Chapter XVII: Appendix: 1. Architect of the Ducal Palace (6)

RIALTO, BRIDGE OF THE. The best building raised in the time of the
Grotesque Renaissance; very noble in its simplicity, in its
proportions, and in its masonry. Note especially the grand way in
which the oblique archstones rest on the butments of the bridge, safe,
palpably both to the sense and eye: note also the sculpture of the
Annunciation on the southern side of it; how beautifully arranged, so
as to give more lightness and a grace to the arch--_the dove, flying
towards the Madonna, forming the keystone_,--and thus the whole action
of the figures being parallel to the curve of the arch, while all the
masonry is at right angles to it. Note, finally, one circumstance
which gives peculiar firmness to the figure of the angel, and
associates itself with the general expression of strength in the
whole building; namely that the sole of the advanced foot is set
perfectly level, as if placed on the ground, instead of being thrown
back behind like a heron's, as in most modern figures of this kind.

The sculptures themselves are not good; but these pieces of feeling in
them are very admirable. The two figures on the other side, St. Mark
and St. Theodore, are inferior, though all by the same sculptor,
Girolamo Campagna.

The bridge was built by Antonio da Ponte, in 1588. It was anciently of
wood, with a drawbridge in the centre, a representation of which may
be seen in one of Carpaccio's pictures at the Accademia delle Belle
Arti: and the traveller should observe that the interesting effect,
both of this and the Bridge of Sighs, depends in great part on their
both being _more_ than bridges; the one a covered passage, the other a
row of shops, sustained on an arch. No such effect can be produced
merely by the masonry of the roadway itself.

RIO DEL PALAZZO, II. 282.

ROCCO, CAMPIELLO DI SAN, windows in, II. 258.

ROCCO, CHURCH OF ST. Notable only for the most interesting pictures by
Tintoret which it contains, namely:

1. _San Rocco before the Pope._ (On the left of the door as we enter.)
A delightful picture in his best manner, but not much labored; and,
like several other pictures in this church, it seems to me to have
been executed at some period of the painter's life when he was either
in ill health, or else had got into a mechanical way of painting, from
having made too little reference to nature for a long time. There is
something stiff and forced in the white draperies on both sides, and a
general character about the whole which I can feel better than I can
describe; but which, if I had been the painter's physician, would have
immediately caused me to order him to shut up his painting-room, and
take a voyage to the Levant, and back again. The figure of the Pope
is, however, extremely beautiful, and is not unworthy, in its jewelled
magnificence, here dark against the sky, of comparison with the figure
of the high priest in the "Presentation," in the Scuola di San Rocco.

2. _Annunciation._ (On the other side of the door, on entering.) A
most disagreeable and dead picture, having all the faults of the age,
and none of the merits of the painter. It must be a matter of future
investigation to me, what could cause the fall of his mind from a
conception so great and so fiery as that of the "Annunciation" in the
Scuola di San Rocco, to this miserable reprint of an idea worn out
centuries before. One of the most inconceivable things in it,
considered as the work of Tintoret, is that where the angel's robe
drifts away behind his limb, one cannot tell by the character of the
outline, or by the tones of the color, whether the cloud comes in
before the robe, or whether the robe cuts upon the cloud. The Virgin
is uglier than that of the Scuola, and not half so real; and the
draperies are crumpled in the most commonplace and ignoble folds. It
is a picture well worth study, as an example of the extent to which
the greatest mind may be betrayed by the abuse of its powers, and the
neglect of its proper food in the study of nature.

3. _Pool of Bethesda._ (On the right side of the church, in its
centre, the lowest of the two pictures which occupy the wall.) A noble
work, but eminently disagreeable, as must be all pictures of this
subject; and with the same character in it of undefinable want, which
I have noticed in the two preceding works. The main figure in it is
the cripple, who has taken up his bed; but the whole effect of this
action is lost by his not turning to Christ, but flinging it on his
shoulder like a triumphant porter with a huge load; and the corrupt
Renaissance architecture, among which the figures are crowded, is both
ugly in itself, and much too small for them. It is worth noticing, for
the benefit of persons who find fault with the perspective of the
Pre-Raphaelites, that the perspective of the brackets beneath these
pillars is utterly absurd; and that, in fine, the presence or absence
of perspective has nothing to do with the merits of a great picture:
not that the perspective of the Pre-Raphaelites _is_ false in any case
that I have examined, the objection being just as untenable as it is
ridiculous.

4. _San Rocco in the Desert._ (Above the last-named picture.) A single
recumbent figure in a not very interesting landscape, deserving less
attention than a picture of St. Martin just opposite to it,--a noble
and knightly figure on horseback by Pordenone, to which I cannot pay a
greater compliment than by saying that I was a considerable time in
doubt whether or not it was another Tintoret.

