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 AVERS 
 
 18TH CENTURY 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 WITH AN 
 INTRODUCTION 
 
 Vignette 
 
 ARCHIBALD 
 
 YOUNGHR 
 
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 Ji,ii4.!UiAl.t. 
 
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CORNELL 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 COLLEGE OF 
 
 ARCHITECTURE 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
Cornell University Library 
 NE 647.Y78 
 
 French engravers of the eighteenth centu 
 
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 3 1924 020 502 203 
 
FRENCH ENGRAVERS OF THE 
 EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 
 
FRENCH ENGRAVERS 
 
 OF 
 
 THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 
 
 NINETY-SEVEN ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 WITH AN INTRODUCTION 
 
 BY 
 
 ARCHIBALD YOUNGER 
 
 BRENTANO'S NEW YORK 
 
TurnbuU & Spears 
 
 Printers 
 
 Edinburgh 
 
 
To 
 P. T. W. 
 
The Blocks from which have been produced Plates 
 
 Nos. I, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, S3, 6i and 72 have been kindly lent 
 
 by Mr FREDK. B. DANIELL, 32 Cranbourn Street, 
 
 London, W.C. 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 " ^^^ RENCH Engravers ! " What thoughts do these two words not 
 frH call up in the mind of the connoisseur or collector: of extraordinary 
 " bargains picked up in some tiny shop in some mean city street; of 
 princely prices realised at Christie's or the Hotel Drouot and setting the 
 whole Print world agape when chronicled in next day's morning paper; of 
 hesitation to " back one's opinion " and give a seemingly appalling price for 
 what one half of one's sentient being tells one must be less than it will eventu- 
 ally be worth, while the other half brutally and insistently affirms that one is 
 as mad as any hatter; of constant heart burnings as to whether the " top of 
 the market " has yet been reached or whether there can still be room for any 
 further advance in prices; of evenings spent in turning over the contents of 
 one's folios or wandering round one's rooms looking at the treasures hanging 
 on the walls; of delightful hours passed in the company of fellow-lunatics in 
 discussing rival collections; in fact of all the mental joys and depressions 
 of the true collector. 
 
 Of all insidious diseases this collecting mania is one of the most insidious, 
 sparing neither rich nor poor, man nor woman, and proving utterly beyond the 
 power of science to eradicate once it has attacked it's subject, who, no sooner 
 have the seeds of this strange malady taken root, not only shows an immediate 
 and violent aversion to any attempts of well-minded friends to affect a cure but 
 rather abandons himself more and more completely to the delightful infection. 
 The disease will develop more or less rapidly according to the idiosyncrasies 
 of the person attacked and the symptoms declare themselves in many different 
 forms. And of all the forms that this mania assumes surely that which leads 
 to the collecting of eighteenth century French prints is one of the least repre- 
 hensible, or even one of the most excusable. 
 
 For here, in these sheets of printed paper, toned yellow with the one 
 hundred and fifty years or so of their existence, with their fascinating pictures 
 as brilliant now as on the day they were printed, we get the real essence of 
 the spirit of the most picturesque period in France's history, portrayed with a 
 lightness of touch, not always unmixed with a spice of frivolity, and at the same 
 time a charm and grace that has never been equalled. 
 
 And it is not only for their decorative qualities that these little gems of 
 the purest art claim one's attention, for they will prove on examination of rare 
 interest to the student of " les moeurs des temps passes " equally well. Here 
 we see the French people at home, in the chateau, in the cottage, at work, 
 at play, indoors and out, all depicted for us with an astonishing accuracy 
 of detail ; the costume, the furniture, the architecture of the period are all 
 here put before our eyes in the most fascinating manner; in fact we can, from 
 
 vii 
 
these pictures that still survive, get a ready insight into the real inner life of 
 France that could only otherwise be obtained by patient and prolonged study 
 of the published literature of the same period. 
 
 Herein lies one of the chief pleasures that the collector of these prints 
 derives from his hobby. The formation of an even moderate collection of 
 this nature, however, has during the last few years become a matter of in- 
 creasing difficulty owing to the great rise in price of such prints that has 
 been taking place and that appears likely to continue, and even now, at the 
 present day, it is only the possessor of a long purse that can hope to put to- 
 gether a really representative collection of any size or one containing many 
 examples of the earlier ' ' states ' ' and the more brilliant impressions. But the 
 subject is one that undoubtedly interests many besides actual collectors who are 
 fascinated by these charming little pictures without knowing how they came 
 into existence, who created them or what the process was that was employed 
 in their making; and it is with the idea of affording some slight and easily 
 assimilated information on such points as these that this little monograph 
 has been written. The writer would therefore beg his readers to bear in mind 
 that in what follows merely the fringe of the subject has been lightly touched 
 on, with no pretensions whatever to impart detailed information as to definite 
 data or specific points entailing expert knowledge or to provide anything in 
 any way approaching a ' ' text-book, ' ' of which those in search of more de- 
 tailed information can without difficulty find many already in existence to tell 
 them what they may want to know. 
 
 Till 
 
ENGRAVING may be defined as the art of cutting a design in relief or the 
 opposite on a flat surface, so that when ink or other colouring matter 
 is applied to the raised or sunk portions thus created the plate or block 
 so engraved will, on being impressed on paper or any similar material, leave 
 an impression on the latter which will be an exact reproduction of what has 
 been cut on the block. 
 
 In old times manuscripts were illuminated by hand, but when printing 
 was invented it was obvious that some process was necessary in order to pro- 
 duce many copies of the same design. Pliny mentions in one of his writings 
 " a marvellous and almost divine invention " whereby, in a certain book, 
 portraits of some illustrious personages were reproduced in unlimited numbers 
 (vide Les Procedes de la Gravure by A. de Lostalot, publ. A. Quantin, Paris), 
 but as no mention is made by him of what that process was this must be 
 accepted with reserve. There can be no doubt that engraving on wood was 
 practised in very early times, but it must have been of little practical use for the 
 purpose of reproduction until the invention of paper, as parchment or skins 
 can never have been a suitable medium on which to print. We can thus say 
 that engraving, except for the making of seals or for casting purposes, really 
 commenced in the first half of the fourteenth century. Wood was the first 
 material used for the block on which to engrave a design, and the earliest 
 knov/n woodcut. The Virgin surrounded by Four Saints, now in the Brussels 
 Museum, is dated 1418. 
 
 These first woodcuts were all book illustrations and were extremely crude, 
 being badly drawn and badly reproduced. The great advance made in the art 
 of printing during the first years of the sixteenth century, however, soon had 
 it's effect on the engraver, and the German artists of the time at once made 
 their mark in the engravings that they now began to turn out in increasing 
 numbers. Albert Diirer may well be styled the creator of fine engraving, though 
 there were many others at the time worthy of ranking with him, such as Holbein, 
 Cranach, Lucas de Leyde, Goltzius, Aldegrever and Beham. Italy also rapidly 
 absorbed the new art, as is shown by the fine work existing to-day that came 
 from the hands of Marc Antonio Raimondi, Montagna and Vecellio, while it 
 was bound to be taken up in France, where books were now being printed in 
 large numbers and such men as Jean Cousin, Tory and Bernard Solomon began 
 to apply their talent to the new craft. 
 
 It was the wood of the pear tree that was at first used for the blocks on which 
 the engravings were made, but this was soon replaced by the harder box wood. 
 The desired outline was first sketched on the smooth surface of a block of 
 wood, the rest being then hollowed out with a gouge. This reproduced lines 
 
 ix 
 
in relief, and it can easily be seen how difficult and laborious such a process was ; 
 and it was soon discovered that it was both simpler and better to cut lines on 
 a smooth surface to be filled with ink, so that when the flat surfaces had been 
 wiped clean it was only where such lines held the ink that an impression was 
 printed on the paper. This practice soon led to a further discovery, that of 
 etching, which process is carried out to-day exactly as it was at that time. Here 
 a smooth copper plate is covered with a coating of wax or varnish, on which the 
 required design is drawn or etched with a pointed needle or fine engraving tool. 
 The plate is then placed in a bath of nitric acid of a certain strength which eats 
 into the copper where the varnish or wax has been scraped away by the graving 
 tool, but not where the copper still remains covered, and so the design is produced 
 on the plate in sunken lines. By this means the plate can be examined at 
 any time while the acid is acting on it and can be corrected if necessary by 
 painting on fresh varnish where needed, or where the copper is judged to have 
 been already sufficiently eaten away, and so any effect that the engraver may 
 require can be obtained. Finally ink, in the form of a plug like one of 
 cobbler's wax, is worked carefully into the lines thus formed in the copper so 
 as to fill the smallest and shallowest hollow; the surface of the plate is then 
 wiped clean, and when the latter is then passed through the printing press the 
 ink that has been left in the grooves prints an impression onto the paper. 
 
 As the practice of this art progressed, however, it was found that the action 
 of acid on the copper had the effect of making the lines or grooves too thick, 
 it being soon discovered that it was better for fine work to cut grooves or 
 lines in the copper with a sharply pointed tool, and the French artists soon 
 achieved such proficiency and delicacy of touch in this that the etching process 
 of biting into the copper was altogether discarded, or was used merely to bite 
 in the rough outlines of the design, which was then filled in and completed 
 with the graving tool. 
 
 Other processes, such as aquatint, lithograph, mezzotint and stipple, 
 were in turn discovered or invented and brought into use, but these were little 
 employed by the French artists, who found in line engraving the very medium 
 in which to express the lightness, delicacy and grace of the paintings of the 
 period when the art of engraving may be said to have reached it's highest level. 
 For nothing that has been produced before or since can equal the perfection 
 of the engraved work that was being turned out in such profusion by the first 
 and most finished artists towards the end of the eighteenth century. In 
 England art was making the same strides as in France and elsewhere in 
 Europe, but oddly enough, so far as engraving is concerned, it was being developed 
 on broader and grander lines than in France, and it was to the process of mezzo- 
 tinting that our English engravers chiefly applied themselves. Shortly stated 
 this latter process is as follows: A smooth copper plate is taken and is given 
 a rough but finely granulated surface by means of passing a heavy rounded tool 
 with a roughly toothed surface to it over and over the smooth copper in every 
 direction until the whole of the plate is uniformly roughened all over. The 
 engraver then with a small tool like the blade of a pocket-knife carves away the 
 roughness where he wants his lights, cutting away the most where his high 
 lights are to be and least where the deep shadows are to lie, so that when the 
 plate has been inked and then wiped it is where the original roughened surface 
 
is that most ink remains and least ink where the roughness has been most 
 completely cut away and left smooth. It was by this process that the English 
 engravers made their mark and proved themselves every bit as great masters 
 in their way as any of their European rivals. Strong, " big," bold and rugged, 
 and yet refined and totally different in every way to the more ' ' dilletante ' ' 
 line engravings that were at the same time delighting connoisseurs and art 
 patrons in France, these English mezzotints must always hold their own, and at 
 the present time prove, by the prices that they fetch even in France, their real 
 superiority over any other process of engraving. 
 
 There was yet another process in use in England, and in a very much less 
 degree on the Continent also, —that called " stipple." Here a fiat and smooth 
 copper plate was taken and the design picked out on it's surface by a small 
 tool like the blade of a pocket-knife with the point curved downwards with 
 which small holes were picked in the soft copper, deeper and closer together 
 where the deeper shadows were to be and further apart and shallower where 
 the higher lights were required. This process was, however, unsuited to the 
 "bigger" and more important style of work, and it's use was practically 
 confined to the small classical type of picture such as those produced by Angelica 
 Kauffman, by J. R. Smith, by WiUiam Ward,— of what one might call the 
 "pretty pretty," and it's finest exponents, who worked in this medium only, 
 were without doubt Bartolozzi and Caroline Watson. 
 
 Thus we see the old woodcuts and etchings of the Middle Ages suddenly 
 developing, with the sudden development of all forms of art such as those of 
 the painter, sculptor, goldsmith, silversmith, furniture maker, " big " but quiet 
 and restrained in England, " finicky " but marvellously graceful and beautiful 
 in France ; and it is curious to note how these different forms of art developed 
 on exactly similar lines to the different national characteristics of the times, 
 and to reflect that with the final overthrow of the ' ' ancien regime ' ' in France 
 came the end of the art of engraving in line, and that to-day, while there are 
 still great mezzotinters and etchers, there are practically no line engravers 
 of note to be ranked with the old masters of this now perished art. 
 
 " The old order changeth, giving place to the new"; and this may be said 
 of the art of engraving as truly as of anything else. And after all it is only 
 in the nature of things that this should have been so. Until the invention 
 and subsequent development of the mechanical art of photography and the 
 various processes of photographic reproduction the painter or draughtsman 
 was entirely dependent on the engraver for the duplication of his work, while 
 the latter was necessarily responsible for book illustration or ornamentation and 
 reproduction in quantity of portraits or of pictures for the decoration of rooms 
 alike. It was in portraits that the engraver first found his real inspiration, 
 and nowhere more than in France did he receive the necessary encouragement 
 and appreciation to spur him to the attainment of the highest ideals. One has 
 only to examine a fine proof impression of one of Nanteuil's plates to realise 
 what fine work was put into these wonderful prints, the delicacy of the engraving 
 being such that it almost requires the closest examination to assure oneself that 
 it is line engraving, especially where the shadows, as, for instance, on the cheeks, 
 are very light; and yet where they are deepest the rich quality obtained is almost 
 that of a mezzotint. 
 
