safe transport to 
 Notre Dame des Champs. 
 
 Of the two effigies of Francois, one was, in all pro- 
 bability, employed to personate the body of the King 
 during the lying in state — a function often fulfilled 
 by these waxen figures, when, for any reason, it was 
 impossible or undesirable to expose the corpse. The 
 lying in state on this occasion took place at St. Cloud. 
 The Dauphin commanded ‘ de porter le corps du feu 
 roy son pere a St. Cloud pres Paris, pour y faire la 
 quarantaine.’ Thither, at least, one effigy was sent, 
 and the boatman who took it there by water finds 
 mention in the accounts. 
 
 During the six years in which he was engaged in 
 the service of Francois I., there is no extant entry of 
 any yearly payment made to Francois Clouet, but we 
 know from the terms of the original grant made to 
 
WAGES OF FRANCOIS CLOUET. 
 
 333 
 
 him in 15 40-1 that he was to be paid at the rate of 
 his father’s yearly salary of 240 liv. This sum he had 
 in all likelihood received punctually, up to the end 
 of March 1547, when Francois I. died, for in the first 
 payment made to him in the new reign he is reckoned 
 with from the first of the following April, and he 
 receives wages for the three quarters of the year 
 commencing from that date. He is paid ‘ nine twen- 
 ties ’ of livres , that is to say, at the yearly rate of 240 liv., 
 the salary before received by his father. The fact 
 that Francois Clouet here receives wages for three 
 quarters of a year only, is possibly not due alone to the 
 demise of the Crown which had taken place in the 
 March previous, for in 1518, four years after the 
 accession of Francois I., we find Jean Clouet acknow- 
 ledging the receipt of a similar sum, due to him for 
 the similar period of three quarters of a year, be- 
 ginning with April, and ending with December. It 
 is probable, therefore, that the financial year began on 
 April 1, and that wages were paid in two sums, one 
 of which covered only a single quarter, whilst the other 
 completed the amount due for the remaining nine 
 months. 
 
 For some years after the accession of Henri II., 
 Francis Clouet is lost sight of. At last, about 1553, 
 he reappears. There hangs in the Louvre a small 
 full-length portrait of Henri II., which represents him 
 at the age of thirty-five, or thereabouts, and which, 
 
334 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 therefore, must have been painted at this date. It was 
 formerly in the collection of Louis XIV. at Versailles, 
 where it was noted for the first time in an inventory 
 taken at the beginning of the last century. In the 
 Louvre, too, there is preserved a half-length half life- 
 size portrait of the King, which resembles in pose and 
 costume the little figure, which is only some twelve 
 inches in height. The likeness in all points between 
 the two is close, and as the miniature cannot have served 
 as the model from which the bust was enlarged, it is 
 most likely that both are reproductions of a common 
 original the size of life. The execution of the bust has 
 little merit, but we recognise a keenness of observation 
 in the details, a precision of style in the drawing, 
 which leave little doubt that the copyist had before 
 him the work of Frangois Clouet himself. 
 
 The small ‘portrait d’ Henry II. en pied ’ figures 
 at the head of a list of nine paintings, under the title 
 ‘ Iicole Frangaise/ in an inventory made by a certain 
 Bailly, for the Due d’ Antin, ‘ surintendant de la maison 
 du roi/ in 1709-10. The portrait of the King hung, 
 as has been said, at Versailles, in the ‘ petite galerie du 
 roi/ the remaining eight, which are classed with it, on 
 account of similarity of style, were not at Versailles, 
 but at the Luxembourg. They were ranged together 
 in the ‘ Cabinet dore,’ and though varying greatly in 
 length were all of the uniform height of 5i feet, from 
 which we may infer that they formed a continuous 
 
PAINTINGS OF THE ‘CABINET DORE: 
 
 335 
 
 line of decoration running round the room above the 
 wainscot, which was probably carried beneath them ‘a 
 demi-revetement/ that is to say, rising to the height of 
 the chimney-piece. The pictures would thus take the 
 place more anciently filled by tapestry. 
 
 It is not easy to guess from the vague descriptions 
 of the catalogue what were the special events illustrated 
 by the two paintings standing first on the list, but the 
 remaining six all evidently refer to important events 
 in the lives of Henri II. and Catharine de Medicis. 
 They are contemporary historical paintings on a con- 
 siderable scale, and nothing of this class is known to 
 us amongst the French pictures, of the same date, now 
 in our hands. It is of course possible that Bailly was 
 mistaken in classing them under ‘ Iicole Frangaise.’ 
 In a note to Mariette’s edition of Germain Brice, we 
 find the decorations of the ‘ Cabinet dore ’ described 
 as copies after Cosme Rouilli, but the presumption 
 seems in favour of Bailly’s correctness, and our interest 
 in the lost series is heightened, when we recollect that 
 the one painting with which he couples them, and which 
 can now be identified, the small portrait of Henri II., 
 is probably a copy after Frangois Clouet himself. 
 
 The portrait of the boy previously mentioned as 
 attributed to ‘Janet’ at Hampton Court, is described 
 in the catalogue as the Dauphin Frangois, son of 
 Henri II., but a glance at the meagre profile which 
 slants across the coins of Frangois II. will suffice to 
 
336 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 show that this energetic boy, with the strongly arched 
 nose, is not the Dauphin Francois. The picture re- 
 presents most probably one of his brothers, for the 
 lower lip shows the marked indenture which brands 
 the portraits of their mother, and which they all in- 
 herited from her. I think, that it will be found on 
 comparison with the portraits of Henri III., that it is 
 he whom we have in this picture, at the age of ten or 
 twelve years, for beneath the round fulness of the 
 young face which here looks out shining with native 
 brilliance from the sober background of quiet brown, 
 can be traced the same conformation of structure which 
 renders the face of the last of the Valois so remark- 
 able ; and not only the shape, but the expression of 
 the eyes and mouth bears a close resemblance to the 
 portraits of the same Prince in later life. Curiously 
 enough, the dress is not distinguished by the extrava- 
 gant splendour customary to royal portraits at this 
 epoch. The deep and luminous black of the ‘juste 
 au corps’ and ‘ tocque ’ is but sparingly relieved by the 
 white plume then invariably worn, and by golden 
 ornaments in quantity just sufficient to reveal the noble 
 quality of the wearer. 
 
 The special character of the type is brought 
 into strong relief by this unostentatious treatment, 
 which is also admirably calculated to give value to 
 the rich colour of the flesh tints, to the limpid radi- 
 ance of the eyes, and to the striking air of life and 
 
COFFER DECORATED BY FRANCOIS CLOUET. 337 
 
 health which animates the head. Antoine Muret, in 
 commenting the second edition of the 4 Amours de 
 Ronsard/ published during this year (1553), appends 
 to the poem commencing ‘ Peins-moy J anet ’ a note, in 
 which he explains that Janet 4 pour representer vi- 
 vant la nature a passe tous ceux de nostre aage,’ and 
 perhaps the whole of Francois Clouet’s work does not 
 afford a better example than the Hampton Court 
 portrait of that art of giving life which was attributed 
 to him in chief by his contemporaries. 
 
