Classic Myths in Art  

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Classic Myths in Art (1910) by Julia de Wolf Gibbs Addison

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preface

IN dealing with the subject of Classic Myths in Art, it is not my purpose to write a manual of mythology. Many of the most interesting myths of literature are hardly ever brought into the field of representation, and of these I propose to make no mention. Only in so far as the subject can be illus- trated by the works of ancient sculptors or more modern painters, is it available in a volume of this description.

Neither have we space to consider and analyze the origins of the stories, which can usually be traced to some natural conditions or phenomena. It is only in the relation of these stories to art that our course is planned, the literary aspect of the myths not being within our scope. Many readers are familiar with some one or more of the excellent handbooks of mythology, or, better still, with the Greek authors themselves, who give colour and atmosphere to the legends which nothing but the original sources can furnish.

In illustrating the book I have made it a general

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rule not to use such statues or pictures as are avail- able to every one in familiar casts or prints; but rather I have selected for presentation some of the less well-known works of art, even though they be not so famous as the antique.

JULIA DE WOLF ADDISON. 1904.

Contents

CHAPTBR PAGK

I. THE ACCESSION OF ZEUS . . . . i

II. OLYMPUS, OCEAN, AND HADES ... 12

III. THE LOVES OF ZEUS 32

IV. VENUS, APHRODITE 63

V. APOLLO AND THE MUSES .... 88

VI. MYTHS RELATING TO DIANA . . . .no

VII. PALLAS, MARS, MERCURY, AND VULCAN . 129

VIII. BACCHUS AND His TRAIN . . . .150

IX. CLASSIC LOVE-STORIES 167

X. HERCULES .188

XI. THESEUS AND THE CENTAURS . . . 199

XII. PERSEUS 211

XIII. MINOR MYTHS 228

XIV. HEROES OF THE TROJAN WAR . . . 250

BIBLIOGRAPHY 275

INDEX 277

%ist of Ullustratfons

PAGE

HENNER. Andromeda (see page 219} . Frontispiece

PEKING DEL VAGA. Battle of the Giants ... 8 GIULIO ROMANO. Infancy of Jupiter . . .12

RAPHAEL. Triumph of Galatea . . . . .21 TINTORETTO. Leda and the Swan . . . 36

VERONESE. Danae and the Shower of Gold . . 46 VERONESE. Europa and the Bull .... 50

TITIAN. Jupiter and Antiope 57

BOTTICELLI. Birth of Venus 66

TITIAN. Head of Venus 72

RUBENS Venus and Adonis 85

BERNINI. Apollo and Daphne 95

GREEK PAINTING. Muse of Cortona . . . 100

GIULIO ROMANO. Apollo and the Muses . . .102

MANTEGNA. Parnassus 106

CORREGGIO. Diana ill

DOMENICHINO. Diana and Her Nymphs . . .116 TINTORETTO. Minerva Rebuking Mars . . .130 ALBANO. Mercury Giving the Lyre to Apollo . . 139

VELASQUEZ. Forge of Vulcan 146

LEONARDO DA VINCI (ATTRIBUTED). Bacchus. . 154 TINTORETTO. Marriage of Bacchus and Ariadne . 1 56 CAMUCCINO. Cupid and Psyche before Jupiter . .178

VOLTER.RANQ Sleeping Love 189

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PACK

GUIDO RENI. Cephalus and Procris . . .- 186

ANNIBALE CARACCI Choice of Hercules . . .191

POLLAJUOLO Hercules and Antaeus . . . .194

ANTIQUE BRONZE A Centaur 210

LEONARDO DA VINCI (ATTRIBUTED). Head of Medusa 2 1 8 PIERO DI COSIMO. Perseus and Andromeda (detail) 222

TITIAN Flora 228

ANTIQUE MARBLE The Three Graces . . . 232

PELLEGRINO Hebe 236

GUIDO RENI. Atalanta's Race 243

CANOVA Daedalus and Icarus 245

VAN DER WERFF. Judgment of Paris . . .251

DAVID. Paris and Helen 253

Dosso Dossi Circe 263

GUIDO RENI Ulysses and Nausicaa .... 265

PINTURICCHIO Return of Ulysses . . . .267

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CHAPTER I.

THE ACCESSION OF ZEUS

THE pictures of the old masters deal generally with religious subjects, but at the approach of the Renaissance the revived interest in classic art and culture led many of the artists to paint scenes from the mythology of the Greeks. It is with these pic- tures, rather more than with ancient sculpture, that this volume will concern itself. Certain gods and heroes naturally became favourites with the painters, while others were hardly ever represented. There- fore, one cannot study mythology systematically from the pictures of the Renaissance, but one can, by studying the pictures of the Renaissance, discover what features in the old legends had predominated and survived with perennial interest for the later students of classic myth.

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" Each great master of the Renaissance," says Symonds, " had his own relation to classical mythol- ogy." Symonds then enumerates Leda and the Swan, as treated by Da Vinci and Michelangelo; Correggio's Danae and lo; Titian and Tintoretto, with their rival pictures of Bacchus and Ariadne; Raphael's Galatea; Pollajuolo's Hercules; Vero- nese's Europa; Dosso Dossi's Circe; Palma's Venus. " All these," he continues, " to mention none but pictures familiar to every traveller, . . . raise for the student of the classical revival absorb- ing questions relative to the influences of pagan myths upon the modern imagination."

The aim of the Middle Ages had been to express subtle emotions and to suggest thought ; the aim of the Renaissance was to represent beautiful nude bodies, and to call the picture by whatever name it might fittingly bear. Paris Bordone is chronicled as having executed for a high ecclesiastic " a singu- larly beautiful church picture, with one of Venus and Cupid for his chamber." The same duplex type of order seems to have been repeated for the Cardinal of Lorraine, for whom he painted " The Ecce Homo, with a Jupiter and lo." Another curiously assorted pair was sent to Flanders, a Magdalen and a Diana bathing.

The artists of the early Renaissance had little knowledge of Greek conditions ; they topk their

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stories from Ovid, and then interpreted them in the light of their own experience, which was practically a mediaeval experience. As Vernon Lee has so aptly expressed it : " They made up their paganism for themselves, out of all the pleasant things they knew; their fancy has brooded upon it; and the very details that make us laugh, the details coming direct from the Middle Ages, the spirit in glaring opposition occasionally to that of antiquity, bring home to us how completely this pagan fairyland is a genuine reality to these men." Giotto carved two of the little medallions on the Campanile, in Flor- ence ; one, supposed to represent Phidias, is a sculp- tor, engaged in hewing a human shape out of a block of stone with chisel and mallet; the other, Apelles, typical of the art of painting, is naively portrayed as working on an elaborate altar-piece, in the form of a triptych.

In the study of Greek art, Taine has justly summed up the chief needs of the reader : " A Homer and a Plato are better guides than all the archaeologists, artists, and catalogues in the world." The original sources are better always than later commentators. No one can tell the story of a classic myth so well to-day as Ovid told it twenty centuries ago. The difference between the spirit of the Greek artist and the artist of the Renaissance is well expressed by Taine. He says ; " Both are

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equally pagan ; that is to say, wholly occupied with the present and physical life. Notwithstanding this, they are separated by two notable differences; the antique is more calm ; ... it is that of animal life, almost vegetative ; man lives for the sake of living, and desires nothing beyond. . . . The Renaissance sculptor, on the other hand, imitates the real more subtly, and aims more at expression." The Greek love for beauty extended even to the commonest and most homely details; when an object could not be externally beautiful, they chose that it should be accurately adapted to its use; and any office well performed, be it ever so menial, deserved recog- nition. Plato has immortalized a baker who hap- pened to be especially skilful in his craft; and also an innkeeper who understood perfectly the difficult art of harmonizing all the diverse elements of his exacting calling.

The distinction made by Prof. C. M. Gayley be- tween the fable and the myth will be worth quoting at this point. " A fable is a story," says Professor Gayley, " like that of King Log, or the Fox and the Grapes, in which characters and plot, neither pre- tending to reality nor demanding credence, are fabri- cated confessedly as the vehicle of moral or didactic instruction. . . . Myths, on the other hand, are stories of anonymous origin, prevalent among primi- tive people, and by them accepted as true, concerning

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supernatural beings and events, or natural beings and events influenced by supernatural agencies. Fables are made by individuals. . . . Myths are born, not made." The myths grew up as anecdotes about the supernatural beings of the Greek worship, who, in their turn, were an outcome and embodi- ment of nature-worship. John Fiske, in his " Myths and Myth-makers " says : " To the ancients, the moon was not a lifeless body of stones and clods; it was the horned huntress Artemis, coursing through the upper ether, or bathing herself in a clear lake; or it was Aphrodite, protectress of lovers, born of the sea-foam in the East; . . . The yellow-haired Phoebus drove westward all day in his flaming chariot." Personality was ascribed to the Dawn, to Night, to the Winds, and to Storms ; each had its presiding genius, and each received a part of the Pantheistic worship. Euripides speaks of " the limitless ether which holds the earth in its moist grasp." Myth may be understood to include the stories related of the divinities of Olympus, and also the deeds and achievements of the heroes of Greece, who, though not always worshipped as gods, were partly mythical while they were partly histori- cal. Besides gods and heroes, the Greek myth dealt with various fabulous creatures, such as fauns, gor- gons, and nymphs, who have figured largely in the art of all following generations.

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Among the primal divinities of Greece were the elements. Owing to a system of geography which recognized the earth as a flat disc, the Greeks con- veniently placed their heaven in the central position upon this plane, while River Ocean was considered to surround the whole with an undefined boundary of water. Thus the gods of Olympus were deities of air and land, while the gods of the ocean presided over the rivers and seas. Monsters of an aquatic variety inhabited the waters. The Dawn and the Sun and Moon were impersonated by gods and goddesses, who were very popular in art.

Hesiod, in his Theogony, deals with the creation of the world according to the Greek belief:

" Chaos, of all the origin, gave birth First to her offspring, the wide-bosomed Earth, The seat secure of all the Gods, who now Possess Olympus ever clothed in snow. Th' abodes of Hell from the same fountain rise A gloomy land that subterranean lies. . . . At length the Ocean, with his pools profound, Whose whirling streams pursue their rapid round Of Heaven and Earth is born."

One of the first events recognized in art was the Battle of the Giants, or Fall of the Titans. The first gigantic race which peopled the earth had to be swept away before Jupiter and his brothers could gain the ascendency, and reign as gods.

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" Furious and swift the Titan phalanx drove And both with mighty force for empire strove. The Ocean roared from every part profound, And the Earth bellowed from her inmost ground. Heaven groans; and to the gods conflicting bends And the loud tumult high Olympus rends. So strong the darts from god to god were hurled, The clamour reached the subterranean world, And where, with haughty strides, each warrior trod, Hell felt the weight, and sunk beneath the god."

Jupiter, having- dethroned his father Saturn, reigned in Olympus. As Hesiod wrote :

" Great Jove, their sire, who rules th' ethereal plains, Confirmed in power, of gods the monarch reigns. His father Saturn hurled from his command, He grasps the thunder with his conquering hand: He gives the bolts their vigour as they fly, And bids the lurid lightning pierce the sky."

Primarily, Jupiter stands as emblematic of power. The great altar at Pergamus, casts of which have been made, displays in its famous sculptures this Battle of the Giants. It is the work of sculptors of the third century B. c., and shows struggling forms fighting for liberty. The action in the great battered fragments is noble, and is equal, in many respects, to the best work of Scopas and Praxiteles.

In Giulio Romano's great frescoes at Mantua, he treats this subject in the spirit of his time; but a

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good deal of classic feeling remains in the Titan forms huddling in their beds of cloud, and driven hurtling away from the light by the invincible power of Jove and his army. They are well-drawn, writh- ing bodies, but, lacking in virility of purpose, they are forced to give way before their conqueror.

" Erect and dauntless see the Thunderer stand, The bolts red hissing from his vengeful hand."

In the Prado at Madrid is a painting by Gouwi of the Titans' fall, and one in Dresden by Schon- feldt.

Perino del Vaga's fresco of the Battle of the Giants, in the Doria Palace, in Genoa, is a good bit of Renaissance realism. The victory has here been accomplished; the fallen Titans lie on the earth in the lower plane of the fresco, while above, in the Olympic heaven, at the top of the lunette, Jupiter and the divinities about him are serenely seated, in state, while the Thunderer still hurls his bolts among his disconsolate precursors. The figures are stiff, and yet there is a certain monumental quality in the whole, which is much more satisfactory than the inextricable mixture of nude bodies and shafts of flame which characterize so many representations of this scene.

Vasari alludes to a " Gigantomachia," painted by

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Licinio (Pordenone) on the Tinghi Palace. Some of the giants were being hurled to their doom by Jove's thunderbolts, while others attacked Diana, who defended herself with a lighted torch.

The most pathetic tale of all the Titans is that of Prometheus, the great misunderstood benefactor, who, for his theft of fire, was condemned to suffer eternal torture, chained to a rock, while a vulture preyed upon his vitals. This scene has been taken for many gruesome and morbid works of art. Prometheus represents a great type, which, though powerful in one way, is helpless in another. As Decharme says in his " Mythologie de la Grece Antique," " He is the type of man striving against nature, and, by dint of intelligence and skill, suc- cessful in wresting from her some of her secrets."

