This is a 19th century imitation by León of a 17th century painting. It is based on a life-size picture of a dwarf in the manner of Velázquez which is in the Prado, Madrid.
Infra-red photographs have demonstrated that it was painted over a 17th- or 18th-century flower piece.
The attribution depends on Charles Terry, who wrote in 1897 that he had been told by Ignacio de León that the painting was a pastiche León had painted after Velázquez and given to a dealer in London.
