Taking into account the methods dear to Leonardo, his intermittent ardour, his endless hesitations, it would be over-bold to attempt a solution of so delicate a problem of chronology, until a key has been furnished by documents in the archives. Let us be content, at present, to study the different phases through which the Adoration of the Magi

passed before taking form in the Uffizi cartoon. We can trace these step by step in a number of drawings.1

The earliest of the sketches preserved in the house or perhaps I should rather say the museum-in the Rue Bassano, in which M. Léon Bonnat has collected so many mementoes of the great masters, shows

1 The catalogue at the end of the volume describes those drawings not mentioned in

the text.

that Leonardo's first intention was to paint, not an Adoration of the Magi, but an Adoration of the Shepherds, or Nativity, a subject we

know him to have painted for the Emperor Maximilian. It represents the Infant Jesus lying on the ground, with the Virgin adoring, and a child bending over Him. Nude figures are grouped to the right and

K

left, one of whom, with his bald head, his long beard, and the protuberant belly under his crossed arms, seems to have been inspired by the Silenus of the ancients. This strange personage re-appears (but in reverse) in a drawing formerly in the Armand collection, now in that of M. Valton. The drawing in the Bonnat collection also contains the figure of a young man, shading his eyes with his left hand. This motive recurs in a drawing in the Louvre, and in one in the Galichon collection, to which I shall return presently. In the latter, however, it is an old man, and not a youth, who thus concentrates his gaze on the Divine Child. A third spectator, the young man standing with one foot on the bench on which the oldest of the shepherds is seated, was transferred bodily from M. Bonnat's drawing to that of the Armand and Valton collections, save that in the latter he turns his back to the spectator, while in the former he is in profile.

Appropriate as all these attitudes are to the shepherds, they are entirely at variance with those traditionally given to the three kings; we have none of those signs of profound veneration, the genuflections, the kissing of the feet, etc., which serve to characterise the monarchs from the far East.

Yet another figure in M. Bonnat's drawing, sketched on the same sheet, but apart from the main group, gives a final indication that we are studying a sketch for an Adoration of the Shepherds. It is a young man with clasped hands, naked but for a strip of drapery passing from his left shoulder to his right hip; this is a shepherd, not an Eastern king, nor an Oriental attendant. The touching gesture of the clasped hands disappears in the sequel, and I cannot but regret it; yet only strong and exuberant spirits, like Leonardo, can thus sacrifice their finest details, confident that they will be able to replace them by others no less perfect.

In the drawing which passed from M. Alfred Armand's collection to that of M. P. Valton, the composition has hardly as yet taken definite form in the master's mind. He still seeks and hesitates. Leonardo, indeed, had none of that precision of conception proper to the literary temperament. temperament. Not only did he give himself up to the most arduous toil in pursuit of his ideal, demolishing and reconstructing again and again, but he loved to hover tentatively round a subject,

instead of attacking it boldly. The drawing of the Valton collection betrays these fluctuations; it contains only isolated figures, some of them so vaguely indicated that it is impossible to divine the master's intention through the maze of interwoven lines and corrections.

Among the recognisable figures I may mention the youth with his foot on a step, and the bearded old man, both borrowed from the drawing in the Bonnat collection. The old man's attitude is slightly modified; his right hand supports his chin. The figure is repeated further off, leaning on a long staff. Then we have young men, their hands on their hips, a usual gesture among the actors or spectators in pictures of the adoration of the Magi; it occurs, for instance, in Raphael's version of the theme in the Vatican. Other figures are remarkable for the striking originality of their attitudes; they stand with arms crossed on their breasts, or hands on their hips, like the Hermes of Praxiteles, or the Narcissus in the Naples Museum. We know from the figure of Silenus mentioned above, that Leonardo now began to draw inspiration from classic models.

A drawing in the Louvre (in the revolving case at the entrance of the Salles Thiers), consists, like that of the Valton collection, of single figures only. But the composition has advanced a stage. Here, all the attitudes express the deepest reverence. First, we have a prostrate figure; then two others bowing; then a person advancing, his body slightly inclined, his hands uplifted as if to express astonishment. Finally, a spectator who shades his eyes with his hands to get a better view, and another, who stretches out his arm as if exclaiming : “Behold this miracle!"

A drawing in the Cologne Museum, to which Messrs. de Geymüller and Richter drew my attention, and for a photograph of which I am indebted to Herr Aldenhoven, is certainly contemporary with the Louvre drawing; for both contain combinations of the same figures, with certain differences of attitude. In the Louvre drawing, the figures are partially draped; whereas in the Cologne sketches, only three of the persons have indications of garments behind them.

But let us take the actors one by one. Beginning on the left, in the upper part, we have a charming figure of a young lad, his arms stretched

!

out before him, his head turned over his shoulder.

Buskins are slightly indicated on his feet. In the Louvre drawing, this figure has undergone a complete transformation: instead of nearly facing us, as before, it is now seen almost from behind, clothed in a tunic fastened round the waist by a girdle.

The second and central figure is even more thoroughly metamorphosed. In the Cologne drawing, he faces us, one hand on his hip, the other over his forehead, shading his eyes. in the Louvre drawing, but the figure is

Both gestures are preserved in profile; and Leonardo has

utilised another motive of the Cologne drawing for this last figure that of the person in the middle distance, in profile, his hand above his eyes.

Another figure, a youth standing, towards the right, his shoulders drawn back, his fore-arms extended in an attitude expressive of surprise and veneration, has disappeared in the Louvre drawing, as has also one of his companions, standing, to the left, his arm resting on his hip. On the other hand, the bent

His

figure advancing with arms extended, reappears in the Louvre drawing, draped, and with his arms drawn rather closer to his body. neighbour, who bends forward with clasped hands, also figures in the Louvre drawing, where, however, he raises his head, instead of inclining it, and advances his right, instead of his left leg. He re-appears in the important drawing of the Galichon collection (see L'Art, 1887, vol. ii, p. 71), which represents the last stage of the composition. Another, who kneels on one knee, prostrates himself