5. _San Rocco in the Hospital._ (On the right-hand side of the altar.)
There are four vast pictures by Tintoret in the dark choir of this
church, not only important by their size (each being some twenty-five
feet long by ten feet high), but also elaborate compositions; and
remarkable, one for its extraordinary landscape, and the other as the
most studied picture in which the painter has introduced horses in
violent action. In order to show what waste of human mind there is in
these dark churches of Venice, it is worth recording that, as I was
examining these pictures, there came in a party of eighteen German
tourists, not hurried, nor jesting among themselves as large parties
often do, but patiently submitting to their cicerone, and evidently
desirous of doing their duty as intelligent travellers. They sat down
for a long time on the benches of the nave, looked a little at the
"Pool of Bethesda," walked up into the choir and there heard a lecture
of considerable length from their _valet-de-place_ upon some subject
connected with the altar itself, which, being in German, I did not
understand; they then turned and went slowly out of the church, not
one of the whole eighteen ever giving a single glance to any of the
four Tintorets, and only one of them, as far as I saw, even raising
his eyes to the walls on which they hung, and immediately withdrawing
them, with a jaded and _nonchalant_ expression easily interpretable
into "Nothing but old black pictures." The two Tintorets above
noticed, at the end of the church, were passed also without a glance;
and this neglect is not because the pictures have nothing in them
capable of arresting the popular mind, but simply because they are
totally in the dark, or confused among easier and more prominent
objects of attention. This picture, which I have called "St. Rocco in
the Hospital," shows him, I suppose, in his general ministrations at
such places, and is one of the usual representations of a disgusting
subject from which neither Orcagna nor Tintoret seems ever to have
shrunk. It is a very noble picture, carefully composed and highly
wrought; but to me gives no pleasure, first, on account of its
subject, secondly, on account of its dull brown tone all over,--it
being impossible, or nearly so, in such a scene, and at all events
inconsistent with its feeling, to introduce vivid color of any kind.
So it is a brown study of diseased limbs in a close room.

6. _Cattle Piece._ (Above the picture last described.) I can give no
other name to this picture, whose subject I can neither guess nor
discover, the picture being in the dark, and the guide-books leaving
me in the same position. All I can make out of it is, that there is a
noble landscape with cattle and figures. It seems to me the best
landscape of Tintoret's in Venice, except the "Flight into Egypt;" and
is even still more interesting from its savage character, the
principal trees being pines, something like Titian's in his "St.
Francis receiving the Stigmata," and chestnuts on the slopes and in
the hollows of the hills; the animals also seem first-rate. But it is
too high, too much faded, and too much in the dark to be made out. It
seems never to have been rich in color, rather cool and grey, and very
full of light.

7. _Finding of Body of San Rocco._ (On the left-hand side of the
altar.) An elaborate, but somewhat confused picture, with a flying
angel in a blue drapery; but it seemed to me altogether uninteresting,
or perhaps requiring more study than I was able to give it.

8. _San Rocco in Campo d' Armata._ So this picture is called by the
sacristan. I could see no San Rocco in it; nothing but a wild group of
horses and warriors in the most magnificent confusion of fall and
flight ever painted by man. They seem all dashed different ways as if
by a whirlwind; and a whirlwind there must be, or a thunderbolt,
behind them, for a huge tree is torn up and hurled into the air beyond
the central figure, as if it were a shivered lance. Two of the horses
meet in the midst, as if in a tournament; but in madness of fear, not
in hostility; on the horse to the right is a standard-bearer, who
stoops as from some foe behind him, with the lance laid across his
saddle-bow, level, and the flag stretched out behind him as he flies,
like the sail of a ship drifting from its mast; the central horseman,
who meets the shock, of storm, or enemy, whatever it be, is hurled
backwards from his seat, like a stone from a sling; and this figure
with the shattered tree trunk behind it, is the most noble part of the
picture. There is another grand horse on the right, however, also in
full action. Two gigantic figures on foot, on the left, meant to be
nearer than the others, would, it seems to me, have injured the
picture, had they been clearly visible; but time has reduced them to
perfect subordination.

ROCCO, SCUOLA DI SAN, bases of, I. 291, 431; soffit ornaments of, I.
337. An interesting building of the early Renaissance (1517), passing
into Roman Renaissance. The wreaths of leafage about its shafts are
wonderfully delicate and fine, though misplaced.

As regards the pictures which it contains, it is one of the three most
precious buildings in Italy; buildings, I mean, consistently decorated
with a series of paintings at the time of their erection, and still
exhibiting that series in its original order. I suppose there can be
little question, but that the three most important edifices of this
kind in Italy are the Sistine Chapel, the Campo Santo of Pisa, and the
Scuola di San Rocco at Venice: the first is painted by Michael Angelo;
the second by Orcagna, Benozzo Gozzoli, Pietro Laurati, and several
other men whose works are as rare as they are precious; and the third
by Tintoret.

Whatever the traveller may miss in Venice, he should therefore give
unembarrassed attention and unbroken time to the Scuola di San Rocco;
and I shall, accordingly, number the pictures, and note in them, one
by one, what seemed to me most worthy of observation.

