A leading London publisher consulted by me on the subject, writes
as follows--

"Dore's works are no longer in vogue. One of the reasons lies in the
fact that his pictures were done by the old engraved process. He drew
them straight on wood, and there are, accordingly, no original drawings
to be reproduced by modern methods."

The words "fatal facility" cannot be applied to so consummate a
draughtsman as the illustrator of Dante, Cervantes and Victor Hugo. But
Dore's almost superhuman memory was no less of a pitfall than manual
dexterity. The following story will partly explain his dislike of
facsimile and duplication.

An intimate friend, named Bourdelin, relates how one day during the
siege of Paris, the pair found themselves by the Courbevoie bridge. One
side of this bridge was guarded by French gendarmes, the other by
German officers, Prussians, Saxons, Bavarians, a dozen in all. For a
quarter of an hour the two Frenchmen lingered, Dore intently gazing on
the group opposite. On returning home some hours later he produced a
sketch-book and in Bourdelin's presence swiftly outlined the twelve
figures, exactly reproducing not only physiognomic divergences but
every detail of costume! Poor Dore! In those ardently patriotic days he
entirely relied upon victory and drew an anticipatory picture of France
triumphant, entitled, "Le Passage du Rhin." But the French never
crossed the Rhine, and the drawing was given to this friend with the
words: "My sketch has no longer any _raison d'etre_. Keep it in memory
of our fallacious hopes."