V E L 



expence is from 30J. to 40J. per ton. The cup which con- 

 tains the nut or kernel conftitutes the value of the valonia. 

 It has been ufed in this country many years by the dyers, 

 and has lately been introduced into the tanneries as a fub- 

 ftitute for oak-bark, and the quantity ufed in this way has 

 been very confiderable. The quantity imported into Lon- 

 don and Liverpool for the years 1811, 1812, 18 13, amounted 

 to above 1 200 tons per annum on an average. This was at 

 a time when oak-bark was fcarce and dear ; but when the 

 price of bark is low, the confumption of velani is lefs ex- 

 tenfive ; for the leather raanufaftured with oak-bark is pre- 

 ferred to that prepared with velani, chiefly on account of its 

 colour, as the quality of the leather is reckoned to be equal, 

 if not fuperior, to that which is tanned with bark. We 

 may here obferve, that the great diftance from which va- 

 lonia, or velani, is brought, and the heavy duty it pays, 

 compared with oak-bark, difcourage its ufe ; but if the 

 duty (hould be taken off, it is probable that the confumption 

 would be greatly increafed. 



VELANIDA, in Botany. See QuEBCUs, n. 68. 



VELARIUS, in Antiquity, an officer in the court of the 

 Roman emperors, being a kind of ufher, whofe poll; was 

 behind the curtain, -vela, in the prince's apartment ; as that 

 of the chancellors, cancelli, was at the entry of the baluftrade, 

 and that of the ojTiarii at the door. 



The velarii had a fuperior, of the fame denomination, who 

 commanded them ; as we find in two infcriptions, quoted by 

 Salmafius in his notes on Vopifcus, and by a third in Gruter. 



VE LASCO, Don Antonio Palomino, in 5/o_5-ra/>A_)r,was 

 a Spanifh painter and hiftorian of the artifts of his country. 

 He was a native of Valencia, where he flourilhed about 

 1700. He was painter to Philip V., and painted many 

 pictures for the churches and convents of Valencia, Sala- 

 manca, and Grenada, but is much better known to us as an 

 author. He publifhed an elaborate treatife on the art of 

 painting, in two folio volumes, in which he notices 250 

 painters and fculptors who had flourilhed in Spain previous 

 to the conclufion of the reign of Philip IV. Of this work, 

 there was an abridgment publiflied in London in 1742, 

 entitled " Las Vidas de los Pintores y Statuarios eminentes 

 Efpanoles," of which there is an Englifh tranflation. 



Velasco, in Geography, a town of North America, in the 

 province of Mexico. 



VELASQUEZ de Silva, Don Diego, in Biography, 

 the mod diftinguilhed painter of the Spanifli fchool, was 

 born at Seville in 1594. His parentage was noble, being 

 of a family originally of Portugal, which had eftabliflied 

 itfelf in Andalufia. Though confined in fortune, they gave 

 him a Uberal education, and, as he had evinced much inclina- 

 tion for drawing, placed him with Francefco de Herrera, 

 the elder ; but he afterwards became the difciple of F. Pa- 

 checo, an artill of very confiderable abihty, and a fcholar, 

 then refiding at Seville. With him Velafquez ftudied at- 

 tentively, and his talents difplaycd themfelves in a variety of 

 imitations of natural objedts, particularly of peafantry in 

 their pecuhar habits and occupations. Of thefe we have 

 now a fpecimen in England, which had at all times been 

 efteemed as a mafter exhibition of his early acquirements, 

 and celebrated under the appellation of the " Water Car- 

 rier." It was Ilationed in the new palace at Madrid, but 

 was removed from tlience by Jofeph Bonaparte, and was 

 found, with a great number of other piftures, in the imperial 

 carriage taken at the battle of Vittoria. It is now in the pof- 

 feffion of the duke of Wellington, among the numerous other 

 trophies of that great man's fame. Still, however, it is con- 

 fidered by his grace as the property of the Spanifh crown. 