There are sixty-two in all, but eight of these are merely of children
or children's heads, and two of unimportant figures. The number of
valuable pictures is fifty-two; arranged on the walls and ceilings of
three rooms, so badly lighted, in consequence of the admirable
arrangements of the Renaissance architect, that it is only in the
early morning that some of the pictures can be seen at all, nor can
they ever be seen but imperfectly. They were all painted, however, for
their places in the dark, and, as compared with Tintoret's other
works, are therefore, for the most part, nothing more than vast
sketches, made to produce, under a certain degree of shadow, the
effect of finished pictures. Their treatment is thus to be considered
as a kind of scene-painting; differing from ordinary scene-painting
only in this, that the effect aimed at is not _that of a natural
scene_ but _a perfect picture_. They differ in this respect from all
other existing works; for there is not, as far as I know, any other
instance in which a great master has consented to work for a room
plunged into almost total obscurity. It is probable that none but
Tintoret would have undertaken the task, and most fortunate that he
was forced to it. For in this magnificent scene-painting we have, of
course, more wonderful examples, both of his handling, and knowledge
of effect, than could ever have been exhibited in finished pictures;
while the necessity of doing much with few strokes keeps his mind so
completely on the stretch throughout the work (while yet the velocity
of production prevented his being wearied), that no other series of
his works exhibits powers so exalted. On the other hand, owing to the
velocity and coarseness of the painting, it is more liable to injury
through drought or damp; and, as the walls have been for years
continually running down with rain, and what little sun gets into the
place contrives to fall all day right on one or other of the pictures,
they are nothing but wrecks of what they were; and the ruins of
paintings originally coarse are not likely ever to be attractive to
the public mind. Twenty or thirty years ago they were taken down to be
retouched; but the man to whom the task was committed providentially
died, and only one of them was spoiled. I have found traces of his
work upon another, but not to an extent very seriously destructive.
The rest of the sixty-two, or, at any rate, all that are in the upper
room, appear entirely intact.

Although, as compared with his other works, they are all very scenic
in execution, there are great differences in their degrees of finish;
and, curiously enough, some on the ceilings and others in the darkest
places in the lower room are very nearly finished pictures, while the
"Agony in the Garden," which is in one of the best lights in the upper
room, appears to have been painted in a couple of hours with a broom
for a brush.

For the traveller's greater convenience, I shall give a rude plan of
the arrangement, and list of the subjects, of each group of pictures
before examining them in detail.

First Group. On the walls of the room on the ground floor.

1. Annunciation. 5. The Magdalen.
2. Adoration of Magi. 6. St. Mary of Egypt.
3. Flight into Egypt. 7. Circumcision.
4. Massacre of Innocents. 8. Assumption of Virgin.

At the turn of the stairs leading to the upper room:
9. Visitation.]

1. _The Annunciation._ This, which first strikes the eye, is a very
just representative of the whole group, the execution being carried to
the utmost limits of boldness consistent with completion. It is a
well-known picture, and need not therefore be specially described, but
one or two points in it require notice. The face of the Virgin is very
disagreeable to the spectator from below, giving the idea of a woman
about thirty, who had never been handsome. If the face is untouched,
it is the only instance I have ever seen of Tintoret's failing in an
intended effect, for, when seen near, the face is comely and youthful,
and expresses only surprise, instead of the pain and fear of which it
bears the aspect in the distance. I could not get near enough to see
whether it had been retouched. It looks like Tintoret's work, though
rather hard; but, as there are unquestionable marks in the retouching
of this picture, it is possible that some slight restoration of lines
supposed to be faded, entirely alter the distant expression of the
face. One of the evident pieces of repainting is the scarlet of the
Madonna's lap, which is heavy and lifeless. A far more injurious one
is the strip of sky seen through the doorway by which the angel
enters, which has originally been of the deep golden color of the
distance on the left, and which the blundering restorer has daubed
over with whitish blue, so that it looks like a bit of the wall;
luckily he has not touched the outlines of the angel's black wings, on
which the whole expression of the picture depends. This angel and the
group of small cherubs above form a great swinging chain, of which the
dove representing the Holy Spirit forms the bend. The angels in their
flight seem to be attached to this as the train of fire is to a
rocket; all of them appearing to have swooped down with the swiftness
of a falling star.

2. _Adoration of the Magi._ The most finished picture in the Scuola,
except the "Crucifixion," and perhaps the most delightful of the
whole. It unites every source of pleasure that a picture can possess:
the highest elevation of principal subject, mixed with the lowest
detail of picturesque incident; the dignity of the highest ranks of
men, opposed to the simplicity of the lowest; the quietness and
serenity of an incident in cottage life, contrasted with the
turbulence of troops of horsemen and the spiritual power of angels.
The placing of the two doves as principal points of light in the front
of the picture, in order to remind the spectator of the poverty of the
mother whose child is receiving the offerings and adoration of three
monarchs, is one of Tintoret's master touches; the whole scene,
indeed, is conceived in his happiest manner. Nothing can be at once
more humble or more dignified than the bearing of the kings; and there
is a sweet reality given to the whole incident by the Madonna's
stooping forward and lifting her hand in admiration of the vase of
gold which has been set before the Christ, though she does so with
such gentleness and quietness that her dignity is not in the least
injured by the simplicity of the action. As if to illustrate the means
by which the Wise men were brought from the East, the whole picture is
nothing but a large star, of which Christ is the centre; all the
figures, even the timbers of the roof, radiate from the small bright
figure on which the countenances of the flying angels are bent, the
star itself, gleaming through the timbers above, being quite
subordinate. The composition would almost be too artificial were it
not broken by the luminous distance where the troop of horsemen are
waiting for the kings. These, with a dog running at full speed, at
once interrupt the symmetry of the lines, and form a point of relief
from the over concentration of all the rest of the action.