The subject of Prometheus was evidently painted by the Greeks. Achilles Tatius, in his novel, " Cleito- phon and Leucippe," in the fifth century, describes a picture representing Prometheus as follows: " There was Prometheus chained to the rock, and Hercules armed with bow and spear. And a bird was feeding on the entrails of Prometheus, for it stood rending his vitals open, open though they were enough already. But its beak was plunged in the wound, and it seemed as though it was seeking his liver . . . and the bird dug the points of its talons into the thigh of Prometheus, so that he was

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all contracted with pain, and his body was all bent, and he lifted his thigh to his own detriment, for he thus drew the bird closer to his liver. And right down the other leg you could see every muscle braced and strained in grievous pain to his very toes. Elsewhere, too, you saw evidences of his agony ; his brows were bent, his lips contracted, and he showed his teeth." We talk of modern realism; where shall we find a more realistic picture either in graphic art or in literature? But the deliverer was at hand. Zeus permitted Hercules to slay the eagle and thus put an end to the torment of Prome- theus. In this old Greek picture Hercules stood aim- ing his arrow at the eagle, " his left hand pressing out the bow away from him, while his right he drew back to his breast, pulling the string, and his elbow was bent behind him. So that all was bent alike the bow, the string, the arrow, and his hand."

In the Prado at Madrid there is a painting of Prometheus, by Ribera. It is a colossal figure, originally in the possession of Philip IV., at the Royal Palace at Madrid. We have reason to fear that Philip never quite appreciated the grim mes- sage of this picture.

In the same gallery is a Flemish painting by Cossins, who worked about 1600, representing Prometheus descending with the fire which he has stolen from heaven, the unpardonable sin. There

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is a picture of the same object also by Soli- mena in the Prado, and one by Guido Reni, less forceful than many of the others.

After the giants had all been disposed of, to the satisfaction of their conqueror, Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto, three brothers, became the presiding deities of Earth, Ocean, and Hades. Olympus, the heaven of the Greek mythology, was also under the dominion of Jupiter, for the classic mind had not aspired to a heaven which should be higher (except in physical elevation) than the earth where mor- tals dwelt. These three powerful brothers had a certain resemblance one to another in early art; all were represented with beards, while their attributes were, for Jupiter, the thunderbolt, for Neptune, the trident, and for Pluto, the fork with two spikes practically the pitchfork, which survived in medi- aeval conceptions of the devil.

The children of Jupiter Venus, Mars, Vulcan, Diana, Minerva, and Apollo were the chief heroes of Olympus. It will be our purpose to examine first the myths connected with Jupiter, the legends of Neptune and the sea-divinities, and the gods of the Under World, and afterward to consider the myths concerning the Olympian offspring.

CHAPTER II.

OLYMPUS, OCEAN, AND HADES

IMMEDIATELY after the birth of Jupiter, Jove, Zeus (call him by which name you will), he was given by his mother Rhea to the nymphs of Dicta, who at once provided a foster-mother for him in the shape of the goat Amalthea. In the Capitoline Museum in Rome is a series of reliefs representing the infancy and childhood of Zeus. Cretan coins, too, often show the young god suckled by the goat, or carried in the arms of the nymphs. Between Vasari and Christofano Gherardi, a series of frescoes was executed in a mansion in Venice, among which might be seen the infant Jove suckled by Amalthea. In Munich is a painting by Cicagni, representing the infant Jupiter and the goat Amalthea, enter- tained by corybantes who play to him. There is also a picture in the National Gallery of London, by Giulio Romano, dealing with the infancy of Jupiter.

The Thunderer has always been represented in rather a conventional way, usually in Greek art

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mature, calm, and masterful. He is always bearded ; his hair is drawn up on his forehead and parted. It then falls again on each side, but is not so unkempt as that of Neptune. The types of the three brothers, Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto, are easily distinguished when these characteristics of each are known. Jupiter is always credited with a great and por- tentous " nod." The shaking of his locks is the characteristic action for the monarch of Olympus, besides a movement of the eyebrows.

Zeus is generally seated, draped below the waist, his muscular torso exposed to view. In most repre- sentations, both ancient and modern, he is accom- panied by the eagle, his constant emblem.

The picture by Apelles (in the time of Alexander the Great), of the emperor as Jupiter, must have been a thrilling portrayal. Pliny says of it : " The fingers seem to shoot forward, and the lightning to be out of the picture."

In the latter half of the fifth century B. c., Phidias made his great statue of Zeus, larger than his Minerva of the Parthenon. The figure was seated on a throne, and stood sixty feet high. It was of chryselephantine, that is to say, of gold and ivory; the nude parts of the figure being of ivory, laid on in plates, and the draperies of gold similarly applied. It has come down to us by description only. Pau- sanias's description is graphic in all its details. It is

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too long to be given here in full, but certain extracts from the account may be quoted : " That the statue of Zeus is the work of Phidias is shown by the in- scription written at the base of it, ' Phidias the Athenian, the son of Charmides, made me.' . . . The image of the god is of gold and ivory, seated on a throne. And a crown is on his head, imitating the foliage of an olive-tree. In his right hand he holds a Victory in ivory and gold, and in his left hand a sceptre adorned with all manner of precious stones, and the bird seated on the sceptre is an eagle. The robes and sandals of the god are of gold, and on his robes are imitations of flowers, especially of lilies. And there are imitations of animals painted on it, and models worked on it. There are four Victories like dancers, one at each foot of the throne, and two also at the instep of each foot. ... At the top of the throne Phidias has represented above the head of Zeus the three Graces and three seasons. And I know that the size of the Olympian Zeus, both in height and breadth, has been stated, but I cannot bestow praise upon the measurers, for their recorded measurement comes far short of what any one would infer looking at the statue. They made the god also to have testified to the art of Phidias. For they say that when the statue was finished, Phidias prayed him to signify if the work was to his mind, and immediately Zeus struck with lightning that part

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of the pavement where, in our day, is a brazen urn with a lid." Pausanias tells also of a statue of Zeus in Corinth, made of brass, by Lysippus, and standing in the market-place.

The Jupiter of Raphael, included among his " Days," is the god presiding over Thursday. It is a magnificent figure of a mature man, seated in a chariot, which is wrought with devices of eagles and sphinxes; it is drawn by two eagles on the clouds. Jove is bearing a flaming thunderbolt, which he holds in a statuesque way, as if it were a torch. The design has fine classic feeling, and is as reposeful and as dignified in its academic conven- tional reverence as a genuine work of a gem-cutter of Athens.

Zeus figuring as the lord of Olympus is not very common in art. Scenes from his numerous loves have been usually selected for artistic purposes. He was highly volatile and susceptible; and, as nearly all his loves have been copiously illustrated, this amorous phase must be reserved for a whole chapter.

Neptune figures little in art. There are fewer rep- resentations of him than of most of the chief deities. He is depicted as a less serenely dignified figure than Jove, being compelled always to battle with the unruly element, and with storms. He is usually bearded. With a stroke of his trident he is said to have created the horse. He always figures in the

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Battle of the Giants. But his loves also form the subject of most of the vase-paintings which deal with Neptune. Amphitrite, his wife, is usually with him in art. He is a striking figure as described by Homer : " The god put upon him his armour, seized a gleaming whip, stepped upon his chariot, and drove it over the wave. Below him leapt the mon- sters, come forth in crowds from their hiding-places, to recognize their lord. The sea, overjoyed, opened to make a way before him. His horses sped on rapidly, and, as they passed, the wave did not make wet the brazen pole." This train of aquatic follow- ers always accompany Neptune in art, and " the chorus of the fifty daughters of Nerus entwine in the dance," as Euripides says. Nereids and Tritons, with fish-tails and conch-shells, upon which they blow, as upon horns, sea-horses and dragons, appear at the famous scene of the marriage of Neptune and Amphitrite, a favourite subject among painters. There is an antique bas-relief in Munich, a won- derfully beautiful work of the school of Scopas, which shows this episode. In 1670 a mosaic was dis- covered in the Baths of Caracalla, showing a repeat- ing ornament of a Nereid, riding on a hippocampus, divided conventionally by tridents and dolphins.

Philostratus, describing a Greek picture of the marriage of Neptune and Amphitrite, says : " Al- ready the wave is arching for the nuptials; though

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green still, and of an azure hue, yet Neptune is painting it purple." This is the result of observa- tion; for in the Mediterranean, when storms arise, a certain reddish light appears in the distance, caus- ing the waves to assume a purplish tone.

Among the Pompeian mosaics in the Naples Museum is one depicting the marriage of Neptune and Amphitrite. They are seated on their triumphal car, as usual in treatments of this subject, and are surrounded by the characteristic retainers. Neptune carries his trident, and is wrapped in a mantle.

Giovanni da Bologna's Neptune on the fountain in Perugia is good, and in Greek spirit. It is not simply a strong old man, sitting up with a trident, as many Neptunes of that period were ; it has some- thing of the sea-quality in it.

In the courtyard of the Ducal Palace in Venice stand two statues by Sansovino, which, in spite of their colossal proportions, are insignificant. They represent Mars and Neptune. They are elaborate, large, and unsuggestive. They lack inspiration and thought, being the work of a sculptor who was not an intellectual man. For a moment they look rather imposing, standing, as they do, at either side of the Scala d'Oro, but they are really shallow and unin- spired.

There are two crowded pictures of the triumphal car of Neptune and Amphitrite, by Francesco

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Franck, one in the Uffizi and the other in Berlin. In each case the car appears to be on the verge of the shore, in fact at the very head of a cove, so that it cannot possibly go farther. The sea-god and his bride must be just about to alight. Crowds of Nereids, Tritons, and sea-horses (these latter rather literal) are all around them, and in the throng may be distinguished Galatea, while her unhappy adorer, Polyphemus, the Cyclops, languishes on the shore on the left. A feast is being served on the opposite shore.

Rubens has attempted to depict a domestic scene in his Neptune and Amphitrite in Berlin. The hoary god of the waters sits holding fast his trident, while his wife stands by him. She is a fair, fat Dutchwoman, much like all Rubens's people with- out clothes. The couple are surrounded by pets, aquatic and otherwise ; a happy family, composed of a lion, a tiger, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and an alli- gator. The latter is being fondled by a pale, flabby sea-nymph, who lies flat upon her back before the divinities, gazing boldly up into their faces in a very ridiculous fashion. She is apparently in the com- pany of a Triton, who is offering a large shell filled with jewels to Amphitrite. A large sail is spread over the group as a shelter. Neptune is a robust person, but his muscles are a trifle pronounced,

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those on the calves of his legs suggesting eggs buried under the skin.

The Triumph of Amphitrite, by Taraval, in the Louvre, is certainly flowery enough to suit the latest Renaissance palate. The sea-goddess lies back upon a very ornamental dolphin, with her feet daintily crossed and her toes pointed, and her much-made-up eyes turned languishingly upon the spectator. With a trifle more drapery (she is nude except for a filmy scarf that lies in her lap) she might be suspected of having escaped from Marigny's Theatre. Airy Cupids tumble about in the clouds, and Tritons and Nereids writhe in the foreground.

There is a picture of Neptune by Tiepolo, a late Venetian painter, in the Ducal Palace in Venice. He is in the act of offering a cornucopia of gems and coins to Venus, who scornfully points to them, evidently refusing to be so won. In this picture Neptune is rather an old man, haggard, weary, and unkempt, with his hair all about his face, and a beard. A young attendant carries his trident behind him. Tiepolo probably meant this to symbolize the sea's casting its riches at the feet of Venice, for Venus is dressed in regal eighteenth century taste, with a crown and sceptre.

Among the sea-divinities figures the lovely Gala- tea, a daughter of Nereus, and a sister to Amphitrite, Neptune's bride. The myth of Galatea is on this

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wise. She loved a faun, Acis, a sprightly, amphibi- ous person, whose mother was a Naiad ; but she was beloved herself by the Cyclops Polyphemus, who loved, as Theocritus tells us, " with fatal frenzy." He paid her such attentions as might have been gratifying had he been fair to look upon, telling her that she was more white than pressed milk, more delicate than the lamb, and more sleek than the un- ripened grape. But Galatea knew all this, and, as Acis seemed to be quite as ready with compliments as was the ugly Cyclops, she naturally preferred them from that source. The poor giant was pathetic in his woe:

" I know, sweet maiden, why thou art so coy : Shaggy and huge, a single eyebrow spans From ear to ear my forehead, whence one eye Gleams, and an o'er-broad nostril tops my lip."

Certainly Theocritus has so expressed it that no further explanation was necessary. Hesiod has described the Cyclops in equally attractive terms :

" One eye was placed, a large round orb, and bright Amidst their forehead, to receive the light."

So the Cyclops poured out his soul in song, while within was rankling the pain of unrequited devotion. Finally, one day, when he was wandering in the woods, he came upon Acis and Galatea in a hollow

RAPHAEL. TRIUMPH OF GALATEA.

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rock or cave, where they had been listening to his singing. Infuriated, he dashed a huge stone at Acis, killing his rival. But he derived no further benefit from his jealous rage than the death of the faun, for Galatea was quite inconsolable at the loss of her lover, and never could be brought to look upon Polyphemus as other than a monster.

In the House of Livia, on the Palatine hill, is a fresco, showing Galatea laughing, riding on a hippo- campus, or sea-horse.