 In March of the following year — 1554 — Francois 
 Clouet was employed to execute the decorations of a 
 coffer for the King. He paints and patterns it in 
 colour, and fine silver and gold, blazoning on it the royal 
 devices, including many 4 croissants lacez.’ For this he 
 receives 20 liv., but after this entry we have no evidence 
 of any payments to him, or of his employment by the 
 Court up to the date of the death of Henri II., which 
 occurred in 1559. At some time previous Clouet 
 had indeed produced an important equestrian portrait 
 of the King. It is mentioned by Etienne Jodelle, in 
 a little collection of inscriptions and devices which he 
 printed at Paris in 1558. 
 
 Jodelle had been entrusted with the conduct of 
 certain representations given in that year at the Hotel 
 de Ville, in honour of the marriage of the Dauphin 
 Francois with Mary, Queen of Scots. These perform- 
 ances were not successful, many of Jodelle’s compli- 
 
 vol. t. z 
 
338 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 cated contrivances would not act, and he published the 
 volume in question as a justification of these disasters. 
 It contains, besides other matter, a series of inscrip- 
 tions which designate portraits of celebrated person- 
 ages. These portraits seem to have been brought 
 together for the occasion, and formed a part of the 
 decorations of the Hotel de Ville. One of them is thus 
 described, ‘ Icon Henrici equitantis domi sic nuper 
 Janetio pictore Parisiensi excellentissimo in maiore 
 tabula depicti.’ 
 
 It has been suggested that the expression ‘equi- 
 tantis domi,’ which certainly is untranslatable, may 
 have been intended to mean that the King was riding 
 not in state representation, or on a warlike expedition, 
 but for private pleasure ‘at home.’ He would wear, 
 therefore, neither armour, nor robes of ceremony, but 
 the dress of ordinary days. It is possible that the 
 picture may have been the original of a portrait now 
 at Azay le Rideau, in the possession of the Marquis de 
 Biencourt, in which the King is represented, about half 
 life-size, on horseback. He wears a rich court cos- 
 tume of black relieved by white, and the trappings of 
 his horse show the same colours. Horse and rider 
 issue from a great gate, a portion of which is seen on 
 the right, and pass across the picture to the left ; be- 
 hind them runs a blank wall of grey stone, of the same 
 tint as that of which the gateway is built. The pic- 
 ture hangs in a bad light* so that it is impossible to 
 
HENRI || (CRAYON) ATTRIBUTED TO FRANCOIS CLOUET 
 
 REPRODUCED FROM LENOIRS MUSEE DES MONUMENS FRANCA I 
 
EQUESTRIAN PORTRAIT OF HENRI II. 
 
 339 
 
 test it for the qualities which should distinguish even 
 a copy after Francois Clouet, but it looks like a grave 
 and dignified work. 
 
 The King turns his head towards us over his left 
 shoulder, and his eyes look full into ours. They are 
 dark with that unexplained look, which comes out more 
 or less in every portrait of Henri II. There is a 
 touch of silent suspicion and distress, as in the face 
 of a woman long oppressed. Did the circumstances 
 of the King’s own life give this cast to his features, 
 or did he inherit it from his mother, who only escaped 
 from the harsh rule of Anne of Brittany, to suffer the 
 tyranny of Louise of Savoy, and the neglect of Francois 
 I ? The look is there always, sometimes softened 
 by inquiry, or entreaty rather, sometimes crossed by 
 a shade of dull regret, but ever the same dominant 
 regard as of one whom nature had left dumb. 
 
 Now and then the expression lapses into something 
 peevishly sinister, as in a portrait belonging to Mr. 
 Heugh, exhibited some years back at the Royal Aca- 
 demy Exhibition of Old Masters ; in the present in- 
 stance it rises to almost tragic dignity, helped by the 
 grave sobriety of the colour and the general treat- 
 ment. The sombre figure of the mounted King, 
 swarthy, difficult of speech, gazing outwards with con- 
 centrated intention, habited in black, and set in a 
 framework of grey half-tones, haunts the recollection 
 with the vividness of actual vision ; for the subject, 
 
340 
 
 RENA ISSA NCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 which seems to offer in itself weird suggestions of a 
 phantom magic, is realised with tangible definiteness of 
 conception, and rendered with unflinching fidelity to 
 the solid aspect of real life. 
 
 Another equestrian portrait of Henri II. hangs in 
 the gallery of Florence, where it figures as a com- 
 panion to a similar portrait of Francis I. It is perhaps 
 a copy from some lost painting by Francis Clouet. 
 Both have been already mentioned in the notice of his 
 fathers works, to whom the original of the portrait 
 of Francois I. has been ascribed. That of Henri II. 
 is said to be somewhat weak in tone, and feeble in 
 design, and these defects diminish the probability that 
 the work of Francois Clouet can possibly have served 
 as the model. It is certainly not a reproduction of 
 the picture at Azay le Rideau. The figure of the 
 Florentine portrait rides from left to right, instead of 
 from right to left, and the head, which in the Azay 
 le Rideau portrait is covered with a black cap, is in 
 that at Florence bared. 
 
 In 1 5 58, the Court went to Villers-Cotterets. 
 Thither, too, went Marshal de Vieilleville, and from a 
 passage in his ‘ Memoirs/ which relates the enthusias- 
 tic reception which he met with at the hands of the 
 King, it would seem that Francois Clouet was amongst 
 those in attendance. ‘ Je ne me veulx arrester/ — it is 
 his secretary who writes, — ‘ aux caresses et honneurs 
 qu’il receust du Roy et de la Royne, et generalement de 
 
PORTRAIT OF MARSHAL DE VIELLEVILLE. 
 
 34i 
 
 toute la Cour, qui furent fort grandes, mais celles de la 
 Royne estaient au nombre des premiers a cause des 
 medailles dor qu’il avait donnees aux princes et chefs 
 des trouppes d’Allemaigne, qui estoient venus a 
 Thionville, et qu’il l’avoit tant favorisee que de mettre 
 son portraict de l’aultre coste de celuy du Roy, son 
 Seigneur, et mary, dont elle luy en sceust ung mer- 
 vielleaux gre. Mais le comble de son contentement 
 fut que, luy en ayant faict, M. de Vieilleville, present 
 des trois poids et especes elle se y veid si au naturel 
 represente que le plus habile peintre de France ne 
 l’eu sceu mieulx pourtraire avec le pinceau, par la 
 confession meme de Janet, le plus excellent ouvrier 
 de ce temps la.’ 
 