3. _Flight into Egypt._ One of the principal figures here is the
donkey. I have never seen any of the nobler animals--lion, or leopard,
or horse, or dragon--made so sublime as this quiet head of the
domestic ass, chiefly owing to the grand motion in the nostril and
writhing in the ears. The space of the picture is chiefly occupied by
lovely landscape, and the Madonna and St. Joseph are pacing their way
along a shady path upon the banks of a river at the side of the
picture. I had not any conception, until I got near, how much pains
had been taken with the Virgin's head; its expression is as sweet and
as intense as that of any of Raffaelle's, its reality far greater. The
painter seems to have intended that everything should be subordinate
to the beauty of this single head; and the work is a wonderful proof
of the way in which a vast field of canvas may be made conducive to
the interest of a single figure. This is partly accomplished by
slightness of painting, so that on close examination, while there is
everything to astonish in the masterly handling and purpose, there is
not much perfect or very delightful painting; in fact, the two figures
are treated like the living figures in a scene at the theatre, and
finished to perfection, while the landscape is painted as hastily as
the scenes, and with the same kind of opaque size color. It has,
however, suffered as much as any of the series, and it is hardly fair
to judge of its tones and colors in its present state.

4. _Massacre of the Innocents._ The following account of this picture,
given in "Modern Painters," may be useful to the traveller, and is
therefore here repeated. "I have before alluded to the painfulness of
Raffaelle's treatment of the Massacre of the Innocents. Fuseli affirms
of it, that, 'in dramatic gradation he disclosed all the mother
through every image of pity and terror.' If this be so, I think the
philosophical spirit has prevailed over the imaginative. The
imagination never errs; it sees all that is, and all the relations
and bearings of it; but it would not have confused the mortal frenzy
of maternal terror, with various development of maternal character.
Fear, rage, and agony, at their utmost pitch, sweep away all
character: humanity itself would be lost in maternity, the woman would
become the mere personification of animal fury or fear. For this
reason all the ordinary representations of this subject are, I think,
false and cold: the artist has not heard the shrieks, nor mingled with
the fugitives; he has sat down in his study to convulse features
methodically, and philosophize over insanity. Not so Tintoret.
Knowing, or feeling, that the expression of the human face was, in
such circumstances, not to be rendered, and that the effort could only
end in an ugly falsehood, he denies himself all aid from the features,
he feels that if he is to place himself or us in the midst of that
maddened multitude, there can be no time allowed for watching
expression. Still less does he depend on details of murder or
ghastliness of death; there is no blood, no stabbing or cutting, but
there is an awful substitute for these in the chiaroscuro. The scene
is the outer vestibule of a palace, the slippery marble floor is
fearfully barred across by sanguine shadows, so that our eyes seem to
become bloodshot and strained with strange horror and deadly vision; a
lake of life before them, like the burning seen of the doomed Moabite
on the water that came by the way of Edom: a huge flight of stairs,
without parapet, descends on the left; down this rush a crowd of women
mixed with the murderers; the child in the arms of one has been seized
by the limbs, _she hurls herself over the edge, and falls head
downmost, dragging the child out of the grasp by her weight_;--she
will be dashed dead in a second:--close to us is the great struggle; a
heap of the mothers, entangled in one mortal writhe with each other
and the swords; one of the murderers dashed down and crushed beneath
them, the sword of another caught by the blade and dragged at by a
woman's naked hand; the youngest and fairest of the women, her child
just torn away from a death grasp, and clasped to her breast with the
grip of a steel vice, falls backwards, helpless over the heap, right
on the sword points; all knit together and hurled down in one
hopeless, frenzied, furious abandonment of body and soul in the
effort to save. Far back, at the bottom of the stairs, there is
something in the shadow like a heap of clothes. It is a woman, sitting
quiet,--quite quiet,--still as any stone; she looks down steadfastly
on her dead child, laid along on the floor before her, and her hand is
pressed softly upon her brow."

I have nothing to add to the above description of this picture, except
that I believe there may have been some change in the color of the
shadow that crosses the pavement. The chequers of the pavements are,
in the light, golden white and pale grey; in the shadow, red and dark
grey, the white in the sunshine becoming red in the shadow. I formerly
supposed that this was meant to give greater horror to the scene, and
it is very like Tintoret if it be so; but there is a strangeness and
discordance in it which makes me suspect the colors may have changed.