 XI 
 
In commencing this short fore- word to his subject proper the writer had 
 intended to confine himself to a discussion of the later work of the eighteenth 
 century in France that is most typical of the period, and to which he has limited 
 his collection of French prints from which the plates illustrating this small 
 monograph are taken. He finds it impossible, however, in writing of the 
 French engravers to pass without mention such men as Nanteuil, Audran, 
 Edelinck, the three Drevets,— father and two sons, Poilly, Chereau and Wille, 
 not to mention a host of others almost, if not quite, as famous who found their 
 inspiration in the magnificent portraits that at the end of the seventeenth and 
 commencement of the eighteenth centuries were being painted in such profusion 
 by Rigaud and Largillierre, Nattier and Raoux and others of the famous Court 
 painters of the times. It was Nanteuil and Edelinck who may be said to have 
 supplied the connecting link between the engraved work of the seventeenth 
 and eighteenth centuries and to have paved the way for the continuance of the 
 talent that was being applied by them to the reproduction of the great works 
 of art that were to be produced in France in such profusion without a break 
 all through the eighteenth century up to the cataclysm that ended it. Edelinck, 
 who died in 1707, passed on a part of his skill with the graving tool to his son 
 Nicolas Etienne who, while never the equal of his father, still worthily held 
 his place as a fine engraver of portraits. Pierre Drevet, the bulk of whose 
 work was produced during the closing years of the seventeenth century, con- 
 tinued to turn out magnificent plates up to his death in 1738, while his two 
 sons, Pierre Imbert and Claude, proved worthy successors to their talented 
 father. It was these men and their contemporaries who raised the art of en- 
 graving to the very summit of it's perfection, and close examination of any 
 of the wonderful plates that they produced in such numbers makes one realise 
 the delicacy, skill, and perfect art that created them. 
 
 A change was to come, however, and while the skill displayed remained 
 as perfect as ever it was in the subjects portrayed that a sudden and marked 
 development arose. " Autres temps, autres moeurs ! " With the death of 
 Louis XIV. Court life underwent what might almost be termed a revolution. 
 Conduct became less and less strict, the pursuit of pleasure and amusement 
 almost the first object of life, and the examples set by the highest in the land 
 soon spread their insidious roots down to the very lowest strata of the nation. 
 This slackening in ideals was bound to soon show itself in many ways, and the 
 Art of the period gives a very faithful record of its downward progress. The 
 first note of the changes to come is struck by the work of one who was to bring 
 something entirely new into the realm of Art, and it is to Antoine Watteau 
 that we may attribute the first influences that led to the grandeur and ' ' bigness ' ' 
 of the pictures of the century that had just closed giving way to the lighter and 
 more frivolous charm and grace that may be said to have been the soul of the 
 new era. With Watteau we arrive at the period of the " Fete galante," but 
 not yet of the " sujet grivois," though the latter was soon to follow and to 
 almost monopolise the field of engraving. The work of Watteau, whose 
 principal charm as a painter may be said to have depended on his marvellous 
 skill as a colourist, was not perhaps suited to the art of the engraver, for 
 though an immense number of plates were produced of his pictures the results 
 may be said to have been on the whole somewhat unsatisfactory and certainly 
 
 xii 
 
not equal in delicacy to those of other painters of the time, or more particu- 
 larly of later work still. Tardieu, Crepy, Scotin, Le Bas and Lepicie may be 
 mentioned as the chief engravers to occupy themselves with his work. The 
 results, however, in nearly every case are not so pleasing to the print-collector 
 of the present time as the work that was soon to give eighteenth century engrav- 
 ing the reputation that it has worthily enjoyed ever since it was produced. 
 The line work employed was as a rule somewhat coarse and heavy, with little 
 or none of the delicacy yet firmness of the later work, due possibly to the fact 
 that a good deal of it was etched and bitten into the plate by acid and not by 
 the " burin " or engraving tool, though at the same time it must be confessed 
 that these plates have a distinct charm of their own, particularly in the way in 
 which prominence is given to the more important figures even when the back- 
 ground, nearly always of trees or thickly wooded landscape, is most complicated 
 and varied in it's lights and shades, while the faces, though generally lightly 
 engraved and somewhat " flat," are wonderfully expressive. 
 
 To this same school of the "Fete galante"— the romantic apotheosis of 
 the " Partie de Plaisir " in a country of perpetual summer— may be said to belong 
 the work of Lancret and Pater, though neither of these painters attained the 
 brilliance of Watteau. Both were reproduced by the same engravers, but de 
 Larmessin was responsible for the bulk of the plates of Lancret 's paintings and 
 Surugue for those of Pater. Much of their talent was devoted to book illus- 
 tration, which was at this period just commencing to reach it's apogee, and 
 doubtless it was largely due to this latter art now commencing to receive rapidly 
 increasing encouragement that the work of these engravers began to grow finer 
 and more delicate. 
 
 While Watteau may be said to have inaugurated a new era in French art 
 in breaking away from the academic style of the seventeenth century and in 
 giving to that of the eighteenth a lightness and grace of it's own, there was 
 yet another great master who exercised an influence almost, if not quite, as 
 marked as that of Watteau on the art of his time that was likewise to lead to 
 the type of work that we to-day are accustomed to consider as typifying the 
 style of the eighteenth century. Jean Baptiste Simeon Chardin, born in 1699 
 and dying in 1779, may well be said to have been more of the eighteenth 
 century than Watteau, who died at the age of thirty-seven in the year 1721, 
 and certainly to-day his work gives us a far better representation of the actual 
 domestic life of the period, thorough realist that he was, than that of the 
 idealist Watteau. His paintings give us a very exact knowledge of the times, 
 — of the dress, the furniture, the actual modes of domestic life of the period 
 in which he lived. He was the faithful chronicler of the daily existence of 
 the people, upper, middle and lower classes alike, and nothing now better 
 brings this before our eyes than the engravings of his pictures which, though 
 not large in point of numbers, were beautifully executed, mostly by Lepicie, 
 but also by Surugue, Cochin and Le Bas. The work of these engravers, difficult 
 as it must have been to reproduce in black and white the life with which his 
 pictures were imbued, was extremely fine, as, for instance, in Lepicie 's beauti- 
 ful plate of Le Benedicite or Surugue 's equally fascinating rendering of Les 
 Amiisements de la Vie privee, and the engraver's art may be said to have now 
 almost reached its zenith. With the final stage of it's development, however, 
 
 xiii 
 
it was to lose somewhat of it's hitherto striking refinement, and if we only con- 
 sider for a moment the changes that were now rapidly taking place in the 
 manners and morals of the times this is not to be wondered at. Life at Court 
 under the two Louis, XV. and XVL, one almost as weak as the other, was 
 daily becoming more dissolute, and the canker was rapidly eating its way down- 
 wards through the ranks of the nobility. No clearer evidence of the moral 
 condition of a nation can ever be obtained than by reference at any par- 
 ticular period in that nation's history to it's literature and pictorial art ; and 
 never was this more true than in the case of the period of French history that 
 we are now considering. A general and rapidly increasing decline in the 
 morals of both sexes alike was taking place : books were being openly pub- 
 lished and freely purchased of a nature that could only encourage and excuse 
 the most unblushing depravity ; pictures were being commissioned, and re- 
 productions called for from the engraver, that could only blunt morality or 
 modesty. And this downward progress in morals is nowhere more faithfully 
 chronicled than in the engravings of the period. It was to be some years 
 yet, however, before the delicacy and charm that the great artist craftsmen 
 were now more than ever putting into their work were to be lost under the in- 
 creasing " grivoiserie " of subject, and as a result we have a period when 
 French line engravings may well be said generally to have reached their very 
 highest limit of perfection. As Watteau may be said to have inaugurated 
 the idealist art that he and his school evolved from the academic period that 
 preceded him, or Chardin the realistic art that immediately followed, so — almost 
 naturally, one might say when one tells oneself what path the taste of the 
 nation was now treading — was bound to follow the meretricious beauty that 
 proclaims itself in the nevertheless charming work produced so lavishly by the 
 prolific brush of Francois Boucher, to be succeeded with ever increasing sug- 
 gestiveness, and yet at the same time with equal, or even perhaps still growing 
 charm, by that of such men as Greuze, Fragonard, Saint-Aubin, Boilly, 
 Lavreince, Huet, Baudouin and Borel. The work of these artists, so thoroughly 
 in accord with the spirit of the times, seems to have inspired the engravers as 
 never before, and never was more perfect engraving produced. Of Boucher 
 the Goncourts have written : ' ' Boucher est un de ces hommes qui signifient 
 le gout d'un siecle, qui I'expriment, le personnifient et I'incarnent. Le gout 
 frangais du XVIIP siecle s'est manifesto en lui dans toute la particularite de 
 son caractere : Boucher en demeurera non seulement le peintre, mais le temoin, 
 le representant, le type. . . . Le theatre, le livre, le tableau, la statue, la maison, 
 I'appartement, rien n'echappe a la parure, a la coquetterie, a la gentillesse 
 d'une decadence delicieuse. Le joli — voila, a ces heures d'histoire legere, 
 le signe et la seduction de la France. Le joli est I'essence de son genie. Le 
 joli est le ton de ses moeurs. Le joli est I'ecole de ses modes. Le joli, c'est 
 I'ame du temps— et c'est le genie de Boucher." 
 
 One has only to turn to the plates engraved from Boucher's paintings, of 
 which a vast number were produced, to realise how true this is. Born in 1703 
 and living till 1770, himself an etcher of great ability, producing many 
 plates after his own compositions, most of the engravers of the time con- 
 tributed to the reproduction of his paintings either in line, in colours, or in 
 imitation of pencil work. Whatever the process employed the results may be 
 
 xiv 
 
said to invariably be equally charming, and even when, as in the case of some of 
 the larger plates engraved in line, the line work is somewhat heavy or coarse 
 the prints, so long as they are not late impressions taken off the plate when 
 the latter has got flat and worn, reproduce for us the gloss and sheen of the 
 wonderful flesh painting of this great painter of the female form, so often very 
 naked and very much unashamed. Employed as he was very largely in paint- 
 ing for decorative purposes, — ceilings and walls of rooms, panels for fine 
 furniture, snuff-boxes, miniatures and the like in addition to his pictures, it 
 was thanks to his wonderful genius that the demand for work of this nature 
 began to increase to an extraordinary extent and, in consequence, the art of the 
 engraver at the same time received far wider attention than it had ever previ- 
 ously enjoyed. The stimulus thus created led to an increasing amount of 
 real talent being devoted to it and to the consequent production in ever in- 
 creasing numbers of the fascinating prints that still appeal so strongly to the 
 art lover and connoisseur of to-day. The output of these prints was extra- 
 ordinary, more especially when one considers the time and work — and work 
 of the finest — that each individual plate entailed. The demand for these little 
 gems of art seems to have been beyond the powers of supply. And as the 
 output increased so did the delicacy and grace of the subjects chosen. A more 
 intimate note in the work was now creeping in and every phase of the national 
 life was being made to serve in providing the artists with their subjects, who 
 give us in their plates so wonderfully faithful a record of the times, of the 
 architecture, the furniture, the dress. And yet, loaded with detail as most 
 of these plates are, the artist continually shows his skill in the " balance " 
 of his picture, detail, although present, never being allowed to overshadow or 
 crowd out the principal part of his design which stands out from its back- 
 ground in a manner that one would expect to find more readily in a large canvas, 
 and not in the small space of a copper plate. Most of these artists had their 
 protectors in the higher circles of Society who supported them in buying, and 
 getting their friends to buy, copies of their productions, and in most of these 
 plates we find the artist adding a ' ' dedication ' ' to his particular patron at the 
 bottom of his plate, following on the lettering of it's title, with very frequently 
 his coat of arms included, all being brought into exquisite harmony with the 
 whole design. Definite commissions for definite subjects were doubtless given 
 by the patrons, and in consequence, following the trend of the morality of the 
 period to grow less and less strict, we find these subjects becoming more and 
 more " free." From the representation of the ordinary every-day life of the 
 rich and noble it was, under the circumstances, an almost natural transition 
 to the more unreserved disclosure of the " intimites " of domestic life and the 
 ' ' piment ' ' of the increasing display of feminine charms. Boucher may be 
 called the apostle of the beauty of woman's form freely and frankly paraded, 
 but the taste of the period required, and very soon produced, the added spice 
 of "suggestion" in subject or title, frequently both. Hence, we find a 
 steadily increasing leaning towards the " sujet grivois," of which the work 
 of the painter Baudouin may be taken as the type. And yet the marvellous 
 instinct of the French eye for real grace and charm was able to avoid the 
 ' ' grossier ' ' until the end of all things when, as the century of which we speak 
 was drawing to its close, the whole civilized world stood aghast and agape at 
 
 XV 
 
the terrible spectacle of an entire nation suddenly losing its mental balance 
 and giving way to the blood-lust and wild ferocity of primaeval man. 
 
 This rapid survey of the progress made in France in the engraver's art 
 during the eighteenth century may possibly serve to explain to those who, 
 while posessing a liking for these delicately engraved plates, have never 
 seriously studied them or given much thought to the feelings and tastes that 
 called them into being, how the spirit of the times is faithfully reflected in these 
 wonderful little pictures that cannot fail even now to charm the eye and delight 
 the artistic part of one's senses. The writer would impress on his readers 
 the fact that it is impossible in the restricted space of a short monograph such 
 as this to do more than afford the most cursory glance at the engraved work 
 of the century of which he writes, and that to anyone desirous of informa- 
 tion as to any particular plate by any particular engraver reference must 
 be made to one or other of the numerous text-books that have already been 
 produced both in France and England dealing with special aspects of the broad 
 subject of engravers and their work. Even such a thing as a complete detailed 
 list giving more than the bare names of the engravers of the eighteenth century 
 would be impossible within the limits of a general article such as this is in- 
 tended to be. Some slight reference, however, to individual plates amongst 
 those used to illustrate this article may possibly serve to amplify the general 
 remarks contained in the foregoing. 
 
