among the Aiitlents. 165 



Tlie first monument of this kind erected in France was 

 ti»e statue of Henry IV^. ; the horse was cast at Florence by 

 John of Boulogne: Cosmo II., the grand duke of Tuscany, 

 presented it to Mary of Medicis, queen of France, and at 

 tliat lime regent; she destined it to consecrate the memory 

 of the king her husband, whose statue was executed by Du- 

 pre the sculfHor by her orders. It was erected in 1635. 



A short time afterwards cardinal Richelieu erected the 

 equestrian statue of Louis XIII. in the Place Royale. The 

 horse was executed in Tuscany bv Ilicciarelii de Volterre, a 

 pupil of Michael Angelo, and was regarded by some as a 

 superior work, and by others as a middling production. The 

 statue of the king was executed bv Biard. 



ITie age of Louis XIV. was so brilliant for the arts, that 

 the splendour of the Augustan age, so much boasted of, is 

 nearly eclipsed by the comparison. 



The art of founding declined under Augustus ; and the 

 reports of Pliny and Vitruvius, both upon the taste then 

 reigning in painting, and upon the method of the painters 

 in their days, must give us a very unfavourable idea of their 

 talents, while the names of Girardon,De?jardins, Bouchardon, 

 Lemoine, Paget, Lebrun, Lesueur, Bourdon, Miguard, Jou- 

 vcnet, &c., have been the glory of their age, and the admira- 

 tion of every country where their works have penetrated. 



The statue of Louis XIV. in the Place dcs Victoires, by 

 Des-jardins, and the equestrian statue of the same prince ia 

 the Place Vendomc, by Girardon, were unique performances, 

 with respect to beauty of design and the elegance and 

 niagniliccnee of the appendages, llie cities of Lyons, 

 Rennes, Dijon, MoBtpelier, Bourdeaux, and Metz, were 

 necessarily adorned with statues of this prince, and of his 

 successor; but thg revolution of the 18th century was 

 equally fatal to all these works as was the invasion of 

 Altila to the bronzes of Kome, and the fanaticism of the 

 crusaders to those of Constantinople. 



France, which produced the talents that decorated the 

 other cities of Europe, is, however, strijipcd of these chei's- 

 fl'ujuvre, which formeily formed the ornaments of her 

 iHiblic places. 



h 3 ft 



