Viewing page 23 of 85

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

16
13
[[stamp]]ARCHIVES OF AMERICAN ART[[/stamp]]

To disprove these statements it is only necessary for me to say that Houdon himself informed me that he made the cast alone, not waiting for his workmen, who never joined him, and that the figure was composed in Paris, by means of Pencil sketches & measurements made at Mount Vernon, and from a Picture in Continental Costume, painted by my Father for that purpose, by order of the Virginia Legislature. It must be observed that Houdon, having designed the figure of Washington in Paris, and not in the presence of the living original, (and did not finish it till Three years afterwards)has given it by the shoulders being thrown back, and by the projection of the chin, a theatrical air, not that of Washington whose glances was at the Horizon & the level of his associates, this is the more to be regretted as the statue elevated on a pedestal exaggerates the error; and makes the forehead appear more retreating than it really is, it showed therefore be viewed from an elevated stand. 

When Mr. Delaplaine was about to publish his gallery of American characters, I assembled in my Studio all the portraits of Washington