 But before proceeding to thus refer to particular illustrations it is necessary 
 to say a few words in explanation of the term ' ' state ' ' that is at the same time 
 the despair and the delight of the collector. In the first place it must be re- 
 membered that these prints which we are now considering were all impressions 
 taken direct from the copper plate on which the engraver had engraved his 
 picture. This copper was always quite soft, as, indeed, it had to be to allow of 
 the delicate softness of the engraving and the consequent softness as well of 
 the impression, a very different thing to the hard, cold steeliness of an impression 
 printed from a steel-faced plate. As will readily be understood the mere 
 passing of such a plate through the printing-press was bound to have some 
 effect on its finely engraved surface, and as a matter of fact this effect is quite 
 perceptible to the practised eye. To speak broadly, the very first impression 
 taken off a plate must necessarily have been the finest and most brilliant ; 
 the second impression could not be quite so perfect as the first, the third as the 
 second, and so on ; and hence it will readily be understood that for the best 
 impressions one must look to the earliest that were printed from any particular 
 plate, which latter gradually became more and more worn until the brilliancy 
 of the engraving would be quite lost, the shallowest of the engraved lines having 
 been completely worn away and merely the deeper ones left, an impression 
 printed from a badly-worn or over-worked plate thus being ' ' flat ' ' and dull, 
 all the lighter shadows and gradations of shadows having disappeared. This 
 then is what is meant when reference is made to " state," early states being 
 the most brilliant, the most rare, the most sought after, and, in consequence, 
 of the most value, later states being of less account. 
 
 Now in producing a plate the engraver was practically always ac- 
 customed to pull off an impression or two before he had finally completed the 
 engraving of his plate in order to assure himself that the printed result was 
 
 xvi 
 
shaping as well as his eye told him to be the case from looking at the engraved 
 copper itself,— ^that his shadows had the right degree of intensity, that his high 
 lights were sufficiently in contrast with the rest of the picture, and so forth, 
 and it was, especially with these French engravers, a very usual practice to 
 send the first impression of any particular plate to the artist from whose picture 
 the engraving was being done so that the latter could express his satisfaction 
 or otherwise with the result ; and the collector occasionally at the present 
 time will come across some of these very impressions on which are to be seen 
 shadows touched up and deepened with a wash of water-colour or chalk, or 
 high lights brought out more prominently by a touch of white paint. It has 
 always been a much debated question with connoisseurs and collectors as to 
 whether these trial impressions should be included in the actual published 
 " states " of a plate or not, and the writer, in common with many others, 
 is decidedly of opinion that they should not, especially as these impressions 
 are practically always taken from the unfinished plate, which latter underwent 
 subsequent alteration to a greater or less extent according to circumstances. 
 It therefore seems preferable to class all impressions of this nature under 
 the title of " engraver's " or " trial proof." 
 
 Apart from these more or less experimental impressions engravers were 
 accustomed to issue their prints in little lots, making some slight difference 
 between each batch so that it could be told without any doubt which were the 
 earlier and which the later of the different impressions printed from any one 
 plate, these little batches being known as "First State," "Second State," 
 and so on. While there were no definite rules governing the differences be- 
 tween these states it was an almost invariable custom to make the changes 
 in the inscription or title that was nearly always engraved at the bottom of 
 the picture itself, though there were frequently no doubt slight alterations as 
 well in the engraving of the latter. In the same way there was no regular 
 recognised number of these different states. Speaking generally, however, 
 it may be said that the first issued state consisted of the picture with nothing 
 at all engraved on the bottom strip of the plate reserved for the title and dedi- 
 cation. The second state would generally have engraved the ' ' fleuron ' ' 
 or coat of arms of the patron to whom the plate was to be dedicated. The 
 third state would have, in addition, the title of the plate added, with, in the 
 bottom left-hand corner, the name of the painter from whose work the en- 
 graving had been made and in the right-hand bottom corner that of the en- 
 graver himself. The next state would probably have the full dedication added, 
 with the words, " Avec Privilege du Roi," or perhaps simply the four letters, 
 "A.P.D.R.," while the last, or so-called "Print" state would have the 
 " A.P.D.R." erased. As said above, it is impossible to lay down any hard 
 and fast rules as to these states as individual engravers had their own 
 customs in this direction, which they even varied themselves with individual 
 plates. It can be taken for granted, however, that an impression with no 
 lettering whatever on the portion at the bottom reserved for the inscription 
 may safely be considered a first state, while when the " fleuron," title and 
 dedication appear with no " A.P.D.R." it is pretty certain to be an impression 
 of the last, or " print," state. Only a few copies were as a rule printed of 
 each of the ' ' proof ' ' states, the bulk of those issued being of the ' ' print, ' ' or 
 6 xvii 
 
final, state. In addition to the actual title, dedication, coat of arms and 
 painter's and engraver's names it was also customary to frequently add what 
 is known as the ' ' publication line, ' ' usually in very small etched letters, which 
 gave the name and address of the publisher or issuer with the year of issue, 
 and impressions of the same plate can frequently be found with different dates 
 on them, from which it can be seen that a second and later issue was made after 
 the original one had become exhausted. Another fairly common form of 
 variation in the different states of a plate was to engrave the lettering of the 
 title for a first state in lightly or roughly etched lettering which in the next state 
 would be altered to firmly engraved square " block " or ornamental letters, 
 leading one to suppose that the engraver possibly scratched the title on the 
 plate roughly and lightly to commence with in order to see that he had it 
 properly spaced, and then, after satisfying himself by pulling off a few im- 
 pressions that all was as he wished it to be, he engraved his title as he in- 
 tended it to appear finally. It is doubtful if the " A.P.D.R." state can really 
 be invariably considered as a " proof " state, for in the case of very many 
 plates there seem to have been as many copies printed in this as in the ultimate 
 ' ' print ' ' state, so that in such a case we can only consider it as being an early 
 print state and not really as a " proof." But, as already explained above, it 
 is quite impossible to give any definite rule for detecting the actual number 
 of proof states of these prints, and in order to discover this in any particular 
 case reference must be made to one of the text-books or " catalogues 
 raisonnes ' ' dealing with the work of the engraver in question. 
 
 In connection with this question of " state " there is still another such 
 that is occasionally met with in addition to those already mentioned above, 
 but only in the case of the more suggestive or " oses " subjects, and commonly 
 known as the ' ' decouvert. ' ' This latter word explains its meaning well 
 enough. When one or two impressions had been printed from a plate of the 
 nature referred to sufficient to satisfy the demands of the artist's patron and, 
 probably, one or two of the latter 's friends as well the engraver, by adding 
 to, or by altering the disposition of, the drapery of the principal subject, would 
 render his plate more fit for issue to the general public and would then proceed 
 to print off his impressions through the usual series of states. 
 
 Let us now turn to the plates that illustrate this very cursory review of the 
 progress of the art of engraving in France during the course of the eighteenth 
 century, examination of which may perhaps help to make the points raised 
 therein the more readily understood. In this connection it should be borne in 
 mind that owing to the expense that finer reproductions would necessarily have 
 entailed it has been found impossible to do more in this case than to make 
 ordinary process blocks from ordinary half-plate photographs taken direct from 
 the prints themselves and that a very great deal of the brilliance and delicacy 
 of the originals has in consequence been lost. The writer trusts, however, that 
 sufficient of the general effect of the latter has still been retained to give point 
 to his remarks and clarity to his somewhat laboured explanations. 
 
 Plates Nos. i, 2, 3 and 4 are very typical of the work that was being turned 
 out by engravers at the commencement of the century under review and serve 
 well to illustrate the fine work of painter and engraver alike. No. i is from a 
 brilliant impression of the second state of the portrait of de Novion both painted 
 
 xviii 
 
and engraved by Robert Nanteuil. Born in 1630 and dying in 1678 Nanteuil 
 does not properly come within the scope of this article on the engravers of the 
 eighteenth century, but it is difficult to write of the latter without reference 
 to the great master from whom they drew their inspiration. Nanteuil may well 
 be said to have been the greatest master of French line engraving as adapted 
 to portraiture, and our first plate well illustrates the great beauty of effect 
 and the immense character and strength of expression that he was able to 
 obtain with paint-brush and graving tool alike. Issued in 1699 this plate 
 may be said to represent the very best of his work. Everything here has its 
 proper proportion, and it will be noticed how everything in the plate is sub- 
 ordinated to the head of the figure which stands out boldly, yet without undue 
 prominence, from its frame of bay leaves. 
 
 Our second plate, like our first, properly belongs to the century before that 
 which we are now reviewing, as it's engraver, Gerard Edelinck, was born in 1640 
 and died in 1707. Much of this master's best work was, however, produced 
 during the last years of his life, notably two plates issued in 1706, portraits 
 of Madame de Miramion and of Herault de Gourville. The plate we illustrate, 
 issued twenty years later than that of our first illustration in the year 1689, 
 serves equally with the latter to demonstrate how the skill of the engraver was 
 able to produce on the copper plate, and in monotint, the full effect gained by 
 the painter by the use of colours. Here we get all the boldness of the original 
 picture, the depth of shadow, the clean brilliant high lights, the bold modelling 
 of the features, the lightness of the curls of the wig, the very texture even of 
 the dress, the quiet reticence of the background, all typical of Edelinck 's and 
 Rigaud's work alike. 
 
 Our third illustration carries us somewhat further into the eighteenth 
 century. It reproduces the work of Pierre Drevet, who was born in 1663 
 and died in 1738. It, like No. 2, is from one of Rigaud's fine portraits and is 
 a most brilliant impression of a very beautiful print. Both this plate and the 
 one that follows it. No. 4, serve to show the increasing delicacy of the line 
 work employed as time went on, yet without any loss of brilliance. Plate 
 No. 4, by the same engraver, is reproduced from a somewhat late impression, 
 and this can be seen in the hardness and coldness of the result as compared 
 with Nos. 2 and 3, though the actual line work is as fine and brilliant 
 as ever. 
 
 We now, with Plate No. 5, come to the transition to what we have referred 
 to above as the Romantic period. Here, as also in Plate No. 6, we have the 
 ' ' Fete galante ' ' pure and simple, the pleasure party in a landscape of perpetual 
 summer and sunshine. Both the examples given are as perfectly typical of 
 the work of the two masters, Watteau and Lancret, as of that of the engravers 
 by whom these plates were reproduced, Audran (1700 to 1772) and le Bas 
 (1707 to 1783). It will be noticed how in each case the principal subject is 
 given by the engraver a perfectly pleasing prominence without the slightest 
 insistence and seems to lose none of that effect that one might be excused for 
 thinking could only be produced by the aid of the original colours of the painted 
 picture. In these two particular examples the engraving is of the most delicate 
 and lighter and finer than one is accustomed to find in the reproductions of 
 the work of these two painters where the lines are generally coarse and heavy, 
 
 xix 
 
the result being a natural loss of brilliance and lightness, while in the originals 
 from which our illustrations are taken it is easy to see how largely the etching 
 process has been employed in producing these plates. Small as these latter 
 are none of the detail of the originals seems to have escaped the engravers, 
 and the vivacity of expression on the different faces, as well as the little glimpse 
 through the trees of distant sunlit landscape in No. 6, betrays the hand of the 
 true artist. 
 
 In Plate No. 7 we have the domestic interior by which the brush of 
 Chardin seems to have been principally attracted, and which Cochin (1688 to 
 1754) translated into black and white so well. It will easily be observed how 
 much coarser in texture is the line work here employed compared to that of 
 the preceding plates, and more particularly of those that follow, and yet this 
 coarser type of engraving seems to exactly suit its subject, that of the rustic 
 interior, with no attempt at idealization. 
 
 With Nos. 8 and 9, however, we strike an entirely different note in the 
 work of Beauvarlet (1731 to 1797). Here the engraving is extraordinarily 
 delicate and fine and the result, in consequence, of the utmost brilliance, while 
 we now pass from the realistic to the idealistic. The original prints from 
 which these two plates have been reproduced are evidently " engraver's proofs " 
 and probably the first impressions taken off the finished plates. They are 
 both ' ' before all letters, ' ' that is to say were printed before the engraver had 
 engraved anything whatever in the shape of inscription or title on his plates, 
 even the names of painter or engraver. These particular impressions have 
 evidently been put aside in some folio and allowed to remain there, probably 
 forgotten, since the time they were printed, as they show not the slightest trace 
 of dust stain or handling, except along the extreme edge of the complete and 
 untrimmed margin, which latter affords convincing proof that they have not 
 passed through the hands of the cleaner, which is also borne out by the fact 
 that each, in the bottom right-hand corner, bears Beauvarlet 's own signature 
 in pencil. Of all the engravings possessed or seen by the writer these two are 
 quite the most brilliant as regards actual impression, and it can be said without 
 any exaggeration that in looking at them steadily for a moment, and in a 
 modified degree perhaps at our reproductions also, one can easily imagine that 
 one is actually looking through an oval opening in a stone wall at a really 
 existing landscape beyond. These two prints alone are surely sufficient to 
 show the high level of skill reached by the best engravers of the eighteenth, 
 or, for that matter, of any, century, and place Beauvarlet in the foremost rank of 
 the craftsmen who were then being so largely encouraged to devote their talents 
 to this fascinating art. 
 