 This reference to Janet is specially significant, for, 
 in 1558, Primaticcio was at the height of his credit; 
 the very mention of Francois Clouet as the supremely 
 competent painter of the day implies a preference. 
 De Vieilleville’ s secretary, it is evident, rated him 
 higher than the more brilliant and showy Italian, if 
 not as skilled in every accomplishment proper to his 
 profession, at any rate, as master of that art of por- 
 traiture, in which he declares him to be without a rival. 
 De Vieilleville himself, possibly during this visit to 
 Villers-Cotterets, or a little later (for we must again 
 guess the year by guessing the date of the portrait), 
 sat to Francois Clouet. In the Gallery of Besan^on, 
 we find ‘ Francois de Scepeaux, Marshal de Vieilleville,’ 
 
342 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 attributed to ‘ Janet/ which, if not by Francis Clouet 
 himself, is probably a good copy after him. 
 
 On June 29, 1559, the year following that in which 
 took place the marriage of the Dauphin Francois with 
 Mary Stuart, Henri II. celebrated with great pomp the 
 wedding of his eldest daughter Isabeau with Philip II. 
 King of Spain. A tournament was held in her honour 
 in lists set up across the Rue St. Antoine, including 
 the space from the Palace of the Tournelles to the 
 Bastille. At the close of the third day, the King came 
 by the accident which caused his death. He had al- 
 ready broken several lances, with a royal luck and 
 success, when the fancy took him to try his chance 
 against Gabriel de Lorges. The lance of De Lorges 
 broke, he did not, or could not throw away, as was 
 customary, the portion remaining in his hand. With 
 this portion the King was struck in the face, his visor 
 (says De Vieilleville) was driven up, and he was 
 wounded severely just beneath the right eyebrow. He 
 was thrown to the ground insensible, and after linger- 
 ing for eleven days, during which he recovered speech 
 and consciousness but for a moment, he died. Francis 
 Clouet was now called upon to perform for Henri II. 
 the funeral offices which he had, in 1547, discharged at 
 the burial of Francois I. His name stands first on 
 the list of ‘ sommes payees pour les obseques, et pompes 
 funebres du feu roy Henry II. en 1559/ The payments 
 made on his account are, for white wax, white lead, 
 
RONSARD AND FRANCOIS CLOUET. 
 
 343 
 
 brushes, oil, and plaster for casting the face and effigy 
 of the King. Black cloth for mourning suits was also 
 distributed to the members of the Household, and the 
 accounts for the first quarter of the new King’s reign 
 — July, August, September — contain the entry ‘a 
 Francois Cloudet, paintre du feu roy, sept aunes et 
 demy dudit drap.’ 
 
 The first book of ‘ Amours ’ in the first edition of 
 Ronsard’s works, published in 1560, about a year after 
 the death of Henri II., contains an Eldgie , which is 
 addressed to Francois Clouet. It begins : ‘ Pein-moy, 
 Janet, pein-moy, je te supplie, sur ce tableau les 
 beautez de m’amie,’ and concludes, ‘Je ne scais plus, 
 mon Janet, ou je suis.’ The tone throughout shows 
 that Ronsard not only knew Francois Clouet, but that 
 there existed something like equal terms of friendship 
 between the painter and the ‘ gentilhomme Vandom- 
 mois.’ Again, the opening lines of the ‘ Ode geniale,’ 
 ‘ Boy, Janet, a moy tour a tour,’ have the same accent 
 of easy familiarity, from which we may infer that there 
 was no very wide difference between the position 
 occupied by Francois Clouet, ‘ peintre en titre,’ and 
 that of the favourite poet whom Charles IX., ‘prince 
 gdnereux au possible,’ is said to have publicly invited 
 to a seat on the throne. 
 
 After 1560, for nine succeeding years there is a 
 total absence of light on the existence of Francois 
 Clouet. At last, on December 9, 1569, his name re- 
 
344 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 appears. The registers of the 1 Corn* des Monnoyes/ 
 under that date, set forth that ‘ La Cour a mis en de- 
 liberation sy Ton devoit continuer la fabrication des 
 testons pour l’annee prochaine soulz le poingon de 
 l’effigye du roy (Charles IX.) qui a este par cy devant 
 faicte et au commencement de son regne, ou bien sy 
 Ton feroit faire nouveau poingon de la dicte effigye en 
 l’aage que le dicte Seigneur et Roy est a present, parce- 
 que depuis son advenement a la courronne le poingon 
 de la dicte effigye navoit este change en la dicte fabri- 
 cation de testons, et sur ce mande Claude de Hery, 
 tailleur general, qui a diet que le diet S., estant der- 
 nierrement au moys de Juilliet, en l’abbaye Saint Ger- 
 main des Pres, apres l’avoir veu par diverses foys, il en 
 auroit faict le pourteraict au myeulx qui luy auroit este 
 possible et faict et grave ung nouveau poingon de son 
 effigye, lequel de Hery a montre a la dicte court, et 
 iceluy veu par icelle, et faict voir a M. Frangois Clouet 
 diet Janet, painctre et varlet de chambre du roy, pour 
 ce mande au bureau qui auroit rapporte le diet poingon 
 est fort approchant de Feffigye du roy en la aige qu’il 
 est a present.' 
 
 Strong in the approbation of Frangois Clouet, the 
 1 bureau ’ ordered the new die to be engraved, and on 
 January i, 1570, specimen coins were despatched to 
 Angers, where the Court then was, for the inspection 
 of Charles himself. But the King was far from being 
 satisfied, and expressed his own opinion of the like- 
 
PORTRAIT OF CHARLES IX. 
 
 345 
 
 ness in the following terms : 4 La dicte effigie ne repre- 
 sente aucunement nostre aaige, ne pareillement nostre 
 visage, ne la taille dont nous sommes a present.’ 
 The missive (dated Angiers, Feb. 5), which con- 
 tains these words, is forwarded to Paris by a certain 
 Henri de Mesmes, who softens the harshness of the 
 royal condemnation by explaining that ‘ La Royne ’ 
 (Catharine de Medicis) ‘ en a faict le jugement qui n’a 
 garde de trouver bonne aucune portraiture du Roy, car 
 a ce que nous avons et voyons a toute heure nul 
 peintre peult suffire pour le representer a nostre con- 
 tentement.’ 
 
 Catharine at this moment was indeed occupied in 
 negotiating the marriage of her son with Elisabeth, 
 daughter of Maximilian II., and was, in all probability, 
 anxious to obtain a likeness of Charles IX. which 
 might make a good impression upon the Austrian 
 Court. It is to her efforts to obtain a satisfactory 
 portrait, at the time when she was bent, as Ronsard 
 says, on ‘ alliant nostre roy a la race germaine,’ that 
 De Mesmes most likely here refers. 
 