The loveliest Galatea in art is Raphael's, in the Farnesina Palace in Rome. It has wonderful appre- hension of the perennial joy of the Greeks. Galatea is seen riding in her shell, drawn by dolphins, the breeze in her draperies, and her head turned with a charming grace toward the light. She is surrounded by water-nymphs, Tritons, and Cupids, and, on the shore, a centaur, with a sea-nymph riding upon his back. Nothing could be more suggestive of the dashing waves and briny foam than this glowing picture. Cupids in the air all aim their arrows at Galatea; no doubt Acis is somewhere about. The Galatea is full of original touches. The sea-divini- ties are of rather individual forms, and the nymph, who is caught by the Triton, is charmingly coquet- tish. The Triton himself has a Roman nose; it was a good bit of local colour for Raphael to introduce this type. Taine alludes to this Triton as clutching

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and enfolding the nymph in his " nervous arms," saying that he " displays the alertness and spirit of an animal god, inhaling with the soft air of the sea huge drafts of force and contentment." The curve of the figure of the blond nymph, carried off on the back of a god, is also most alluring. Winckelmann, in his " History of Ancient Art," criticizes Raphael's Galatea, saying, " The figure is so disposed that the breast, the most beautiful part of the naked female form, is completely covered by one arm, and the knee which is in view is much too cartilaginous for a per- son of youthful age, to say nothing of a divine nymph." He also says that the conception of the head of Galatea is too common, that it is not as beautiful a type as Raphael might have found. Ra- phael's own letter to Balthassar Castiglione may be quoted in this connection : " With regard to the Galatea, I should consider myself a great master, if it possessed but half the merits of which your lord- ship speaks in your letter. But I attribute your praises to the love you bear me. To paint a beautiful woman, I need to have numerous models before me, and your lordship at hand to aid me with your judgment ; but having here so few beautiful models, and such a scarcity of good judges, I work upon a certain idea that presents itself to my mind. Whether this idea has any artistic excellence, I know not; but I do my best to attain it."

l^mpus, cean, anb Ibabes 23

Carlo Maratta has painted the Triumph of Gala- tea, which hangs in St. Petersburg. The nymph, entirely nude, sits in a shell-shaped car, holding in one hand the reins, with which she guides the dol- phins, while two nymphs are seated at her feet. A third, walking on the waves, holds a red drapery, which floats beyond Galatea. Before the car a Triton is sounding his horn, and at the side a little Cupid rides a dolphin. Farther away one descries a little boat, and, in the heavens, Cupid preparing to dis- charge an arrow from his bow. Polyphemus is seen reclining on the bank, playing upon his pipes.

Giulio Romano has painted Polyphemus in the Palazzo del Te in Mantua; the fresco shows a hulking fellow, with muscles like those of Michel- angelo's personages on the Sistine ceiling, holding in one hand the pan-pipes, on which he was accus- tomed to play. He is represented in this case as a Cyclops only in that a third eye appears in his forehead ; the classic idea of the single eye occupying the whole space below the brow seems to have been too great a tax upon the Renaissance imagination. Acis and Galatea are seen sporting in the waves just beyond his reach.

Claude Lorraine's Acis and Galatea in Dresden is primarily a well-composed view of seashore. A rocky promontory juts far out on the right, while on the left the open sea is seen, carrying the eye to

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the horizon line, which is filled with golden light. Some tall trees on the extreme left balance the com- position. The foreground exhibits the sandy shore, and in the centre Acis and Galatea have put up a little rude tent, and are enjoying each other's em- braces beneath this shelter. On the promontory is Polyphemus with his flocks, far away, and not suspecting their retreat, which is revealed to the spectator alone. At the left, in the shallow water, seen through a vista of trees, are some water-nymphs sporting. Just outside the tent, Cupid, as an infant, is " playing horse " with two doves which he holds in leash. The lights in this picture render it a peace- fully pleasing landscape, aside from the subject treated, which occupies only a small space in the whole scene.

In one of Caracci's frescoes Galatea is seen com- ing to listen to the music of Polyphemus. The giant is sitting on a rock at the left, piping vigorously, while the sea-divinity, supported by two nymphs, in a shell drawn by the customary dolphins, is giving attention to the sounds. The heads of the three women are of extremely differing types, and are very lovely. Another of these frescoes shows Poly- phemus hurling a rock after Acis, who, with Galatea, is fleeing from the wrath of the Cyclops.

A less popular subject among artists is:

t cean, anfc Ibafces 25

" Pluto hard of heart, whose wide command Is o'er a dark and subterranean land."

He is represented much like Jupiter and Neptune, but his hair and beard are generally shorter and more bristling, and his pitchfork distinguishes him from them at a glance.

In the Villa Borghese is a statue of Pluto en- throned; the King of Darkness is seated, with Cerberus, the three-headed dog, which guarded his domain, at his side. Hesiod draws a graphic picture of this dread watch-dog of the nether world :

" A horrid dog and grim couched on the floor, Guards with malicious art, the sounding door. On each who in the entrance first appears, He, fawning, wags his tail, and cocks his ears; If any strive to measure back the way Their steps he watches, and devours his prey."

In the case of the Borghese statue, the three heads of Cerberus are not elaborated. Pluto holds a staff, which may originally have had a forked extremity.

Indeed, if he had not carried off Proserpine to be his bride, it seems doubtful if Pluto would have appeared in art at all. The reason for Pluto's sudden passion for Proserpine is thus explained by Ovid. On Mount Olympus Venus was seated with Cupid, when they descried Pluto wandering in the upper regions of earth. " Embracing her winged son, siie

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said, ' Cupid, my son, my arms, my hands, and my might, take up those darts by which thou conquerest all and direct the swift arrows against the breast of the god to whom fell the last lot of the triple king- dom.' . . . Venus thus spoke. He opened his quiver, and, by the direction of his mother, set apart one dart out of his thousand arrows: ... he bent the flexible horn, by pressing his knee against it, and struck Pluto in the breast with his barbed arrow."

The Homeric Hymn to Demeter (Ceres) gives us the scene briefly : Proserpine, " plucking the rose and the crocus, fair violets, the iris, and the hyacinth flower," is seized by Pluto, " who, in spite of her struggles, caught her up into his golden chariot and bore her off, though she lamented and called with loud cries upon her father." Ovid amplifies this account, adding, " The goddess, affrighted, with lamenting lips calls both her mother and her com- panions, but more frequently her mother ; and as she has torn her garment from the upper edge, the col- lected flowers fall from her loosened robes. So great, too, is the innocence of her childish years, this loss excites the maiden's grief as well. The ravisher drives on his chariot, and encourages his horses ... he is borne through deep lakes, and the pools, smelling of sulphur, and boiling fresh from out of the burnt earth."

Of Bernini's group of Pluto and Proserpine in

, cean, a^ Dafces 27

Rome, Taine speaks thus : " The head of Pluto is vulgarly gay ; his crown and beard give him a ridicu- lous air, while the muscles are strongly marked, and the figure poses. It is not a true divinity, but a decorative god, like those at Versailles ; a mythologi- cal figurante, striving to catch the attention of con- noisseurs and the king. Proserpine's body is very effeminate, very pretty, and very contorted; but there is too much expression in the face, its eyes, its tears, and its little mouth, are too attractive."

In Orvieto, Signorelli painted two scenes from the story of Proserpine in medallions. Symonds points out how curiously mediaeval feeling is here mixed with the choice of classic representation. " Pluto," he says, " drives his jarring car-wheels up through the lava-blocks of ^tna with a fury and vehemence we seek in vain upon antique sarcophagi. Ceres, wandering through Sicily, in search of her daughter, is a gaunt witch with dishevelled hair, raising frantic hands to tear her cheeks ; while the snakes that draw her chariot are no grave symbols of the germinating corn, but greedy serpents, ready to spit fire against the ravishers of Proserpine. . . . The most thrilling moments in the legend are selected for dramatic treat- ment, grace and beauty being exchanged for vivid presentation." This is the key-note to the difference between Greek art and mediaeval art. Henri Beyle, in his " Histoire de la Peinture en Italic," remarks

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that " Greek sculpture was unwilling to reproduce the terrible in any shape; the Greeks had enough real troubles of their own."

Rubens has painted Pluto and Proserpine con- ducted by Cupid to the chariot. The picture is in the Prado.

Of Turner's Rape of Proserpine, Ruskin says: " In this picture the nature is not the grand nature of all time; it is indubitably modern; and we are perfectly electrified at anybody's being carried away in the corner except by people with spiky hats and carabines. This is traceable to several causes ; partly to the want of any grand specific form, partly to the too-evident middle-age character of the ruins crown- ing the hills."

In the Dresden Gallery is a picture by Heinz of Proserpine, and in the Prado, one by Breughel the Younger.

The Pluto and Proserpine by Rembrandt in Berlin is as absurd a presentment of the subject as could be conceived. Pluto, a courtier, with long love-locks and a moustache, is carrying away a bald-foreheaded Dutch lady, in elaborate brocade clothes. Other women are doing their best to detain the elopement, by dragging behind the car.

There is an ancient relief which shows the abduc- tion of Proserpine in fine detail. Pluto, in his four- horsed chariot, is bearing off the maiden, while

, cean, an& tmfces 29

Ceres makes a " close third " behind. Venus, before the car, urges the steeds on, while Cupid has sprung to the front, and is holding the reins. Evidently they are at the very gates of Hades, for the three heads of Cerberus are seen fitted into the space below the horses' heels, while Neptune, Amphitrite, Mer- cury, Minerva, all crowd about apparently interested in the occurrence. Proserpine is bent literally double in her attempts to escape, and looks like pictures of Oriental dancers and acrobats.

In the Brera in Milan there is a picture by Albano entitled Dance of Little Loves. To be sure, the central theme is a wreath of Cupids dancing around a tree, while a little Cupid orchestra sits above in the branches, playing upon pipe, viol, and tambour. But in the landscape at the left may be seen Pluto in his car, dragging away the fated Proserpine, just dashing into a lake, with Ceres quite denuded, cling- ing on behind the chariot in the water. In the sky on the right Cupid is seen confiding to Venus how he has shot an arrow at Pluto with great success.

A spirited picture of this scene is a modern paint- ing by Schobolt. The infernal car occupies the whole composition; Pluto, holding Proserpine, struggling vainly to free herself, looks off fiercely into space, while the two fiery steeds, foaming and rearing, are conducted by two runners who hold their bridles. One of these carries the fork of Pluto.

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The car is evidently just about to enter the dark pit, which yawns in the foreground. Flames are emitted from below. Proserpine hides her eyes as she beholds them.

In Munich is a painting- by Honthorst representing Ceres, the mother of Proserpine, who, while journey- ing over the world in search of her daughter, stopped in a peasant's hut to ask for drink to renew her strength. This picture illustrates the legend as told by Ovid. " By chance she beholds a cottage covered with thatch, and knocks at its humble door, upon which an old woman comes out and sees the goddess, and gives her, asking for water, a sweet drink. . . . While she is drinking it ... a boy of impudent countenance and bold stands before the goddess, and laughs, and calls her greedy." Ceres, with truly Olympian wrath, instantly sprinkles the boy, who undergoes a strange transformation. " His face con- tracts the stains, and he bears legs where he was bearing arms; a tail is added to his changed limbs, and he is contracted into a diminutive form. . . . His size is less than that of a small lizard." This metamorphosis of a boy into a newt seems a severe return for the hospitality of his mother; but no doubt the boy needed the lesson.

A fine early wall-painting of Ceres, the goddess of Plenty, shows her modestly draped, and bearing in one hand a basket of fruits, while in the other she

, cean, anO fmfces 31

carries a graceful torch with a pagoda-like top, being formed in three tiers of wide-spreading leaves like a lotus-flower. Her hair is tied at the sides with bunches of wheat, and she has a nimbus behind her head. A modern painting by F. D. Millet represents Ceres much the same as in the ancient picture, but she is slighter and more girlish, hardly suggesting the mother of Proserpine. In one hand she carries a slim sheaf of wheat, hardly more than a dozen straws, simply as an emblem. The staff with the three tiers has a little fire at the top, from which smoke proceeds.

There is a massive half-hewn bust of Ceres in marble by A. Rodin, in the Boston Art Museum.

CHAPTER III.

THE LOVES OF ZEUS

JUPITER, although known as the " Thunderer," is quite as famous for the number and variety of his loves as for the manifestations of his power and vengeance. How very human is this volatile deity, who is obliged to assume new disguises every time he goes a-wooing in order to escape the vigi- lant observation of his wife ! The situation appealed to the sense of humour of even the Greeks them- selves, and, in spite of their veneration and awe, they have occasionally burlesqued these amorous affairs in their vase-paintings and even in some of their comedies.

