Beaume enrolled at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris in 1817, and later entered the studio of Gros. He then embarked on a successful career as a history painter, which included several commissions from king Louis-Philippe, but later he began producing genre works, many of them in the style of Greuze. He received several medals at the Salons, where he first exhibited in 1819. Beaume was made a Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur in 1836.

Although it is not listed in the 1863 catalogue of the Fodor collection this pencil drawing must have been acquired at the same time as the corresponding watercolor and the sketch of a girl. Its original function is not entirely clear. The marginal note dictates a height of approximately 250 mm, which is a little less than that of the watercolor. It may have been intended as an aide-memoire to enable Beaume to produce copies of his successful Salon painting of the same subject. The practice of preserving contour drawings of the paintings they had sold had been common among artists since the seventeenth century, and they occasionally added notes as reminders of the colors used and the price of the original work. ( Wiepke Loos)