 Francois Clouet was himself engaged in this 
 hopeless task, and if he did not fully content the 
 expectations of the Queen-mother, he seems, at least, 
 to have outstripped all his competitors. The Gallery 
 of the Belvedere still shows, atj Vienna, the life-size 
 portrait of Charles IX., which is supposed to have 
 been sent by Catharine on the occasion of the mar- 
 
346 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 riage. Charles is represented standing beside a chair 
 of state, on which he rests his right hand. The enor- 
 mous distance from the ground at which this picture is 
 unfortunately hung, entirely prevents an examination 
 of its details, which are in the highest degree compli- 
 cated and elaborate. The gold ornaments, the jewels 
 and embroideries, which cover the splendid court-dress 
 worn by the Prince, are handled with the minuteness 
 which we expect in Francis Clouets work, but we 
 are scarcely prepared to find that the breadth of 
 general effect, the firmness and precision of line, the 
 largeness of style — all the nobler qualities, in short, 
 which distinguish his smaller portraits, at once attain 
 proportions in superb accordance with the exigencies 
 of a subject treated on the scale of life. It is evident 
 that he was in the habit of working constantly in these 
 dimensions, and yet this is the only portrait of full 
 size that we can attribute to his hand. 
 
 At the height at which it is hung we surely lose 
 much of the excelling refinement, much of the delicate 
 sleight-of-hand, which gives an intense interest to all 
 Clouet’s work, but the vigour and intelligence of the 
 characterisation fix the eye and impress the memory. 
 The picture bears an inscription, ‘Charles VIII., Tres 
 Chretien, Roy de France, en l’aage de xx ans, peinct 
 au vif par Jannet MDLXIII.’ Neither Dr. Waagen 
 nor M. de Laborde, by whom the line has been 
 already quoted, have noticed the curious discrepancy 
 
PORTRAIT OF ELIZABETH OF AUSTRIA. 
 
 347 
 
 between the age assigned to the King, and the date 
 1563. Charles was born on June 27, 1550; in 1563 
 he was just thirteen ; and this portrait is certainly 
 not that of a lad of thirteen. One cannot but conjec- 
 ture that the inscription, if contemporary, has at some 
 time been retouched, and that so LXIII. has taken the 
 place of LXX. 
 
 Before the picture left France, Clouet himself 
 made a small copy of it, which is now in the Louvre. 
 This portrait also found its way to Vienna, and was 
 brought back to Paris after the victories of 1809. M. 
 Villot says that it must certainly have formed part 
 originally of the French Royal Collections, but it is 
 not mentioned in the inventory of 1709-10 already 
 referred to, and the more probable conjecture would 
 seem to be that the portrait was the property of Elisa- 
 beth of Austria herself, and was by her taken to Vienna, 
 when she retired thither after the death of her husband. 
 
 The Louvre is also fortunate in possessing Francois 
 Clouets portrait of Elisabeth herself, a half-length, 
 which must have been painted at about the date of her 
 marriage (October 22, 1570), an admirable work, exqui- 
 sitely delicate in quality. The princess is dressed in 
 gold patterned with silver ; her hair, her neck, her 
 body are loaded with precious stones, the puffs even 
 of her ruff and slashed sleeves are fastened with pearls 
 and gold, but beneath this splendid ostentation, Fran- 
 cis Clouet has sought out the wearer. 
 
348 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Elisabeth, in the spring of her eighteen years, ani- 
 mates with her own life the artificial ornament with 
 which she is encumbered. She sits in the broad day, 
 but the scrupulous truth and delicate art with which 
 the painter has touched every faintest wave of surface 
 in modelling her face, brings the head out full and 
 round, in spite of the brilliant light in which the out- 
 line seems lost. The drawing of the hands is fully as 
 acute in expression. Idle hands, not specially fine in 
 form, but having the charm which attracts us to the 
 face — the easy charm of a youth which has known no 
 labour. 
 
 In this portrait of Elisabeth, Clouet’s power of 
 reading character is as strongly marked as in the ver- 
 sion which he has given us of her husband, Charles I X. 
 It is impossible to look at the little full-length of the 
 King without tracing behind the courtly polish of 
 the dignified pose, beneath the momentary quiet of 
 the gaze, signs which recall the words of De Thou, ‘ il 
 6tait altier, violent, cruel, dissimule,’ whilst at the same 
 time indications of a certain mobility of mouth and eye 
 remind us * qu’il aimait la po^sie et les arts,’ and prove 
 that Janet’s width of view was equal to his insight. 
 
 In Elisabeth the painter had a far less complicated 
 task ; the want of accent, rather than the intricacy 
 and variety of contradictory signs, presented here 
 the obstacle to a complete individualisation, but 
 Janet’s fine perceptions were quick to appreciate every 
 
DEATH OF FRANCOIS CLOUET. 
 
 349 
 
 type ; and the frank and simple life, the girlish eager- 
 ness which breathes in the delicate lines of this portrait, 
 seem instinct with pathetic appeal, when we remember 
 the fate to which the original was already committed. 
 Four years of a miserable marriage spent under the 
 tutorship of Catharine de Medicis, the honours of a 
 brief sovereignty, and then the sad return to die a 
 premature death amongst her own people. 
 
 The year in which Francois Clouet painted these 
 two portraits, the year 1570, is the date of the last en- 
 try of his name on the roll of the Royal Household. 
 Two years later (1572), Jean Court is named as 
 ‘ peintre du roi,’ and it has been hence inferred that 
 Francois Clouet was already dead. This does not, 
 however, necessarily follow. The number of Court 
 painters was not strictly limited, for in 1588, both 
 Charles Court and Pierre Dumoustier are at one and 
 the same time entered as ‘peintres du roi.’ There 
 are besides reasons for supposing that Francois Clouet’s 
 death did not take place till about 1584. 
 
 M. de Laborde has noted that Benjamin Fouljpn, 
 peintre ordinaire du roi, is described on the Etat des 
 officiers domes tiques du Roi , pour I'annde 1583-4, as 
 
 * nepveu du feu M. Jamet, aussi painctre des 
 
 dictes majestes.’ Foullon is here paid wages from 
 April 19, 1583, to January 7, 1584, but supposing that 
 ‘Jamet’ stands for Francois Clouet, this fact proves 
 only that his death took place at some time prior to 
 
350 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 his nephews appointment : reasons for fixing on the 
 date of 1 5 84 must be sought elsewhere. 
 
 In the first place, there are, amongst his works, 
 portraits which must have been executed at least as 
 late as 1578 or 1580. His portrait of Henri III., now 
 at Stafford House, cannot have been painted much 
 before this date, as the age at which it represents the 
 King is considerably over twenty. Now Henri was 
 but twenty-three when he succeeded to the French 
 throne after the death of Charles IX.; and in his 
 portraits of that year, as, for instance, in the painting 
 in the Gallery at Dresden, which depicts his recep- 
 tion at Venice on his return from Poland, his appear- 
 ance is far more youthful than in the Stafford House 
 portrait, which should be that of a man between eight 
 or nine and twenty. The same may be said of the 
 portrait of Henri I II.’s younger brother, Francois, 
 Due d’Alengon, which is also in the same collection, 
 a picture which must have been painted about 1577-78. 
 If these two portraits, then, are the work of Francois 
 Clouet, he was certainly living long after 1572. 
 
 There are, also, two passages, which occur in the 
 first complete edition of the Works of Ronsard, — that 
 published by Buon — which lead one to suppose that 
 Janets death took place late in 1584. This edition 
 was the first for which the poet received any remunera- 
 tion. He prepared it with the greatest care during the 
 last years of his life, and, by a letter of ‘ September 9, 
 
DEATH OF FRANCOIS CLOUET. 
 
