Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 12.djvu/326

314 HOUBRAKEN, (1698–1780), Dutch engraver, was born at Dort, December 25, 1698. All that his father, Arnold Houbraken, bequeathed to him was a fine constitution and a pure love for work. In 1707 he came to reside at Amsterdam, where for s he had to struggle inces santly against difficulties. He commenced the art of engraving by studying the works of Cornells Cort, Suyderhoef, Edelinck, and the Visschers. He devoted himself almost entirely to portraiture, and as his reputation became known in and beyond the boundary of his country he soon found himself with commissions more than he could conveniently execute. Seeking happiness in the bosom of his family, and being temperate in his habits, he lived to an advanced age, and the work executed the last of his life shows no failing of his power in the use of the burin. Among his best works are scenes from the comedy of De Ontdekte Schijndeuyd, executed in his eightieth, after Cornells Troost, who was called by his countrymen the Dutch Hogarth, with, however, very small title to such a distinction. Houbraken died on the 14th of November 1780, having nearly completed his eighty-second.

1em  HOUDON, (1740–1828), was the most distinguished sculptor produced by France in the latter half of the 18th century. He was born at Versailles in 1740, and at the age of nineteen, having learnt all that he could from Michel Ange Slodtz and Pigalle, Houdon carried off the prix de Rome and left France for Italy, where he spent the next ten s of his life. His brilliant talent, which seems to have been formed by the influence of that world of statues with which Louis XIV. peopled the gardens of Versailles rather than by the lessons of his masters, delighted Clement XIV., who, on seeing the Bruno executed by Houdon for the church of Maria degli Angeli, said &quot; he would speak, were it not that the rules of his order impose silence.&quot; In Italy Houdon had lived in the presence of that second Renaissance with which the name of Winckelmann is. for ever associated, and the direct and simple treatment of the Morpheus which he sent to the Salon of 1771 bore witness to its influence. This work procured him his &quot; agregation &quot; to the Academy of Painting and Sculpture, of which he was made a full member in 1775. Between these dates Houdon had not been idle; busts of Catharine II., Diderot, and Prince Galitzin were remarked at the Salon of 1773, and at that of 1775 he produced, not only his Morpheus in marble, but busts of Turgot, Gluck, and Sophie Arnould, together with his well-known marble relief, &quot; Grive suspendue par les pattes.&quot; He took also an active part in the teaching of the academy, and executed for the instruction of his pupils the celebrated Ecorche still in use. To every Salon Houdon was a chief contributor; most of the leading men of the day were his sitters; his busts of D Alembert, Prince Henry of Prussia, Gerbier, Buffon (for Catharine of Russia), and Mirabeau are amongst the most remarkable portraits of modern times; and in 1778, when the news of Rousseau s death reached him, Houdon started at once for Ermenonville, and there took a cast of the dead man s face, from which, he produced the grand and lifelike head at present in the Louvre. The celebrated draped statue of Voltaire, now in the vestibule of the Theatre F ratals, was exhibited at the Salon of 1781, to which Houdon also sent a statue of Marshal de Tourville, commissioned by the king, and the Diana executed for Catharine II. This work was refused : the jury alleged that a statue of Diana demanded drapery; without drapery, they said, the goddess became a &quot; suivante de Venus,&quot; and not even the proud and frank chastity of the attitude and expression could save the Diana of Houdon (a bronze repro duction of which is now in the Louvre) from insult. Whether Houdon felt annoyance at this folly does not appear; but three s later he very readily accepted an invitation to go to America, there to carry out a statue of Washington. With Franklin, whose bust he had recently executed, Houdon left France in 1785, and, staying some time with Washington at Philadelphia, he modelled the bust, with which he decided to go back to Paris, there to complete the statue destined for the assembly hall uf the State of Virginia. After his return to his native country Houdon executed for the king of Prussia, as a companion to a statue of Summer, La Frileuse, a naif embodiment of shivering cold, which is one of his best as well as one of his best-known works. The Revolution interrupted the busy flow of commissions, and Houdon took up a half-forgotten project for a statue of Scholastica, which had long been put on one side in a corner of his studio. He was immediately denounced to the convention, and his life was only saved by his instant and ingenious adaptation of Scholastica into an embodiment of Philosophy. Under Napoleon, Houdon received little employment; he was, however, commissioned to execute the colossal reliefs intended for the decoration of the column of the &quot; Grand Army&quot; at Boulogne (but which ultimately found a different destination); he also produced a statue of Cicero for the senate, and various busts, amongst which may be cited those of Marshal Ney, of Josephine, and of Napoleon him self, by whom Houdon was rewarded with the legion of honour. After the fall of the first empire Houdon suddenly aged; he lost his memory, and slept away the closing s of his life. He died at Paris in 1828.

1em  HOUND. The foxhound, harrier, and beagle are now the only representatives of whatever varieties of hounds existed previously in England. The staghound proper is practically extinct, no pack of them having been kept since 1825, when the Devon and Somerset establishment was broken up and the pack sold. With the exception of Lord Wolverton s black StHuberts, all hounds now used for stag-hunting are simply those of the foxhound breed entered to deer instead of to fox. Most packs of staghounds are composed of hounds of the ordinary size, but it is said that the present master of the Devon and Somerset (1880) uses none under 25, and excludes bitches altogether. The modern English foxhound is about as near perfection as he can well be, and his excellence is all the more wonderful that less than 200 s ago there does not seem to have been in existence any hound bearing a resemblance to him; for, until fox hunting by hounds kept for that especial purpose was instituted, there could have been no reason to breed foxhounds. According to old writers on hunting subjects, there appear to have been, amongst other varieties, the slow, plodding, southern hound, with a great square head and wondrous powers of working 