 No. 10 reproduces for us the work of the same painter as that of the 
 originals of Nos. 8 and 9 and is again a typical Boucher in subject and handling 
 alike and worthy of note as owing its existence to a feminine hand. Fine as it 
 undoubtedly is it yet seems, to the writer at least, to lack somewhat of the 
 firmness and decision of touch that characterise the two examples of masculine 
 work that immediately precede it in our list, though at the same time closely 
 resembling the latter in method of treatment. In it we have an example of 
 an early state, with no ' ' letters ' ' except the names of painter and engraver 
 in the left and right bottom corners of the engraved portion of the plate and 
 
 XX 
 
the arms of the patron to whom the plate was dedicated by the engraver, 
 Madame Jourdan, but before both title and dedication. 
 
 Plates II and 12 reproduce unmistakably the work of Greuze, the former 
 by Danzel (1775 to 1810), the latter by Gaillard (1722 to 1785). The second of 
 these two shows us, when we compare it with the first, how the charm of the 
 original picture, Lc Baiser envoye, can be not only maintained but even en- 
 hanced by the originality of the engraver. The original print from which 
 No. II is reproduced is certainly a somewhat late impression and, in conse- 
 quence, worn and "flat," but even allowing for this the eye is undoubtedly 
 more taken by Gaillard 's plate, and this is probably due to a great extent to 
 the charmingly designed and engraved festoon of fern, foliage and flower that 
 surrounds and seems to cling lovingly to the plain oval that frames the subject 
 proper. In fact with many of these French prints it is almost as much in 
 the decoration of the frame as in the actual subject of the picture itself that 
 their fascination and charm lie, and no doubt this will be noticed in a number 
 of the plates here reproduced. Great importance was attached by the en- 
 gravers to the elaboration of this means of finishing off their plates, and in more 
 than one instance, as in the case of Massard's engraving after Baudouin's 
 Le Lever (see Plate No. 54) the aid of a second engraver was invoked to 
 produce the most effective frame to the actual engraving itself. 
 
 Examination of, and comparison between, the three plates that follow, 
 Nos. 13, 14 and 15, shows the work of one artist as engraved by different hands 
 and also the difference that may generally be traced between early and later 
 impressions from the same plate. Fine engraver as he undoubtedly was, 
 Mathieu (1749 to 18 15) never quite reached the level of Nicolas de Launay 
 {1739 to 1792) who, if not the finest engraver of the eighteenth century, was one 
 of the giants of that period, and the reader will possibly agree that, good as it 
 is, our Plate No. 15 lacks somewhat of the perfection shown in No. 14. These 
 two illustrations are from print impressions of the two plates and for such are 
 unusually sharp and brilliant and hence cannot be very late copies of the print, 
 and final, state. Comparison of No. 14 with No. 13 at once shows us how 
 rapidly these soft copper plates became worn by being passed through the 
 printing-press. Although there cannot have been many copies pulled off 
 between the two here illustrated, probably fifteen or twenty at most, yet the 
 loss of brilliance must be at once evident to even the untrained eye in every 
 part of the engraved surface, perhaps most readily seen in the foliage of the 
 trees forming the background, and particularly in the small patch of sky and 
 distance seen through the gap in the trees on the right above the head of the boy, 
 and similarly in the patch of deep shadow directly above the woman's head 
 and about an inch from the top of the plate which in the earlier proof state 
 plainly shows the detail of the leaves and branches filling it, and in the later, 
 and print, state shows none of this detail, but, on the other hand, little more than 
 a uniform flat shadow. Close examination will show a similar flattening over 
 the whole plate and thus may explain to the uninitiated the great difference 
 in value at the present time between early and late impressions of the same 
 plate. 
 
 The next ten plates in our list, Nos. 16 to 25, again show us de Launay and 
 now translating into black and white the work of four different artists. Here 
 
 xxi 
 
again, as in the case of No. 12, we are able to appreciate the charm of the 
 engraver's fancy as shown by the festoons of foliage adorning the frames of 
 the subjects proper, in each case different, while we at the same time once more 
 have demonstrated the superiority of the early over the later state of any one 
 plate. Nos. 19 and 20 show us a first state in each case, and an unusual one, 
 before the engraving on the plate of the " fleuron," or coat of arms. Nos. 
 16 and 17 give us the state with the " fleuron," artist's and engraver's names 
 and title, but no " dedication," Nos. 18, 21, 22, 23 and 24 the " A.P.D.R." 
 state, that is to say, with everything engraved, including the dedication, that 
 is to appear on the final, or " print," state, which latter is shown us in No. 25. 
 The difference in brilliance according to the earliness or lateness of the im- 
 pression can again be easily discerned by comparing these different states in 
 the examples here shown. 
 
 No. 26 affords us an example of an engraver who produced very few 
 plates indeed, by name Charles Antoine Porporati, born in 1740 and dying in 
 1816. An Italian by birth, his three best known plates, of which our example 
 is one, were produced in France and he worthily takes his place amongst the 
 great engravers of the eighteenth century. As can readily be seen from our 
 illustration his work was of the finest, and one of the best of the engravings 
 after the work of Greuze, La Petite Fille mo Chien, is by his hand. For some 
 reason which the writer is at a loss to explain his work may at the present 
 time be bought at a price that seems ridiculous when compared with that 
 of prints by other engravers of the period which do not show such fine work, 
 and his plate after Vanloo with the title Le Lever, which is to be bought for a 
 sovereign or so in the first state before all the letters, is a masterpiece of delicate 
 engraving. 
 
 Jean Louis Anselin (1754 to 1823), the engraver of our Plate No. 27, was 
 of Scottish origin. This plate. La ielle Jardiniere, is from Vanloo 's portrait 
 of Madame de Pompadour and one of the best examples of Anselin 's work, 
 much of which was done from pictures of subjects of the most suggestive 
 nature. Our example, which is reproduced from a first state, bearing only the 
 painter's and engraver's names, is a most charming little plate and the en- 
 graving is of the finest. 
 
 Nos. 28, 29 and 30 show us three of the plates engraved to illustrate that 
 very wonderful example of an illustrated book, Le Monument du Costume, 
 published with thirty-six plates, and sometimes found with two additional 
 included, of which latter our No. 31 is one. This book, as also the pictures 
 painted and engraved in order to illustrate it, gives a very faithful representa- 
 tion of the costume of the period, which, as it's title implies, was the intention 
 with which it's production was undertaken, and was brought out in three parts, 
 the first twelve illustrations being by Freudeberg (1745 to 1801) and the re- 
 mainder by Moreau le jeune {1741 to 18 14). The Moreau pictures certainly 
 possess more merit than those by Freudeberg, but our No. 28, engraved by 
 N. J. Voyez, an example of fhe first state of the plate before all letters, shows 
 what softness and " bloom " a well engraved plate can give to the printed 
 impression. Nos. 29 and 30 are from the Moreau illustrations engraved by 
 Helmann (1743 to 1806) and the younger de Launay (1754 to 18 14) respectively. 
 The second of these is a very fine— and in the opinion of the writer the finest — 
 
 xxii 
 
example of the engraved work of the period that we are considering. While 
 the heavy shadows in the corridor behind the door of the theatre-box have a 
 wonderful depth in them the lightness of the embroidery on the hooped skirt 
 is even more wonderful, and the whole picture has an unusual grace and 
 charm in the grouping of the figures which are instinct with life, from the man's 
 profile silhouetted against the brilliant light of the interior of the theatre to 
 the figure of the " ouvreuse," and even to the point of the little slipper just 
 showing from under the skirt of the central figure. No. 31, engraved by 
 Bosse, affords a charming example of an interior and the furniture, at the 
 same time as the costume, of the period. 
 
 In Nos. 32 and 33 we have a pair of prints engraved by N. de Launay after 
 Lavreince both equally typical of the engraved work of the period and equally 
 pleasing, and almost as fine as anything done by him. Here again we have 
 most interesting details of the furniture of the time. No. 34 is from a later 
 state, of which there are four, of the same plate as No. 33 and affords a good 
 example of the wearing of a plate through printing, and it can be readily seen 
 how the plate has lost its brilliance, notably in the picture hanging on the wall, 
 the festoons round it, the curtain on the right, the glimpse of the room seen in 
 the mirror, and most especially in the table beneath the latter. 
 
 This difference in impression between states is even better shown in Nos. 
 35 and 36 where we have a first and a third state respectively and where 
 the principal figure in the first stands out from the background much more 
 brilliantly than in the second, in which most of the high lights will be seen 
 to have become considerably toned down and the surface of the plate generally 
 become much flatter. 
 
 Our next two illustrations, Nos. 37 and 38, are examples of a different 
 process of engraving, — the " pointille " or stipple, which was at the same 
 period so much employed by the English engravers and so rarely by the French. 
 The engraver of this pair, Nicolas Frangois Regnault (born in 1746), produced 
 plates in both stipple and line with equal success in either process, though his 
 work in stipple, like that of most of the other French engravers employing 
 this medium, cannot be said to have ever attained the distinction of that being 
 done by his English contemporaries such as Bartolozzi, William Ward or 
 Caroline Watson. The two examples of his work here given are from proofs 
 before all the letters with merely the name " Regnault " scratched on the 
 plate in roughly and very lightly etched letters. They are undoubtedly 
 brilliant and the originals have a beautiful velvety softness and gloss: in that 
 of Le Matin the froth of the boiling milk is so cleverly done that one feels, 
 on looking at it, that one could put one's finger into it and skim it off. Nos. 
 39 and 40 are from proof and print impressions respectively from another of 
 Regnault 's stipple plates where once more the difference between the little worn 
 and the very worn plate is most marked, notably in the background and in the 
 figures just seen through the half-open doorway. 
 
 Nos. 41, 42 and 43 show us Baudouin engraved by three different hands, 
 and Baudouin with no trace of the suggestion of " double entendre " that so 
 many of his works, and especially his interiors, convey and were obviously 
 intended to convey. Nicolas Ponce (1748 to 1831) engraved several plates 
 after Baudouin and is perhaps best known by his U Enlevement nocturne, a 
 
 xxiii 
 
fine plate finely engraved. In the case of Les Cerises, our No. 41, the engraving 
 is hard and cold and the print somewhat flat and uninteresting in consequence. 
 We shall see him at his best later, in Plate No. 56. No 42, Le Jardinier galant, 
 is a pretty piece of work, and the only plate that Helmann (1743 to 1806) pro- 
 duced from Baudouin's work. It well represents this engraver who did much 
 charming work, notably two plates for Le Monument du Costume. In No. 43 
 we have a very gracefully grouped little picture engraved by Leveau (1729 
 to 1785), who is also responsible for our Plate No. 44, after Aubry. Oddly 
 enough the work of this latter artist was not engraved to any great extent, 
 charming though it was, as Nos. 44 and 45 show us. The latter plate is by 
 Robert de Launay (1754 to 18 14), the younger brother of that wonderful crafts- 
 man and great artist, Nicolas de Launay, and at times almost his equal, as is 
 seen from his splendid plate of Les Adieux for Le Monument du Costume of 
 which we have already seen the reproduction in our illustration No. 30. Again 
 in No. 46 we see Aubry engraved, this time by de Longueil (1736 to 1790), 
 whose art, like that of Helmann, was acquired in the studio of Le Bas who 
 might almost be called the father of eighteenth century French engraving. 
 The example we give of his plate of Correction maternele (sic) is from a copy of 
 the second state, of which latter there are three. 
 
 We now come to two examples of one of the painters of the period who 
 did so much by the subjects of his pictures to give to the " estampe galante " 
 the popularity that it quickly acquired and continued to hold until the revulsion 
 of taste that followed the general upheaval of the Revolution. Lavreince, 
 born in Stockholm in 1737 and dying in his native country in 1807, spent the 
 greater part of his life painting in France, and the influence of his adopted 
 country is readily to be seen in his work, while it even affected the spelling of 
 his name as it is now generally known, for the latter was in reality Lafrensen. 
 His subjects have a perfectly Gallic lightness and gallantry and were very 
 largely engraved, with varying success according, no doubt, to the engraver 
 responsible for the different individual plates, amongst his most celebrated 
 works being several engraved in colours by Janinet. The two we have before 
 xis, Nos. 47 and 48, are excellent examples of his work and are excellently 
 engraved, the first by Vidal, the second by Deni, — or Deny, Both these plates 
 afford most interesting detail of the furniture and costume of the period. 
 
 No. 49 gives us an example of a plate engraved by two artists, Augustin 
 
 de St Aubin (1736 to 1807) and N. Pruneau (1751 to ), master and pupil. 
 
 Of the latter little work is known to-day, but the former was most prolific 
 and turned out some exceedingly fine plates. 
 
 Our next two illustrations, Nos. 50 and 51, are from a set of four charming 
 little subjects by Baudouin. The engraving of both is of a high order, the first 
 
 by Masquelier (1741 to 1811), the second by Lebeau (1748 to ), though they 
 
 are perhaps the least pleasing of the set, Marton and Perrette, engraved by 
 N. Ponce (1746 to 1831) and H. Guttenberg (1744 to 1790) respectively, being 
 usually the more sought after by collectors. 
 
