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Updated: June 27, 2025
L'Indifférent, that young man in the Louvre who treads the earth with such light disdain, with such an airy expression of sweetness and ennui, that picture, Mauclair remarks, is the soul of Watteau. And, perhaps, spills his secret. Mauclair does not like the coupling of Watteau's name with those of Boucher, Pater, Lancret, De Troy, Coypel, or Vanloo.
Fifty years' toning does the same thing to a picture. He is happier when he is writing about Watteau and Lancret, about Rubens and Giorgione, about Rembrandt, Corregio, and Michael Angelo; happiest of all when he is writing about Greek things. What is Gothic touched him very little, but classical art and the art of the Renaissance were always dear to him.
The departure for Cythera! exclaims Watteau; Lancret, the painter of plebeians, contemplates his bourgeois, who have flitted away into the azure sky; Diderot stretches out his arms to all these love idyls, and d'Urfe mingles druids with them.
In the oval medallions supported by cupids, is found a domestic scene by a Fragonard or a Chardin; and the portraits of innocent children by Greuze replace the courting shepherds and mythological goddesses of Boucher and Lancret. Sculpture, too, becomes more refined and decorous in its representations. As with architecture, decoration, painting, and sculpture, so also with furniture.
It was indeed the ideal artistic centre: Fragonard, Lavrience, Eisen, St. Aubin, and the school of followers of Boucher and Lancret elegant triflers in their way, but unequalled for dash and brilliancy were the leading spirits as Rowlandson imbibed his first inspiration from these attractive fonts.
There were bits of old china, pieces of tapestry, some rare prints, my choice collection of mezzotints, a picture or two of value one a Lancret, a very dear possession. And there were my books once I had a passion for rare bindings. Every thing had to me a personal significance, and I hated the idea of surrender more than I dared to confess even to myself. But I said to Lola: "Vanity of vanities!
There are only two pictures on the walls: "The Departure of the Newly Married Couple," exquisitely painted by Lancret; and "The Prediction," an adorable work by Watteau, bought at an incredible price at the Pourtales sale. Over the chimney-piece is a miniature by Pommayrac, representing Micheline as a little child a treasure which Madame Desvarennes cannot behold without tears coming to her eyes.
The Rococo period was now chosen, many lovely specimens of the art of Watteau, Lancret, David, Vigee, Lebrun, Fragonnard, Greuze, and Bonnat were procured, and again the Berliner was given an opportunity not only of enjoying an artistic treat of a delightful kind, but of comparing the impressions made on him by the art spirits of two other nations.
Miss Stackpole directed her gaze to the Constable again, and Ralph bespoke her attention for a small Lancret hanging near it, which represented a gentleman in a pink doublet and hose and a ruff, leaning against the pedestal of the statue of a nymph in a garden and playing the guitar to two ladies seated on the grass. "That's my ideal of a regular occupation," he said.
"Then the people of whom you buy things of this kind are very stupid, are they?" she asked quickly. "Stupid dealers are unknown in Paris," Pons answered almost drily. "Then you must be very clever," put in Cecile by way of calming the dispute. "Clever enough to know a Lancret, a Watteau, a Pater, or Greuze when I see it, little cousin; but anxious, most of all, to please your dear mamma."
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