for exactly the required incitement to fertile effort; here and there we find some to whom under other circumstances the world about them might have furnished motives adequate to the production of independent work, but these also respond happily to the claims made upon them, claims the fulfilment of which was not incompatible with a sufficing freedom in the choice of subject. As regards Duvet the case was otherwise; his thoughts dwelt beyond the marge and rim of actual existence, and the rarer spirit which animated them escaped from the forced control of absolute dictation. It is probable that if we were in possession of authenticated specimens of his goldsmith's work we might be unable to recognise in them the hand of the master whom we have learnt to reverence in the illustrations to the Apocalypse. Delaulne's designs may now and again be identified on pieces of plate, but we never seem to catch sight of anything which is individualised from the general mass by the peculiar accent of Duvet. Duvet's engravings are for us the sum of the activity of his long life. With the last page of the Apocalypse we close the record. When or where he died is unknown. Four engravings should, I think, be excepted from the catalogue of Duvet's work which are included in it by M. de Laboullaye, the most recent writer on the subject. These are, Triomphe de la Divinité ;' Portrait of Adrian VI. (the obverse and reverse, it is supposed by M. Galichon, of one and the same medal), 'Mars,' an engraving dated 1524, and 'Intemperance.' All these show a technic totally distinct from that which characterises Duvet's authentic work. There has also been some controversy as to the epoch at which he executed the St. John in Patmos, which was not included by Robert-Dumesnil, nor by Leblanc, in the series of the Apocalypse, although it is of exactly the same size and character as the rest of the set. M. de Laboullaye says that an impression in the Musée de Langres bears date 1517, but this date does not occur on any example that I have seen. In the Privilege' affixed to the perfect series in the Print Room at Paris, which contains this plate, it is expressly stated that the work had occupied Duvet for ten years, and that it had been begun for François I. It must therefore have been undertaken prior to 1547, and in that case we may assume that the date 1555 which occurs on the frontispiece was the date of its completion, and I am inclined to think that the subject of St. John in Patmos, if originally executed in 1517, was re-engraved without date when included by Duvet in the complete edition. 143 CHAPTER IV. ENGRAVING ON METAL. (1553-1576.) Étienne Delaulne. J'ay voulu m'en aller du lieu de ma naissance C. MAROT. Étienne DelaulnE, commonly called 'Maître Stephanus,' comes forward, as Duvet passes out of sight. Delaulne has left us a vast legacy, but of the conditions under which he carried on his indefatigable labours we know little. By the help of the dates which he has frequently prefixed to his engravings, we are just able to trace an outline, which vaguely defines for us his place in the history of the time. Yet even what might have been done, in this way, has been left undone. His work has had many a collector, but hardly any students, and thus dates and inscriptions have continued to serve simply as aids to the objects of identification and catalogue, rather than as links, by which might be pieced together a continuous story of development. By profession, Delaulne was, like Duvet, a gold smith, and Mariette tells us that he had himself examined a volume of original designs for medals made by Maître Stephanus, of which he gives a list, but the collection itself has since disappeared. Robert-Dumesnil has catalogued 443 engravings by Delaulne, according to subject, and recapitulates, in a prefatory notice, the few known references to previous authors who have made incidental mention of his name. M. Burty, in' Chefs-d'œuvre des Arts Industriels,' recently consecrated a few lines to the same subject. The authors of La France Protestante' have ascertained that he was born at Orleans, about the close of the year 1520, the year which saw the election of Charles V., and the beginning of troubles. They have also given the date of his death, which occurred in 1595, at Strasbourg, the city of refuge for Frenchmen guilty of the crime of unauthorised thought. ་ We first hear of him in 1553, just two years before Duvet completed his last work, the series of illustrations to the Apocalypse. On March 3 in that year, letters patent were granted by Henri II. to Aubin Ollivier, by which the said Ollivier was empowered to stamp coin in a mill, according to a process of his own invention. Jean Rondelle and Étienne Delaulne associated with Ollivier in this enterprise. Ollivier himself engraved on wood, as he has told us in the Preface to Cousin's 'Livre de Perspective,' which came out seven years later (1560), but his turn of genius seems to have been specially mechanical; and, as the engagements of his appointment as 'maître et conducteur des engins de la monnoye,' made certain and regular demands upon his time, Delaulne, who was distinguished by great facility and readiness in design, was a desirable assistant. How long the partnership lasted we do not know. Delaulne's name does not again appear in any official record, and thenceforth we depend upon his engravings alone, to furnish such information as can be gleaned about him. Certain of these engravings immediately separate themselves from the rest. These are those commonly said by French collectors to be in his 'grand manner,'— such as the 'Conversion of St. Paul,' after Cousin, most of the series called 'Combats et Triomphes,' and the larger set of 'Months.' The remainder are all characterised by greater lightness of handling, and less marked style. Amongst them many examples occur which would appear rather to be the product of the needle than the burin. In these it would seem that we have his earliest work, and all may, I think, be referred to some time between the years 1560 and 1570. To this class belongs his portrait of Henri II., which is the earliest dated work which we have from his hand, and also a set of Scripture subjects engraved within small ovals. Two of these, Jacob wrestling with the Angel,' and 'Laban,' are signed and dated 1561. Taken as a whole, these very early prints are |