Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 39, Number 69, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 May 1907 — Believed To Own An Old Master. [ARTICLE]

Believed To Own An Old Master.

Bishop Alerding, of the Fort Wayne diocese of the Roman Catholic church*, recently discovered that the episcopal residence at twt) Perfc woo of wr real Titian, and, what is a peculiar coincidence, the discovery was made at a time when the very subject is a much discussed one because of its reproductions on the operatic stage—Salome’s carrying of the ghastly head of John the Baptist to her mother, Herodias. Bishop Alerding found the painting in a crude wooden frame standing face to the wall on top of a bookcase in a storeroom of the episcopal residence, covered by dust and attacked by decay. Curi osity prompted him to examine it, and he was surprised and delighted to find it bore the great Titian’s name and other evidences that it was a genuine masterpiece. Many connoisseurs have examined |it recently and attest its authenticity. The picture was one of eight brought to the residence of Bishop Dwenger thirty years ago, on returning from Europe, where he had received them from an aged bishop, who probably did not realize their value, for a comfortable fortune could not| buy them now. It is thought they had been carried from place to place by soldiers of hapoleon. Bishop Alerding has each properly framed and set with electric lights for the gratification of callers at the residence.