The De Dion-Bouton was a French automobile and rail-car builder operating from 1883 till 1953. Pithy detail: after he saw a toy- steamtrain in a toyshop he got the idea to build a steam-automobile and became several years later one of the bigest car-builder of France. The story behind this watercolor: In a article in the French newspaper Le Martin in January of 1907, the editors raised a challenge to the world: ...We ask this question of car manufacturese in France and abroad: Is there anyone who will undertake to travel this summer from Paris to Peking by automobile? Whoever he is, this tough and daring man, whose gallant car will have a dozen till nations watching its progress, he will certainly deserve to have his name spoken as a byword in the four quarters of the earth... In 1907 eleven men, and five vehicles, set out to take the newly- born automobile on an adventure, for more than 10.000 miles, across two continents, over deserts and through swamps, over roads who were hardly appropriate for the strongly underpowerd cars of those days. Would it be up to the challenge? Sponsored by two French autodealers, four ambitious journalists toke part in two 10hp De Dion-Boutons. They arrived, in Paris, 20 days after the first competitor, because in connection of the mossoon was desside the race would be done from Peking tot Paris. Bibliography: Peking to Paris: Prince Borghese's Journey Across Two Continents in 1907, by Luigu Barzini, Translation by L.P. DE Castelvecchio, Library Press, 1973. Prince Borghese's Trail, by Genevieve Obert, Council Oak Books, 1999. Image size: 260 x 360 mm