 3Si 
 
 1584/ he authorised his friend Jean Galland ‘ d’en 
 parler aux libraires du Palais/ in case Buon refused to 
 give him the sum for which he asked, namely ‘ soix- 
 ante escus pour avoir du bois, pour s’aller chauffer cet 
 hiver/ 
 
 The date of this letter, as copied by M. Prosper 
 Blanchmain from Colletets MS. Memoir, stands 1584, 
 and if these figures are correct, that usually assigned to 
 the edition in question — namely January 4, 1584, 
 should be read Old Style, as it cannot have appeared 
 earlier than January 1584-5. Unfortunately no refer- 
 ence can now be made to the original MS., as it can- 
 not now be found in the Library of the Louvre : it 
 is believed to have perished in the fires of the 
 Commune. 
 
 In the edition to which the letter in question 
 referred, Ronsard, besides revising and correcting the 
 poems which had previously appeared, had made 
 several additions. Amongst these additions is the 
 little poem which contains the words, 
 
 Un seul Janet, honneur de nostre France, 
 
 De ses crayons ne te portrairoit mieux. 
 
 Here we have a direct allusion to Janet, which looks 
 as if Ronsard thought him still alive. One of the 
 corrections is also worth notice. It occurs in the 'Ode 
 geniale/ which has already been mentioned, and which 
 had been printed in the edition of 1560. It then be- 
 gan, 
 
352 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 Boy, vilain, boy k moi tour k tour. 
 
 In three succeeding issues the word ' vilain ’ was re- 
 placed by ‘Janin,’and then Ronsard, in his last revise, 
 finally substitutes 'Janet.’ 
 
 Now this correction certainly seems to imply that 
 at the time of writing Janet was still alive, or that his 
 death was so recent that Ronsard was unaware of it. 
 The edition was carried through the press during the 
 last months of 1584, and the text was complete when 
 Ronsard wrote to Galland in September. These facts 
 are decidedly in favour of the hypothesis which fixes 
 the closing months of the same year as the date at 
 which Francis Clouet’s death took place. Ronsard, 
 in his home at Tours, engrossed with his own ill- 
 health and literary work, may well have remained in 
 ignorance for awhile that the Janet of whom he sang 
 had passed away. Had he known that he was lying 
 dead, it is difficult to suppose that he would have 
 written of ‘ l’honneur de nostre France,’ without a word 
 of regret for his loss. 
 
 In dealing with the numerous portraits attributed 
 to 'Janet,’ or roughly classed as ‘ £cole des Clouet,’ 
 it is necessary to bear in mind how slight is the basis 
 of fact on which we have to build. The difficulties 
 which lie in the way of utilising even the materials 
 which exist are great. The mass of work lies hid in 
 private collections, and however practised the eye may 
 be, in passing from one to another, in leaving Chenon- 
 
FRENCH PORTRAITS AT STAFFORD HOUSE. 353 
 
 ceau for Azay le Rideau, or Castle Howard for 
 Stafford House, it is impossible to retain impressions 
 with sufficient exactness for the purpose of satisfactory 
 investigation and comparison. 
 
 In the case of Francois Clouet, we are not, indeed, 
 quite so ill provided as in that of his father, Jean 
 Clouet II., for we have at least the life-size Charles 
 IX. of the Belvedere Gallery, and the two admirable 
 portraits of the Louvre, as points of departure. Next 
 to these in importance stand the so-called Dauphin 
 Frangois of Hampton Court and the Dauphin of 
 Antwerp, after which all attributions become less well 
 assured. 
 
 M. de Laborde was inclined, in the first instance, 
 to credit the collection at Stafford House with at least 
 six genuine works by Francois Clouet, but, on a second 
 visit, he reconsidered his first decisions, changed his 
 mind, and was scarcely ready to admit a single work 
 as genuine. He even suggested that the portraits of 
 Jeanne d’Albret and her husband, which he considered 
 superior to the rest, were possibly produced by Janets 
 brother. 
 
 Now the portrait of Jeanne d’Albret differs so 
 decidedly in point of style from that of her husband, 
 that it does not seem likely that they can be the work 
 of the same hand. The portrait of the Queen, though 
 thinly painted and weak in colour, is a piece of capable 
 work, but there could be no question here of the 
 
 VOL. 1. 
 
 A A 
 
354 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 * peintre frere de Jannet,’ who was in the service of her 
 mother, if indeed he were, as M. de Laborde sup- 
 posed, a brother of Frangois Clouet, for he became 
 painter to the Queen of Navarre as early as 1529, and 
 must have died whilst her daughter Jeanne was still a 
 child, since in 1541, as we have already seen, Frangois 
 Clouet claimed as sole heir of his father Jean Clouet 
 II., then deceased. If, on the other hand, he were 
 the uncle of Frangois Clouet, it is only just possible, 
 not probable, that he was living at the date when this 
 portrait was painted. The picture, therefore, if not 
 the work of Frangois Clouet, of whom it is scarcely 
 worthy, must have been painted by some pupil or fol- 
 lower living circa 1560-65, for Jeanne is here repre- 
 sented as a woman already aged. The date 1572, 
 which follows the inscription of her name, in an old 
 hand, at the top of the picture, indicates probably not 
 the epoch at which the picture was painted, but the 
 year of her death. She died, not without some sus- 
 picion of foul play, shortly after the massacre of the 
 Saint Bartholomew. 
 
 To the Catharine de Medicis of Stafford House, 
 another of the six pictures originally attributed to 
 Janet by M. de Laborde, he will, afterwards, only 
 accord the merit of being ‘ une bonne peinture ; ’ the 
 Henri III. is a 'fine peinture;’ the Frangois, Due 
 d’Alengon, obtains not a word of encomium ; but the 
 Frangois I. as a boy, and his sister, Marguerite, 
 
FRENCH PORTRAITS AT STAFFORD HOUSE. 355 
 
 nursing a little dog, is ascribed to the old Jean Clouet 
 II., or some good master of his day. 
 
 The Catharine is certainly doubtful. There exist 
 several other portraits of her, exactly resembling that 
 at Stafford House, both in pose and costume ; one, for 
 instance, at Chenonceau, is of considerable merit. It 
 is difficult to be sure which is the original ; but the 
 portraits of Henri III. and his brother are, very 
 probably, by Frangois Clouet. 
 
 The head of Henri III. is terribly excellent. It 
 is one of those typical heads which seem to resume 
 and idealise the characteristics of a family. The 
 sinister melancholy of his father looks out of the eyes, 
 the eyebrows raised unmeaningly give an air of weak- 
 ness and vacillation which counteracts the impression 
 produced by the shape of the forehead and the style 
 of the jaw, the upper lip swells passionately, against 
 the close pressure which fails to restrain lines which 
 tell of a myriad thronging suspicions, whilst the 
 lower is obstinately thrust forward by the violent 
 indenture which all her children inherited from 
 Catharine. 
 
