In a very short while, however, the example of the Italians and the heavy premium placed upon any artistic talent led to the rise of native sculptors of distinction. The first French sculptor of supreme ability was Jean Goujon. The name first occurs in the building accounts of St. Maclou at Rouen in 1540. By 1547 Jean Goujon had entered the service of Francis I. Two years later he was at work upon the Fountain of the Innocents of Paris. The most instructive example of Goujon’s work is, however, the famous “Diana” now in the Louvre. The statue originally surmounted a fountain in the courtyard of Diana of Poitiers’ Castle of Anet, built by Henry II. for his mistress. The marble rested upon a sarcophagus raised upon tier after tier of carved decorative work. It was, therefore, intended to be viewed at an elevation, as can be seen in the well-known drawing by Goujon himself at the British Museum. In estimating the genius of Goujon, the fact that he was first and foremost an architect must never be forgotten. The full beauty of his statues can only be properly appreciated when considered in connection with the sites for which they were designed. When we realize the decorative scheme of which a statue like “Diana” was intended to be the culminating-point, we can see that the claims of Goujon to be considered as the founder of modern French sculpture are not ill-founded. In addition to its fine decorative effect, the “Diana” possesses that balance which has always been a feature in the finest French art. For the rest, Goujon owes some prominent characteristics of his style to Cellini and the painters of the Fontainebleau school. Note, for instance, the elongated limbs and the over-slender proportions of his figures which Goujon has accentuated in his endeavour to endow his statues with all possible grace. The justification for the inclusion of Goujon among the great masters of sculpture depends upon the fact that he was the first French sculptor to introduce the nude figure as an object of æsthetic admiration into French decorative art. In doing so he freed French sculpture from the bonds of asceticism, and showed how its eventual greatness was to be secured. [Illustration: JEAN GOUJON DIANA (FROM THE FOUNTAIN AT ANET) Louvre, Paris] Nor does this exhaust the interest attaching to Goujon’s “Diana.” It equally emphasizes the second great characteristic of French sculpture—its connection with the feminine element, which has always been a dominant factor alike in French art and French social life.