Page:Self-help with illustrations of conduct and perseverance (IA selfhelpwithillu00smiliala).pdf/233

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
Chap. vi]
JACQUES CALLOT
195

prosecuting his studies at Rome. Thither he went accordingly; and this time he remained, diligently studying design and engraving for several years, under competent masters. On his way back to France, he was encouraged by Cosmo II. to remain at Florence, where he studied and worked for several years more. On the death of his patron he returned to his family at Nancy, where, by the use of his burin and needle, he shortly acquired both wealth and fame. When Nancy was taken by siege during the civil war, Callot was requested by Richelieu to make a design and engraving of the event, but the artist would not commemorate the disaster which had befallen his native place, and he refused point-blank. Richelieu could not shake his resolution, and threw him into prison. There Callot met with some of his old friends the gipsies, who had relieved his wants on his first journey to Rome. When Louis XIII. heard of his imprisonment, he not only released him, but offered to grant him any favour he might ask. Callot immediately requested that his old companions, the gipsies, might be set free and permitted to beg in Paris without molestation. This odd request was granted on condition that Callot should engrave their portraits, and hence his curious book of engravings entitled 'The Beggars.' Louis is said to have offered Callot a pension of 3,000 livres provided he would not leave Paris; but the artist was now too much of a Bohemian, and prized his liberty too highly to permit him to accept it; and he returned to Nancy, where he worked till his death. His industry may be inferred from the number of his engravings and etchings, of which he left not fewer than 1,600. He was

13