 In this face we see by turns the gloom of Henri II., 
 the passion and morose violence of Charles IX., the 
 frivolity, the low and fruitless cunning of Alengon ; the 
 unbridled desires and instincts of the wife of Henri IV., 
 and, over and above all else, something which neither his 
 sisters nor his brothers ever possessed, the fine volup- 
 
35 <> 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 tuous polish proper to a descendant of the house of 
 Medicis. If this portrait is not by Francois Clouet, 
 then there must have lived among his contemporaries 
 a master of whom we know not even the name, and 
 who was all but worthy to rank as his equal. 
 
 The Catharine de Medicis of Chenonceau has been 
 referred to : Chenonceau also possesses, amongst many 
 other works of this school, a remarkable Henri III. 
 painted during the latter years of his reign, a portrait 
 from which his shaven face looks out prepared alike for 
 the part of the woman or the monk. Another Henri 
 III., this time not only cleanly shaven, but dressed in 
 a costume closely resembling that of a woman, hangs 
 at Azay le Rideau in the rich collection of the Marquis 
 de Biencourt. The walls, indeed, of every room, and 
 every passage in the chateau , are panelled with portraits 
 attributed to the Clouet and their school. Besides the 
 Henri III., and the equestrian portrait of Henri II. 
 already noticed, there is an excellent half-length of 
 Charles IX., and numerous other examples, some of 
 great intrinsic value ; several which might be referred 
 to the skilful painter of the Louvre portrait of M. de 
 Brissac, a few not unworthy of Janet, and, amongst 
 those on a large scale, many which present the cha- 
 racteristics of the work of Corneille de Lyon. 
 
 Corneille de Lyon is mentioned in an anecdote 
 reported by Brantome in his ‘ Life of Catharine de 
 Medicis.’ He relates that she having gone one day 
 
CORNEILLE DE LYON. 
 
 357 
 
 at Lyon to see ‘ un peintre qui s’appelloit Corneille, 
 qui avoit peint en une grande chambre toils les grands 
 seigneurs, princes, cavalliers, et grandes reynes, prin- 
 cesses, dames, filles de la court de France, estant done 
 en la dicte chambre de ces paintures, nous y vismes 
 cette reyne parestre painte tres bien en sa beaut£, et 
 en sa perfection, habillee a la franceze dun chapperon 
 avec ses grosses perles, et une robe a grandes 
 manches de toille d’argent fourrees de loups cerviers ; 
 le tout si bien repr£sent£ au vif avec son beau visage, 
 qu’il n’y falloit rien plus que la parolle, aiant ses trois 
 belles filles aupres d’elle. A quoy elle prist fort grand 
 plaisir a telle veue, et toute la compagnie qui y estoit, 
 s’amusant fort a la contempler et admirer et louer sa 
 beaute par dessus toutes.’ 
 
 For a long while the name of Corneille was only 
 preserved by Brantome’s accidental mention. The 
 Fountaine collection at Narford can, however, show 
 two portraits, probably from his hand. One, the por- 
 trait of Jean, Sire de Rieux, has long been ascribed to 
 Holbein, although it is indisputably the work, not 
 only of a French painter, but of the painter who signs 
 a second portrait in the same room, with a monogram 
 composed of the three first letters of Corneille’s name. 
 There are also at Narford two other portraits ‘ Ecole 
 des Clouet,’ not of very great importance, which are 
 inserted in the panels of a cabinet, formerly the pro- 
 perty of Cardinal Mazarin. The better of the two 
 
358 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 shows a fair young man whose tawny hair flames out 
 from a green background. 
 
 Lord Spencers collection, at Althorp, has been 
 carefully noticed by M. de Laborde, who also examined 
 at Castle Howard the life-size portrait of Catharine de 
 M^dicis, with her children, Francis II., Charles IX., 
 and Marguerite. This picture was hastily attributed 
 by Dr. Waagen to Janet, but this is a mistake. 
 Though in itself an important example of French 
 work, it cannot possibly be by the painter of the 
 Louvre portraits of Charles and Elisabeth. It has not 
 even the special merit of pure French style which dis- 
 tinguishes all the portraits, without exception, of the 
 4 Iicole des Clouet.' The painter of this picture is one 
 who, like Germain Pilon, has not been able to resist 
 the seductions of Italian fashion, and losing his own 
 personality, has become absorbed into the school of 
 Fontainebleau. 
 
 At Vienna, the Belvedere contains the only life- 
 size portrait by Francis Clouet now extant, and that 
 is all, but the private collection of Prince Lichtenstein, 
 to which allusion has already been made, contains 
 much that is worth notice. At Munich, a portrait of 
 the second daughter of Henri II., Claude of France, 
 Duchess of Lorraine, is the only example that calls for 
 attention, a sound, hard, careful piece of work, which is 
 certainly not by * Janet,’ under whose name it finds a 
 place. The equestrian portraits at Florence, and the 
 
FRENCH DRAWINGS AT CASTLE HOWARD . 359 
 
 Dauphin at Antwerp, have been referred to ; but, as a 
 rule, foreign galleries show but few works of this 
 school ;and even in France, the local museums — though 
 many, as, for instance, Dijon, Rheims, Besanc^on, count 
 in their lists paintings which are attributed to Janet — 
 possess no works of any considerable importance. It 
 is chiefly to the private collections, such as exist in 
 several of the chateaux of the Loire, that we must look 
 for our best material. 
 
 The drawings produced by the ‘ Ecole des Clouet 1 
 are, if possible, more embarrassing than the paintings. 
 These drawings were executed, for the most part, in 
 chalks of two or three colours. The principal collec- 
 tion in England is that at Castle Howard, which 
 almost rivals in number, if not in quality, that of the 
 Bibliotheque d’Estampes. The British Museum pos- 
 sesses a small series, there is another at Stafford 
 House, and in the collection of the Archduke Albert 
 at Vienna, the richest collection of drawings in Europe, 
 the school is represented by several studies, one of 
 which is probably by the hand of Francois Clouet 
 himself, for it closely resembles, both in style and 
 execution, the beautiful drawing which bears his name 
 in the Louvre. The Louvre shows also many crayon 
 portraits of the same date by other and inferior hands, 
 and detached examples are also to be found both in 
 England and abroad in public and private collections, 
 but not in any large number. 
 