 No. 52, Vaimable Paysane (sic), gives us an example of the work of the 
 engraver Janinet (1752 to 1813) who may be said to share with Debucourt 
 the distinction of being the finest exponent of the art of colour printing that this, 
 or for the matter of that any other, period has produced. The beauty of his 
 
 xxiv 
 
work, with a wonderful delicacy in the shades of his colours that has never 
 been surpassed, is best seen in the plates engraved by him after Lavreince, so 
 frequently of the " sujet grivois " that his patrons commissioned, such as 
 La Conifaraison, VAveti. difficile, or Jk ! laissc vioi done voir. Janinet may 
 be said to have come nearer to the original colours of the subjects reproduced 
 by him than any other engraver practising this beautiful branch of the art, 
 and to those without an expert's knowledge it may often be found difficult 
 at first to tell one of his colour prints from an original water-colour drawing. 
 He certainly excelled in the purity of his colours and in the cleanness of wash 
 in putting the colours on to his plates. A large number of engravers made use 
 of the process of printing in colours, but owing to the amount of labour and 
 time necessarily employed in producing a single impression the number of 
 prints in colours never approached that of those in monotint. Different en- 
 gravers employed slightly differing processes, but the latter may roughly be 
 said to have been two in number. The first was where several plates, three or 
 four, or occasionally five, were employed, just as at the present time with what 
 is known as the three colour process. Each of these plates was engraved with 
 a different portion of the subject and inked with a different coloured ink, so that 
 as each was impressed in turn on the paper the colour values of the original 
 were reproduced either in the pure body-colours or in the required gradations 
 of mixed colours by the superimposing of one over the other. The printing 
 of a copy by this process necessarily required very exact application of each 
 plate so as to ensure the absolutely correct superimposing of the coloured 
 portions of each, and this was obtained by drilling a small hole in each that 
 fitted over a small peg or projection on the printing-press. This process was the 
 one most generally used in printing coloured impressions of the ' ' wash ' ' type 
 of engraved plates, in French called ' ' au lavis, ' ' where the copper was treated 
 with various varnishes and gum preparations washed on and then placed in an 
 acid bath as in the case of an etching, no actual cutting tool being used. For 
 plates, however, where a tool was employed, as in the case of stipple or mezzo- 
 tint engraving, or for etched plates, the second process was the one generally 
 made use of. Here only one plate was engraved, and this was then coloured 
 by the engraver exactly as he wished his colours to print, the different coloured 
 inks being worked into the plate as desired by means of stumps similar to those 
 used for pastel or chalk drawings. In this case the skill and time employed 
 were, in consequence, very much greater than in the case of the first process, 
 where each separate plate had merely to be given a wash of one colour before 
 printing; but at the same time it allowed of more delicate gradation of 
 shade and combination of body-colour and, further, of more variation in 
 different impressions, as only one such could naturally be printed without the 
 plate having to be re-coloured. 
 
 The results obtained by these two processes were extraordinarily delicate 
 and beautiful, and no finer examples could be chosen to show this than Janinet 's 
 Toilette de Venus or his Trois Graces, which have all the beauty of original 
 water-colour drawings. A large number of the engravers of this period pro- 
 duced colour prints, but, speaking broadly, without arriving at the delicate 
 grace that is found in the work of Janinet and also in that of Debucourt (1755 
 to 1832) and Descourtis (1753 to 1820). Of the former the Promenade publique 
 
 xxv 
 
(see our Plate No. 53), La Promenade de la Galerie du Palais-Royal, Le Menuet 
 de la Mariee and the Noce au Chateau show a degree of perfection of com- 
 position and colouring as well as of skill in engraving quite equal to the fine work 
 of Janinet, while Descourtis may be considered to have raised himself to 
 the same plane of perfection by his Noce de Village or his Foire de Village 
 alike. The process of line engraving, which was that mostly employed at this 
 period and in which so many artists of the time excelled, did not lend itself to 
 the production of impressions in colour, which were necessarily thin, cold and 
 unpleasing, and the three names above mentioned may therefore be considered 
 to represent satisfactorily those practising this delicate art, though mention 
 must at the same time be made of Sergent {1751 to 1847), whose work, however, 
 was practically confined to portraits. 
 
 Plates Nos. 54 and 55 show us the engraved work of Jean Massard (1740 
 to 1822), one of the most successful engravers of subjects painted by Greuze 
 and best known perhaps by his rendering of that master's celebrated La Cruche 
 cassee, No. 55. Nothing could better illustrate the spirit that was at this 
 period creeping over the art of the time than this latter subject with it's touch 
 of suggestiveness expressed with a reticence purely and typically French. This 
 plate and No. 54 {Le Lever, after Baudouin) alike show a wonderful lightness 
 of touch in the handling of the engraving tool, while in the latter the effect 
 gained by the artist in his lighting of the subject is most skilfully retained, the 
 principal figure being given its right prominence without undue insistence. 
 The engraved frame surrounding the latter picture is the work of Choffard 
 (1730 to 1809) who himself engraved a number of plates from the " sujets 
 galants, ' ' and often ' ' grivois, ' ' of Baudouin, and who also turned out a great 
 deal of purely decorative work such as this frame, especially in the field of 
 book-illustration and ornamentation. This same frame or border we see 
 again in La Toilette by N. Ponce (1746 to 1831) after Baudouin, our illustration 
 No. 56, and one can say that nothing could better serve to set off and give effect 
 to these two subjects alike, more especially in the case of the latter where the 
 engraving is somewhat hard and cold and without the brilliance that one will 
 generally find in a print of such an early state as this particular example. 
 
 Another engraver of the work of Baudouin is illustrated in Plates 57 and 58, 
 Le Banger du Tete-d-Tete and La Soiree des Thuileries (sic), both by the hand of 
 Jean Baptiste Simonet (born in 1742) and one of the best translators into black 
 and white of that artist's painted work, more especially of his fondness for some- 
 what unusual lighting effects of which each of these particular plates affords 
 an excellent example, the one of a dark room lit only by the light from the fire- 
 place, the other of brilliant moonlight in a garden scene. In No. 58, too, we 
 again have the cleverly veiled hint of suggestion that we have already noticed 
 above in the case of La Cruche cassee (No. 55). No. 57 also once more enables 
 us to see, as do Nos. 54 and 56, what added effect may be given to the subject 
 proper by an engraved frame or border of which this is a particularly pleasing 
 example, with a lightness and grace of design that it would be difficult indeed 
 to surpass. 
 
 In Plates 59, 60, 61 and 62 we once more see the work of Nicolas de 
 Launay (1739 to 1792), one of the most prolific as also one of the finest of the 
 engravers in France at the period that we are considering and also, like Simonet, 
 
 xxvi 
 
one of the best of Baudouin's interpreters. Although no earher than the 
 A.P.D.R. state No. 59, Le petit Jour, is an unusually brilliant piece of engraving 
 and a good example of an extremely fine plate. Le Carquois cyuise, our No. 60, 
 is even a finer specimen of engraving, the copy from which our illustration 
 was obtained, though merely in print state, possessing a rich velvety bloom that 
 one associates as a rule with only the earliest impressions from some par- 
 ticularly fine plate. These two prints afford very interesting details of in- 
 teriors of the period. No. 61 is from a very fine impression of the third of the 
 six states of what is perhaps the best known French print of the eighteenth 
 century, Lcs Hazards heureux de rEscarpolettes (sic), with the " fleuron," 
 title and names of painter and engraver only, but before the dedication. It 
 will be noticed that the name of the painter is here spelt " Fragonare," 
 which error is corrected in the later states in which also the final " s " of 
 the word " Escarpolettes " is likewise correctly omitted. This plate 
 may well be taken as typical of the best engraved work of the time in 
 France and is, as can be readily seen from our somewhat indifferent repro- 
 duction, an exceedingly fine piece of work. In No. 62 we again have an in- 
 terior and another very finely engraved plate, the lighting of the two central 
 figures being especially clever. Taking these four plates together we get a 
 very good example of the different gradations of taste displayed in the en- 
 gravings of this period: No. 59 shows us the " vie intime " of the time, simple 
 and unaffected; No. 60 is a typical example of the thinly veiled suggestion of 
 " double entendre; " No. 61 gives us a representation of the " vie galante " 
 in its most frivolous form; while in No. 62 we have the " sujet grivois " pure 
 and simple. 
 
 Nos. 63 and 64 show us the work of another exceedingly fine engraver, 
 who was painter as well, Augustin de St Aubin {1736 to 1807), except for Moreau 
 le jeune the most prolific of the engravers of the century, and probably the most 
 versatile. He excelled in portrait work, especially on a small scale, and two 
 of his small portraits, almost miniatures in fact, are deservedly famous, 
 those of the Marquise de * * * * and the Baronne de * * * * respectively. Our 
 two examples of his work with the titles Au moins soyez discret and Comptez 
 siir mes Sermens are thoroughly representative and are portraits of his wife 
 and himself. 
 
 J. Chevillet (1729 to 1790), the engraver of our next two illustrations, Nos. 65 
 and 66, never attained the celebrity that most of those mentioned above enjoyed 
 and still enjoy, but he engraved a few very fine plates, notably a portrait of the 
 painter Chardin and Le leger Vetement after Baudouin. The latter subject 
 was also engraved and printed in colours by Janinet and is very charming, 
 though Chevillet's rendering of it, deprived of the added effect gained by the 
 colour printing, is almost as pleasing. Our two plates are from proof and print 
 of this plate and in them we once more have an excellent opportunity of seeing, 
 by comparison of the two, what a vast difference there can be between early 
 and late impressions of the same plate, for it must be readily seen how flat and 
 lacking in brilliance is No. 66 when compared with the proof state before the 
 letters. No. 65, 
 
 We now turn to two plates, Nos. 67 and 68, of less merit than most of those 
 that we have so far discussed, Le Bouton de Rose and La Curieuse, both by 
 
 xxvii 
 
Voyez I'aine (1742 to ) after Wille. While somewhat cold and steely, 
 
 as are most of the engravings of the work of Wille, these two plates have a very 
 pleasing sheen and velvety softness when in the earliest states, and while our 
 illustrations do not quite show us this they serve as typical examples of the 
 kind of subject that Wille so frequently employed with a view to loosening the 
 purse-strings of his patrons, notably in his VEssai du Corset and Dedicace 
 d'u7i Poeme epique. Voyez I'aine cannot properly be placed in the front rank 
 of engravers of the period, but certainly produced a few plates of greater merit 
 than the two that we here reproduce, notably the Diredeur des Toilettes after 
 Lavreince and Le Fruit de V Amour secret after Baudouin. 
 
 Our next illustration. No. 69, is of the work of Beauvarlet, the engraver 
 of two plates already noticed above, Nos. 8 and 9, this time after Baudouin, 
 and serves well, with the two that immediately precede it, to show the kind of 
 subject that, as morals declined, began to be called for more and more from 
 painter and engraver alike. The technique still remains of a high order, 
 however. In No. 70, La Resistance inutile, we have an example of an engraver, 
 G. Vidal, who practically confined his work to the production of plates of this 
 same nature, the " sujet grivois " par excellence, and who largely made use of 
 the custom of publishing the first few impressions from his plates in the state 
 already referred to above as " decouvert," the literal translation of which term 
 sufficiently explains its meaning in this connection, subsequent states showing 
 an alteration in the drapery. 
 
 The engraver of our next plate. No. 71, Jean Marie Mixelle, is principally 
 known by his plates that were copied from plates already produced by other 
 engravers, notably the Englishmen, J. R. Smith and W. Ward, and that there- 
 fore differ from all those that we have so far considered and from practically 
 all the engraved work that one meets with in being reproductions of another 
 person's style and not original translations from colour into monochrome. 
 Our illustration, La Surprise agreable, is, however, one of his few plates done direct 
 from the original painting, in this case by Boilly, and is one of the compara- 
 tively rare examples of the use by French engravers of the process of stippling. 
 While the subject and the grouping of the figures, thanks to the painter, are 
 charming enough the engraving is not of a very high order and shows that 
 this process, which was being so largely and so successfully employed by the 
 English engravers at this same period, never really appealed to the crafts- 
 men in France with whom the ' ' burin ' ' seems to have been the natural medium 
 of expression on the copper plate. And this seems to be borne out in actual 
 practice, for no French stipple plate exists that in any way approaches in beauty 
 or technique thousands that were being produced at this same time in England 
 by the bulk of the English engravers. Rare as the stipple plate was in France 
 it is curious that the bulk of reproductions of the painted work of Boilly were 
 produced by means of that medium, possibly due to the fact that this process 
 was found to give better than any other the effect of the satin and silk that 
 he almost invariably used for the dresses of his women subjects. Our 
 plates Nos. 72 and 73, both after Boilly and both in stipple, would seem to bear 
 this out, especially the latter, where the sheen on the lady's dress is cleverly 
 indicated and probably could not have been given so much effect had the en- 
 graving been in line. These two plates also serve to show what poor use the 
 
 xxviii 
 
French engraver, as compared with his EngHsh fellow-craftsman, was able 
 to make of the stippling tool, and it should be added that No. 73, UAmant 
 favorise, is unusually good for a French plate in this medium. Again in No. 
 74, Les Apprets du Ballet, by Tresca after Lavreince, we have a stipple plate 
 which only bears out what we have just said above as to the inability of the 
 French engravers to make satisfactory use of this process. 
 
 In Plate No. 75 we have an interesting illustration of what the Paris streets 
 were at the time of the Revolution and one probably little exaggerated. As an 
 engraving, however, it is of little merit and certainly does no credit to Petit 
 (born in 1760), its author. 
 
