91 EDGAR DEGAS This is a sketch from an album of pencil sketches drawn by Degas around 1877 (see French, 1834-1917 no. 92). The inscription, in the hand of Ludovic Halevy, identifies the studies as being Procession at Saint-Germain from a procession at the Church of Saint-Germain in Paris, in June 1877. It is easy to Graphite see why the different subjects caught the artist's eye: the little girl with a pretty hairstyle 24.8 x 33 cm (9¾ x 13 in.) holding a candle, bottom left; the haughty man with a flower in his buttonhole, 95.GD.35 immediately behind her; the eccentric-looking priests, including the balding one in profile, with a coif at the front of his head and the remnant of hair at the back brushed forward; and the array of not-so-good-looking middle-aged women on the right. Drawn with great rapidity, the line is muscular, economical, and sure. Each head is a recognizable, particularly observed individual, and there is no trace of repetition or relapse into formula, so often a weakness of caricature. The row of three female heads in profile, or near profile, top right, should be compared with the caricature "cameo" of three bearded men in profile, top right of the Agostino Carracci drawing (see no. 25). Both the Carracci and the Degas are within the tradition of grotesque or caricature drawing that goes back to Leonardo da Vinci. FRENCH SCHOOL 111