5. _The Magdalen._ This and the picture opposite to it, "St. Mary of
Egypt," have been painted to fill up narrow spaces between the windows
which were not large enough to receive compositions, and yet in which
single figures would have looked awkwardly thrust into the corner.
Tintoret has made these spaces as large as possible by filling them
with landscapes, which are rendered interesting by the introduction of
single figures of very small size. He has not, however, considered his
task, of making a small piece of wainscot look like a large one, worth
the stretch of his powers, and has painted these two landscapes just
as carelessly and as fast as an upholsterer's journeyman finishing a
room at a railroad hotel. The color is for the most part opaque, and
dashed or scrawled on in the manner of a scene-painter; and as during
the whole morning the sun shines upon the one picture, and during the
afternoon upon the other, hues, which were originally thin and
imperfect, are now dried in many places into mere dirt upon the
canvas. With all these drawbacks the pictures are of very high
interest, for although, as I said, hastily and carelessly, they are
not languidly painted; on the contrary, he has been in his hottest and
grandest temper; and in this first one ("Magdalen") the laurel tree,
with its leaves driven hither and thither among flakes of fiery cloud,
has been probably one of the greatest achievements that his hand
performed in landscape: its roots are entangled in underwood; of which
every leaf seems to be articulated, yet all is as wild as if it had
grown there instead of having been painted; there has been a mountain
distance, too, and a sky of stormy light, of which I infinitely regret
the loss, for though its masses of light are still discernible, its
variety of hue is all sunk into a withered brown. There is a curious
piece of execution in the striking of the light upon a brook which
runs under the roots of the laurel in the foreground: these roots are
traced in shadow against the bright surface of the water; another
painter would have drawn the light first, and drawn the dark roots
over it. Tintoret has laid in a brown ground which he has left for the
roots, and painted the water through their interstices with a few
mighty rolls of his brush laden with white.

6. _St. Mary of Egypt._ This picture differs but little in the plan,
from the one opposite, except that St. Mary has her back towards us,
and the Magdalen her face, and that the tree on the other side of the
brook is a palm instead of a laurel. The brook (Jordan?) is, however,
here much more important; and the water painting is exceedingly fine.
Of all painters that I know, in old times, Tintoret is the fondest of
running water; there was a sort of sympathy between it and his own
impetuous spirit. The rest of the landscape is not of much interest,
except so far as it is pleasant to see trunks of trees drawn by single
strokes of the brush.

7. _The Circumcision of Christ._ The custode has some story about this
picture having been painted in imitation of Paul Veronese. I much
doubt if Tintoret ever imitated any body; but this picture is the
expression of his perception of what Veronese delighted in, the
nobility that there may be in mere golden tissue and colored drapery.
It is, in fact, a picture of the moral power of gold and color; and
the chief use of the attendant priest is to support upon his shoulders
the crimson robe, with its square tablets of black and gold; and yet
nothing is withdrawn from the interest or dignity of the scene.
Tintoret has taken immense pains with the head of the high-priest. I
know not any existing old man's head so exquisitely tender, or so
noble in its lines. He receives the Infant Christ in his arms
kneeling, and looking down upon the Child with infinite veneration and
love; and the flashing of golden rays from its head is made the centre
of light, and all interest. The whole picture is like a golden charger
to receive the Child; the priest's dress is held up behind him, that
it may occupy larger space; the tables and floor are covered with
chequer-work; the shadows of the temple are filled with brazen lamps;
and above all are hung masses of curtains, whose crimson folds are
strewn over with golden flakes. Next to the "Adoration of the Magi"
this picture is the most laboriously finished of the Scuola di San
Rocco, and it is unquestionably the highest existing type of the
sublimity which may be thrown into the treatment of accessaries of
dress and decoration.

8. _Assumption of the Virgin._ On the tablet or panel of stone which
forms the side of the tomb out of which the Madonna rises, is this
inscription, in large letters, REST. ANTONIUS FLORIAN, 1834. Exactly
in proportion to a man's idiocy, is always the size of the letters in
which he writes his name on the picture that he spoils. The old
mosaicists in St. Mark's have not, in a single instance, as far as I
know, signed their names; but the spectator who wishes to know who
destroyed the effect of the nave, may see his name inscribed, twice
over, in letters half a foot high, BARTOLOMEO BOZZA. I have never seen
Tintoret's name signed, except in the great "Crucifixion;" but this
Antony Florian, I have no doubt, repainted the whole side of the tomb
that he might put his name on it. The picture is, of course, ruined
wherever he touched it; that is to say, half over; the circle of
cherubs in the sky is still pure; and the design of the great painter
is palpable enough yet in the grand flight of the horizontal angel, on
whom the Madonna half leans as she ascends. It has been a noble
picture, and is a grievous loss; but, happily, there are so many pure
ones, that we need not spend time in gleaning treasures out of the
ruins of this.

9. _Visitation._ A small picture, painted in his very best manner;
exquisite in its simplicity, unrivalled in vigor, well preserved, and,
as a piece of painting, certainly one of the most precious in Venice.
Of course it does not show any of his high inventive powers; nor can a
picture of four middle-sized figures be made a proper subject of
comparison with large canvases containing forty or fifty; but it is,
for this very reason, painted with such perfect ease, and yet with no
slackness either of affection or power, that there is no picture that
I covet so much. It is, besides, altogether free from the Renaissance
taint of dramatic effect. The gestures are as simple and natural as
Giotto's, only expressed by grander lines, such as none but Tintoret
ever reached. The draperies are dark, relieved against a light sky,
the horizon being excessively low, and the outlines of the drapery so
severe, that the intervals between the figures look like ravines
between great rocks, and have all the sublimity of an Alpine valley at
twilight. This precious picture is hung about thirty feet above the
eye, but by looking at it in a strong light, it is discoverable that
the Saint Elizabeth is dressed in green and crimson, the Virgin in the
peculiar red which all great colorists delight in--a sort of glowing
brick-color or brownish scarlet, opposed to rich golden brownish
black; and both have white kerchiefs, or drapery, thrown over their
shoulders. Zacharias leans on his staff behind them in a black dress
with white sleeves. The stroke of brilliant white light, which
outlines the knee of Saint Elizabeth, is a curious instance of the
habit of the painter to relieve his dark forms by a sort of halo of
more vivid light, which, until lately, one would have been apt to
suppose a somewhat artificial and unjustifiable means of effect. The
daguerreotype has shown, what the naked eye never could, that the
instinct of the great painter was true, and that there is actually
such a sudden and sharp line of light round the edges of dark objects
relieved by luminous space.

