in
Literature
and Art.
309
producing engravings of fieges, feftive entertainments, and fuch elaborate
fubjects. As Callot's afpirations had been directed towards Italy, thofe of
Della Bella were turned towards France, and when in the latter days of
the minitiry of Cardinal Richelieu, the grand duke of Florence fent
Alexandro del Nero as his relident arnbatfador in Paris, Della Bella was
permitted to accompany him. Richelieu was occupied in the liege of
Arras, and the engraving of that event was the foundation of Della Bella's
fame in France, where he remained about ten years, frequently employed
on fimilar fubjeits. He fubfequently vifited Flanders and Holland, and
at Amfterdarn made the acquaintance of Rembrandt. He returned to
Florence in 1650, and died there on the 23rd of July, 1664.
Wliile [till in Florence, Della Bella executed four prints of dwarfs
quite in the grotefque {tyle of Callot. In 1637, on the occalion of the
marriage of the grand duke Ferdinand II., Della Bella publifhed
engravings of the different fcenes reprefentcd, or performed, on that
occafion. Thefe were elfeeted by very elaborate machinery, and were
reprefented in fix engravings, the fifth
of which (fcena quinta) reprefents _-Lkx
hell (d' Inferno), and is tilled with L, V 7"
turies, demons, and witches, which X:
might have found a place in Callot's '1 J
"Temptation of St. Anthony." if
A fpecimen of thefe is given in our
cut No. 168-a naked witch feated XX
upon a {keleton of an animal that
might have been borrowed from fome C; ' is
far diilant geological period. In ML
1642, Della Bella executed a set of
fmall " Caprices," conlifting of thirteen plates, from the eighth of which
we take our cut No. 169. It reprefents a beggar-woman, carrying one
child on her back, while another is ilretched on the ground. In this
clafs of fubjects Della Bella imitated Callot, but the copyiti never fuc-
ceeded in equalling the original. His beii ftyle, as an original artift of
burlefque and caricature, is ihown in a fet of five plates of Death carrying
away
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