 Velafquez continued attached to this particular apphcation of 



9 



V E L 



his art, eonfcious of his fuperiority, and declining to extend 

 his views to a more elevated clafs of fubjefts, till at length 

 the fight of fome piftures by Guido and Caravaggio, which 

 Pacheco had received from Italy, excited his emulation, and 

 he then turned his thoughts to hiftory and portraiture. 

 After he had been five years with Pacheco, that mafter be. 

 ftowed upon him the hand of his daughter in marriage, and 

 he continued ftill to praftife his art under the guidance of 

 that able inftruftor. In 1622, Velafquez left Seville, to 

 vifit the metropohs of Spain and the Efcurial, and there 

 his talents recommended him to the notice of the count Dc 

 Olivarez, the favourite minifter of Philip IV., who patro- 

 nized and befriended him ; taking him into his own palace 

 to dwell. Soon after he introduced him to the king, who 

 immediately ordered him to paint his portrait. From the 

 completion of this pifture, which was upon a grand fcale in 

 armour, and on horfeback, the reputation of Velafquez was 

 eftablilhed above all his contemporaries, and his patron was 

 ordered to inform him, that from that time the royal perfon 

 would be intrufted to no other painter but himfelf. He 

 received the royal permiffion to make a pubhc exhibition of 

 it, when it was loudly applauded by all about the court, and 

 lield up to pubhc eftimation by laudatory verfes in its 

 honour from the poets. 



After this fuccefsful commencement of his public career, 

 he was employed to paint the portraits of the infants Don 

 Carlos and Don Fernando ; and that of the minifter, his 

 patron, mounted, like his royal mafter, on a noble Andalufian 

 charger, richly caparifoned. He now, therefore, began to 

 enjoy the bleffings of fortune, as well as thofe of fame. He 

 was appointed principal painter to the king, with a hberal 

 falary, befides receiving munificent remuneration for his 

 piftures, and being bufily occupied in portraits. 



He now alfo, in emulation of other Spanifh painters, de- 

 termined to undertake a work upon a more extended fcale 

 than he had before done, and took for his fubjeft the ex- 

 pulfion of the Moors from Spain by Philip III. But, if 

 we may judge by the defcription given of the pifture, it 

 does not appear to have pofleffed much interefting matter 

 of a high hiftoric quahty ; however, he gained great repu- 

 tation from the flcill with which he executed it. The com- 

 pofition reprefented the king armed, and in the aft of com- 

 manding a party of foldiers, who are efcorting a group of 

 Moors of different fexes and ages to the fea-fhore for em- 

 barkation. On the other fide is perfonified the kingdom of 

 Spain, as a majeftic matron, with a ftately edifice. This 

 pifture, as appears by an infcription upon it, was painted in 

 1627, and it was no fooner completed than he again expe- 

 rienced the munificence of his fovereign, who made him one 

 of his chamberlains, and allowed him an additional ftipcnd. 



It was at this time that Rubens vifited Madrid. He 

 formed an intimacy with Velafquez, and firft infpired him 

 with a defire to vifit Italy ; and he obtained from his royal 

 patron every advantageous means of going there, with re- 

 commendatory letters to render his refidence in Rome 

 and Venice as ufeful and agreeable to him as polTible. 



He embarked at Barcelona in 1629, and firft landed at 

 Venice, where he was received and entertained by the Spa- 

 nifh ambaffador. In this dehghtful birth-place of colouring, 

 the works of its great mafter Titian, in the palace of St. Marc, 

 excited his warmeft admiration, and he made feveral copies of 

 them : and no one ever more thoroughly imbibed the prin- 

 ciples upon which they are conftrufted. But perhaps it is 

 of Tintoretto that Velafquez is more the imitator, than of 

 Titian. His freedom of pencil appears to have been more 

 congenial with the tafte of the Spaniard, than the fober and 

 more correft h.ind of the former. After remaining at Ve- 

 nice 