Opposite this picture is a most precious Titian, the "Annunciation,"
full of grace and beauty. I think the Madonna one of the sweetest
figures he ever painted. But if the traveller has entered at all into
the spirit of Tintoret, he will immediately feel the comparative
feebleness and conventionality of the Titian. Note especially the mean
and petty folds of the angel's drapery, and compare them with the
draperies of the opposite picture. The larger pictures at the sides of
the stairs by Zanchi and Negri, are utterly worthless.

10. Adoration of Shepherds. 17. Resurrection of Lazarus.
11. Baptism. 18. Ascension.
12. Resurrection. 19. Pool of Bethesda.
13. Agony in Garden. 20. Temptation.
14. Last Supper. 21. St. Rocco.
15. Altar Piece: St. Rocco. 22. St. Sebastian.
16. Miracle of Loaves.]

10. _The Adoration of the Shepherds._ This picture commences the
series of the upper room, which, as already noticed, is painted with
far less care than that of the lower. It is one of the painter's
inconceivable caprices that the only canvases that are in good light
should be covered in this hasty manner, while those in the dungeon
below, and on the ceiling above, are all highly labored. It is,
however, just possible that the covering of these walls may have been
an after-thought, when he had got tired of his work. They are also,
for the most part, illustrative of a principle of which I am more and
more convinced every day, that historical and figure pieces ought not
to be made vehicles for effects of light. The light which is fit for a
historical picture is that tempered semi-sunshine of which, in
general, the works of Titian are the best examples, and of which the
picture we have just passed, "The Visitation," is a perfect example
from the hand of one greater than Titian; so also the three
"Crucifixions" of San Rocco, San Cassano, and St. John and Paul; the
"Adoration of the Magi" here; and, in general, the finest works of
the master; but Tintoret was not a man to work in any formal or
systematic manner; and, exactly like Turner, we find him recording
every effect which Nature herself displays. Still he seems to regard
the pictures which deviate from the great general principle of
colorists rather as "tours de force" than as sources of pleasure; and
I do not think there is any instance of his having worked out one of
these tricky pictures with thorough affection, except only in the case
of the "Marriage of Cana." By tricky pictures, I mean those which
display light entering in different directions, and attract the eye to
the effects rather than to the figure which displays them. Of this
treatment, we have already had a marvellous instance in the
candle-light picture of the "Last Supper" in San Giorgio Maggiore.
This "Adoration of the Shepherds" has probably been nearly as
wonderful when first painted: the Madonna is seated on a kind of
hammock floor made of rope netting, covered with straw; it divides the
picture into two stories, of which the uppermost contains the Virgin,
with two women who are adoring Christ, and shows light entering from
above through the loose timbers of the roof of the stable, as well as
through the bars of a square window; the lower division shows this
light falling behind the netting upon the stable floor, occupied by a
cock and a cow, and against this light are relieved the figures of the
shepherds, for the most part in demi-tint, but with flakes of more
vigorous sunshine falling here and there upon them from above. The
optical illusion has originally been as perfect as one of Hunt's best
interiors; but it is most curious that no part of the work seems to
have been taken any pleasure in by the painter; it is all by his hand,
but it looks as if he had been bent only on getting over the ground.
It is literally a piece of scene-painting, and is exactly what we
might fancy Tintoret to have done, had he been forced to paint scenes
at a small theatre at a shilling a day. I cannot think that the whole
canvas, though fourteen feet high and ten wide, or thereabouts, could
have taken him more than a couple of days to finish: and it is very
noticeable that exactly in proportion to the brilliant effects of
light is the coarseness of the execution, for the figures of the
Madonna and of the women above, which are not in any strong effect,
are painted with some care, while the shepherds and the cow are alike
slovenly; and the latter, which is in full sunshine, is recognizable
for a cow more by its size and that of its horns, than by any care
given to its form. It is interesting to contrast this slovenly and
mean sketch with the ass's head in the "Flight into Egypt," on which
the painter exerted his full power; as an effect of light, however,
the work is, of course, most interesting. One point in the treatment
is especially noticeable: there is a peacock in the rack beyond the
cow; and under other circumstances, one cannot doubt that Tintoret
would have liked a peacock in full color, and would have painted it
green and blue with great satisfaction. It is sacrificed to the light,
however, and is painted in warm grey, with a dim eye or two in the
tail: this process is exactly analogous to Turner's taking the colors
out of the flags of his ships in the "Gosport." Another striking point
is the litter with which the whole picture is filled in order more to
confuse the eye: there is straw sticking from the roof, straw all over
the hammock floor, and straw struggling hither and thither all over
the floor itself; and, to add to the confusion, the glory around the
head of the infant, instead of being united and serene, is broken into
little bits, and is like a glory of chopped straw. But the most
curious thing, after all, is the want of delight in any of the
principal figures, and the comparative meanness and commonplaceness of
even the folds of the drapery. It seems as if Tintoret had determined
to make the shepherds as uninteresting as possible; but one does not
see why their very clothes should be ill painted, and their
disposition unpicturesque. I believe, however, though it never struck
me until I had examined this picture, that this is one of the
painter's fixed principles: he does not, with German sentimentality,
make shepherds and peasants graceful or sublime, but he purposely
vulgarizes them, not by making their actions or their faces boorish or
disagreeable, but rather by painting them ill, and composing their
draperies tamely. As far as I recollect at present, the principle is
universal with him; exactly in proportion to the dignity of character
is the beauty of the painting. He will not put out his strength upon
any man belonging to the lower classes; and, in order to know what the
painter is, one must see him at work on a king, a senator, or a
saint. The curious connexion of this with the aristocratic tendencies
of the Venetian nation, when we remember that Tintoret was the
greatest man whom that nation produced, may become very interesting,
if followed out. I forgot to note that, though the peacock is painted
with great regardlessness of color, there is a feature in it which no
common painter would have observed,--the peculiar flatness of the
back, and undulation of the shoulders: the bird's body is all there,
though its feathers are a good deal neglected; and the same thing is
noticeable in a cock who is pecking among the straw near the
spectator, though in other respects a shabby cock enough. The fact is,
I believe, he had made his shepherds so commonplace that he dare not
paint his animals well, otherwise one would have looked at nothing in
the picture but the peacock, cock, and cow. I cannot tell what the
shepherds are offering; they look like milk bowls, but they are
awkwardly held up, with such twistings of body as would have certainly
spilt the milk. A woman in front has a basket of eggs; but this I
imagine to be merely to keep up the rustic character of the scene, and
not part of the shepherd's offerings.