Juno or Hera is not popular in modern art, for her life was not a dramatic one; as a divinity of dignity, typifying matrimony, she was much revered by the Greeks, and many statues of her are extant. The Barberini Juno in Rome is a noble work. " On her head," say Pausanias, " she wears a Stephanos, decorated with figures of the Horae and the Chari-

3*

Ube %o\>es ot Zeus 33

tes; in one hand holds a pomegranate, and in the other a sceptre." Pausanias continues, drily, " But as to the cuckoo which sits on the sceptre, they say that Zeus, when he was enamoured of Hera, while still a maid, changed himself into that bird, and that Hera chased the supposed cuckoo in sport. This tradition and similar ones about the gods," adds Pausanias, discreetly, " I do not record because I believe them, but I record them just the same." It is delightful to read the ingenuous accounts of the Greek author Pausanias, a modern in apprecia- tion, who, while possessing as much zest for fact as a reporter, held to the theology of the classic pagan. Writing in the second century of our era, he tells us that, " in the Celtic territory " Apollo changed a certain king, at his own request, into a swan after his death. " I daresay a musical man reigned," says Pausanias, " but I can hardly believe that a man became a bird." Heretic! He will be- lieve in no foreign testimony as to miracles ; yet we wonder whether even he questioned the myth of Leda? Pausanias, however, did not accept all of what he considered the superstitious dogma of his religion. For instance, alluding to an attack upon an effigy of Venus, he remarked, " It would have been altogether childish to make a small figure of cedar-wood and call it Aphrodite, and then think, in punishing it, one was punishing the goddess."

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Yet Pausanias was credulous withal. In one place he comments calmly upon the fact that a dragon was seen " running eagerly into its hole."

Apparently Jupiter enjoyed transforming him- self when making love, for in courting his future wife it would otherwise hardly appear necessary for him to have indulged in the metamorphosis re- corded by Pausanias.

Of Juno, one of the most typical representations in ancient art is the head known as the Ludovisi Juno; the large eyes and imperious mouth, and the lofty diadem above the brows, are usual in Greek statues of the goddess. Juno is sometimes accom- panied by a peacock and sometimes by a serpent. There is a fine early fresco in the Naples museum portraying the wedding of Jupiter and Juno. It was found in the house of the Tragic Poet in Pompeii. It is boldly executed.

Lorenzo Lotto has painted a Triumph of Juno over Venus, in the Casino Rospigliosi. Juno bran- dishes a broken bow over the head of the cowering Venus, who, with jewelled head-dress, is crouching with Cupid in terror.

The Jupiter and Juno by Caracci in the Farnese Palace in Rome is dignified in drawing and feeling. The Thunderer has cast aside his bolts, which lie harmless upon the floor, while he turns lovingly to his wife, who is partly draped, standing by the couch,

Ube Xo\>es of Zeus 35

leaning upon its edge with one knee. She is a fair matron, of firm classic mould, handsome and grace- ful. Jove is represented in his softer aspect as a wooer; this is one of the few pictures of Jupiter as a lover when he is not under some disguise. The head is that of the Otricoli bust.

Jupiter's infatuation for the fair Leda is a subject constantly portrayed by the Renaissance painters. The whimsical deity, this time disguising himself as a swan, made love to a mortal maiden.

The most beautiful picture of Leda and the Swan is in the Uffizi, and is by Tintoretto. The scene is rather unreal, for Jupiter, in the guise of a white bird, seems to have penetrated into the lady's cham- ber, like " Goosey, Goosey, Gander," in the nursery rhyme. In this particular, the other representations of the same subject, which in nearly all cases are in an outdoor setting, are better chosen. But for a work of art for a study of the nude in that beauti- ful chaste spirit of Tintoret, and for colour and form and composition none of the others are as lovely as this. At the right, Leda is reclining on a couch. The swan, on the floor at her feet, is curving its graceful neck up toward the girl, who turns slightly to caress her strange adorer. A servant, at the left, is opening a cage, in which is seen a duck. Another small cage on the wall, with some sort of bird, sug- gests that possibly the scene may be supposed to be

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in a bird-fancier's establishment; it is not possible to know just what the Venetian had in mind when he painted his incomparable Leda. Of the central figure there can be but one opinion. She is as fair, as slender, and yet as voluptuously perfect as any of the rather majestic creations of Tintoretto. The head is Venetian, and, indeed, there is little classic feeling in any part of the composition.

A more realistic view of this scene is by Correg- gio, and is in Berlin. In a pretty, soft landscape, with thick trees, and amid little purling streams, a party of nymphs are bathing. A flock of wild swans have alighted among them. One swan is the dis- guised lord of Olympus. He makes his way to Leda, who, in the centre of the picture, receives him, rather amused, and a good deal surprised. Another swan is attacking a nymph at the right. She is de- fending herself; while in the air above a swan is seen flying away. Possibly this may be intended as three scenes in the same myth; Leda startled by the appearance of the bird, Leda accepting the love of Jupiter, and, finally, the flight of the god. But the arrangement and general appearance of the pic- ture leads one to think that it was intended for a single scene. In the centre, farther back, one of the nymphs is replacing her garments, and at the left, on the river bank, sits Cupid, playing upon a small harp, while other loves are disporting themselves

Ube Xoves of ^eus 37

in the water, blowing on reeds to accompany the pas- toral music of Eros. The whole picture is full of the cheerful inconsequent paganism of Correggio. Correggio has been called the Ariel of the Renais- sance. Symonds says : " We are compelled to think of him as an elemental spirit, whose bidding the air and the light and the hues of the morning obey." Even when he paints the Fates they appear as light-hearted nymphs. He is joyous and gleeful in all his representations of human life.

In the Borghese Gallery in Rome is that picture which Morelli calls " The Magnificent Leda," which has been long ascribed to Da Vinci, but is now pro- nounced to be the work of Sodoma. The whole arrangement is a little academic; but the face of Leda is certainly of Leonardo's type, with its deeply dimpled corners of the mouth, and the smooth brow with parted hair. Leda is standing, turning to caress the swan at her side. One wing of the bird is extended and wrapped about her in such a way that the edge of the wing exactly corresponds in contour to the line of her hip and thigh, making a rather artificial but graceful line. The landscape background is much in the spirit of Da Vinci ; this is by way of a domestic scene, for Castor and Pollux, the twin sons of Jupiter and Leda, play at the feet of their mother, while, at a little distance, is seen the egg from which they emerged. Morelli says : " The

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composition of this fine painting certainly carries out the principles of Leonardo, but is conceived entirely in the spirit of Sodoma." The details are springlike and charming, a thrush, a snail, and a dove are seen. Morelli considers the child nearest Leda very Raphaelesque. There are two drawings by Sodoma for pictures of Leda, quite different from this, one in Weimar, and one at Chatsworth. In both cases Leda kneels, and the swan is by her side. Sodoma's drawing for the Leda of the Borghese is at Windsor.

Technically, Paul Veronese's Leda in Dresden is a beautiful bit of painting. It is boldly handled, and is full of rich beauty as a treatment of the nude form ; but the woman is too mature, too heavy, and the subject is not pleasingly managed. It is a Vene- tian woman, decked with jewels, and not a simple pastoral maiden, to whom the swan is offering his devotion.

One of the most delicate and beautiful paintings of this subject is by a modern painter, Courtat, and is in the Luxemburg. On the river shore are stretched out the two soft white bodies, reminding one of the simile used by Edmund Spenser in his Prothalamiion, speaking of some white swans:

"Nor Jove himself when he a swan would be For love of Leda, whiter did appear; Yet Leda was, they say, as white as he."

Xoves of eus 39

While Michelangelo was working on the fortifica- tions of Ferrara, he employed part of his time in painting a picture of Jupiter and Leda by way of a more peaceful task. Owing to some misunderstand- ing, the Duke of Ferrara never purchased this pic- ture, which was sent to France, where it became the property of Francis L, who, no doubt, appreciated all its points. It was executed in Tempera, about 1529. For some time it was at Fontainebleau, but has since disappeared, and was evidently destroyed. A cartoon of it might have been seen in Florence in 1584.

Michelangelo's Leda in Dresden is muscular, full of a certain kind of beauty, but coarse in every sense of the word, and the question may be raised whether, except as a technical success, it should be placed on exhibition. Taine speaks of it as " tragic."

The myth of Danae relates to one of the many love-adventures of Jove, whose idea of right seems to have been " might," and who was esteemed for the number of his conquests in the field of gallantry.

Danae, the beautiful daughter of King Acrisius of Argos, laboured under the disadvantage of being the subject of a prophecy, which predicted that her son should kill his grandfather. The far-seeing King Acrisius, discerning that discretion was the better part of valour, especially when dealing with the utterances of infallible sibyls, decided that the

4 o Classic flDptbs in art

best way to prevent the prophesied catastrophe was to shut his daughter up securely in a tall tower made of brass, so that no question of matrimony might arise, and the dreaded son never arrive upon the scene. But he had not reckoned with the powers of Olympus. As soon as Jupiter realized that Danae was inaccessible, he became enamoured of her. All things being possible with him, he decided to enter her apartment in the shape of a golden rain. This being quite easy for Jove, and apparently quite ac- ceptable to the lady, who must have been much bored with solitude, Jupiter visited her through the window of the tower. Her son was the far- famed Perseus.

There are three notable pictures by Titian of the wooing of Danae by the golden shower. The finest, in modelling, chiaroscuro, and atmosphere, is that in the Imperial Gallery at Vienna. Danae lies care- lessly back upon a couch with a rich canopy and brocade draperies, although, judging from the land- scape background, she is quite out-of-doors. The lines of her body are exquisitely graceful, in beauti- ful proportion, she being slender and willowy, with no suggestion of thinness. Her face is beautiful, her eyes being turned toward the golden rain, which, in the rather too realistic form of " current coin," is descending in profusion from a rent in the clouds, through which the face of Jove may be seen. By

Ube Stoves of Zeus 41

her side is a crone, who, charmed by such a rare opportunity, raises a metal basin to intercept the shower. There is a note of bathos in this, it is so extremely like an alms-basin being rapidly filled by a special Providence. The picture of Danae, by Titian, in the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, is very similar to that at Vienna, but the form of Danae is less lithe, the limbs heavier and softer, and the lights and shades less well managed. The old woman, in this instance, sits on the further edge of the couch, and raises a cloth instead of a basin. The face of Danae is unintelligent. In Naples is another Danae by Titian, similar to these. She lies on a much-tumbled bed of ample build, with a con- ventional bolster and pillow. Her face wears an affected smirk, and her whole figure lacks vitality. Instead of an old crone, a mannered little Cupid, with one protesting hand raised, is trotting across the foot of the bed, apparently anxious to escape. The alarming manifestation of zigzag lightning, which accompanies the golden shower, seems to have no effect upon the equanimity of the nymph. In each case, the golden rain takes the form of money. The mystical element of the legend was less marked in the epoch of the Renaissance than in the days when Athens was supreme.

The Danae of Naples was painted for Ottavio Farnese, when Titian was sixty-eight years old.

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Crowe and Cavalcaselle point out certain charms in the background of this picture. " In the gloom behind, made gloomier by the livid cloud from which the golden rain is falling, a pillar rears its shaft on a dark gray plinth, cutting strongly on the clear blue of a bright and sunny sky, and a dis- tance of hills and trees bathed in haze. . . . The glow of day seems to fade as it rests on the boy, and is quenched in the darkness behind, . . . yet, looking into the picture closely, we see how spacious breadths of light are marred on the prominent places and illumined with decisive touches of still lighter quality, while pearly half-tints of great tenderness and transparent strata of a deeper value are broken and rejoined by rubbings and glazings with a skill quite incomparable." Titian is said to have mod- elled the Cupid for this picture after the Cupid of Praxiteles ; as Crowe says : " With a power of assimilation, which is truly marvellous, he mastered the laws of motion illustrated in the statue, divined the classic method of interpreting form, committed to memory its grand disposal of lines, and repro- duced them in his own peculiar way. . . . He did this by reversing the action of the legs and frame, and altering the turn of the head, and thus produced something original that reminds us of the Greeks." Taine, describing the Naples Danae, says : " This head is quite vulgar; nothing beyond the voluptu-

TTbc %oves ot Zeus 43

ous . . . but what flesh tones relieving on that white linen and on that golden hair in such wild disorder about the throat! What a perfect hand projecting from that diamond bracelet, and what beautiful fingers and yielding form ! "

Mundler considers it a triumph of aerial perspec- tive and chiaroscuro. Morelli says that, in being far removed from the " immoral prudery " of the present day, he thinks it more worthy to be ranked with Greek art than any other picture. He is cer- tainly right about its not being prudish.

In Correggio's famous Danae in the Villa Bor- ghese in Rome, the maiden is half-sitting, half-re- cumbent, while Cupid, figured as a half-grown youth, is looking up at a round cloud, which, hover- ing above, emits a few drops of molten gold. Danae in this picture is quite unchaperoned by any female attendants. Two delightful and world-renowned little Cupids are seen on the floor in the foreground, sharpening their arrows. Correggio's pagan irre- sponsible charm pervades the picture, which is soft and mellow in colour. The body of the young girl is finely modelled, and the boy Cupid is a study of youthful grace. The scene is laid in the brazen tower, and a city landscape is seen through an open- ing on the left. There is little of the gorgeous dress- ing and upholstery of the Renaissance in this painting. The types are not distinctively of any one

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period, and both Danae and Cupid might easily be Greeks, a god and a maiden of the Golden Age. The little attendant loves are delightful creations. One of them leans over with great preoccupation, holding the point of his arrow down carefully to be sharpened, while the other, drawing back a little* grips the block upon which his cornpanion is press- ing. They are little embodiments of earnestness of purpose, and would serve as models of diligence in decorating the walls of a modern kindergarten. There is a Danae in Dresden by Van Dyck. The classic feeling is lacking in this picture. Danae, lying on a couch, is extending her arms toward the golden shower, wljich is not only exemplified by money, but also by jewels, chains, rings, and trinkets descend upon the delighted damsel, who, with real cupidity, but with an expressionless face, is wel- coming these tokens of regard. Her attendant not a venerable dame like Titian's, but a young and good-looking girl gazing with envious wonder at the phenomenon, holds up an edge of the sheet that none of the gold be lost. An adoring Cupid, who seems to recognize the glittering intruder as a manifestation of his volatile sovereign, is kneel- ing at the foot of the bed. He is a sweet Dutch urchin, very human. Danae herself is a blond Dutch girl, such as Van Dyck had often painted.

