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oil on canvas 42 by 45 in. 106.7 by 114.3 cm. Grinling Gibbons was an important wood carver during the 17th Century. The diarist, John Evelyn, was responsible for his introduction to court and wrote, "Mar: 1. I caused Mr. Gibbon to bring to Whitehall his excellent piece of Carving where being come, I advertised his Majestie who asked me where it was, I told him, in Sir R: Brownes (my F. in Laws) Chamber, & that if it pleased his Majestie to appoint whither it should be brought (for "twas large, and though of Wood, yet heavy) I would take care for it: No says the King: shew me the Way, Ile go to Sir Richards Chamber: which his Majestie immediately did, walking all along the Enteries after me as far as the Ewrie til he came up into the rome where I also lay: & no sooner was he entred, & cast his eye on the Worke but he was a stonish'd by the curiositie of it, & having considred it a long time, & dicours'd it with Mr. Gibbon, whom I brought to kisse his hand; he commanded it should immediately carried to the Queenes side to shew her Majestie, so it was carried up into her bed-chamber, where she and the King looked on & admired it againe, the King thus leaving us with the Queene now being called away, I think to Council, believing that she would have bought it, it being a Crucifix; but when his Majestie was gon, a French pedling woman, one Madame de boord, that used to bring peticoates & fanns & baubles out of France to the Ladys, began to find faults with severall things in the worke, which she understood no more than an Asse or Monkey; so as in a kind of Indignation, I caused the porters who brought it, to carry it to the Chamber againe, finding the Queene so much govern'd by an ignorant french woman: and this incomparable Artist (had) the labour onely for his paines, which not a little displeased me; so he was faine to send it downe to his cottage againe, though he not long after sold it for 80 pounds, which was realy, (even without the frame) worth an hundred..." This painting of the event, however, was very well recieved as reported in the Times of 1869; "...This is just the subject for Mr. Ward, and he has found all his old force of effect and brightness of colour under its inspiration. The figure of Evelyn is excellent, refined to high breeding, even in the visible struggle of indignation with courtliness; and the mortification of the artist, the glib assurance and affectation of the peddling Frenchwoman, in her black and orange mantua, and the docility of the poor little nose-led Queen are capitally hit off." Provenance: Frost & Reed, Ltd., Bristol Dr. Edward Kaplan, New York Literature: The Times, 1869, May 15 Art Journal, "Royal Academy", London, 1869, p. 166 E.S. de Beer, The Diary of John Evelyn, London, 1959, pp. 551-2.