the picture[1]. The injury done by the damp to the colouring has been, it is true, in some measure repaired by Michael Angelo Bellotti, a painter of Milan, who viewing the picture in 1726, made an offer to the Prior and convent to restore, by means of a secret which he possessed, the original colours. His proposition being accepted, and the experiment succeeding beyond their hopes, the convent made him a present of five hundred pounds for his labour, and he in return communicated to them the secret by which it had been effected[2].
Deprived, as they certainly are by these events, of the means of judging accurately of the merit of the original, it is still some consolation to the lovers of painting, that several copies of it made by Leonardo’s scholars, many of whom were very able artists, and at a time when the picture had not been yet injured, are still in existence.
- ↑ Additions to the Life in Vasari, 53. My worthy friend, Mr. Rigaud, who has more than once seen the original picture, gives this account of it: “The cutting of the wall for the sake of opening a door, was no doubt the effect of ignorance and barbarity, but it did not materially injure the painting; it only took away some of the feet under the table, entirely shaded. The true value of this picture consists in what was seen above the table. The door is only four feet wide, and cuts off only about two feet of the lower part of the picture. More damage has been done by subsequent quacks, who, within my own time, have undertaken to repair it.”
- ↑ Additions to the Life in Vasari, 53.
