Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - XII - Picture gallery at Christiansborg palace
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
190
COPENHAGEN.
Chap. XII.
drawing of the soldier and child, scimitar in hand, is
excellent; the infant hangs so boneless—so helpless,
and the man is, in contrast, such a display of muscle,
that you feel the sword must come down; it takes
away your breath.* In one corner of this picture is
inscribed, around a coat-of-arms, “Mons. Josias de
Ranzan, Marechal de France, me l’a donnéthough
who “ me ” was nobody knows—supposed to have been
some Holstein nobleman. This Maréchal de Rantzau
was a Dane of noble birth, who took service under
Louis XIII., and was so highly in favour with the
queen that the northern gossips of the century asserted
him to have been the father of Louis XIV. himself.
That Rantzau was a man of great personal attractions—
fair-haired, a true son of the North—an engraving of his
portrait, after Rousselet, leaves no cause for doubt, t
There is another excellent painting by Rubens, the
portrait of Matthew Irselius, an aged abbot of the St.
Michael’s convent at Antwerp, died 1629, which was
painted by Rubens to adorn the superb monument
of his old and intimate friend, constructed of white
marble; but nothing looked well inserted in such a
* An original pen-and-ink drawing of this picture exists, in the
possession of Mr. Hartzer, in Hamburg; it has also been engraved by
Cornelius Visscher.
f “ Rantzau le Beau ” he was called, though his beauty became
later sadly mutilated, for he lost a leg, an eye, an arm, and an ear in
Flanders, Arras, Dole, and elsewhere, but died in his bed, at Paris,
aged 41, in 1640. Folks say he wore a sword with an enchanted
handle, an heirloom descended to him from his great-grandmother
Anne Walstorf, who was called by a mountaineer to aid his wife in
childbirth underground, in return for which he presented her with a
nugget of gold, which she caused to be made into a herring. This
herring later formed the handle of Josias Rantzau’s sword, and bore him
good luck whenever he used it.
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