360 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 The family likeness, certain to mark series of por- 
 traits, executed at the same epoch, of persons belong- 
 ing to the same nation, and, it may be said, with few 
 exceptions, to the same Court, has caused the whole of 
 this mass of drawings, which may be roughly estimated 
 at over three thousand, to be reckoned as the work 
 of two men, Jean and Francois Clouet. Undoubtedly 
 some amongst the number are by them, but which ? 
 That is a question not easy to answer. An examina- 
 tion of any one of these collections shows at work, not 
 one, nor two, but many different hands of very various 
 skill and merit. The best of the British Museum 
 series, the best at Castle Howard — namely, the por- 
 traits of the ‘ Marquise de Rotelin,’ and of ‘ Madame 
 de Savoie estant Madame Marguerite,’ and the able 
 drawing of 4 Hercule de Valois, Due d’ Alenin,’ 
 at Stafford House, do not present the beauty of 
 touch, the width as well as the point and precision 
 which distinguish the two drawings attributed to 
 Francis Clouet in the collections of the Albertina 
 and the Louvre. They are excellent, but they are in- 
 ferior, both in manner and style, and to these the 
 greater part of the remainder is again inferior. The 
 workmanship of some is coarse, careless, imperfect to 
 the last degree, whilst others are wrought with an ex- 
 treme finish, which, if pleasanter to the unpractised 
 eye, is wholly mechanical and unmeaning. 
 
 The purpose for which these drawings were pro- 
 
CRA YON PORTRAITS — ‘ &COLE DES CLOUET? 361 
 
 duced is almost as uncertain as the names of those 
 who produced them. Some are the size of life, others 
 are miniature. Some have a freshness and directness 
 which tells of impressions received direct from life, 
 whilst others seem but work at second-hand, bad copies 
 of copies from which all trace of original intention has 
 vanished. One collection often contains as many as 
 three or even four of these repetitions, varying but 
 slightly from each other, the same face, the same pose, 
 the same general arrangement of dress, only here and 
 there an altered ornament, a curl more or less on the 
 forehead, a chain in place of a ribbon round the 
 throat. 
 
 It is impossible, therefore, to suppose that they 
 were all executed as preliminary studies for portraits, 
 afterwards to be carried out in oil. The mere fact 
 that so many exist, not only in duplicate, but even 
 reproduced fourfold, is sufficient to refute such 
 an hypothesis. But a very probable solution of the 
 mystery is to be found in the passion which pre- 
 vailed at this time, amongst the nobles of the Court, for 
 making collections of portraits. The pages of Bran- 
 tome contain many references to this taste. Amongst 
 others, he mentions the collection of ‘la belle Torcy,’ 
 and the taste of the Court spread far and wide in the 
 ranks beneath. To satisfy those who were unable to 
 afford oil paintings, these series of crayon drawings 
 were probably produced, and many reproductions of a 
 
362 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 single portrait would thus be required if the subject 
 were in any degree popular. 
 
 It was not easy to obtain sittings from princes and 
 men of rank. We have seen how, in 1570, when the 
 ‘ Cour des Monnoyes ’ directed Claude de Hery to 
 prepare a new die for the coinage of Charles IX., De 
 Hery had no better means of ensuring a good likeness 
 of the King than trying to catch sight of him at 
 different times, when he happened to be at the Abbaye 
 Saint-Germain des Pr6s. A portrait once painted 
 served as the model for many repetitions, and thus 
 we find in a collection such as that at Castle Howard 
 — which was brought together by M. Lenoir, at the 
 beginning of the present century, out of the ddbris 
 of various smaller sets — many drawings which are 
 evidently copies from one and the same model. 
 
 In the course of time many will probably be 
 identified as having been made for the purpose of en- 
 graving. These are those executed with the greatest 
 elaboration. In the early work of De Leu, we have 
 many portraits of the Valois, signed ‘ Tho. de Leu, f. 
 et ex.’ A portrait of Henri III. is engraved by De 
 Leu after Jean Rabel, a painter and engraver who illus- 
 trated Corrozet’s ‘ Antiquites de Paris,’ but of whom 
 nothing is known, although l’Estoile, in chronicling his 
 death on March 4, 1603, calls him ‘ un des premiers 
 en l’art de portraiture, et d’un bel esprit.’ Sometimes 
 Rabel, in his turn, engraves from drawings by De Leu, 
 
STYLE OF WORK UNDER FRANCOIS I. 363 
 
 and it seems not unlikely that a patient comparison, 
 for which the materials have yet to be gathered, may 
 end in assigning to De Leu, or to Rabel, many of the 
 drawings, and not only many of the drawings, but also 
 many of the paintings, for which their possessors are 
 now eager to claim the name of ‘ Janet.' 
 
 The change which took place during the reign of 
 Francois I. in the character of all art-production is 
 strongly marked in the portraits of the time. They 
 fall at once into two groups : those which were executed 
 during the reigns of Henri II. and his sons, and those 
 which were produced during the preceding reign. 
 The name of Jean Clouet II., who stands out dimly 
 conspicuous amongst the painters of France under the 
 first of the Valois, may be taken to represent this first 
 period, as does that of his son, the second. 
 
 To the best of the work of the first epoch we often 
 find the name of Holbein attached, as in the case of 
 the equestrian portraits at Florence. This is a signi- 
 ficant intimation of the quality by which it is distin- 
 guished. The type is seized and rendered with a deci- 
 sion and directness which excludes any modifying 
 interpretation, and results in the portrait natf. But 
 the type presented is of a different order to that which 
 it chiefly fell to the lot of Holbein to depict, and offers 
 different peculiarities. Where the German or English 
 model became broad and clumsy, the French painter 
 had been accustomed to find sharp angularities, and 
 
364 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 his national traditions obliged him no less to bring out 
 a scheme of colour corresponding in quality, a scheme 
 in which depth and force were replaced by a midday 
 brilliance of light, showing tones of infinite purity and 
 refinement, but which beside a fuller scale, and bolder 
 relief, looks flat and faded. 
 
 In point of technic the difference is, as a rule, abso 
 lute. Through the thinly driven local colour of their 
 great contemporary, we may often (as in several pas- 
 sages of the Darmstadt Madonna) trace the outlines 
 lying beneath; but the French painters laid on their 
 local tint in a solid layer, running it up to its extreme 
 edge in mass ; on this mass, when perfectly dried 
 and hardened, they modelled up their surface by 
 hatching with the brush point. The colour, with 
 which the brush was then filled, being excessively 
 diluted, the successive touches melt into one another, 
 forming an evenly distributed film upon the solid layer 
 which lies beneath them. This practice, which was 
 simply an application of the method pursued by the 
 miniaturists of the fifteenth century, continued to be 
 employed, to some extent, by the painters of the second 
 period, but they achieved a greater freedom of manner, 
 used the brush more boldly, and though they did not 
 yield a point to their predecessors in the rendering 
 with careful perfection of the most exquisite minutiae of 
 ornamental detail, they attained a breadth of sight and 
 skill, which preserved to each object its natural veil— 
 
STYLE OF WORK UNDER HENRI II. 
 
 365 
 
 the common air, which in actual life prevents and saves 
 the eye. There is also one more shade of difference : 
 the asperity of accent, which had previously given a 
 touch of quaint character to the pose, and of harshness 
 to the features of the model, was replaced by the 
 refinements of an interpretation alike intelligent and 
 courtly. 
 
