Letter from Charles S. Carstairs to Henry Clay Frick, 18 February 1907

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Hermitage Hotel
Monte-Carlo
18 Feby 1907
Dear Mr. Frick,
I appreciated your cable New Year's time & I am delighted you are so pleased with the great Rembrandt, it will always be a great joy to you & we were all very lucky to have it.
Roland writes me you have the Isaac Ostade in your gallery, his pictures are very rare as he died at the age of 27. He is beautifully represented at the National Gallery, Wallace Collection, Louvre etc. & the galleries of Holland and is a very popular painter. You may remember Alfred Rothschild's 2 examples, he values them at 20,000 [pounds] each. This picture comes from the same collection as Terrell's Rembrandt and is universally known in Europe as one of Ostade's finest pictures.
My winter's work is now completed
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and I have seen almost ready our superb 7 Van Dycks the balance of the collection yours comes from. They are being photographed & in 3 weeks by the time they have thoroughly dried the frames will be ready. I would like to have had you in Paris with me to see them all under proper conditions & I assure you they are well worth a visit to Paris to see them. They represent about ($1,500,000.) a million and a half & at the present time they are all being held for your inspection approval or rejection. Will you come over and see them? I presume not, therefore, my present plan is to ship them from Havre Mch 23 & I sail from Naples by the Celtic Mch 20th. We should therefore arrive the same time which will enable me to show them to you in the public Stores, which is where they go for examination & is much better than the bonded warehouse where you saw the Gainsborough. The greatest picture Van Dyck ever painted
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Hermitage Hotel
Monte-Carlo
is among this lot. It’s as high as the full length Hoppner I had hanging in your dining room & about 12 to 15 inches wider. A full length, noble Genoese woman, very beautiful full length, standing on a terrace overlooking an Italian garden with a black boy behind her all in yellow & he himself, like an Italian bronze, holding a red parasol over her. There is no question, no
argument, from every standpoint it is Van Dyck's masterpiece. I think I have seen about everything he ever painted & I have never been so impressed. My anticipated pleasure in showing you this wonderful example of Van Dycks most sumptuous period at times is almost more than I can stand. It has been an
exciting Winter the trips to Genoa
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the delight at eventually getting them and the immense excitement of getting them out of Italy. They have all had to be relived the old varnish removed & revarnished. This has been four months work but they are nearly ready & I am soon to have the pleasure of showing them all to you. Little Roland will be the most excited man you ever knew & if he has had any feeling about my remaining over here this Winter, it will be dissipated quickly. Please dont mention these pictures to anyone. Not a living soul knows about them. Poor Sulley, the Berlin gallery & some others will be greatly upset & disappointed when it eventually leaks out. Just think they were
painted for the family in 1623 to 5 and have never been out of Genoa. Sail for Naples & I will motor you 1 day to Rome, 1 day to Florence magnificent trip 1 day to Genoa & one to Monte Carlo & then we will take the train to Paris. Best wishes
Always Devotedly
C.S. Carstairs
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