Xoves ot Zeus 45

The draperies and accessories of the picture are well handled.

Rembrandt's Danae in the Hermitage is seen in a deep shadow, the light being all thrown in through a lifted curtain in the background. A male attend- ant is raising this curtain, and one expects to see Jupiter enter in the blaze of light. Above Danae floats a Cupid made of gold burnished, like a small statuette. The idea is not artistic, and the figure of Danae is rather thin, and shivering.

There is a quaint little picture of Danae by Ma- buse, who painted about 1490. The picture is in Munich. It is quite mediaeval in its conscientious ob- servation of the details of the legend. Danae is sit- ting quite alone in a little round turret-chamber ; she is looking up to the roof, where a light cloud has gathered, from which a literal shower is descend- ing. This is not in the form of money, for once; it is a genuine rain of tiny golden drops, almost a mist. The stiff little Flemish lady looks surprised and pleased, but not much excited by the peculiar manifestation. About her neck, where her satin garment has slipped down, one can see the ribbon which is usually worn with a scapular. The turret- room is surrounded by columns, with a view out over the city buildings.

Perhaps the most individual picture of Danae is that by Paul Veronese, in the Royal Gallery of

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Turin. The figure is seen from the side and back; she is on a couch close to the loggia-like opening in her tower. The golden rain is coming in upon her, and seems to alarm her ; she reaches up her arm and tries to protect herself with the hanging drapery of the couch. Her curious and unusual attitude is worthy of notice, the foreshortening of the upper part of the body being clever, and the whole a strik- ing and interesting composition.

In Naples is a Danae in the school of Tintoretto which is very disappointing. Whoever the scholar of Tintoret was, he had imbibed little from his master. The soft treatment of the flesh seems to be the only feature in common between the two. The face of Danae is vapid, and the attitude un- gainly.

Calvart has painted a tumultuous picture of Danae, but it has little merit.

The myth of Europa is one with the most promis- ing artistic possibilities. She was another famous love of Jupiter, who approached her under the dis- guise of a bull. She was the daughter of King Agenor of Phoenicia. The story of Jupiter's woo- ing of this maiden is told by the old Greek idyllist, Moschus, and no words could improve upon the stately narrative as he renders it. Europa is described as going forth with her friends to sport in the meadows, " when she was arrayed for the

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dance, or when she would bathe her bright body at the mouths of the river, or would gather fragrant lilies on the leas." A charming description follows, of the girls gathering flowers : " But in the midst of them all the princess culled with her hand the splendour of the crimson rose, and shone pre- eminent among them all like the foam-born goddess among the Graces. Verily she was not for long to set her heart's desire upon the flowers, . . . for of a truth the son of Kronos so soon as he beheld her was troubled, and his heart was subdued by the sudden shafts of Cypris, who alone can conquer even Jupiter. Therefore, both to avoid the wrath of jealous Juno, and being eager to beguile the maiden's tender heart, he concealed his godhead, and changed his shape, and became a bull." Ovid's description of the bull is most artistic : " The father and the ruler of the gods, whose right hand is armed with three-forked flames, who shakes the world with his nod, laying aside the dignity of his empire, assumes the appearance of a bull ... his colour is that of snow, which neither the soles of hard feet have trodden upon, nor the watery south wind melted. His horns . . . are more transparent than a bright gem." So Jupiter, as a neat and gentle young bull, came into the pasture where the maidens were play- ing, and he came among them so quietly, and ap- peared so amiable, that they were in no way dis-

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turbed, but soon began to pat him and to deck him with flowers, and finally Europa grew bold, saying, " Let us mount the bull here and take our pastime, for truly he will bear us on his back and carry all of us! And how mild he is, and dear, and gentle to behold, and no whit like other bulls! A mind as honest as a man's possesses him, and he lacks nothing but speech ! " So she spake, and smiling, she sat down on the back of the bull, and the others were about to follow. But the bull leaped up immediately, now he had gotten her that he desired, and swiftly he sped to the deep. Then the god, bearing the maiden on his back, swam far out to sea, and when they were out " where neither sea-beat headland nor steep hill could now be seen," Europa, with pardonable and even commendable curiosity, in- quired of the bull his intentions. " Whither bear- est thou me, bull-god ? " she asked. " What art thou ? How dost thou fare on thy feet through the path of the sea-beasts, nor fearest the sea? The sea is a path fit for swift ships that traverse the brine, but bulls dread the salt sea ways. What drink is sweet to thee, what food shalt thou find from the deep? Nay, art thou then some god? For god-like are these deeds of thine." (Which remark from the ingenuous Europa is circumstantial evidence that the gods of Olympus were constantly indulging in such escapades.) So spake she, and the horned bull

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made answer to her again : " Take courage, maiden, and dread not the swell of the deep. Be- hold, I am Jupiter, even I, though closely beheld I wear the form of a bull, for I can put on the sem- blance of what thing I will. But 'tis love of thee that has compelled me to measure out so great a span of the salt sea in a bull's shape. So Crete shall presently receive thee." In the " Palace of Art," Tennyson has enshrined this charming scene :

" Or sweet Europa's mantle blew unclasped From off her shoulder backward borne, From one hand drooped a crocus, one hand grasped The mild bull's golden horn."

Among ancient statues there is one in the Vatican of Europa riding the bull.

Paul Veronese, in his sumptuous Venetian way, has painted this myth several times. The most satisfactory of his pictures is in the Ducal Palace in Venice. As Ruskin says, " It is one of the very few pictures which both possess and deserve a high reputation." So far as classic feeling for actual representation of the scene is concerned, this paint- ing cannot be called Greek. But it is full of that abundant life, warm colour, and appreciation of beauty which in the days of the Renaissance was connoted by the word Greek. The classic revival meant just that; standards of typical grace and

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harmonious lines superseded the far more interest- ing but inaccurate work of the mediaeval artists. Gorgeousness of detail, with harmony of composi- tion, began to be understood again as it had not been since classic times. Veronese's picture in Venice should be compared with his treatment of the same subject in a painting in the Capitoline Gallery in Rome. The two compositions are alike, at first one would say that they were exactly alike, but soon one notices that in Venice Europa is seen in pro- file, while in Rome she is seen full-face, looking up into the heavens above. The moment selected for representation is the same in each. The beautiful white bull has laid himself down upon the flower- strewn grass, that Europa may climb upon his back. She is just seating herself, and her companions are assisting her to arrange her very stiff Venetian satin and brocade draperies. One maiden, a beautifully foreshortened figure, leans forward to clasp a shoul- der-strap which has come unfastened. Another companion, surprised, is stretching up her hands to two little Loves, which fly above, one of them bearing a wreath for the new favourite of Zeus. Taine, in speaking of the Europa of Veronese at Venice, calls attention to the lustrous colouring: " The reflection of the foliage overhead," he ob- serves, " bathes the entire picture with an aqueous green tone; the white drapery of Europa is tinged

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with it; she, arch, subtle, and languishing, seems almost like an eighteenth century figure. This is one of those works in which, through subtlety and combination of tones, a painter surpasses himself, forgets his public, loses himself in the unexplored regions of his art, and, discarding all known rules, finds, outside of the common world of sensible ap- pearances, harmonious contrasts, and peculiar suc- cesses beyond all verisimilitude and all proportion." Europa herself is a beautiful court lady, well-born and well-dressed, whose only concession to classic prejudice is a sandalled foot, which the bull, turning his head, has reached, and is caressing with his tongue after the manner of his kind. In a deep vale at the right of the picture the story is carried out on two planes. Europa, seated, is seen going off on the bull's back toward the shore; later, the bull has plunged into the water, and is swimming away with the princess, who is waving farewell to her astonished companions. In the Roman picture these secondary details are on a larger scale than in the Venetian one, where they are merely background accessories. It is a matter of taste whether one prefers the profile view of Europa or the full-face ; the first seems more pleasing and less theatrical. There is a little touch of humour in the composition which sometimes escapes the notice of observers. At the extreme right of the picture (discernible in

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either, but more clearly defined in that in Rome) is the head of an investigating cow, who has been led to inquire into this mysterious transaction! In the painting in Rome this cow is lowing vociferously.

That delightful old traveller, Dr. John Moore, tells us of his impressions of Veronese's Europa : " The foot of Europa is honoured by the particular admiration of the connoisseurs," writes Doctor Moore, in the eighteenth century. " The bull seems to be of their way of thinking, for he licks it. ... Some people admire even this thought of the painter ; I cannot say that I am of the number. I think it is the only thing in the picture which is not admi- rable; it is making Jupiter enter a little too much into the character he has assumed."

" Veronese produced the happiest picture in the world," says Henry James. " The Rape of Europa surely deserves that title; it is impossible to look at it without aching with envy. Nowhere else in art is such a temperament revealed; never did in- clination and opportunity combine to express such enjoyment. The mixture of flowers and gems, and brocade and blooming flesh, and shining sea and waving groves, of youth, health, movement, desire, all this is the brightest vision that ever descended upon the soul of a painter. Happy the artist who could entertain such a vision ; happy the artist who could paint it as the Rape of Europa is painted."

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Of this picture it is interesting to note two abso- lutely opposite opinions given by two critics. Charles Blanc says : " In my opinion this is one of the least successful pictures of the master, and void of expression. The heroine is badly posed on the bull, which looks like a calf." Lecomte observes: " Nothing can be fresher than this painting, nothing more gracious than this composition . . . the deli- cate opal tone of the dress of the principal figure is inimitable."

Paul Veronese has also a Europa at Dresden, not differing very essentially from these. Ruskin calls attention to the fact that the entire foreground is covered with flowers, but " executed with sharp, crude touches like those of a decorative painter."

There is a painting in Vienna by H. Von Balen, representing this scene in a slightly different way. Europa, seated on the bull, occupies the central posi- tion, but the maidens about her look more like nymphs or bacchantes; they carry flat, round bas- kets of flowers, which they pass to the attendant loves, who are numerous, and give the scene an almost faery aspect. The women are too mature and stout, and the bull is indifferent and heavy. It is in no way as fine a work as that of Veronese. Two little simpering Cupids are picking over a basket of flowers in the foreground. The maidens are only clothed in floating scarfs, which would

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certainly not continue to float long in the very loose manner in which they are adjusted. In fact, these girls are draped only for tableau purposes. Move- ment would disrobe them at once.

In the Uffizi Gallery in Florence is a picture by Francesco Albani, representing the flight of Europa and the bull from the water point of view. Jupiter swims bravely off with Europa on his back; surely none but a supernatural bull could so dominate the flood as to float so high as he does ! The somewhat startled Europa looks rather regretfully back at the group of companions on the distant shore. Numer- ous Cupids attend the unique elopement, some of whom wave drapery of a reddish hue; some lead Jupiter by a garland of flowers, while one, at the back, prods the bull with his arrow to urge him on. In the sky hovers Mercury with his caduceus, while Jove's eagle precedes his transformed lord. There is a picture of the same subject by Albani in the Hermitage, almost exactly like the one in Florence.

The earliest description of a painting of Europa is found in that old Greek novel, " Cleitophon and Leucippe," by Achilles Tatius, showing that the ancient painters portrayed the scene much as modern men have done. " And in the picture, on the land was a meadow and a band of maidens danc- ing. And on the sea there swam a bull, on whose back a fair maiden sat, steering toward Crete upon

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the beast. The meadow was all abloom with many flowers . . . long rows of trees, dense growth of boughs. Beneath the boughs the artist had painted the shade, and down on the meadow the sun gently filtered through in scattered rays, where the painter had made openings in the dense foliage. ... In mid-sea a bull was painted, riding upon the billows . . . right upon its back a maiden sat, not across, but sideways : and her legs hung over to the right, while with her left hand she grasped its horn, as a driver holds the reins; for the bull steered rather to the left, where the pressure of her hand was guiding it. ... And a kirtle hung about her breast . . . and the rest of her body was covered with a cloak. White was the kirtle, and purple-red the cloak, but the shapeliness of her form was visible for all her clothing. . . . Her hands were spread on either side of her, one toward the bull's horn, and the other toward its tail. . . . Around the bull dolphins sported and young loves did play. . . . Love drew on the bull, Love, the little child, and spread his wings and shook his quiver and with- held his torch and turned and smiled in sport at Zeus."

In the Barberini Palace there is a mosaic, found at Praeneste, which shows the Rape of Europa. The bull is just plunging into the water, with the maiden on his back, while her companions on the

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shore are running and shouting. The drawing of the bull is unusually fine and spirited in action.

The Europa in the Dulwich Gallery is pronounced by Ruskin to be " an exquisite and inimitable little bit of colour. He continues : " The blue of the dark promontory on the left is thoroughly absurd and im- possible, and the warm tones of the clouds equally so, unless it were sunset; but the blue, especially, because it is nearer than several points of land, which are equally in shadow, and yet are rendered in warm gray. But the whole value and tone of the picture would be destroyed if this blue were altered."

