The Hospital, from the series The Miseries and Misfortunes of War

In the foreground, bedraggled soldiers hobble on wooden legs or push themselves toward the door of the hospital at left, where they will receive charitable assistance. Inscribed in the entabulature of the neighboring church are the words, “Mary, Mother of Grace, Mother of Mercy.”

The Hospital is the fifteenth print in the series, which early writers referred to as The Life of the Soldier, suggesting it is a commentary on the violence both inflicted and suffered by soldiers in war. Although the hospital provides charitable care, both the images and the verses, penned by an anonymous author and likely approved by Callot, convey that this help was entirely inadequate in relation to the scale of the soldiers’ loss and suffering.

Inscription below image: “See how the world goes, and how chance constantly pursues the children of the god Mars. Some, crippled, drag themselves along the ground. Others, more fortunate, receive promotion in war. Some die on a gallows by a fatal blow, and others go from the camp to the hospital.”