11. _Baptism._ There is more of the true picture quality in this work
than in the former one, but still very little appearance of enjoyment
or care. The color is for the most part grey and uninteresting, and
the figures are thin and meagre in form, and slightly painted; so much
so, that of the nineteen figures in the distance, about a dozen are
hardly worth calling figures, and the rest are so sketched and
flourished in that one can hardly tell which is which. There is one
point about it very interesting to a landscape painter: the river is
seen far into the distance, with a piece of copse bordering it; the
sky beyond is dark, but the water nevertheless receives a brilliant
reflection from some unseen rent in the clouds, so brilliant, that
when I was first at Venice, not being accustomed to Tintoret's slight
execution, or to see pictures so much injured, I took this piece of
water for a piece of sky. The effect as Tintoret has arranged it, is
indeed somewhat unnatural, but it is valuable as showing his
recognition of a principle unknown to half the historical painters of
the present day,--that the reflection seen in the water is totally
different from the object seen above it, and that it is very possible
to have a bright light in reflection where there appears nothing but
darkness to be reflected. The clouds in the sky itself are round,
heavy, and lightless, and in a great degree spoil what would otherwise
be a fine landscape distance. Behind the rocks on the right, a single
head is seen, with a collar on the shoulders: it seems to be intended
for a portrait of some person connected with the picture.

12. _Resurrection._ Another of the "effect of light" pictures, and not
a very striking one, the best part of it being the two distant figures
of the Maries seen in the dawn of the morning. The conception of the
Resurrection itself is characteristic of the worst points of Tintoret.
His impetuosity is here in the wrong place; Christ bursts out of the
rock like a thunderbolt, and the angels themselves seem likely to be
crushed under the rent stones of the tomb. Had the figure of Christ
been sublime, this conception might have been accepted; but, on the
contrary, it is weak, mean, and painful; and the whole picture is
languidly or roughly painted, except only the fig-tree at the top of
the rock, which, by a curious caprice, is not only drawn in the
painter's best manner, but has golden ribs to all its leaves, making
it look like one of the beautiful crossed or chequered patterns, of
which he is so fond in his dresses; the leaves themselves being a dark
olive brown.