Titian's Europa, although a late work of the mas- ter, and therefore bold and dashing in touch, has magic effects of light and shade, and is genial and charming in atmosphere. The bull, garlanded, rushes through the water, while the head of a dolphin is just visible this may be Neptune in disguise, doing a little detective work on his gay brother-deity. The bull leaves a white wake behind him, showing his impetuous speed. On his back, of course, is seen Europa, holding his horn by one hand and stretching the other toward the shore. Her orange draperies, relieved by white muslin, are well con- trasted with the green foaming surges of the water. Cupid rides a dolphin near by. The shadow which Europa's lifted arm casts upon her own face is painted with great delicacy.

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The story of Jupiter and Antiope is often used in art. Antiope was a beautiful girl, whom Jupiter, in the form of a satyr, wooed and won. She is usually represented as sleeping after her exertions in the Maenad dances, when approached by the Olympian king. The two most famous pictures dealing with the legend are a large canvas by Titian in the Louvre, and Correggio's Antiope in the same gallery. Titian's work was originally the property of Philip II. of Spain. It has great beauty of form and arrangement, fine light and shade, and shows magic skill in handling. Titian had been painting for fifty years when he produced it. Anti- ope lies back upon a bed of skins, in the fresh open landscape, sleeping or indulging in a day-dream. Jupiter, approaching in his disguise as a satyr, is pulling away her draperies. She is apparently quite unconscious, let us give her the benefit of the doubt, and assume that she sleeps. Crowe and Cavalcaselle observe that " her shape is modelled with a purity of colour and softness of rounding hardly surpassed in the Parian marble of the ancients." Cupid is seen in a tree, aiming an arrow at the satyr. Jupiter and Antiope form part only of the rural scene. The picture is divided by a tree, and on the other side a satyr and nymph are seated in conversation, while a hunter, with dogs, followed by a youth sounding a horn, are starting to cross

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the sward toward the spot where a stag is being brought to bay. The whole composition is a charm- ing scene of sylvan joyousness and unrestrained pagan vitality. In these particulars it is Greek, although the landscape is essentially Italian, such as Titian must have grown up amidst in the hills of Cadore. The various textures in this painting are well rendered.

Correggio's Antiope is more concrete in con- ception. It deals only with Jupiter and the sleeping nymph, who lies in such a way, and is .so disposed upon the canvas, that she reaches diagonally nearly across the whole space. This is a world-famed picture, and has many attractions in colour, the luminous flesh of the nymph contrasting well with the rough dark being who kneels by her, lifting the covering from her sleeping form. There is, however, very bad drawing about the shoulders of Antiope, and the attitude is strained and awkward. An un- gainly little Cupid lies by the side of Antiope. The foreshortening of the nymph's body is defective, giving her a stunted appearance. The picture be- longed to the Dukes of Mantua, and then, through Charles I. and Cardinal Mazarin, passed finally into the possession of Louis XIV.

Paul Veronese painted a study of Jupiter and Antiope, which is in Munich. The figures are seen only to the waist, and occupy the whole picture.

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The paint is thin, on a very coarse canvas, the lights and shadows being charmingly disposed. The fair Antiope is in strong contrast to her suitor. The colouring is in a low key.

In Munich is also a treatment of this subject by a pupil of Van Dyck. Antiope, slightly covered with a blue cloth, lies asleep on the ground. The satyr, accompanied by the eagle of Jove, is seen behind her. Cupids hold brownish draperies above. It was long believed to be the work of Van Dyck himself.

Jupiter frequently walked about upon the earth. " While thus he often went to and fro," as Ovid expresses it, " he stopped short on seeing a virgin of Monacris." That was enough for Jupiter. When the charming Calisto laid down in the grove, with her quiver under her head for a pillow, to take a noon-day nap, then argued the Thunderer with him- self : " For certain, my wife will know nothing of this stolen embrace; or, if she should chance to know, is her scolding, is it, I say, of such great consequence? " Having reached this stage in philosophy, it may be believed that nothing could deter Jove. That he might not cause alarm, he took on the form of Diana, an act of deliberate Olympic forgery, and made the most of his opportunity. When Diana discovered the error of

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this her nymph, she was enraged, and ordered Calisto out of her sight.

In the Gallerie san Luca in Rome is a picture by Titian, of Diana discovering the guilt of the un- happy Calisto. The figures of the nymphs are some- what heavy, but the wood-tones and luminous colouring of the flesh in the several nude figures are charming. This picture occurs elsewhere; Titian painted it several times. Calisto 'is being dealt with in a summary manner. Taine remarks upon this picture : " No mere prettiness of epicureanism exists in this bold composition. The nymphs do their office brutally, like common women with vigorous arms. One especially erect, and with a superb, almost masculine torso, is a virago, capable of giving a man a drubbing."

Among Jupiter's other indiscretions was his amour with the nymph lo, a fascinating person of whom Juno conceived a violent and legitimate sus- picion. Juno, as Ovid tells us, " was full well ac- quainted with the intrigues of a husband who had been so often detected." So Juno decided to visit the earth in search of her missing lord, soliloquizing, " I am either deceived, or I am injured." While Jupiter, in the disguise of a cloud, was enjoying the companionship of his fair lo one day, Juno, looking down through the thick atmosphere, was just in time to see the maiden transformed into a heifer.

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Juno, however, had seen so much of metamorphosis in her day, especially in connection with the amorous adventures of her husband, that she decided to set a watch upon that cow. So she placed her under the observation of the hundred-eyed Argus, a mytho- logical detective, to whom all these optical advan- tages must have been of inestimable benefit. Argus, having so many eyes, only required to sleep with two at a time, so that really there was no opportunity for lo to resume her usual shape, or to receive her Olympian visitor while under his supervision. Therefore Jupiter sent his trusty Mercury, with the injunction that he must find a way to make Argus sleep with all his eyes at once. After some attempts, Mercury related a story so full of weariness, and sighing, and disappointment, that the hundred eyes of Argus all closed in self-defence. As soon as he became unconscious, Mercury slew him, and thus restored lo to freedom. Juno took the eyes of Argus, by way of a memento, and has immortalized them by setting them in the tail of her peacock.

In the House of Livia on the Palatine Hill, there is a fresco dating from the first century, representing Mercury, lo, and Argus. The Roman reading of the myth must have differed somewhat from the form in which it has descended to us, for in this old painting lo sits at the foot of a column, in human

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shape, with Mercury at one side and Argus at the other.

Early Greek vase-paintings show Argus covered from head to foot with eyes, as a leopard is covered with spots.

The most beautiful painting of lo and Jupiter is in Vienna, and is by Correggio. The entire canvas is rich and dark, and the thick cloud is descending. lo sits on a bank, in the foreground, with her back partly turned, and her head thrown back. The face of Jove is discernible in the shadow, imprinting a kiss upon her lips, while one hand, much veiled in cloud, reaches around her waist. She leans back with her eyes half-closed. The figure is one of the most beautifully painted nudes in art.

The Jupiter and lo by Meldola in St. Petersburg shows Jupiter seated on the ground with the lovely nymph in the midst of a delightful landscape. In the clouds above Juno appears, and in the distance is a second scene, with lo metamorphosed into a heifer, and watched by Argus. The landscape of this picture was painted by Campagnola,

CHAPTER IV.

VENUS APHRODITE

VENUS APHRODITE, goddess of love and beauty, figures more in art than any other divinity except, perhaps, her son Cupid. Seriously worshipped by the ancients, as their patron of all things fair and full of pleasure, she has become the great opportun- ity for later painters, who are always glad of a rational excuse for studying the nude. At one time every painter of note created as many Venuses as he could procure good-looking models. So that an ex- haustive study of Venus in art would fill volumes.

The Greek representations are frequently quite reverent, as the Greeks interpreted reverence. The statue of Aphrodite, made by Kanochus for Sicyon, is thus described by Pausanias : " The goddess, made of gold and ivory, wears the peplos on her head; in one hand she holds a poppy, and in the other an apple." The fact that both gold and ivory were used proves that the statue was clothed; for the golden part would have been the drapery, and

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the ivory only the face and arms. The earlier statues of Venus were habitually draped. The Homeric hymn alludes to Aphrodite as wearing " a veil more dazzling than the radiance of fire, bracelets, and earrings ; her neck is laden with golden necklets, and her fair breast gleams even as the moon." Until the fifth century B. c., Venus appeared as a modest matron, clothed in the best fashion of the period. The change to the entirely nude, as we see this god- dess in nearly all subsequent art, must have been somewhat gradual. M. Bernouille says, " It is inconceivable that Aphrodite can have been repre- sented completely undraped in sculptural art, unless public sentiment had been prepared for the change by statues partially draped." Probably Scopas, in the incomparable Venus de Milo, made this inno- vation. The Venus de Milo is one of the most exalted and chaste achievements of art in any period.

Almost at once sculptors began to represent the goddess in a state of nature, and no reports have reached modern ears that it proved unsatisfactory. The Capitoline Venus, the crouching Venus in Naples, the Venus de Medici in Florence, are all what might be called " familiar figures."

Cupid is often a mere accessory of Venus, as it were, the active principle of her power. " A young child, with wings, bow, and quiver," as Anacreon

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describes him, he, directed by his mother, wounded mortals, more or less at the goddess's discretion. He is often simply her messenger, although there are a cluster of myths relating to him independently, which will be treated of in their place. Cupid is often multiplied by groups of little creatures known as Erote, or Amorini, little loves who assist Cupid and his mother on all occasions, and who are as numerous in pictures of Venus as are the small angels in pictures of the Virgin. They are not exactly mythological beings, but are decorative, sug- gestive, unquestioned sprites, who serve to com- plete the illusive attractive quality of many pictures where the delicate passion of love is the key-note.

In Vienna is a picture of Cupid by Parmigianino. He is seen at work making a bow, leaning on the long shaft of wood, which he is hewing into shape, while other loves are seen below the carpenter's bench upon which Cupid stands. One of these amorini is crying; either the flames of love have scorched him, or the other amorino has pinched him.

The statue of the Venus de Medici, almost as famous as the Venus de Milo, is well described by Taine in a few words : " A slender young girl, with a delicate head ... a perfect mortal ... at ease in a nude state, and free from that somewhat mawkish delicacy and bashful coquetry which its

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copies and the restored arms, with their thin ringers, by Bernini, seem to impose upon her."

Botticelli's Birth of Venus in Florence is rather likely to be the first Venus which comes into the mind of the student. Whether one likes her or not, she is at least individual, and will impress herself on the memory. She stands balanced slightly on her left foot, on the edge of a large and conscientiously drawn scallop shell, on which she has floated ashore. She is about to step off this light craft, and the sway of her figure is full of action. Without clothing of any kind, she seems complacent enough while at sea ; but a more worldly-wise Flora, herself completely clad in a thin embroidered garment, meets her on her landing with an ample mantle, which she is about to throw around the goddess. Two hard- working Zephyrs are blowing the shell to the shore. They are thoroughly breezy figures, with the swirl of the wind and the brooding quality of the cloud. A very appreciative and illuminating criticism of this picture is given in John Addington Symonds's " Renaissance in Italy " : " It would be impossible for any painter to design a more exquisitely out- lined figure than that of his Venus, who, with no covering but her golden hair, is wafted to the shore by zephyrs. Roses fall upon the ruffled waves, and the young gods of the air twine hands and feet as they float. ... It would seem as though Botticelli

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intended every articulation of the body to express some meaning, and this, though it enhances the value of his work for sympathetic students, often leads him to the verge of affectation."

Botticelli's Venus was painted for Lorenzo de Medici, and is in tempera. Burckhardt says of it, " He produced not only a beautiful nude, but a charming fairy-like impression." The hands and feet are carefully drawn, as Botticelli's hands and feet always are, indeed, the effect is rather that of a tinted drawing than of a modelled painting. The tone is rather gray and sober. A short appreciation is given by Vernon Lee; she calls Venus " not trium- phant, but sad in her pale beauty ; a king's daughter bound by some charm to flit on her shell over rip- pling sea, until the winds blow it to the kingdom of the good Fairy Spring, who shelters her in her laurel grove, and covers her nakedness with the wonderful mantle of fresh-blown flowers ; " in short, this picture is a mediaeval fairy-tale, based on the narrative of Greek origin.

Walter Pater contributes several thoughts upon this famous picture. He speaks, in his charming language, of the draperies as " powdered all over in the Gothic manner with a quaint conceit of daisies ; " and goes on to say that the figure of Venus re- minds one of the faultless nude studies of Ingres, and that she seems to recall all that you have ever

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read of fifteenth-century Florence. He then suggests that at first the colouring strikes one as hard and cold ; " and yet," he continues, " the more you come to understand what imaginative colouring really is, that all colour is no mere delightful quality of natural things, but a spirit upon them by which they become expressive to the spirit, the better you will like this peculiar quality of colour." He then speaks of the expression of sorrow on the face of Venus, and suggests that "you might think that it was at the thought of the whole long day of love yet to come." Why this thought should prove so depressing to Venus some of us may fail to comprehend. In his analysis of the mental state of Venus, Pater pro- ceeds, " What is unmistakable is the sadness with which he has conceived the goddess of pleasure, as the depository of a great power over the lives of men." At any rate, whether we grasp this esoteric quality in the intention of the painter or not, we can appreciate what Walter Pater says of the sea in this picture as " showing his teeth, and sucking in one by one the falling roses, each severe in its outline, plucked off short at the stalk, but embrowned a little as Botticelli's flowers always are. Botticelli meant all that imagery to be altogether pleasurable; and it was partly an incompleteness of resources, inseparable from the art of that time, that subdued and chilled it; but his predilection for minor tones

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counts also." Vernon Lee, in " Euphorion," speaks of Venus less sympathetically. She says that Botti- celli's Venus, " despite her forms studied from the antique, and her gesture imitated from some earlier copy of the Venus de Medici, has the woe-begone prudery of a Madonna or of an abbess. She shivers physically and morally in her unaccustomed naked- ness, and the goddess of spring, who comes skipping up from a laurel copse, does well to prepare for her a mantle, for in the pallid tempera colour, against the dismal background of rippled sea, this mediaeval Venus, at once indecent and prudish, is no very pleasing sight."

