CALL

Herod, and the beheading of St. John, by Fiesole; a coronation of the Virgin, by Lorenzo de Condi, the fellow-scholar and friend of Leonardo da Vinci, whose productions and personal character were so estimable. Next to these pictures is a Christ on the Mount of Olives, by Raphael, at the time when he had not abandoned the manner of Perugio. This little picture was once a part of the predella to the altar-piece which Raphael painted in the year 1505, for the nuns of St. Anthony, at Perugio. It came with the Orleans gallery to England, and was last in the possession of Lord Eldin, in Edinburgh. Unhappily it has been much injured by cleaning and repairing, but in many parts, particularly in the arms of the angel, there are defects in the drawing, such as we do not find in Raphael even at this period. So that, most probably, the composition alone should be ascribed to him, and the execution to one of the assistants, who painted the two saints belonging to the same predella now in Dulwich College.

"From the Orleans gallery, Mr. Rogers has Raphael's Madonna, well known by Flipart's engraving, with the eyes rather cast down, on whom the child standing by her fondly leans. The expression of joyousness in the child is very pleasing. The gray color of the underdress of the Virgin, with red sleeves, forms an agreeable harmony with the blue mantle. To judge by the character and drawing, the composition may be of the early period of Raphael's residence at Rome. In other respects, this picture admits of no judgment, because many parts have become quite flat by cleaning, and others are painted over. The landscape is in a blue-greenish tone, differing

from Raphael's manner.

Christ

"Of the Roman school I will mention only one more. bearing his cross, by Andrea Sacchi, a moderate-sized picture from the Orleans gallery, is one of the capital pictures of this master, in composition, depth of coloring, and harmony.

"The crown, however, of the whole collection, is Christ appearing to Mary Magdalene, by Titian. It was formerly in the possession of the family of Muselli at Verona, and afterward adorned the Orleans gallery. In the clear, bright, golden tone of the flesh, the careful execution, the refined feeling, in the impassioned desire of the kneeling Magdalene to touch the Lord, and the calm, dignified refusal of the Saviour, we recognize the earlier time of this master. The beau

tiful landscape, with the reflection of the glowing horizon upon the blue sea, which is of great importance here, in proportion to the figures, proves how early Titian obtained extraordinary mastery in this point, and confirms that he was the first who carried this branch to a higher degree of perfection. This poetic picture is, on the whole, in very good preservation; the crimson drapery of the Magdalene is of unusual depth and fulness. The lower part of the legs of Christ have, however, suffered a little. The figures are about a third the

size of life.

"The finished sketch for the celebrated picture, known by the name of La Gloria di Tiziano, which he afterward, by the command of Philip II., King of Spain, painted for the church of the convent where the Emperor Charles V. died, is also very remarkable. It is a rich, but not very pleasing composition. The idea of having the coffin of the emperor carried up to heaven, where God the Father and Son are enthroned, is certainly not a happy one. The painting is throughout excellent, and of a rich, deep tone in the flesh. Unfortunately, it is not wanting in re-touches. The large picture is now in the Escurial.

"As the genuine pictures of Giorgione are so very rare, I will briefly mention a young knight, — small, full-length, noble and powerful in face and figure; the head is masterly, treated in his glowing tone; the armor with great force and clearness in the chiaro-oscuro.

"The original sketch of Tintoretto, for his celebrated picture of St. Mark coming to the assistance of a martyr, is as spirited as it is full and deep in the tone.

"The rich man and Lazarus, by Giacomo Bassano, is, in execution and glow of coloring, approaching to Rembrandt, one of the best pictures of the master.

"There are some fine cabinet pictures of the school of Carracci : a Virgin and Child, worshipped by six saints, by Lodovico Carracci, is one of his most pleasing pictures in imitation of Corregio. Among four pictures by Domenichino, two landscapes, with the punishment of Marsyas, and Tobit with the fish, are very attractive, from the poetry of the composition and the delicacy of the finish. Another likewise very fine one of Bird-catching, from the Borghese Palace,

has unfortunately turned quite dark. A Christ, by Guido, is broadly and spiritedly touched in his finest silver tone.

"There is an exquisite little gem by Claude Lorraine. In a soft evening light, a lonely shepherd, with his peaceful flocks, is playing the pipe. Of the master's earlier time, admirable in the impasto, careful and delicate, decided and soft, all in a warm, golden tone. In the Liber Veritatis, marked No. 11. Few pictures inspire like this a feeling for the delicious stillness of a summer's evening.

"A landscape by Nicolas Poussin, rather large, of a very poetic composition and careful execution, inspires, on the other hand, in the brownish silver tone, the sensation of the freshness of morning. There is quite a reviving coolness in the dark water and under the trees of the fore-ground.

Two smaller historical pictures by Poussin, of his earlier time, class among his careful and good works.

"Of the Flemish school there are a few, but very good, speci

mens.

