During all this time he remained very poor, satisfied to be continually improving himself. He was glad to sell his pictures for whatever they would bring. One, of a prophet, he sold for eight livres; and another, the ‘Plague of the Philistines,’ he sold for 60 crowns—a picture afterwards bought by Cardinal de Richelieu for a thousand. To add to his troubles, he was stricken by a cruel malady, during the helplessness occasioned by which the Chevalier del Posso assisted him with money. For this gentleman Poussin afterwards painted the ‘Rest in the Desert,’ a fine picture, which far more than repaid the advances made during his illness. The brave man went on toiling and learning through suffering. Still aiming at higher things, he went to Florence and Venice, enlarging the range of his studies. The fruits of his conscientious labour at length appeared in the series of great pictures which he now began to produce,—his ‘Death of Germanicus,’ followed by ‘Extreme Unction,’ the ‘Testament of Eudamidas,’ the ‘Manna,’ and the ‘Abduction of the Sabines.’ The reputation of Poussin, however, grew but slowly. He was of a retiring disposition and shunned society. People gave him credit for being a thinker much more than a painter. When not actually employed in painting, he took long solitary walks in the country, meditating the designs of future pictures. One of his few friends while at Rome was Claude Lorraine, with whom he spent many hours at a time on the terrace of La Trinité-du-Mont, conversing about art and antiquarianism. The monotony and the quiet of Rome were suited to his taste, and, provided he could earn a moderate living by his brush, he had no wish to leave it. But his fame now extended beyond Rome, and repeated invitations were sent him to return to Paris. He was offered the appointment of principal painter to the King. At first he hesitated; quoted the Italian proverb, _Chi sta bene non si muove_; said he had lived fifteen years in Rome, married a wife there, and looked forward to dying and being buried there. Urged again, he consented, and returned to Paris. But his appearance there awakened much professional jealousy, and he soon wished himself back in Rome again. While in Paris he painted some of his greatest works—his ‘Saint Xavier,’ the ‘Baptism,’ and the ‘Last Supper.’ He was kept constantly at work. At first he did whatever he was asked to do, such as designing frontispieces for the royal books, more particularly a Bible and a Virgil, cartoons for the Louvre, and designs for tapestry; but at length he expostulated:—“It is impossible for me,” he said to M. de Chanteloup, “to work at the same time at frontispieces for books, at a Virgin, at a picture of the Congregation of St. Louis, at the various designs for the gallery, and, finally, at designs for the royal tapestry. I have only one pair of hands and a feeble head, and can neither be helped nor can my labours be lightened by another.”