Botticelli's Venus in Berlin, a single figure, is not unlike that in the Birth of Venus. The attitude and facial expression are almost the same, and the chief innovation would seem to be a pair of curious stiff little braids, coming with exactness from beneath her flowing ringlets, one on each side. It is diffi- cult to understand why Botticelli elected this exotic style of head-dressing for his goddess of love. The lines of the figure are beautiful, if one could only raise the shoulders a little from their improbable slope.

In the National Gallery is a, draped Venus by Botticelli, reclining, and clothed with a delicate rippling gauze garment, in the fashion loved by the artist. Raised upon one elbow, the goddess looks

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straight out from the picture, her hair, much shorter than that of the nude Venuses, being curled and twisted, and lying in little snaky locks on her shoulders. The face has not the usual appealing look of Botticelli's women, but is rather set and firm in its expression. There are little Loves playing about her. A low-lying plain, with hills in the dis- tance, forms the background. The picture on the whole possesses great decorative value, the balance of the composition being much more normal than that in many of Botticelli's pictures.

Giorgione's Sleeping Venus in Dresden, from which Titian's Venus in the Uffizi was supposed to have been taken, is a beautiful recumbent figure, of sylph-like proportions, lying at the foot of a little hillock. One arm is thrown above her head, which rests upon it in slumber. A satin robe lies dis- carded upon the ground, and the pose is unconscious and graceful. The colouring of the picture is rich, and in the background is seen the usual Venetian landscape. Morelli calls this picture " the quintes- sence of Venetian art." Even Raphael never dis- played a finer sense of outline than is here drawn. Morelli considers Giorgione's Venus realistic in the noblest sense. Some critics claim that a Venus by Titian in Darmstadt was the original from which Giorgione took this one; Morelli thinks that the Darmstadt Venus is only a free copy of this, by

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" some feeble German artist of the eighteenth cen- tury!"

Titian's two Venuses in the Tribuna of the Uffizi should next claim our attention. These charming beings have such varied attributes, each being of a type so different from the other, that one must admire the genius that could create both. Both these goddesses are reclining, one stout and fair, the other a slender glowing form. The two are strangely different in their ideal possibly both were portraits.

The first mentioned lies on a couch upon an open verandah, with a background of open landscape. A little Cupid is at her shoulder, evidently making a confidential suggestion. She turns to look at him. At her feet a small dog is barking furiously. She is a more mature, firmly built person than the second Venus. Her couch is the colour of lake, somewhat subdued; she holds a bunch of flowers in her left hand. The dog seems interested in an owl which is perched on the sill. A little table at the right has a vase of flowers standing upon it. Red curtains close in the landscape view, where a sunset is suggested. The colouring of the whole is rather a soft brownish tone. This Venus is something like the Venus with a Mirror in the Hermitage, of which we shall speak later.

The other Venus is lying luxuriously within a

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spacious room, where women are seen arranging clothing in a chest at the right. The face is said to be a portrait of Eleonora Gonzaga. In every other respect the picture is almost a copy of Gior- gione's Venus at Dresden; and Morelli suggests that Titian was probably commissioned by Francesco Maria della Rovere to paint a copy of the Giorgione, and to place upon it the head of his beloved Eleo- nora.

It passed from Urbino to Florence in the seven- teenth century, and this is the only historical fact in connection with it. Venus lies on a couch on which a muslin sheet covers a ruby-coloured damask beneath. She is playing with a chaplet of flowers, leaning on her right elbow. A little dog lies at the foot of the couch. She is not conceived as a stately goddess, but as one who would preside over the altar of love without the ceremony of a court. She is a natural and beautiful woman, and as such might belong to any period. She is not Greek in any specific way ; Crowe says of this painting : " Per- fect distribution of space, a full and ringing har- mony of tints, atmosphere both warm and mellow, are all combined in such wise as to bring us in con- tact with something that is real, and we feel as we look into the canvas that we might walk into that apartment and find room to wander in the gray twi-

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light into which it is thrown by the summer sky that shows through the coupled windows."

In Madrid is another Venus almost like the first in the Tribuna, except that no Cupid is introduced, and she is caressing a little silky brown dog. At the foot of the couch sits a man playing on an organ. A hunting-party may be seen in the distance, and a peacock admiring itself in a fountain. The man sitting at the organ may be a portrait, there is no record to inform us of the exact intention of the picture, with its classic goddess and its sixteenth- century Italian garden, and people in Renaissance clothes. The picture has been cleansed and restored, and much of the original line has probably been lost.

In Cambridge there is a Venus said to be by Titian, a little on the order of the one in Madrid. Venus lies on a couch of red velvet^ while an Amo- rino crowns her with flowers. She holds a flute in her hand. A man playing upon a lute sits at the foot of the couch, with an open music-book before him. The figure of the goddess is heavy.

A Venus by Titian, beautiful in form and colour, hangs also in the Hermitage. The picture is usually known as the Toilet of Venus. Two little Cupids are holding a mirror before her. She is seated, and, looking aslant into the glass, cannot fail to be satisfied. The figure of Aphrodite is nude

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to the hips, about which she holds a robe of furry material elaborately trimmed with embroidered ornament. Her hair is dressed in Venetian Renais- sance style, which would have caused the Greeks vast wonder. The goddess is very plump. The lights in the picture are rather artificial, being arranged so as to illuminate the central figure, and to leave the surroundings in shadow. Titian painted two replicas of this picture, one for Philip II. of Spain, and one for Nicolo Grasso. There are several others purporting to be by Titian, but most of them have only one Cupid, who holds the glass, while in the St. Petersburg picture the second Cupid is offering Venus a chaplet. This picture belonged to Pomponio Vecelli. The couch on which Venus sits is striped yellow and black, while her mantle is of subdued cherry colour, with gold enrichments. The sash about the Cupid who holds the mirror is yellow. The second Cupid is much like the Cupid in the Venus of the Uffizi. The background hangings are of brown and green, well worked together. The lit- tle bodies of the Cupids are muscular and well drawn. A critic points to the broadly modelled surface, which has been impasted repeatedly before the finish- ing glazing and smirching was done.

Among numerous studies of Venus by Titian may be mentioned the one known as the Darmstadt Venus, which is badly injured, a Venus in the Dul-

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wich Gallery, where Cupid is seen pricking the hand of Venus with an arrow, and the lovely Venus Anadyomene in the Bridgewater Gallery, who is seen standing in the waves about her knees, lifting her tresses, heavy with the water, and whose form is as beautiful as her face. Her eyes are most scintillat- ing in their arch expression, but she is not an in- genuous child of ocean; she is the world-versed goddess who is conscious of all that life holds for her as ministrant to the celestial passion. The modelling of her flexible body is enchanting.

Titian's famous picture of Venus Worship hangs in Madrid. The goddess is here figured by a marble statue holding a shell ; two nymphs, one in red and one in uncompromising blue, are at her feet. Swarms of Amorini are climbing the trees of the grove, and picking fruit, filling baskets with it. The colouring is warm, in spite of the numerous cool grays and greens. They say that when Domenichino heard that this picture had gone to Spain, the tears came into his eyes.

There are four Venuses by Raphael in the Hermit- age. They are all frescoes. One shows her riding on a marine monster, with her back to the spectator, looking over her shoulder. Loves and dolphins accompany her. In another she is sitting at the foot of a tree, adjusting her sandal. She is draped in yellow, and a dove sits on a tree near her. In a third

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picture she appears with Adonis, in a cosy pastoral arrangement; in the fourth she is pleading with Cupid, apparently beseeching him to turn an arrow against herself.

The Venus by Contarini in the Academia in 1 Venice is simply an inferior copy of Titian's Danae. The attitude of the goddess is precisely the same as that of Danae, the only marked difference in the whole being that, instead of a golden shower, two doves are seen on a twig, and there is no old crone or companion, and no Cupid. The texture of the bedclothes is very peculiar in this painting, resem- bling sheets of Liberty gauze indifferently rendered.

Idyll XIX. of Theocritus was evidently in the mind of Lucas Kranach when he painted his Venus which now hangs in the Gallery of the Villa Bor- ghese. Venus is entirely nude, tall and thin, in true mediaeval feeling as expressed by Netherlandish painters. She has the apology for a gauze scarf trailing across her arms, but it is too filmy to be recognized as drapery in any sense. Her hair is composed neatly into a jewelled net, and she wears a jaunty velvet hat with plumes, which accessory does much to emphasize her nakedness. By her side stands a Cupid with a bit of honeycomb in his hand from which tiny, very well painted bees are issuing and alighting upon his arm. Theocritus, in Calverley's translation, thus suggests the subject :

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" Once thievish Love the honeyed hives would rob, When a bee stung him; soon he felt a throb Through all his finger-tips, and, wild with pain, Blew on his hands and stamped and jumped in vain. To Aphrodite then he told his woe :

'How can a thing so tiny hurt one so?' She smiled and said : ' Why, thou'rt a tiny thing, As is the bee ; yet sorely thou canst sting.' "

In the Dresden Gallery is a very pretty Venus by Guido Reni. The goddess, in a thoroughly refined, ladylike pose, reclines upon a couch, while a well- bred little Cupid, with a charming manner, steps forward and offers her an arrow, which he holds between his thumb and finger, she receiving it in an equally dainty way. Though the picture is affected, it is extremely pretty ; its evanescent sweetness calls for no more dignified characterization.

Raphael's " Days " are well known to all, but many people do not stop to analyze which celestial being is selected to preside over each day. Venus rules Friday. She is seen in her car, drawn by doves through the clouds. A breezy, beautiful conception is this, and quite Greek in feeling the picture might easily have been taken from an antique gem, so classic is the whole composition. The well-pro- portioned body of the goddess leans slightly forward, poised upon the left foot, and the swinging arms and the floating draperies are full of graceful action.

In the Prado in Madrid is a painting by Albani,

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called the Toilet of Venus. She reclines on a crimson velvet chair, contemplating herself in a mir- ror held by Cupid. The scene is in a garden; an- other Cupid ties the sandal of Venus, and two others assist at the toilet. Fuseli sums up the chief char- acteristics of Albani, when he alludes to his " Nere- ids and Oreads formed on plump Venetian models," and speaks of their pearly hues contrasted with " the rosy tints of Loves, the juicy brown of fauns and satyrs, and rich marine and sylvan scenery."

In the Gallerie de San Luca in Rome there is a picture of Venus and Cupid by Guercino. It is well drawn, but without special interest. Venus is sit- ting on the ground, her elbow resting on two sym- metrical velvet cushions. She is out-of-doors. She turns to look above at Cupid, who, flying through the air, has just despatched an arrow from his bow, and is in the act of taking another from his quiver. The figure of Venus is much too heavy for beauty of line, and the drapery which covers half her body is unimaginative and cumbrous.

There is a graceful figure of Venus by Velas- quez in the collection at Rokeby Park. The slight figure is reclining, and is seen from behind. She is looking in a mirror, which reflects her face.

A very airy composition is Bronzino's Venus and Cupid in the Uffizi. An unyielding figure is that of the deity, as she poses, like a ballet-girl, although

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half -recumbent, with both arms stretched out and held from behind by Cupid. The position is an im- possible one without the aid of wings it could not be maintained. The picture is among the most affected works of this mannered artist.

There are two abominable panels in the Corsini by Albani representing Venus and Cupid. One shows the goddess sleeping, a fat, lazy, half- idiotic-looking woman, who appears, even through her closed lids, as if she must be cross-eyed. Very doll-like Cupids play about her, one bearing a fan of ostrich feathers, and one holding his finger to his lips, lest some one should disturb Venus, who looks too stupid to do anything but snore her time away. The companion-picture shows Venus awake, slightly better looking, but not much more intellectual ; she is admiring a shield with a heart upon it, which is presented to her by an artificial Cupid, who has been using it as a target. Supernumeraries in Cupid formi overrun the background. These two pictures, if they could be used for covers on fancy boxes, would hardly induce a second glance.

There is a delightful old-world picture by Cosimo Tura, who painted in Ferrara somewhere about 1460, called the Triumph of Venus. It is in the Schifanoia Palace in Ferrara. The picture, which is of long and low proportions, presents two shores, divided by a river. Down this river sails a barque

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hung with scalloped valances and drawn by two stately swans. On this barge is Venus enthroned; Mars is kneeling before her. She is clothed as most of the ladies of Ferrara were probably dressed when Cosimo Tura painted. A high-waisted gown floats to her feet, and she holds fruit and flowers in her hands. The knight is chained to her footstool. On the shore at the right are gathered a party of well- dressed people carrying musical instruments. They surround a young couple, who, kneeling on the sward, are exchanging a kiss. In the background stand the three Graces, nude, on a promontory. At the water's edge a number of white rabbits are sport- ing. On the left shore a standing couple are seen embracing, and others sit and walk about. The costumes are delightful, but it is too early in the Renaissance for anything but mediaeval sentiment.

