Ec. French Late 18th Century, 1st Empire, Blood Drawing, Seated Officer (napoleon Meditating?)

Delicately painted portrait in red chalk representing an officer sitting on a chair and meditating, in a simple posture facing a soberly furnished table, dating from the revolutionary period until the 1st Empire. The line is removed, flexible. The expressiveness of this character with the lowered eyelids surprisingly intense. The lineaments of this face drawn in profile - but also his uniform and frock coat - strongly evoke Napoleon Bonaparte; which will be represented in History of the Revolution illustrated by Auguste Raffet (published after the illustrated events, in 1839, well after the fall of the 1st Empire) on several occurrences in a seated posture, notably in the last years of the Emperor. The back slightly bent while keeping the feet planted in the ground, sporting the shoes (pumps) of well-born people, the character has left the martial boots and surrenders to a last reverie, meditation, brief rest away from the fighting. His saber did not leave him either than his pocket. The nobility of the expression, gentle, outweighs any triviality. Yet the cocked hat with revolutionary attributes (cockade and plume of the French Revolution) seems to refine the dating and attribution of the subject of this drawing to an officer of the Revolution. Without this figure of the cockade, this cocked hat could have belonged to an officer of the British Royal Navy, their cocked hat adorned with a plume having been in use from 1787 to 1812. A model in beaver skin and ostrich feather, worn by General Brock, more adapted to the Canadian climate, having been also in use since 1812, for the officers of the General staff in Canada.
Framed: 33 x 28 cm - at sight: 20 cm x 15cm
Freckles, marie-louise and gilded frame, tiny accidents with the gilding