Page:Women in the Fine Arts From the Seventh Century B.C. to the Twentiet.djvu/451

340 his words in Latin, when she again replied in the same language. The strangers then asked her if she would give them her name. This she did and further told them that she lived with her uncle, Simon Verelst. In the end she painted the portrait of each of these men, and the story of their experience proved the reason for the acquaintance of the artist being sought by people of culture and position. Walpole speaks in praise of her portraits and also mentions her unusual attainments in languages.

Vigée, Marie Louise Elizabeth. Member of the French Academy. Born in Paris in 1755. That happy writer and learned critic, M. Charles Blanc, begins his account of her thus: "All the fairies gathered about the cradle of Elizabeth Vigte, as for the birth of a little princess in the kingdom of art. One gave her beauty, another genius; the fairy Gracious offered her a pencil and a palette. The fairy of marriage, who had not been summoned, told her, it is true, that she should wed M. Le Brun, the expert in pictures — but for her consolation the fairy of travellers promised her that she should bear from court to court, from academy to academy, from Paris to Petersburg, and from Rome to London, her gayety, her talent, and her easel—before which all the sovereigns of Europe and all those whom genius had crowned should place themselves as subjects for her brush."

It is difficult to write of Madame Le Brun in outline because her life was so interesting in detail. Though she had many sorrows, there is a halo of romance and a brilliancy of atmosphere about her which marks her as a