 The portraits of Francis Clouet show the develop- 
 ment, both in technic and style, of the tendencies 
 manifested by his predecessors. At the death of his 
 father Jean, he succeeded not only to his post of court- 
 painter, but also to his position as the chief represen- 
 tative of the national school, for to the exceptional 
 quality of Cousins genius is due an exceptional place. 
 Cousin was also so much engaged in other pursuits that 
 painting was to him an occasional occupation only, 
 rather than the channel in which his energies found 
 their habitual vent, but that which he has left proves 
 that his gifts also in their most perfect expression 
 were shaped by the earlier tendencies of the French 
 school. 
 
 The importation of works of art from Italy, the 
 brief moment of Leonardo's presence, the ten years' 
 sway of II Rosso, the long rule of Primaticcio, modi- 
 fied the course, but could not wholly divert these ten- 
 dencies from their natural issue. A certain number 
 of minor men were drawn off to Fontainebleau, and 
 became the docile pupils of Italian masters ; but there 
 
366 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 were others whose temper was less suited to com- 
 pliance, and who could not easily take the tone of an 
 unfamiliar fashion. To these, intercourse with the 
 Italian artists who had been imported with the prestige 
 of Court authority was a doubtful privilege. 
 
 The Italians who worked and flourished in France 
 were men of the decadence. They possessed every 
 variety of technical accomplishment in perfection, but 
 they had lost the courage required for the direct in- 
 terrogation of nature. The artificial accent which their 
 work had in consequence acquired passed current 
 through the credit of their technical acquirement. 
 The manner was easily caught, and those who were 
 eager only to learn the skilful secrets of a readier art, 
 carried away the infection of an empty style. Cousin 
 himself was at last attracted by the imposing manner 
 of II Rosso’s large Florentine design, whilst the ‘ Iicole 
 des Clouet’ felt the allurement of the sensuous tech- 
 nicalities of the Lombard school. The work of 
 Primaticcio showed traces of the grace affected by 
 the followers of Parmigiano ; and Nicolo dell’ Abbate, 
 the assistant whom, in 1522, he had summoned to his 
 side, brought with him something of the effeminate 
 charm of Correggio’s exceeding softness. The later 
 portraits of the ‘ Ecole des Clouet ’ gradually lose that 
 direct frankness of interpretation which distinguishes 
 the earlier work ; just as in the later work of 
 Cousin the natural dignity of his manner is obscured 
 
THE CLOSE OF THE CENTURY. 
 
 367 
 
 by the vague flourish of an assumed and foreign 
 style. 
 
 Whether the French school might not ultimately 
 have thrown off the impression of these accidental 
 influences, it is impossible to say. An abundant 
 number of younger men were rising round the elder 
 masters, but the internal disturbances of France, which 
 absorbed the best energies of the nation in civil strife, 
 entirely destroyed that sense of peaceful security which 
 is indispensable for the conception and production of 
 considerable works of art. The tranquillity which had 
 disappeared in the wreck of civil order was not to be 
 easily regained. The turn which had been given to 
 taste carried men to Italy, and they found in her re- 
 nowned schools a training which placed them in pos- 
 session of every technical accomplishment. They lost 
 the spirit of individual initiative, and their work was 
 bnt a parrot repetition of the more obvious qualities of 
 some favourite master. The names which mark the 
 close of the century, Toussaint Dubreuil, Bunel, the 
 more able and celebrated Martin Freminet, recall to 
 mind the skilful triumphs of a set practice, uniform, 
 facile, and expeditious, devoted with more or less 
 success to the imitation of others. If for an instant 
 they are tempted to trust to themselves, they all show 
 a like want of inspiration. In either case their work 
 is equally destitute of the natural truth which charac- 
 terised the paintings of their predecessors, and has no 
 
 B B 
 
 VOL. 1. 
 
368 
 
 RENAISSANCE OF ART IN FRANCE. 
 
 touch of the force of intellectual intention, of which 
 the most superb example has been given to us in 
 Greek art ! The era had opened nobly, it had been 
 illustrated by no mean men, it promised to achieve 
 much, but the glorious flower of promise fell to the 
 ground without fruit. 
 
ADDENDA. 
 
 Page 241. 
 
 Under Henri III., Pilon became controller of the mint. In July 
 1582, and again in April 1583, he signs a receipt for ‘20 escus, 1 
 tiers, 13 sols, 4 d.t.’ : — being one quarter’s interest due to him from 
 the municipal authorities of the city of Paris on account of a 1 rente ’ 
 of ‘82 escus, 13 sols, 4 d.t.’ constituted in April 1573, and in each 
 of these documents he describes himself as ‘ sculpteur du roi, et con- 
 treolleur des monnoyes de la France.’ 
 
 Page 268. 
 
 In ‘Vite dei Pittori’ (1st ed. 1550) Vasari says that he had 
 ‘heard’ that Fouquet was with Filarete when he died (circa 1464). 
 Vasari suppressed this passage in the second edition (1568). It was 
 probably incorrect. M. de Montaiglon (Arch, de F Art Frangais , 2 
 serie, vol. i. p. 454) proposes to let it stand, and suggests that Fouquet’s 
 portrait of Pope Eugene was a mere copy ; which indeed it must 
 have been if painted in 1464, — seventeen years after the death of the 
 Pope. The words ‘ mentre al suo servizio in Roma dimorava,’ which 
 seem to point to the early apprenticeship of Fouquet to Filarete, are 
 sometimes taken as intending the employment of Filarete by Pope 
 Eugene. It is not, however, likely that Fouquet left Tours after 
 having been taken into the service of Charles VIII . ; all his work 
 shows traces of early Italian teaching, and the terms of Florio’s letter 
 imply that the portrait of the Pope was an original work. It seems 
 best therefore to accept the earlier date. 
 
37o 
 
 ADDENDA . 
 
 Page 280. 
 
 On the closing page of the Genevan Boccaccio is written ‘ N. 
 Duval, 1536/ This is perhaps the name of a possessor. It is not 
 likely to be the signature of the writer, as it looks later than the rest 
 of the work ; there is no record of an ‘ N.’ Duval amongst French 
 painters of that date, and there can be no question of Marc Duval, 
 the favourite of Charles IX., for he belonged to a later epoch, and his 
 work was deeply affected by the school of Fontainebleau. 
 
 Page 295. 
 
 Jean de Bresche — writing in 1556 {De Rerum et Verborum Signi- 
 ficatione ) — mentions Fouquet and his two sons, Louis and Francois, 
 in recounting the worthies, of Tours. ‘ Inter pictores/ he says, 
 ‘Joannes Foucquettus atque ejusdem filij, Ludovicus et Franciscus. 
 Quorum temporibus fuit et Joannes Poyettus, Foucquettijs ipsis 
 longe sublimior optices et pieturae scientiae.’ This praise of Poyet 
 is extravagant, even if we accept as his the beautiful ‘ Hours of Anne 
 of Brittany’ (in the Bibliothhque Nationale) ascribed to his hand. To 
 Fouquet’s sons, Jean Poyet — judged by this work — was undoubtedly 
 superior, but to Fouquet himself no more than a worthy rival. 
 
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