Adam, Nicholas-Sebastian

, brother of the preceding, and likewise an eminent artist, was born at Nancy, March 22, 1705. He studied under his father at Paris, and in 1726 went to Rome. Two years after he gained one of the prizes of the academy of St. Luke. At this time his brother, the subject of the preceding article, and Francis, a younger brother, were at Rome, and assisted each other | in their labours. After a residence of nine years, he returned to Paris, and with some opposition was admitted into the academy, where he exhibited his model of “Prometheus,” but did not execute it until long after. Next year he executed the “martyrdom of St. Victoria,” a bas-relief in bronze, for the royal chapel at Versailles. For some time he assisted his brother in “the Neptune;” but, a disagreement occurring, quitted this, and employed himself at the hotel Soubise, the chamber of accounts, and the abbey of St. Dennis. He was a candidate for the mausoleum of the cardinal de Fleury, and the public adjudged him the prize; but Lemoyne was employed. The tomb of the queen of Poland, wife of Stanislaus, is esteemed one of his best works. His Prometheus was finished in 1763, and the king of Prussia offered him 30,000 franks for it; but Adam said it was executed for his master, and no longer his own property. He died March 27, 1778, in his 75th year. His merits as a sculptor have been thought equal to those of his brother. It is said to have been his constant prayer that he might be neither the first northe last in his art, but attain an honourable middle rank, as the surest way to avoid jealousy on the one hand, or contempt on the other; and his last biographer thinks his prayer was heard. The younger brother, Francis-Gaspard, exercised his profession as a sculptor for some years with considerable reputation, and obtained a prize from the French academy, but no important works of his are mentioned; he died at Paris in 1759. ¹