the artist Boulanger to copy it for him, and thus obtaining possession of the original, he contrived dexterously to substitute his own copy in its place." The Duke satisfied the monks by giving them more lands. It is supposed that it was afterwards presented to the Medicean family, and by them given to the house of Este in exchange for the Sacrifice of Abraham by Andrea del Sarto. It is now in the Florentine gallery.
PORTRAITS OF CORREGGIO.
Correggio appears to have been far less solicitous
than most other painters, that his likeness should
be transmitted to posterity, for of him there is no
unquestioned portrait extant. That which is prefixed
to his life, in the Roman edition of Vasari, is
evidently false, for it exhibits the head and countenance
of a man aged seventy. It was taken from a
collection of designs, in the possession of Father
Resta, to one of which, representing a man and his
wife with three sons and one daughter, in mean apparel,
he gave the name of the Family of Correggio,
forgetting that the family consisted of three
daughters and one son.
Another portrait, with the title, Antonius Correggius, and consequently supposed to be painted by himself, was preserved in a villa which belonged to the Queen of Sardinia, near Turin, and engraved by Valperga; but its authenticity seems justly questioned by Lanzi and Pungileoni. A third, which
