LOST MASTERPIECES.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, 27 August 1903, Page 6

LOST MASTERPIECES.

MkM Famous Palatine* Resides tJxm ICkUaaboronfrh Work Have Been Stolen. Gainsborough's Duchess of Devonshire, which will probably find its last resting place in the Metropolitan inuieum of art, in this city, is not the only great painting which has been stolen, lays the New York Herald. A portrait of the .ountess of Derby disappeared shortly after it was painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds. Rewards for its return were vainly offered. The final conclusion was that the then earl of Derby, who had quarreled with his wife at the time the picture was painted, had destroyed it. The celebrated "Field of the Cloth of Gold" was never stolen outright, but an important part of it was extracted. The theft was discovered when Cromwell opened negotiations with a foreign dealer for the .sale of some of the pictures of .Charles I. On this particular picture being examined, one of the principal faces, that of Henry VIII., was mls-sed. It had been dexterously cut out, and upon the restoration the thief, a nobleman of note, handed it back to Charles 11. in a perfect state of preservation. His object had been to prevent the picture going out of the country^ Lord Crewe has a picture which was Inst and recovered in a remarkable manner. An ancestor of his had a picture painted of his son and daughter in which the son posed as Cupid. Many years afterward the father and son quarreled, and the younger man, out of revenge, caused the Cupid to be cut out of the canvas. The piece knocked about unheard of for over 100 years. A dealer who had seen an engraving of the original happened to get hold of it • some few years ago, and he at onca communicated with Lord Crewo.

A FAWN AT HOME. Ont of the Prettiest and Pleasant*** Stchtß in All th* Wilder* >en. One <of the prettiest bits of animal lifo we have seen portrayed for a long time is in Mr. William Davenport Hulbert'« article, "The Deer," in McClure's Magazine. It is a fawn which he is describing: "To see t&e baby promenading up and down the shore, with his mother looking on, was one of the prettiest and pleasanteat sights in all the' wilderness. Th* ground color of his coat was a hay red somewhat like the summer dsess which the doe wore, but deeper and richer and handsomer, and with pure white spots arranged.in irregular rows all along his neck and back and sides. He was so sleek and polished that he fairly glistened in the sunshine, like a wellgroomed horse; his great dark eyes were brighterthan a girl's at her first ball; and his ears were almost as big as a mule's, and a million times as pretty. But best and most beautiful of all was the marvelous life and grace md spirit of every pose and motion. When he walked, his slender head and neck .were thrust forward at every step with the daintiest gesture imaginable, and his tiny pointed hoofs touched the ground so lightly, and were away again so quickly, that you hardly knew what they had done. If he was startled he would stamp his fore foot on the Tiard sand, and toss his head in the air with an expression that was not fear, but alertness, and even defiance. And wtien he leaped and ran—but there's no useintryingto describe that."