 Our next illustration, No. 76, the Petite Laitiere anglaise, by Gaugain after 
 Northcote, hardly comes within the scope of this article, having been both en- 
 graved and published in England. Gaugain (born in 1748), however, was a 
 Frenchman by birth, though he spent the greater part of his engraver's life 
 in England, where he turned out some charming work, of which our illustra- 
 tion is by no means the least charming, while it here serves to give point to our 
 remarks above as to the superiority of the English over the French stipple 
 prints. This particular plate has also an added interest in the glimpse of the 
 clock tower of the Horseguards, Whitehall, showing behind the tree trunk, 
 which clearly proves the charming milkmaid to be a direct ancestress of the two 
 old ladies who, some five or six years ago, personally, and successfully, petitioned 
 the late King Edward to confirm the privilege granted to their family by King 
 Charles the Second to keep cows in St James's Park for the sale of their milk, 
 a privilege that a utilitarian and prosaic present-day Government Department 
 had sought to deprive them of. 
 
 Plate No. 77 brings us to the end of the century that we have been con- 
 sidering, for Jazet, it's engraver, was born in 1788. It is a rendering in mezzo- 
 tint of one of Dubufe's many subjects that all bore such a remarkable similarity 
 to one another and shows how all the grace and charm of the earlier and pre- 
 Revolution French art was so quickly to be lost in the sudden revulsion of 
 manners and taste that followed that great upheaval. 
 
 We have now completed our very cursory survey of the engraved work of 
 the wonderful eighteenth century in France, the century that saw Art in 
 almost every form reach its very highest level of human expression not only in 
 France but in every European country alike. But before laying down his pen 
 the writer feels that his subject has not been given the consideration that is 
 its due without a few words as to the book illustrations of the period, or more 
 strictly speaking of the latter part of the period. Never before or since has so 
 much talent been devoted to the embellishment of books as during the last 
 twenty years or so of the century that we have been considering. Con- 
 current with the rapidly increasing luxury and consequent looseness of morals 
 that was overcoming the governing classes more and more surely until the 
 arrival of the inexorable and terrible day of reckoning was a growing demand for 
 beauty in all the amenities of existence. Architecture, internal decoration 
 of houses, landscape gardening, pictures, furniture, personal adornment even, 
 all were undergoing the closest attention from the greatest talent of the day 
 in the endeavour to satisfy the ever increasing demand for beauty in every- 
 thing, and in no direction was this more noticeable than in the production of 
 
 xxix 
 
books. The greatest artists of the day were employed in their embellish- 
 ment and painter and engraver alike devoted his skill and taste to their 
 illustration and gave of his very best in so doing. The result is to be seen to- 
 day in the beautiful books v/ith their wonderful illustrations that survive and 
 that are so eagerly sought after by bibliophile and print lover alike. Many of 
 them have attained a world-wide celebrity and, as in the case of the engravings 
 that we have been considering above, their market value has increased, and 
 still increases, by leaps and bounds. And deservedly so, for they have a delicacy 
 and charm all their own. Reference to our plate No. 78, the engraved title- 
 page to Les Graces of Meunier de Querlon, designed and engraved by Moreau 
 le jeune (1741 to 1814), shows us at once what beauty can be evolved by the 
 true artist from the most perfect simplicity of design. The illustrations to this 
 book, also by the hand of Moreau le jeune, are perfect little gems, one of which 
 we reproduce in our plate No. 79. The photographic reproduction of these book 
 illustrations is a matter of some difficulty and cannot, owing to the impossibility 
 of getting the printed page to lie perfectly flat, give more than the roughest 
 idea of the perfection or brilliance of the originals. 
 
 Almost as celebrated as Les Graces, to which we have just referred, is 
 Fenelon's Les Aventures de Telemaque, two of the illustrations to which, en- 
 graved by Tilliard (1740 to 18 13) after Monnet's designs, are here reproduced 
 in our plates Nos. 80 and 81, the latter in particular being a little master- 
 piece of grouping. Yet another book of equal celebrity is the Origine des 
 Grdces by Mademoiselle D * * * *, one illustration to which we give in our plate 
 No. 82 from the engraving by Masquelier (1741 to 181 1) after Cochin fils. 
 The most remarkable of all these illustrated books is, without doubt, the 
 Chansons de Labor de, or, to give it it's full title, Choix de Chansons mises en 
 Musique far M. De La Borde, published in Paris in 1773 in four volumes by de 
 Lormel. This remarkable book, a collection of songs with their music, was 
 arranged by de Laborde, chief ' ' Valet de chambre ' ' to Louis XV. and Governor 
 of the Louvre. Both text and music are engraved throughout and the four 
 volumes contain one hundred very beautiful engraved plates by Moreau and 
 Masquelier, after Moreau le jeune, Le Barbier, Le Bouteux and St Quentin, 
 while the title-page to Vol. L and the dedication leaf are the work of the en- 
 graver Nee. We reproduce ten of the plates of this delightful book in our illus- 
 trations Nos. 83 to 92. Owing to the latter being considerably larger in size 
 than the originals from which they are photographed they have little of the 
 brilliance of the original plates themselves, but Nos. 84, 85, 86 and 91 in 
 particular give a good idea of how very beautiful these latter are. 
 
 Yet another deservedly celebrated book of the same nature is the four 
 volume Paris edition of 1768 and 1769 of Les Metamorphoses d'Ovide with 
 its very large number of exceedingly lovely plates. Our illustrations Nos. 
 92, 93 and 94 reproduce three of these engraved by Massard after Monnet, 
 by N. de Launay after Eisen and by Massard after Boucher respectively, while 
 the " tail piece " to the fourth and last volume (our plate No. 96) engraved and 
 designed by Choffard is a marvel of grace and a fitting finish to an excep- 
 tionally beautiful book. 
 
 The number of these books illustrated with finely engraved plates is very 
 large and forms a fine field for the print collector. The most celebrated of all 
 
 XXX 
 
is most probably the Conies et Notivclles en Vers of La Fontaine in what is 
 known as the " Fermiers Generaux " edition, pubHshed in Paris (though 
 Amsterdam is given on the title-page) in 1762, actually the third published 
 edition of the book. This is in two volumes, 8vo, and comprises portraits of 
 La Fontaine after Rigaud, engraved by Ficquet; of Eisen after Vispre, engraved 
 by Ficquet ; and of Choffard (in a " cul-de-lampe "), engraved by himself ; 
 also eighty plates by Eisen engraved by different hands, four vignettes and 
 fifty-three culs-de-lampe by Choffard. Another very beautiful book that well 
 deserves its reputation among collectors is Dorat's Lcs Baisers, published in 
 Paris in 1770. It contains a frontispiece by Eisen engraved by Ponce; one 
 plate by Eisen engraved by de Longueil; twenty-three vignettes, one fieuron 
 on the title and twenty-two culs-de-lampe by Eisen and Marillier engraved 
 by Aliamet and others. Yet another gem of equal beauty is Montesquieu's 
 Temple de Gnide, published in Paris in 1772, comprising a frontispiece con- 
 taining the portrait of Montesquieu, a vignette at the head of the dedication 
 (the Arms of England), and nine plates by Eisen, engraved by Lemire. These 
 plates are of a particularly perfect design and execution. A list of similarly 
 beautiful books would be too long to give here, though there are many that must 
 always appeal to the print lover quite as strongly as to the bibliophile, and small 
 though the plates illustrating them necessarily are, in some cases real minia- 
 tures, as in the small edition of Berquin's Idylles, the wonderful delicacy of the 
 engraving makes them every whit as fascinating as those larger prints that we 
 have been considering in the first portion of our somewhat cursory and all too 
 inadequate review of the engraved work of the eighteenth century in France. 
 
 A word or two in closing with reference to present-day engraving and 
 modern reproductions of the work of the eighteenth century may possibly 
 be of interest to those readers who, while eager to indulge in the delights 
 of possession, yet feel too uncertain of their judgment to risk the outlay of 
 the necessary capital and which may perhaps at the same time be of service 
 in assisting them to the gaining of that confidence in " backing their own 
 opinion ' ' without which it would probably be labour in vain to start the forma- 
 tion of a collection of these delightful little reminiscences of a bygone age. 
 The art of the etcher has recently shown a very wonderful revival, and the work 
 that is to-day being turned out by a large number of fine artists by means of 
 the etching needle more than holds its own when considered in relation to that 
 of the past centuries. The practice that now obtains more and more every day 
 of severely limiting the number of impressions printed from any one plate is 
 without doubt a wise one as, apart from the stimulus thus given to prices to 
 maintain themselves, and even to rise, during the lifetime of the engraver, 
 a phenomenon that can rarely, if ever, have occurred in the times of which 
 we have been writing, such a practice necessarily ensures the production of 
 the very finest impressions only with no poor or weak ones from a worn plate 
 that might in coming years weaken the artist's reputation as an engraver. 
 To the writer at least it seems a pity that the same principle should not be 
 applied to the production of modern engravings in mezzotint. Possibly this 
 may be due to the fact that, while the work of the etcher is practically always 
 original, that of the mezzotinter as a rule reproduces the painted work of some 
 other hand entailing the purchase of the picture to be reproduced or alternatively 
 
 xxxi 
 
that of the right of reproduction, and a consequent considerable financial out- 
 lay. In addition the actual labour involved in the engraving of a plate in 
 mezzotint is undoubtedly greater than in the case of an etched plate. Hence 
 we find that it is customary in the case of a mezzotint to publish a very much 
 larger number of copies than in that of an etching. In order to avoid wearing 
 of the copper plate and the production of poor impressions that would 
 necessarily follow it is usual to give the plate, by means of a simple chemical 
 process, an infinitesimally thin coating of steel before printing from it. This 
 necessarily hardens the impressions and, while allowing a practically unlimited 
 number of the latter to be printed all equally good, is bound to render them cold 
 and lacking in that rich velvety softness that we find in the engravings of the 
 eighteenth century and that the copper plate alone can give. In speaking 
 thus of original modern work it is only necessary to refer to these two pro- 
 cesses, of etching and of mezzotint, for the present-day engraver in line or in 
 stipple does not, to all intents and purposes, exist, and the budding collector 
 should have no difficulty whatever in recognising the difference between modern 
 and old work. It is rather with the modern reproduction of old work in line or 
 in stipple that he will at first experience a feeling of uncertainty and scent 
 pitfalls in every folio that he turns over in his search for treasure. No hard 
 and fast rules can be laid down for his guidance and protection. The paper 
 on which is printed the impression that he may be examining ought by rights to 
 afford him an infallible test. It should be remembered that that on which 
 these old prints were printed was made from rags by hand and was of a soft 
 pulpy nature, so that when soaked and passed through the printing press it be- 
 came of much the same consistency as blotting paper, sucking out and absorb- 
 ing the ink filling the engraved depressions in the surface of the plate. To-day 
 on the other hand paper is made by a chemical and mechanical process from 
 hard grass fibres and similar substances, on the harder surface of which merely 
 a deposit of ink is made in printing. Hence we get a velvety softness in the 
 case of old work that cannot quite be equalled in the modern, and this should 
 afford some degree of guidance to the unpractised eye of the beginner. Again 
 the old paper was usually ' ' laid, ' ' and when held up to the light will show the 
 consequent transparent lines running across it that that process of manu- 
 facture entailed, as also the watermark that it bears. This test alone would 
 seem an infallible one, but in reality only adds to the traps awaiting the un- 
 wary, for quantities of this old paper still exist and are to be occasionally met 
 with in the catalogues of present-day auction sales, when they are eagerly sought 
 after by unscrupulous persons for the very purpose of using for reprints from 
 old plates. A very large quantity of these latter still exist in a more or less 
 worn condition. If not too worn they can be, and occasionally are, printed 
 from in their original state, but the impression then must tell its own tale. 
 When badly worn they can be re-touched, or rather re-engraved, and in the case 
 of stipple and line plates particularly this is now being done to a considerable 
 extent. Here again, however, the wary eye can detect the attempted deceit, 
 for the dots or lines cut in the plate necessarily become, when re-engraved, 
 larger and wider than they originally were, and this must show itself on the 
 printed impression. A large number of the better known French line prints 
 of the eighteenth century have recently been reproduced in this way and are to 
 
 xxxii 
 
be frequently met with now in shop windows in England, but a moment's glance 
 by anyone who has seen the ' ' real thing ' ' should be sufficient to expose the 
 deception. 
 
 In addition to the above there is the modern " process " plate, photo- 
 graphically reproduced from an original copy of an old print. At the present 
 time it is chiefly with English stipple prints in colour that this is being done and 
 the result is, as a rule, somewhat smudgy and woolly ; but the process is gradually 
 getting more and more perfect as time goes on and promises before long to put 
 a further difficulty and a serious one in the path of the inexperienced. This 
 difficulty becomes intensified in the case of framed prints, and it is as well to 
 insist invariably on such a one being taken out of its frame for inspection 
 before clinching a bargain as this will frequently reveal some otherwise hidden 
 and unsuspected blemish. Another trick that is sometimes employed in order 
 to entrap the innocent buyer is to paste on the back of the frame a scrap of old 
 discoloured newspaper with a date of probably the eighteenth century cunningly 
 showing, and it is as well to know that a brisk trade is done to-day in such 
 newspapers by unscrupulous persons with this very object in view. 
 
