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RICHARD S DAVIS
WAYZATA 5, MINNESOTA

19 November 1953

Dear Germain:

I am afraid that I have an unpleasant surprise for you, for I have returned, by pre-paid express, the watercolor by Gericault because I have lost confidence in its attribution.

As you know, I was carried away when I first saw the work and, when I received it in Wayzata, Phyllis agreed with me that we had at last found a definitive example and would never have to look farther in order to represent Gericault in our modest collection.

At that time I arranged to sell a smaller watercolor by Gericault which I had purchased in Switzerland a couple of years ago.  The purpose of that sale was to enable me to purchase the work in question.  The sale was completed last month, and I was preparing to send you a check at the very time that I entertained a number of my fellow curators at my house.

Two or three curators saw the watercolor during the course of the Summer and did not seem to be very enthusiastic.  But since the opening of our busy season here, a fairly large percentage of the curators whom we both know have seen the watercolor and, without exception, expressed doubts about the attribution.

As a result, I went over it with a fine tooth comb last week and concluded that it must have been done considerably later than a lithograph of the same subject.  The panoramic landscape is beautiful, whether by Gericault or not.  It reminds me of Goya, and that is primarily why I agreed to purchase the work.  However, the composition, with its segregated groups of figures, does not seem to be typical of Gericault.