Second Visit to Italy.—Velazquez's son-in-law Mazo had suc ceeded him as usher in 1634, and he himself had received steady promotion in the royal household, receiving a pension of 500 ducats in 1640, increased to 700 in 1648, for portraits painted and to be painted, and being appointed inspector of works in the palace in 1647. Philip now entrusted him with the founding of an acad emy of art in Spain. Rich in pictures, Spain was weak in statuary, and Velazquez was commissioned to proceed to Italy to make purchases. Accompanied by his faithful slave Pareja, whom he taught to be a good painter, he sailed from Malaga in 1649, land ing at Genoa, and proceeding thence by Milan to Venice, buying Titians, Tintorettos and Veroneses. A noble example of the paint er's third manner is the great portrait of Innocent X. in the Doria palace at Rome, where he was received with marked favour by the pope, who presented him with a medal and gold chain. Of this portrait, thought by Sir Joshua Reynolds to be the finest picture in Rome, Palomino says that Velazquez took a copy to Spain. There exist several in different galleries. The handling is rapid but unerring. Velazquez had now reached the manera abreviada, as the Spaniards call this bolder style. His early and laborious studies and his close observation of nature had given to him in due time, as to all great painters, the power of representing what he saw by simpler means. At Rome he painted also a portrait of his servant Pareja, probably the picture of Lord Radnor's collection which procured his election into the academy of St. Luke. Mean while Philip was wearying for his return ; accordingly Velazquez embarked in Genoa for Barcelona in 1651, taking with him many pictures and 30o pieces of statuary, which he afterwards arranged and catalogued for the king.
Late Life.—Isabella of Bourbon had died in 1644, and the king had married Mariana, of Austria, whom Velazquez now painted in many attitudes. He was specially chosen by the king to fill the high office of "aposentador major," which imposed on him the duty of looking after the quarters occupied by the court whether at home or in their journeys. His works of this period are amongst the highest examples of his style. The dwarfs "El Bobo de Coria," "El Nino de Vallecas" and "Don Antonio el Ingles" (the English man) with his dog, "Aesop," and "Menippus," all in the Madrid gallery, show his surest and freest manner. To these may be added the charming children's portraits of the Infanta Margarita in Vienna, among the choicest of his works. It is Margarita, the eldest daughter of the new queen, that is the subject of the well known picture "Las Menifias" (the Maids of Honour), in the Madrid gallery, painted in 1656, where the little lady holds court, surrounded by her ladies-in-waiting, her dwarfs and her mastiff, while Velazquez is seen standing at his easel. This is the finest portrait we have of the great painter. It is a face of much dig nity, power and sweetness—like his life. The story is told that the king painted the red cross of Santiago on the breast of the painter, as it appears to-day on the canvas. Velazquez did not,
however, receive the honour till 1659, three years after the execu tion of this work. Even the powerful king of Spain could not make his favourite a belted knight without a commission to in quire into the purity of his lineage on both sides of the house. The records of this commission have been found among the archives of the order of Santiago by M. Villaamil. Fortunately the pedi gree could bear scrutiny, as for generations the family was found free from all taint of heresy, from all trace of Jewish or Moorish blood and from contamination by trade or commerce. The diffi culty connected with the fact that he was a painter was got over by his being painter to the king and by the declaration that he did not sell his pictures. But for this royal appointment, which enabled him to escape the censorship of the Inquisition, we should never have had his splendid "Venus and Cupid," bought by the National Art Collections Fund for £45,000 for the National Gallery in 19o5. On occasions Philip gave commissions for religious pictures to Velazquez—among others, the "Coronation of the Virgin" (Ma drid gallery), splendid in colour—a harmony of red, blue and grey. It was painted for the oratory of the queen, in the palace at Madrid. Another royal commission for the hermitage of Buen Retiro was the "St. Anthony the Abbot and St. Paul the Hermit," painted in 1659 (Madrid gallery). The last of his works which we shall name is "Las Hilanderas" or the Spinners (Madrid), painted about 1656, representing the royal tapestry works.
In 166o a treaty of peace between France and Spain was to be consummated by the marriage of the infanta Maria Theresa with Louis XIV., and the ceremony was to take place in the Island of Pheasants, in the Bidassoa. Velazquez was charged with the decoration of the Spanish pavilion and with the whole scenic dis play. In the midst of the grandees of the first two courts in Christendom Velazquez attracted much attention by the nobility of his bearing and the splendour of his costume. On June 26 he returned to Madrid, and on July 31 he was stricken with fever. Feeling his end approaching, he signed his will, appointing as his sole executors his wife and his firm friend Fuensalida, keeper of the royal records. He died on Aug. 6, 166o. He was buried in the Fuensalida vault of the church of San Juan, and within eight days his wife Juana was laid beside him. This church was destroyed by the French in 1811, so that his place of interment is now unknown.
Velazquez can hardly be said to have formed a school of painting. Yet his influence on those immediately connected with him was considerable. In 5642 he befriended young Murillo on his arrival in Madrid, received him into his house, and directed his studies for three years. He helped to lay the foundations of modern painting; and when centuries later the Impressionists made it their aim to study the effect of light and atmosphere Velazquez was hailed as their precursor.