13. _The Agony in the Garden._ I cannot at present understand the
order of these subjects; but they may have been misplaced. This, of
all the San Rocco pictures, is the most hastily painted, but it is
not, like those we have been passing, _clodly_ painted; it seems to
have been executed altogether with a hearth-broom, and in a few hours.
It is another of the "effects," and a very curious one; the Angel who
bears the cup to Christ is surrounded by a red halo; yet the light
which falls upon the shoulders of the sleeping disciples, and upon the
leaves of the olive-trees, is cool and silvery, while the troop coming
up to seize Christ are seen by torch-light. Judas, who is the second
figure, points to Christ, but turns his head away as he does so, as
unable to look at him. This is a noble touch; the foliage is also
exceedingly fine, though what kind of olive-tree bears such leaves I
know not, each of them being about the size of a man's hand. If there
be any which bear such foliage, their olives must be the size of
cocoa-nuts. This, however, is true only of the underwood, which is,
perhaps, not meant for olive. There are some taller trees at the top
of the picture, whose leaves are of a more natural size. On closely
examining the figures of the troops on the left, I find that the
distant ones are concealed, all but the limbs, by a sort of arch of
dark color, which is now so injured, that I cannot tell whether it was
foliage or ground: I suppose it to have been a mass of close foliage,
through which the troop is breaking its way; Judas rather showing them
the path, than actually pointing to Christ, as it is written, "Judas,
who betrayed him, knew the place." St. Peter, as the most zealous of
the three disciples, the only one who was to endeavor to defend his
Master, is represented as awakening and turning his head toward the
troop, while James and John are buried in profound slumber, laid in
magnificent languor among the leaves. The picture is singularly
impressive, when seen far enough off, as an image of thick forest
gloom amidst the rich and tender foliage of the South; the leaves,
however, tossing as in disturbed night air, and the flickering of the
torches, and of the branches, contrasted with the steady flame which
from the Angel's presence is spread over the robes of the disciples.
The strangest feature in the whole is that the Christ also is
represented as sleeping. The angel seems to appear to him in a dream.

14. _The Last Supper._ A most unsatisfactory picture; I think about
the worst I know of Tintoret's, where there is no appearance of
retouching. He always makes the disciples in this scene too vulgar;
they are here not only vulgar, but diminutive, and Christ is at the
end of the table, the smallest figure of them all. The principal
figures are two mendicants sitting on steps in front; a kind of
supporters, but I suppose intended to be waiting for the fragments; a
dog, in still more earnest expectation, is watching the movements of
the disciples, who are talking together, Judas having just gone out.
Christ is represented as giving what one at first supposes is the sop
to Judas, but as the disciple who received it has a glory, and there
are only eleven at table, it is evidently the Sacramental bread. The
room in which they are assembled is a sort of large kitchen, and the
host is seen employed at a dresser in the background. This picture has
not only been originally poor, but is one of those exposed all day to
the sun, and is dried into mere dusty canvas: where there was once
blue, there is now nothing.

15. _Saint Rocco in Glory._ One of the worst order of Tintorets, with
apparent smoothness and finish, yet languidly painted, as if in
illness or fatigue; very dark and heavy in tone also; its figures, for
the most part, of an awkward middle size, about five feet high, and
very uninteresting. St. Rocco ascends to heaven, looking down upon a
crowd of poor and sick persons who are blessing and adoring him. One
of these, kneeling at the bottom, is very nearly a repetition, though
a careless and indolent one, of that of St. Stephen, in St. Giorgio
Maggiore, and of the central figure in the "Paradise" of the Ducal
Palace. It is a kind of lay figure, of which he seems to have been
fond; its clasped hands are here shockingly painted--I should think
unfinished. It forms the only important light at the bottom, relieved
on a dark ground; at the top of the picture, the figure of St. Rocco
is seen in shadow against the light of the sky, and all the rest is in
confused shadow. The commonplaceness of this composition is curiously
connected with the languor of thought and touch throughout the work.

16. _Miracle of the Loaves._ Hardly anything but a fine piece of
landscape is here left; it is more exposed to the sun than any other
picture in the room, and its draperies having been, in great part,
painted in blue, are now mere patches of the color of starch; the
scene is also very imperfectly conceived. The twenty-one figures,
including Christ and his Disciples, very ill represent a crowd of
seven thousand; still less is the marvel of the miracle expressed by
perfect ease and rest of the reclining figures in the foreground, who
do not so much as look surprised; considered merely as reclining
figures, and as pieces of effect in half light, they have once been
fine. The landscape, which represents the slope of a woody hill, has a
very grand and far-away look. Behind it is a great space of streaky
sky, almost prismatic in color, rosy and golden clouds covering up its
blue, and some fine vigorous trees thrown against it; painted in about
ten minutes each, however, by curly touches of the brush, and looking
rather more like seaweed than foliage.

17. _Resurrection of Lazarus._ Very strangely, and not impressively
conceived. Christ is half reclining, half sitting, at the bottom of
the picture, while Lazarus is disencumbered of his grave-clothes at
the top of it; the scene being the side of a rocky hill, and the mouth
of the tomb probably once visible in the shadow on the left; but all
that is now discernible is a man having his limbs unbound, as if
Christ were merely ordering a prisoner to be loosed. There appears
neither awe nor agitation, nor even much astonishment, in any of the
figures of the group; but the picture is more vigorous than any of the
three last mentioned, and the upper part of it is quite worthy of the
master, especially its noble fig-tree and laurel, which he has
painted, in one of his usual fits of caprice, as carefully as that in
the "Resurrection of Christ," opposite. Perhaps he has some meaning in
this; he may have been thinking of the verse, "Behold the fig-tree,
and all the trees; when they now shoot forth," &c. In the present
instance, the leaves are dark only, and have no golden veins. The
uppermost figures also come dark against the sky, and would form a
precipitous mass, like a piece of the rock itself, but that they are
broken in upon by one of the limbs of Lazarus, bandaged and in full
light, which, to my feeling, sadly injures the picture, both as a
disagreeable object, and a light in the wrong place. The grass and
weeds are, throughout, carefully painted, but the lower figures are of
little interest, and the face of the Christ a grievous failure.