Report to the Right honourable the master of the rolls upon the documents in the archives and public libraries of Venice / by Thomas Duffus Hardy.
- Thomas Duffus Hardy
- Date:
- 1866
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Report to the Right honourable the master of the rolls upon the documents in the archives and public libraries of Venice / by Thomas Duffus Hardy. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Harvey Cushing/John Hay Whitney Medical Library at Yale University.
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![certaine nirae or passage towardes the great library, in the pallace of St. Marke, at Venice. In reply to this despatch, the Senate wrote to Vallaresso on the 2nd of May 1624:— With regard to the entreaties made to you on behalf of the Duke of Buckingham concerning the pictures in the halls of the ducal palace, you acted in a form calculated to prevent further persistence, and we commend you for it. Ayes 16. Noes 1. Neutrals 10. Louis XIII., in order to facilitate his sister's marriage, was more accommodating than the Republic of Venice, to whom Vallaresso's successor, Giovanni Pesaro, wrote from London on the 28th of February 1625 :— A present of choice pictures from the King of France is expected, he having selected the finest he has at Fontainbleau to give them to the Duke of Buckingham ;* all sovereigns now-a-days seeking to gain such ministers as are most powerful by gratifying their tastes and furthering their interests. 44. While on the subject of painting, I may state that among the papers of the Inquisitors of State, there is one dated August and September 1773, being an account of a scheme formed by the consul Udny, and Francesco Bulo, parish priest of St. Bartholo- mew's church at Treviso, to abstract.the famous picture of the Crucifixion by Carlo Caliari. * In the Reliquisc Wottonianae (p. 314) is a letter from Sir Henry Wotton to the Duke of Buckingham, dated Venice, December 1622, in which he advises the duke that he has sent by a ship called the Phoenix some pictures ; one by Titians -wherein the least figure (the child in the Virgin's lap playing with a bird) is alone worth the price of jour expense for all four. In a postscript he says, I have sent a servant of mine (by profession a painter) to make search in the best towns through Italy for some principal pieces, which I hope may produce somewhat for your Lordship's contentment and service. It is a well-known fact that Bucking- ham had a very large collection of pictures. Buckingham's agent on the continent was Balthasar Gerbier; his letters to the duke on works of art are very entertain- ing. One dated Boulogne, 17th November 1624, is very characteristic of these two persons. He writes, during the time I have been in Paris I have not passed one hour without searching after some rarity ; and I should have stayed there but four days had it not been, as I thought, very necessary that I should find out all that there is Paris, and I never could have thought that they had so many rare things in Prance, all which are to come into your hands at your happy arrival. I beg your Excellency to read the other sheet, and you will there see three rare pictures of' Michel Angel Rapael.' It is, my Lord, because since my last I have found, at the house of the Bishop of Paris, three of the most rare pictures that can be. The first is a St. Francis, a good-sized painting, from the hand of the Cavallier Ballion, as good as ' Michel Angelo Carazoago [Carazoago] ;' and the other a picture of our Lady, by Raphael, which is repainted by some devil, who I trust was hanged ; but still it is so lovely, and the drawing is so fine, that it is worth a thousand crowns. There is another picture of ' Michel Angelo Bonnarotta,' but that should be seen kneeling, for it is a Crucifixion, with the Virgin and St. John—the most divine thing in the world. I have been such an idolator as to kiss it three times, for there is nothing more perfect. It is a miniature. . . . . I have met with a most beau- tiful piece of Tintoret, of a Danae, a naked figure, the most beautiful, that flint as cold as ice might fall in love with it. I have given twenty crowns in hand for the Gorgon's head; it cost two hundred crowns. I have not yet paid for them, because I was not willing to draw bills until I knew how much I should employ at Paris.'](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21021284_0042.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
