If our estimate of Canova is correct, can more be said for his rival, the Danish sculptor, Thorvaldsen? Thorvaldsen was born about the year 1770, his father being a journeyman wood-carver of ship’s figure-heads. As a boy he worked on the quays at Copenhagen, much as Puget had done a century earlier at Marseilles. In 1793 Thorvaldsen, then a youth of twenty-three, won the Copenhagen Academy’s gold medal and a travelling scholarship, which made a visit to Rome possible. Four years later, in 1797, Thorvaldsen came to Rome. Between May and December of the previous year, Italy had been overrun by the French. In October 1797 the Venetian territories were divided by Austria and France. In the following February Pius VI. was deposed by Napoleon. Italy had never stood lower in the scale of nations. Perhaps for that very reason Rome was able to welcome artists from all parts of Europe, and imbue them with entirely non-national ideals, drawn from the treasures of art stored in the Eternal City. “I was born on March 8, 1797,” said Thorvaldsen himself. “Up to that time I did not exist.” The Dane’s scholarship only amounted to £24 a year, insufficient for the bare necessities of life. But the young sculptor struggled along until 1803, when his “Jason” was purchased by the English banker, Thomas Hope, and he was relieved from his most pressing difficulties. A little later Thorvaldsen found himself the talk of artistic Rome. The Baron de Schubart, Danish Ambassador at Naples, had commissioned a “Cupid and Psyche.” The sculptor was in the midst of the work when his studio at Montenero was struck by lightning. The only model which escaped destruction was the Baron’s “Cupid and Psyche.” Thorvaldsen himself was in Rome at the time, and the pretty little story naturally ran the round of the studios. The tale caught the fancy of the smart set, ever on the look-out for an excitement, and “the miracle of the marble” became the sensation of the hour. A flood of sonnets and epigrams resulted. Thorvaldsen found himself suddenly recognized as the coming sculptor—second only to Canova. There is no finer example of the genius of Thorvaldsen than his “Venus.” There is certainly no statue upon which he lavished more care. It exists in several forms, including a fine marble copy in the Duke of Devonshire’s collection at Chatsworth. Starting in 1805, he took ten years to complete the design to his satisfaction. Not that Thorvaldsen was a slow worker. He had no love for the actual carving, and left the greater portion of the marble-work to his assistants. But in the clay he worked with extreme facility, and few sculptors have excelled him in the number and variety of his designs. A statue like the “Venus” proves that he also possessed qualities of breadth and emotional austerity, which cannot be claimed for the prettier works of Canova.