St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1880-01-30

artists in both England and the United
States, some of considerable merit, but
largely i'll private collections. On the
continent, however, one seldom sees
good paintings of French masters of
past generations outside of France.
Two rooms in the Louvre are filled
with the works of LIE Sueur,-these are
chiefly NEUROLOGICAL and historical, and
twenty-five of them represent scenes in
the life of st. Bruno. Fifteen Seaports
OF France by Joseph Vernet, and other
sea-scenes by the same, more than fill
another room. The paintings marked
PoussIn are often puzzling as to their
authorship, since two celebrated mas
ters bear that name. Nicolas Poussin,
whose life in Italy made his painting
more Italian than French, drew his
subjects chiefly from history and my
tholOgy, and his best picture represents
shepherd kneeling before tombstone
and reading the inscription: Et in ar
cadia ego, Gaspar Poussin (whOse real
same was Dughet) and Claude Lorraine
are, next to N. Poussin, the most ia
nous of the older French landscape
painters. The latter, however, was ed
ucated and lived mostly in Italy, hence
his works have not the brilliant and
ofteu faring coloring which is one of
ha oh ahar nt OF nf
French style, especially of more recent
days. His pictures are widely scattered.
The best in the Louvre aTe two seaport
views, but these are accounted less
worthy of his fame than several in
Florence and Rome.
VERSAILLES.
We must go to the palace which Louis
XIV built at Versailles, ten miles from
Paris in order to see the best works of
the French painters who attained repu-
tatiOn from Tvs to 1910. These are
chiefly portraits and battle scenes by
David, Delacroix, Ary Scheffer, Horace
Vernet, and DelarOche, and, as one
gazes on the faces of generals and field
marshals, kings, emperOrs, and sadly
tated queens, and OH the views of sieges
and hard-fOught conflicts, he feels more
strongly than ever before that this is a
nation that has dyed itself in blood.
And what besides these pictures and an
unenviable history, has she to-day to
show for it!
In this palace we are taken through
the rooms, and shown the furniture,
books and ornaments, of the queens
Maria Theresa, and Marie Antoinette
Since the death of Louis XVI it has not
been occupied by the rulers of France.
From September 1870 to March 1871, ,
Versailles was the headquarters of the
King of Prussia and much of the palace
was used as hospital, but the pictures
were carefully covered to protect them
from injury and the whole edifice with
its valuable contents was left without
trace of the usual Vandalism of war.
1t is worthy of note here that in all the
wars of Europe in later centuries COM
batants on either side-French Com
munists alone excepted-have We'd with
each other in the preservation of libra
ries and museums. We wish the same
could he truly said of American soldiers
III our late war. The gardens in the
rear of the palace at Versailles, with ar
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tlficial ponds, fountains, statuary, flow
ers, and the extensive park surrounding
the whole, constitute one of the most
attractive pleasure resorts of the Pari-
slams, and on fine Sundays in summer
the place is thronged with visitors. The
fountains here throw jets to the height
OF seventy-fve feet, but play only once
month on Sunday afternoon, and
then only for an hour OF two. The wa
ter for them is brought for distance of
over thirty miles. Voltaire called this
palace and park a "bottomless pit of
expense, the first cost being two hun
dred millions of dollars.
The Luxembourg Palace on the south
side of the Seine has collection of
sculptures, paintings and drawings by
living artists. Some of the marbles are
very good, but the pictures are inferior,
since the best formerly there have been
recently removed. The building and
the trees in the park which environs it,
show marks of shot and shell thrown
eight years ago. Near the Luxembourg
is the Pantheon, an immense church in
the form of a Greek cross. We enter it
through pOrtico of twenty-five Cor
inthian columns, each 80 feet in height,
and the roof is crowned by huge DOME
In the vaults is remarkable echo,-
the tap of hammer on a board sound
ing like the firing of cannon. To us the
Madeleine seems the most imposing and
attractive church edifice in Paris. 1t is
In the form of IL Greek temple, is sur
rounded by sixty magnificent Corinthian
columns, and is richly adorned with
statuary and reliefs. The facade of
Notre Dame is very fine, especially the
portal reliefs representing the Last
Judgment and the Burial of the Virgin,
and the towers are well proportioned
and graceful, but, as. whole, this
church disappointed us. Saint Chapelle,
erected by Lonis TX in 124a, was for
many years the court chapel. 1t is all
elegant Gothic structure, has fifteen fine