O f pine or monumental oak,
Where the rude axe with heaved ftroke
W a s never heard the nymphs to daunt,.
O r fright them from their hallowed haunt.”
Bv Salvator Rofa, the well-known picture of the Prodigal Son,,
from the Houghton collection ; Democritus and Protagoras, not
lefs celebrated; and feveral fine landfcapes..
Of the Bolognefe fchool, two Guercinos, and feveral invaluable
pieces by Guido Rheni, Befides the celebrated picture of the
doctors confulting on the immaculate conception of the Virgin
Mary, from the Houghton collection, I could not fufficiently
admire that delightful painting, known by the name of LeS
Coufeufes, from the Crozat collection. That charming picture
reprefents an aged governefs fuperintending feveral young women
at work, who are models of perfeCt beauty, unaffefted grace,
and ferene innocence. Thefe two. paintings are of themfelves
fufficient to exculpate Guido from the cenfures of thofe eon-
noiifeurs, who, judging haitily from a few fpecimens, indiscriminately
accufe him of always facrificing too much to the
graces, and of introducing affeCted attitudes.
The cabinet contains alfo a few pictures by Battoni and Mengs,
in whom the genius of the Roman fchool feems to have expired.
Of Battoni, Thetis approaching Charon with her infant Achilles,
afleep is not without merit.
Three pictures by Mengs deferve to be mentioned: i . Per-
fcus and Andromeda, in which that painter has erred againit
Coitume,
Coflume, by reprefenting the hero naked, and Andromeda half CHAf,
clothed. The author varied fomewhat from his original defign, , ----
which was an exact copy of the baffo relievo of the Fauilina,
on the pedeftal of a column at Rome, and on which is engraved*
Pietro Santo Bartoli. With refpeCt to the drapery, Mengs
feems to have adopted that from the gem of Callyrrhoe, the
Bacchanalian Woman. 2. The Judgment of Paris, a very fine
picture. 3. St. John preaching in the wildernefs, a fingle
figure j his air and motion are dignified. Mengs finiihed this
„picture for his friend M. de Liana, formerly envoy to the court
o f Parma.
In order to diitinguifh St. John, the artift drew on ene fide of
the picture the head of a fheep badly executed. Mengs having
copied this picture for a friend, omitted the fheep’s head, and
inferted in its place a trunk of a tree, which had a piCturefque
effeCt. The St. John, in the emprefs’s collection, is a third copy
o f the fame fubjeCt; ;the figure, though of a fmaller fize, being
the fame as in the two former, and the llieep’s head is omitted;
Mengs has not in this inftance alone re-copied his figures.
He painted his own portrait for Mr. de Saphorin, and from this
. picture he made feveral copies ; one he fent to. the gallery pf
Florence, a fecond is at Turin, a third at Madrid, and a fourth
in the poffeffion of his friend, Mr. Azara, at Rome.
This circumilaoce fufficiently ihews, that the great mailers
.'frequently copied their own works; and proves the poffibility of
finding feveral paintings in the different collections, which, al-
F f, 2 though