 Finally a word may perhaps be added as to " margin." At the present 
 time the market value of a print will depend to a very considerable extent on 
 the amount of margin of plain paper surrounding the engraved picture, and it 
 is advisable to bear this in mind when considering any print with the idea of 
 its purchase. It is indeed an odd thing that this should be the case, for when a 
 hundred or so years ago these prints were being produced nothing whatever 
 was thought of the size of the sheet of paper on which they were printed, and 
 it is doubtful even whether the engravers ever intended the blank margins to 
 be retained but rather engraved their plates with the idea of their being cut 
 off and the wood frame being fitted close up to the engraving itself. It is, in 
 fact, exceedingly common to find these old prints trimmed quite close, though 
 this in many cases was most probably done in view of the cost of glass at that 
 time and the difficulty of obtaining it in sheets of any size. A certain amount 
 of plain margin, however, certainly does, in the opinion at least of the writer, 
 add to the beauty of a framed print and affords in addition a meed of assist- 
 ance in assuring oneself that any particular impression is a " right " one and 
 not a modern reprint. 
 
 It will thus be seen that the path of the collector, especially at the com- 
 mencement of his career as such, is beset by many difficulties that nothing 
 but time and experience can remove. One very good way of reducing one's 
 mistakes to a minimum, however, is to sternly resolve that if in one's first 
 glance at a print that one is thinking of purchasing there is the slightest feeling 
 of suspicion or doubt one will have none of it. The collector, however, is after 
 all but human, and he would not be human whose inclination did not occasion- 
 ally overcome his better judgment. At the same time there is comfort in 
 the reflection that the acquisition of one real treasure will amply compensate 
 for a number of acknowledged mistakes. 
 
 And so must end our hurried and all too inadequate review of this most 
 
 fascinating epoch in the Art history of the world. The experienced Print 
 
 collector will have found little or nothing in the foregoing that can have added 
 
 to his store of knowledge of the subject. For him text-books in abundance 
 
 xxxiii 
 
already exist to provide the details as to individual engravers, states, prices, or 
 any other special information of which he may be in search, and it is not for 
 him that the writing of this short monograph has been undertaken. If, how- 
 ever, the writer has been happy enough to fan into a flame, however small, the 
 tiny spark of interest that may have already commenced to smoulder in the 
 mind of one would-be explorer in the realms of French engraved work of the 
 eighteenth century his object has been fully attained, and for such he feels that 
 he cannot better conclude his task than by quoting the closing paragraph of 
 M. Loys Delteil's Manuel de F Amateur d'Estampes du XVII I'^ Siecle (Dorbon- 
 Aine, Paris) wherein the Author writes: 
 
 " Nous terminons un Manuel que nous aurions voulu plus ample et par 
 consequent plus complet; I'estampe est, en effet, un vaste champ d'oii surgit 
 a chaque minute un document inedit, une oeuvre inconnue. La matiere est 
 done inepuisable. Nous avons essaye toutefois de renfermer dans le peu 
 d'espace qui nous etait assigne le maximum de renseignements. Nous avons 
 fait la part belle, cela va de soi, aux maitres dignes de ce qualicatif trop souvent 
 prodigue mais nous n 'avons pas cru devoir negliger en outre les artistes de plus 
 modeste valeur, le but d'un Manuel etant avant tout de fournir une source 
 d 'informations multiples. Puissent ces pages repondre, en partie du moins, 
 aux recherches que voudront bien y faire les amateurs, ou plus simplement 
 les curieux. " 
 
 xxxiv 
 
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 iljfci' JtiffdUil 
 
 I'l/ rirrrc iJirrd, 
 
PI. IV. 
 
 
 V-.V 
 
 '■■;•"■'"""""'■-'•"'■'"'■' "'-■" ■' -'''■'■"•"A/,/./- ^cA. _.,■'■■>' V cV-:.-,, , I,..,, ,./,.• :. V/,v/.,// ,V--'^r',Wf'..n.,■' 
 
 " luibci't d<- Cotti:" hji Drcvii, after llujnud 
 
PI. V. 
 
 Uraiii'd J. Ipiw- Ic 'la/'lt'iiii ,<i-hnn,i/ J-'.-i/tl par- ,\,;i/n/,i m.i lit l''..r,i)i/'l,u /■'/n.'./.m iiuui iiiliitluu.' 
 
 11 iiitt-au . Jc inLK^nup/iti/iJi'ur , , 
 
 '"La Ban '<(■ pi( 1/611111:" Inj B. ^liulnni, irftfr Wn/tran 
 
PI. VI. 
 
 
 •^ 
 
1. \'ll 
 
 s 
 
PI. VIII. 
 
 " Xt: Ihjiart (hi, Courricr" hy Biaucarld, after ISimchcr 
 
PI. IX. 
 
 " L'Arrirri' iln (Joiirru'r" hij Bcaiitu rlrt, uftri- Jloiichir 
 
PI. X. 
 
 ' Faifiaif-ils ii rr Jffiiitim /" hi/ JLiip Jnni'ihni, uftc,- Biuirlicr 
 
'1. XI. 
 
 / ( ai'ij//ii 
 
 
 5fK;.^'^^ ., 
 
 " Z'l iSnruiniriisr" Inj Dnifji, after Hiiii'U' 
 
PI. Xll 
 
 " J.ii- ]"i)l aptacasi:'' hij IJa'dlar<l, nj'trr Orar.c 
 
P\. XIIL 
 
 ^e?.V' ■, v"^ '^■1 
 
 J^^^'^^^^^ma^--^: 
 
 ill III 
 
 'Ji^iillM I I 
 
 m-mi 
 
 Zii bonne J/^irrc" h// X. ih: Limnuti, ajlrr Fraijiniii rd. { I'lrmf ) 
 
PI. XIV. 
 
 " Lii hoitiu: JJrri" liji X. (h: Liiuuiqi, after FrfifjoiiarfL {Print date, marr/in cat) 
 
PI. XV. 
 
 " Z'.' Scniintt il'AiiiO'tt/- " hij J. Malli till, nftcr Fraiiniut nl. (Priiii dal,i:, iiiiirijln cut) 
 
PI. XVI. 
 
 
 s 
 
PI. XVII. 
 
 ^ 
 
PL XVI 1 1. 
 
 ^ 
 
 fe; 
 
 5>. 
 
 S 
 
 S 
 
I'l. XIX. 
 
 s 
 
PI. XX. 
 
 
 s 
 
 i-O 
 
 < 
 
 
PI. XXI. 
 
PI. XXII. 
 
 
 s 
 
 
PI. XXIII. 
 
 fc. 
 
 c:* 
 
PI. XXIV. 
 
 
 
PI. XXV. 
 
 ^ 
 
 
PI. XXYI. 
 
 " Ve'ims qui cKressc PAmonr" hi/ I'nrpondi, ,(ftrr J'onipro 7l,if(o,. 
 
^1. XXV 
 
 La h'lh Jardinihr" {'[lortrait of Mm/amc di: Fdiiiin/dour) h// Jcan-Limis Aiisdin, 
 
 after Carle Vnnloo 
 
PI, XW'III. 
 
 ^^ 
 
 c ! 
 ^ i 
 
 ^1 
 
 
 "Z<(. ToilHt,:" hi) X. J. I'oiir:, nflrr Fmuhhrni (fnun " /<• .)/,<,/ ,//,,,7i/ ,//, ro>ii„,iu") 
 
1^1, XXIX. 
 
 ■'Zr.'.s Dfliccs lir la Jff'tenu'tr" h// J. S. Jlrlniaii, nftcr Mmran Ic jcam 
 (from "Li Jfoiunnf/if <1 ii C'lixfinnr") 
 
PI. XXX. 
 
 
 \.V . O. K 
 
 'X« A.lirnx:' hj 11. ,],: Launaii, a/kr Momm k jcwnc (from '' Lf Monument 
 i/ii Costiimc "). .j'-'' slati: 
 
PI. XXXI. 
 
 _ X, - r HEUIEi?JSE 
 
 . )'bri£rce[lsiceJKvruLeiir 
 
 r^ss 
 
 At' 2'Ajaron oe cTLolmen 
 
 c^ St Cinne. i^t Jr J' StanuliLi. /Mtm.trrc 
 Cm? yJrc'jjan? r^^SJ S .tK' /eTnnn 
 
 ^' L'heurcusc Union. " /'// JJusse, after Frnuhhery 
 
PI. XXXII. 
 
 Sj2E313Sk 
 
 lHj|lPl^|[!il!|!!IW^ 
 
 7// I, /I 7,,,/ yn/.i J >(/i vJ,<- > 
 
 C,irniii/ )i( P vV / ,/ cA /iii/j- 
 
 I ■,<;// , / III 
 
 It Arm tM*^ ^Am J, niA ^ jIMm 
 
 " LhcHreu.i: Moment" hij N. <Je Lawnai/, nftcr Lavninri-. {A.V.I). R. fitate) 
 
PI. XXXIII 
 
 « iSi^^'Ua^- ^If^HFff- 
 
 lll'di '■''«?■ 
 
 "Zrt Coiisohdioii dc rAhs.nirr" hy N. lie Ijitininij, aj'tcr Lnrnih 
 
PI. XXXIV. 
 
 --■teesBeta 
 
 ^l!;|llllHll]!|lSl!««l|ill|;l^r;lllSll1!l;"^P!JSlll;1^lP■n"^il■r";'l':' 
 trss 
 
 
 e.- 
 
 
 iB.iL. J ^ ^'-'-^^A'i 
 
 " //« t'oiiHolatiiiii (h: /'Ahsi-jin;" Jiif iV. f'e Lfcii'unij^ nftef Ijion'iwe, 
 
PI. XXXV. 
 
 " Lu Coriiplalsanrc niatrrndlc" Inj N. (h: Jjiiniay, after Fi'iiolrhi nj. (1'' t<fi(t>') 
 
1^1. XXXVI. 
 
 
 Cv. 
 
 LA. COJvlPLAISA-NCE 
 
 (Ly^L:JL,i^yC a^ame t Jeanne 
 
 vf /U> .^'11. yv z:*-^ f^ d, i. M.M^rt^, 
 
 a A-fr it^nt'n' f".' ii rv* itiv AiiW 
 
 Tit'e t/u Oihati 
 
 ^^'..xju'^ i'. ■;L:i''.!i!-LL;-j!. 
 
 -i,^ ^ ^.J«- .. 'UWTf ^ » - 
 
 _.^„,.M .A^«^i 
 
 
 -i//o.r . 
 
 " /y ( 'inirii/ii isii iiCi' iiiiifirntcl/i' " h// X. <h Ijlumni^ ajh r Fi-einlrhi- iij. (o''' xtntc) 
 
I 'I. XX.WII. 
 
PI. XXXVI II 
 
 s 
 
I'l. XXXIX. 
 
XL. 
 
I'l. XI.I- 
 
 
 Lcs Certsrs'' hij N. Pu'/ire^ njli-r ]hiiiiIoii.i:ih 
 
PI. XLIl 
 
 
 Li JniiH iiici' i/ii/a/iit" /'// HcliiKum, njii-i Bdudnvin 
 
" Z" lli'/ncoiitvi' ilinii/fi'iiisr" hij Li'i'riiii^ (i.fln- Jla inloii i ii 
 
PI. XLIV. 
 
 s 
 
PI. XLV. 
 
 *<! 
 
PI. XLVI. 
 
 1^' 
 
PI. XI. VII. 
 
 I^SiK^SWSg^WfJSi^^Ssq^ 
 
 ?VW«&\'^?ts^^'^T'^w*3:iS»f^JV*'T^^ 
 
 """ LA soiBftcrTF ( ^^^^^l3ENTE 
 
 JLL%^{)/r a /y/uwJ/r/// 
 
 _<'?r /, iw aJm '/'•">.» 'Mil'/. ^ 
 
 '-o-_/fr ^Vi'.- /W^;^^kv^(f.' 
 
 " La Souhrettc voaphriitc" hy YUhil^ <ift<:r Laorciufi: 
 
PI. XLVIII. 
 
 i L 1. j..uj,ja,_i, kii.iij.x ijj;i;:::iiuT tTTxr' i;iii.-i' viiii-T vtr :.kTrun"txin.];i.i ii 1 1 1 TjrrrgtTnrn; r-^ 
 
 ill 
 
 ill' 
 r.i 
 ■J 
 
 1^. 
 
 :i.lu.-<lv.OXXi.^^fc'-'.^:c>V-^'JXrj_^v.^^'..jji.v:<^>,^Z 
 
 
 ^f^^..'-^t-u^£^ ^'^^.^^^>u.:^'^^z.^^\ 
 
 . t » r : '^r , ; i.u ;-.':' . ^'fe i ;fc ' , ;' — -i'v'.: "^S^; .-■. s.-^.W ; . i 
 
 @ 
 
 
 LE IRJIiSTAlTRANl^ • 
 
 i*T-*.«.y«i^- 
 
 /Vv Jiw^ 
 
 " 7>'' lu'sfanra at'' hij ]_)cii.i, aj'frr Lavrci/icc 
 
I'l^ XLIX. 
 
 |i||||||!!!i|ii!i||lllli|!lil!!liffi 
 
 ;/ K\ot a 
 
 Hi 
 
 
 
 L.I, I I. Hini 
 
 I III 1^1 T I] n yn 
 
 " L' Anion r (( I'EsixKjiiijIr " hij yi. ilr ,SV A'liJdii find N. I'nini'un, iij'trr Lr Priuri' 
 
1^1. L. 
 
 " Jiis'/ncs (1(1 IIS la iiidlniyrc C/iasc " hy Mas(iU(:l.ijr, after Ihnuhjuiii 
 
I 'I. 
 