"There is a highly interesting picture by Rubens. During his residence in Mantua, he was so pleased with the triumph of Julius Cæsar, by Mantegna, that he made a fine copy of one of the nine pictures. His love for the fantastic and pompous led him to choose that with the elephants carrying the candelabra; but his ardent imagination, ever directed to the dramatic, could not be content with this. Instead of a harmless sheep, which in Mantegna is walking by the side of the foremost elephant, Rubens made a lion and a lioness, which growl angrily at the elephant. The latter, on his part, is not idle, but, looking furiously round, is on the point of striking the lion a blow with his trunk. The severe pattern which he had before him in Mantegna has moderated Rubens in his usually very full forms, so that they are more noble and slender than they generally are. The coloring, as in all his earlier pictures, is more subdued than in the later, and yet powerful. Rubens himself seems to have set much value on this study; for it was among the effects at his death. During the revolution, Mr. Champernowne brought it from the Balbi Palace, at Genoa. It is three feet high, and five feet five inches wide.

"The study for the celebrated picture, the Terrors of War, in the Pitti Palace, at Florence, and respecting which we have a letter in

Rubens' own hand, is likewise well worth notice. Rubens painted this picture for the Grand Duke of Tuscany. Venus endeavors, in vain, to keep Mars, the insatiable warrior, as Homer calls him, from war; he hurries away to prepare indescribable destruction. This picture, one foot eight inches high, and two feet six and a half inches wide, which I have seen in the exhibition of the British Institution, is, by the warmth and power of the coloring, and the spirited and careful execution, one of the most eminent of Rubens' small pictures of this period.

"Lastly, there is a Moonlight by him. The clear reflection of the moon in the water, its effect in the low distance, the contrast of the dark mass of trees in the fore-ground, are a proof of the deep feeling for striking incidents in nature which was peculiar to Rubens. As in another picture the flakes of snow were represented, he has here marked the stars.

"I have now become acquainted with Rembrandt in a new department; he has painted in brown and white a rather obscure allegory on the deliverance of the United Provinces from the union of such great powers as Spain and Austria. It is a rich composition, with many horsemen. One of the most prominent figures is a lion chained at the foot of a rock, on which the the tree of liberty is growing. Over the rock are the words, Solo Deo gloria.' The whole is executed with consummate skill, and the principal effect striking.

"His own portrait, at an advanced age, with very dark ground and shadows, and, for him, a cool tone of the lights, is to be classed, among the great number of them, with that in the Bridgewater Gallery; only it is treated in his broadest manner, which borders on looseness.

"A landscape, with a few trees upon a hill, in the fore-ground, with a horseman and a pedestrian in the back-ground, a plain with a bright horizon, is clearer in the shadows than other landscapes by Rembrandt, and, therefore, with the most powerful effect, the more harmonious.

"Among the drawings, I must at least mention some of the finest. "RAPHAEL.—The celebrated Entombment, drawn with the utmost spirit with the pen. From the Crozat collection. Mr. Rogers gave one hundred and twenty pounds for it.

"ANDREA DEL SARTO.-Some studies in black chalks, for his fresco paintings in the Chapel del Scalzo. That for the young man who carries the baggage in the visitation of the Virgin is remarkably animated.

"LUCAS VAN LEYDEN.-A pen drawing, executed in the most perfect and masterly manner, for his celebrated and excessively rare engraving of the portrait of the Emperor Maximilian I. This wonderful drawing has hitherto been erroneously ascribed to Albert Durer.

"ALBERT DURER.-A child weeping. In chalk, on colored paper, brightened with white; almost unpleasantly true to reality.

"Among the admirable engravings, I mention only a single female figure, very delicately treated, which is so entirely pervaded with the spirit of Francisco Francia, that I do not hesitate to ascribe it to him. Francia, originally a goldsmith, is well known to have been peculiarly skilled in executing larger compositions in niello. How easily, therefore, might it have occurred to him, instead of working as hitherto in silver, to work with his graver in copper, especially as in his time the engraving on copper had been brought into more general use in Italy, by A. Mantegna and others; and Francia had such energy and diversity of talents that, in his mature age, he successfully made himself master of the art of painting, which was so much more remote from his own original profession. Beside this, the fine delicate lines in which the engraving is executed indicate an artist who had been previously accustomed to work for niello-plates, in which this manner is usually practised. The circumstance, too, that Marcantonio was educated in the workshop of Francia, is favorable to the presumption that he himself had practised engraving.

"Among the old miniatures, that which is framed and glazed and hung up, representing, in a landscape, a knight in golden armor, kneeling down, to whom God the Father, surrounded by cherubim and seraphim, appears in the air, while the damned are tormented by devils in the abyss, is by far the most important. As has been already observed by Passavant, it belongs to a series of forty miniatures, in the possession of Mr. George Brentano, at Frankfort-onMaine, which were executed for Maître Etienne Chevalier, treasurer of France under King Charles VII., and may probably have adorned his prayer-book. They are by the greatest French miniature-painter