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CHARLES LEANDRE
75

well imagine one of his victims, impressed with the undeniable truth of Léandre's portrait of himself, shunning daylight altogether, after the publication thereof; and refusing to walk abroad carrying those weasel eyes and that terrible nose, which previously he had flaunted on the boulevards with such evident pride. Indeed, a dose of Léandre might well be prescribed as a cure for swollen head.

It must not be imagined from the foregoing that portrait caricature alone occupies the pencil of our artist, His book of subtle wash drawings entitled "Nocturnes," and the lively pages of Le Rire, L' Album, Lassiette au Beurre, and other journals are embellished with his cartoons and comic drawings, covering a fairly wide range of subjects, He is moreover a serious portrait-painter of great feeling and delicacy. We may look on him almost as an animalier, or natural history artist making a speciality of that droll, brainy, beast — man, recording all his different varieties, and watching his every gesture and movement.

In his cartoons he occasionally approaches the somewhat nervous style of Willette, whom we incline to think time may prove to have been an overrated artist. [he stronger method ot Léandre, however, is particularly noticed in such drawings as Le Ministère en Vacances and Le Retour du Genéral Duchesne in Le Rire; and here we may mention how much many of the most excellent of the younger artists — such as Steinlen, Léandre, Malteste, Redon,