 
 ; li .\Jkii ' l,if |ii A^if i^WiW *^ 
 
 111! 
 
 li« 
 
 " )S'" TaiJb: est rnv/^S'inti' " hi/ Lrhi-ini^ iiflii- Jiniiihrnii 
 
PI. LII. 
 
 L'li iinohh: I'liiisain:" hti Juiinu't, itftn- St IJi'eiitin 
 
PI. IJII. 
 
 K^.r. 
 
 V 
 
 -- I ^ 
 
PI. LIV. 
 
 
 B^SBK 
 
 ass^ra 
 
 "./>(: Li'ver" hi/ Miissard, aftir Jin luJim in. (Fiynnc iiiifvari'd hi/ Clinjfii nl ) 
 
PI. LV. 
 
 
 
 
 " Jji (.riiclir ciixSi'i " /iij J. Miii<>i{i ril , II fli'r ( I rni 
 
PI. L\'l. 
 
 . T y " "9 " 
 
 mMMM^}E:£M. ^iiMM^ 
 
 ' ^MMiifi:mmMKmn\m wmmmaii/iaeam9mmmitm 
 
 T^i-'-i'^ifiiiifiniriimriiiii 
 
 n> 
 
 " Li. Tmlrllr " Ay ,A'. /'(i;/rr, ,(//,/■ lUmdiini,, . (Fraiii,' r iiij ni nil Irij Chopnil ) 
 
1^1. lA'll. 
 
 
 .-r ■«'i 
 
 ' ■»■ -^«i 
 
 
 .;S 
 
 , ♦■ '-.*T-g:;.*^-^T. 
 
 
 /,(• fjniii/ii' lip /I'fr-ii-ti'tc " III/ Hiiiionit, iifl' r Uinnliiiiiii 
 
PI. LVIII. 
 
 " L(i S'oi/yr i/rs Thuili-i'ti'S " hy l^iiiioiirt, after BcilKlovin 
 
PI. IJX. 
 
 ft' 'i|(l , V ,<>l!S.fci ■ ,«. 
 
 "//« petit Jour" till N. itc LdiiiKiji, nfter Firndctieni 
 
PI. LX, 
 
 ^;<.>^„rr^^-5..,.. , LE CARQliOIS 
 iji _ CL son c^iticjjc _ ^Con.icu]iic(u 
 t\Com/nanJi-in i~^ c/t oJuriiKut/ux') 
 
 
 ■1 J^a iLnnxc) Jc (jueriicn&iJ , ,; 
 ' ((Ui CfcnJarmcJ c>c (a Garde dwL'Loi \ 
 
 •VvV.1 ' <.-'--J-'"^t'^ f inn -' " iii-^fTi'lMi- ( 
 
 " 7^f (Janj^mns I'li/n.sr'' //// .A". 'A' L^nnitr//, (iff<:r ]'>ii inhui in 
 
I'l. LXI. 
 
 " Li A Hir.ii I'lls lirii i-nj,r ih' I' E^iyi rpuliiti s " hy X. ilr Ijimiiiij, uflir Frdiimiii ii) 
 
PI. LXII. 
 
 " IJK'iJOU^ii: uiiltScrrfr " hij X. ill' Li'ili III! 11^ iiftvr Jill iiihiii ill 
 
PI, LX III. 
 
 'Ah iiKjins soijcz dii^crct^' puiiiliil and inyrncnl hi/ St ^IiiJhi 
 
PI. LXIV. 
 
 " L'oiiipti^z sii r iiii'S Si'niit'nts," poiiitof nni] rngravei^ lnj Ht Avljin 
 
PI. LXV. 
 
 "Zc leijri- I'i'teineni" by (Jlncillcf, afta- Batuhuiin. {Pn>of state) 
 
PI. LXVI. 
 
 
 W/f ' i 
 
 P 
 
 iii.,i,,,.i 
 
 id&ri&O ER jg-g^T^B^St&Sf-T^Tr 
 
 "Zt /('V/rr Vrti'inoit" hi/ Chcri/lrt, after Baiiilouin. (I'rint state) 
 
PI. 1..WII. 
 
 'Li: Biyidon ih: llosi:" lij V'l'jc. Vainc, aj'lcr Willi' 
 
PI. LXVIII. 
 
 " L'l Curirusc" h// Vnt/c.-: I'uinr, aftci- irillc 
 
\>l. LXIX. 
 
 " L'Aiiinii I- fi-ivolc" hij J!i'(i II 111 ricf, lifter Tm nilmi i ii 
 
PI. LXX. 
 
PI. LXXI. 
 
 La Sl'ijirisr iiijiivlih:" Inj M'lxdlc, It fill- I'milli, 
 
PI. LXXIl 
 
 ^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 s 
 
PI. I.XXIll. 
 
 " L'Aiii.ant /acorisi'" liy CJuqionincr, iiftcr JJodly 
 
PI, LXXIN' 
 
 
 
 < \^ 
 
 1 ^\ 
 
 VN 
 
 V 
 
 N 
 
 f^ 
 
 s 
 
'1 LX.W. 
 
 1^ ^y/d-C/^/r' // 
 
 I ////. 'r //// 
 
 " I'li^siKfi: (hi Hiii^sium " hi/ I'd it, afli'v (lariurr 
 
PI. LX.Wl. 
 
 'Pic '/■ / TE A .J / TI K /f K . 7. V ^/ /,. 1 / S E 
 
 I'll ill f.il'ililii II jiiflil isr" hif I !iliiilii'i il. II fill- Xnrl lirijtl' 
 
1^1. I, XXVII 
 
PI LXXVIII. 
 
 i ■ :iirT;iiii;,!iTm]riiiiij''Tri],'ir„u,aiii.i?a^ 
 
 .'^ .//■ M.T.-.m k- J< im- i-Oo 
 
 Tith'-jHnji' In "Z/.s (/r'irrs" Ijij Jfn/ni>i' <h' fJ//fj-/o/i, r/if/rtfrr,l />// Mi>irai' Ic i'luir. 
 
I 'I I.XXIX. 
 
 tUr . 
 
 LES GRACES VENGEIKS 
 
 Ulustration to " Lcs Gracr.s " »/' JA'«/(/,;,- dr 'Jmrlua (J'uns, 170!)) 
 hy /^i/iiond, afti !■ Moixnu Ic jeimr 
 
PI. LXXX. 
 
 
 [//lis/ 1,1/ II, II /,, " Zr.s jlnii/nrrs ,/,' 'l'i'/i'i,,aij,ir" /iij Fnii/i,ii, {Paris, TTXri) 
 J!iii>/. II'., A,,. 1 L, /,,/,(,■, i„,ip' ,SG. Eiiinvixil Ijij TiJ/iard, nftir Minniei 
 
PI. LXXXI. 
 
 \&?sitj:s 
 
 
 
 Illustration to " Lt:s Avciituns iJr Tilniunjn,:" hi/ Faiflon. (Fai'is, 178.".) 
 Bool: IX., No. 1, tofacepagr 1'08, eiigra cal hi Tilliard, after Mound 
 
PI. LXXXII. 
 
 Ill list ri(tioii. III "Ofir/iiir (/is (!i-iin:s" hi] Milileiliniwlli' ]> . {Poris, 177 I ) 
 
 To fi'dr, pii'ir .'!7, I'liKid Ilf., viKjravml hif Musiiiidiir, afUr Cuchiii Jils 
 
PI. LXXXIII. 
 
 ^L. ! c'eit la Nmaplie <ie la France 
 IVous comiaifflon.s ce Portrait - la 
 
 Illustration to " Cltoi.i' dc CJuinsons" htj df la Bonlf. (Park, 177M) 
 " Zc Portrait reeomta " ( I'al. I., paffc (J), riigraml and dcsii/iird Iri/ Morcau h: jcuim 
 
PI. LXXXIV. 
 
 Jvlajs potcpnepas le Im doTiiier 
 Ij muTrf bien le laifTerpreniire. 
 
 Ill ustraf ion to " ('/ini.f ilr Cliansons" hij ilc Ik Jli/rdr. (Paris, 177-!) 
 Lr Ihvii (If PeKtji " ( ]'iil, I ., jiaiir 102), riiijra lyyj ami ilcsigncd hij Jloirau h' jciinc 
 
1^1. LXXXV. 
 
 
 ■■^ V .' 
 
 C}ian(oiis sans ccTrc , 
 Vrve la Fojre de Ooiie/Te 
 
 III iistrrdifin to " O/mi.r iji- ('//o/iisoiis" bi/ ilc hi Biirdi-. (I'uris, 177-1) 
 " L(i Foirc ill': (_rOiu:&S''" ( \"ijl. I., puijc VHJ), migrnced mnl (Irsii/ncd In/ Moreau Ic /ntiu: 
 
PI. LXXXVI. 
 
 Colin a TOOTi coenr n'olire 
 
 T 
 
 trne ilenr 
 
 ilc 
 
 ATais de ia conitance 
 vJ'aKens tout nion bonlicnr . 
 
 Illvsfratiiin fa " Clioi^: /Ir (//lansoiis" hi/ de la Boi-ile. {Puris, ITT'-'O 
 " L\linant fiin'ijh:" ( I'ul. /., purjc 144), I'lni reived and drsii/iied hi/ Monait le jiaiir 
 
I'l. lAX.W'll. 
 
 .-in-' 
 
 
 .f;jF*Y-.'Ks-?'t, 
 
 S^i^i;^;*^-: ;*»? 
 
 
 Ce nectar plcin d aUra\ls , 
 Le vin coule a longs traits 
 LaVlcilleGc s'cndorl, el la Jeunelie veiUc. 
 
 Ill astro till II, to " Glioi.'- lie Ijianmn^ " In/ (te In llnrflc. (Faris^ 177''>) 
 " L'Aiitoniiii'" ( 77)/. //., j)i-".l'' ^-^) 1>!I Mfisiimiii'i-, nflri- Ic Bnntcii.r 
 
PI. LXXXVIII. 
 
 AVi dit elle, en mbntrant le poin^ 
 Tu defcbejs a ta mere . 
 
 lUustmtion to " Choic de Cluinsons" hy de la Bordc. (Paris, 1773) 
 " Le Pot axL Lait " ( Vol. II., parje 26) hy Nee. after Ic Bouteuj- 
 
PI. LXXXIX. 
 
 II fut initie par ellos 
 
 Dans Icurs miucres enchanteurs 
 
 Illasfratiiin tji " Choi'- >If Chansons" ly ilc la Bonlc. (I'aris, 177M) 
 " Ana,riiiia-,!iliv" { Vol. III., page 2) /'// Masqnclur, a/In- /c Barhior 
 
PI. xc. 
 
 •Aprcs \in lono- lilence 
 J'cnicndis un (oupir... 
 
 Ill iistriiHiiii t-j " Cliiii.i- (/(■ Chdii^iiiis" III/ (](' id I'tdrih'. (I'di-i^, 177-1) 
 " I^'henrriinr lid/nli" ( Vdl. III., iKd/r :','2) hi/ Misrj id'l ir r^ dftir Ir IidrhieV 
 
XCI 
 
 Que le SoleiJ ell Iodcp a Hnir Pa carncre 
 Quand on attend la niut pouj" rc\'oir (a Bercccre. 
 
 Illnstriifiiiii til " ''/,„/,,■ ilr CliKiii^fiis" hij ilf III Jinnlr. {/'iiri^, ITT-") 
 " Li lu'tour i/)i J!iiyri' " { I'n/. ///., pm/r ^ 10) /;// jVir, iijlrr Ir Biirhiir 
 
PI. XCII. 
 
 T.c cruel poifon 
 De la raifoa 
 
 Ne glace plus mon ame, 
 Jc I abandonne a toi 
 
 ll]ii^l raliiiii til " ("//()/,• (/,/ CIijiiixiiiix" hij ilr hi Biirdr. {Phi'ik, 177''!) 
 L' Anion r rii iiii/iii II r ilr In Ji'iiison" { I'nl. IV., jiiiflr 104) /'// ^''''', <'ift>'i' Sn int-Ql'ent in. 
 
1^1. XCIII. 
 
 La NvinpKc Salimaacis vciit cjinlji'affer 
 le I'cune If CR'nJiiai^lvrO'clilc qiiii''c:lle voil 
 dams le Baim » 
 
 III ust ration to " IaS Mctii.iiiiiriihiisiA tl'th-'nlr." {I'liris^ 1768) 
 'Sfdmacis d HirniKApliriKJiti:" [to fuce paiii' 'I't, Vol, II.) lii/ jl/iixsont, aftrr ifoinict 
 
PI. XCIV. 
 
 D.-J^unJU .':--//• t-64 
 
 llliixli-iil'iui, ti, " Zcs Mrfiiiiiiiriihiisr.^ trOridi." {Paris 1760) 
 i\'iiis.';,i,ii-r i/'Ai/,,iiis" {/u/<i,_r jitij/r 2;;,j, ]'n/. III.) hi/ X. i/r Latuijif/, lifter Uiseii 
 
1^1. xcv. 
 
 IlhistmtiKii til " Li'!i M,tjiiiiorp]i(->S(H i/'Oriil,." (I'uris, 1709) 
 J'emts et Adonis snr vii Haz'ui" (t,, face p, up: 241, /',//. ///.) /-// Mamird, afkr Jlmirhn- 
 
PI. XCVI. 
 
 Tdil-piiyi: til " Lrs Mr/jiiinirjihuws il'Uvide." {Paris, 1771) 
 Til fiivi- IVKJ'' •'■''•% ''"^- ^^'i i'n'.iriiV('Al and druvjna} Iry Choffurd 
 

 ■■■;-ijiT 
 
 v**