In the Audience Hall of the Cambio in Perugia Perugino has painted, among these little frescoes which impress Vernon Lee as " so many ballets," a Venus, which is most characteristic of the artist in his usual mannerisms. The figure of the goddess is seen in floating draperies, whirling in a tremen- dous draught, with her feet in what the dancing-mas- ters call the " fifth position ; " she is standing on a curious little car, a sort of buckboard on small wheels, with a wrought iron seat at the back, and drawn by two doves. Cupid, blindfold, is seen dash-

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ing by in the background, with his bow drawn for action. " Venus," as Vernon Lee says, " daintily poised on one foot on her dove-drawn chariot, the exquisite Venus in her clinging veils, conquering the world with the demure gravity and adorable prim- ness of a high-born young abbess."

Rubens's Festival of Venus is an abandoned scene of wild orgies in a wood. Venus stands alone in the centre at the foot of a tree, while all the nymphs and satyrs of the grove are enjoying themselves in the dance. A little fire is burning in a brazier at the feet of the goddess ; this act of worship is supposed to compensate for the neglect of her followers, who are in pursuit of their own pleasure. A ruined tem- ple and fountain are seen at the left; Cupids innu- merable are floating in the air.

Cupid is the hero of few myths independently of his mother. Representations of him, both in Greek and modern art, are usually in connection with some other person's affairs, and, as such, will be noted in various other places. There are, how- ever, a few statues and pictures of Cupid for his own sake. The Cupid of Praxiteles is the most time- honoured and familiar of these, and sets the type for most serious attempts at his portrayal. The statue by Michelangelo in the South Kensington Museum, of a kneeling Cupid stringing his bow, is justly famous. It is a graceful, and, at the same time, a

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virile young figure, the raised arm being full of strength and beauty. An old fresco in Pompeii treats a series of Cupids as wine-sellers; they are in a cellar among the wine-jugs, one of which they have placed upon a stand so that they may pour from it. One Cupid is filling a cup, and one is handing his to another ; these cups are round and flat, like the proverbial " wine-tasters " of the Old World. These little Cupids are all fitted with fluttering feather wings, and stand about quite in club-men's attitudes.

There is a delightful little Cupid by Washington Allston in the Boston Art Museum, in which the figure stands with his back nearly turned, and is straining to lift a large helmet. In this rich canvas the blue and green tones predominate, a slight red scarf about Cupid's shoulder being the only warmer note. The drawing of the sturdy childish figure is pleasing.

One of the most interesting myths in connection with Venus is her love for Adonis. Adonis was a fair youth with a rather hazy origin ; legend states that he was born from a tree, and that he was brought up by the wood-nymphs. Bernardino Luini has interpreted this story for us in the Brera in Milan, having painted a truly mythical picture called the Birth of Adonis. This picture combines in a rather remarkable way the mediaeval with the

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Greek form of treatment. It is similar in many ways to paintings at Pompeii, and certain other Greek paintings that have survived. In the background is seen the infant Adonis being taken from the tree- trunk by two admiring women, while two others are running to behold the miracle. In the foreground, separated from the scene behind by a river, two figures are seated, apparently arguing. These may be Adonis, later in life, being wooed by Venus, although the personal appearance of the latter would hardly sanction such an assumption. More probably the scene illustrates his education among the nymphs as he approached maturity. The picture has great quaintness, and, although probably an early work of Luini, exhibits his characteristic crisp lines, especially in the foliage and in the hair.

The magical effect which her love for Adonis had upon Venus reminds us of similar transformations which occur at all ages among- mortals. Venus had never, up to this time, thought of anything but the development of her own charms, the beautifying of her person, and her ease and luxury in Olympus. Now, because her love was a hunter, she came upon earth, and spent her time in the chase, practically turning Diana for the nonce, never contented except roaming the fields and hills which were frequented by the beautiful youth. But her cautious spirit made her fear the wilder game, and she constantly

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warned Adonis to beware of wolves and bears, and not to pursue the more dangerous animals. The huntsman, however, with characteristic indifference to danger, followed such game as happened to come his way. One day his dogs roused a wild boar, while Adonis was resting in the sylvan shade with Venus. Instantly the youth sprang up to follow. Venus tried to restrain him, but in vain. He rushed after his hounds, and threw his javelin at the boar, but failed to wound him fatally; the infuriated beast turned upon him, and killed him, burying its tusks in the side of the lad. Venus wept long and bitterly. Bion's Lament for Adonis is full of her sorrow : " Woe, woe for Cypris, the mountains all are saying; and the oak-trees answer, Woe for Adonis! and the rivers bewail the sorrows of Aphrodite, and the wells are weeping Adonis on the mountains. The flowers flush red for anguish, and Cytheria, through all the mountain-knees, through every dell, doth shrill the piteous dirge : Woe, woe for Cytheria, he hath perished, the lovely Adonis." The scene is famous in literature and art. All are familiar with Shakespeare's poem of Venus and Adonis. The legend goes on : "A tear the Pa- phian sheds for each blood-drop of Adonis, and tears and blood on the earth are turned to flowers. The blood brings forth the rose; the tears, the wind- flower."

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There is a fine canvas by Rubens in the Uffizi, representing Adonis refusing to be detained by Venus, while a Fury in the sky above is pulling at his mantle. The scene (in a grove) is somewhat inconsistent, as the dogs of Adonis are quietly play- ing with Amorini at one side, instead of announcing the arrival of the boar. The three Graces are also on the side of Venus, beseeching the handsome youth to remain with the goddess of love instead of leaving her for the chase. It is one of the noblest of Rubens's pictures of classic subjects, and has much of the light-hearted spirit of youth in it. Rubens generally is given to portraying mature people in relating classic myths. The inconsequent joyousness of spring is thus frequently missed in his compo- sitions. The figure of Adonis is faultless, and that of Venus very lovely. The Graces show rather more of the overfed characteristics of Rubens's women, but not so much as in many of his works. The landscape is by J. Breughel.

In the Prado is a Venus and Adonis by Veronese, where the youth is seen sleeping in an abandoned and unattractive pose, while Venus, supporting his head on her knee, is fanning him with a little square Venetian fan. A Cupid is holding the dogs back so that they may not disturb the sleeper. Venus is looking out from the canvas in a confidential way, at the spectator, as one who gloats over a possession,

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and is anxious for sympathy. Adonis is hers while he lies asleep, at least he will not leave her until he wakes!

Caracci's Venus with the dead Adonis, in the Cor- sini Gallery, is interesting, as representing Venus as a more mature woman than she usually appears in art. She is weeping, and her brow is drawn with really human woe. The body of the dead youth is a very lovely piece of painting in its school. The god of love is gazing over the shoulder of Venus, weeping and wringing his hands in sorrow. A real sentiment of grief has taken self -consciousness away from the goddess of pleasure; human pain has its message for her too.

In the Bargello in Florence is a recumbent statue of Adonis usually ascribed to Michelangelo. The wounded and dying youth lies twisted with pain, his hand behind his head. A deep wound is in his thigh, which does not, however, suggest a necessarily fatal thrust, judging from its situation. The figure lacks that convincing power of sinew and muscle which would prove it to be the undoubted work of Michelangelo. It is too passive in spite of the dis- tortions. It is holding a pose rather than presenting a transition of feeling.

Titian, too, painted a Venus and Adonis. Venus, seen with her back to the spectator, is trying to hold Adonis from going to his doom, while he, with his

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dogs in leash, refuses to be detained. This is one of the few instances where Titian has treated a given theme less acceptably than Rubens. Far away a little vision is shown of the death of the poor Adonis. This picture is in Madrid, where it was sent to King Philip II. He wrote, " The Adonis has arrived, but so ill-treated that it must be repaired, having a long fold across the middle of the canvas." This injury is still traceable.

There is a large Death of Adonis in the Uffizi, generally ascribed to Moretto, which Morelli gives to Sebastiano del Piombo.

CHAPTER V.

i

APOLLO AND THE MUSES

APOLLO, being the god of the sun, of light and radiance, is usually depicted as beautiful in person, and has come to be recognized also as the god of beauty, as Venus has become the goddess of beauty. He, too, is the presiding genius over har- mony, and often is painted in company with the Muses, epitomizing what, in our day, we call the " artistic temperament." In the Homeric Hymn to the Delian Apollo, he is made to say, almost imme- diately after his birth, " Give me a sweet-sounding lyre and a curved bow, and my oracle shall make known unto men the true wishes of Zeus."

As the sun-god, Apollo has been beautifully figured by numerous artists of the Renaissance. Milton, in " Comus," mentions the car of the sun- god:

" Now the gilded car of day His golden axle doth allay In the deep Atlantic stream," 88

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and speaks of Apollo

" Pacing towards the other goal Of his chamber in the East."

Apollo is also protector of shepherds and seamen. In his pastoral character he occurs frequently in art. In the early Dorian representations of Apollo, he wears long hair, and is much of an athlete. The Homeric Hymn describes him thus : " The god was like unto a man of full sap and vigour in all the bril- liancy of young manhood, and over his broad shoul- ders streamed the loosed locks." During the archaic period he was thus represented. A number of small votive bronzes in different museums are usually supposed to represent Apollo ; there is one in Berlin with the inscription : " Dienagoras dedicated me to Apollo the Far-darter." A little later it became cus- tomary to clothe the figures of Apollo, like the Apollo Musagetes in the Vatican, who might easily, in his long flowing draperies, with high belt, be taken for one of the Muses themselves. Praxiteles presented still another type in his turn, a slender, nude boy, charmingly graceful, as in the Apollo Sauroktonos in the Vatican. He is leaning carelessly with one hand against a tree-trunk, while with the other hand he aims a light missile at a lizard which is crawling up the bark. His features are relaxed

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in a whimsical smile; the dignity of the god is merged in the human.

Generally acknowledged as the masterpiece among Greek statues of Apollo is the Apollo Belvedere of the Vatican. The hand which is extended is sup- posed by some to have held the bow, from which the arrow has just been sped. The hand which was missing, when the statue was found, has been re- stored according to this theory. The question has been raised, however, as to whether Apollo might have carried in that hand the shield bearing the Gor- gon's head. The famous statue, in any case, is a Roman copy of the great original, which was exe- cuted in the third century B. c. Accepting either of these theories regarding the use of the missing hand, the statue shows the young deity in his war-like as- pect. He was intended to exhibit, in his facial ex- pression, anger and contempt; and as the artist wished him to retain his perfect beauty in spite of this manifestation, he indicated anger only in the curling dilated nostril, and has expressed contempt by a slight raising of the chin and lower lip. He is supposed to have just slain the great serpent, Python. The myth of Apollo kill- ing Python is related by Ovid; he thus apostro- phizes the creature : " Thou, unheard-of serpent, wast a source of terror to this new race of men, so vast a part of the mountain did thou occupy ! "

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Ovid relates that " the god that bears the bow . . . overwhelmed him with a thousand ar- rows. . . ." So perished the monster that had been troubling humanity. The symbolism of this mytfc is pointed out by Ruskin : " Apollo's contest with Python is the strife of purity with pollution; of life with forgetfulness ; of love with the grave."

Apollo Belvedere has been criticized as being a little too elegant ; suited to the flowery taste of the eighteenth century. Taine speaks of his aristocratic appearance : " The attitude reminds us of a young lord," says Taine, " repelling somebody that troubled him. This Apollo certainly displays savoir-vivre, also consciousness of his rank. I am sure he has a crowd of domestics ! "

In a fourth-century painting found in the baths of Constantine, the Pythian Apollo, with his bow in one hand, and his arrow in the other, is shown, a full-length figure of slim, graceful proportions.

Apollo matching in contest his " golden lyre giving forth dulcet sounds beneath the bow," with the flute of the satyr Marsyas, is a favourite subject among artists.

Marsyas (some say that it was Pan himself) had the temerity to propose a musical competition be- tween himself and Apollo. After humbling him in the contest, as the god of music of course could do,

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Apollo undertook to manifest his godlike qualities further by flaying his adversary.

The semi-mediaeval treatment of pictures of classic scenes, to which allusion has already been made, is most evident in the case of the Apollo and Marsyas in the Louvre, long given to Raphael, but now often thought to be the work of Pinturicchio. Morelli gives this picture to Perugino. The drawing for it is in the Venice Academy, under the name of Raphael. " This piping Marsyas seated by the tree-stump," says Vernon Lee, " this naked Apollo, thin and hec- tic, like an undressed archangel, standing against the Umbrian valley with its distant blue hills, its cas- tellated villages, its delicate thinly-leaved trees, . . . all this is as little like Ovid as the triumphant antique Galatea of Raphael is like Spenser."

Marsyas, a satyr, or rather a Silenus, was the per- sonification of a little stream in Phrygia.

Correggio's Apollo and Marsyas in St. Petersburg takes the form of a landscape divided into two scenes. First, at the right, the musical contest be- tween the god and the mortal is seen. In another group, Apollo is seen flaying Marsyas in the usual manner, holding him by one ear, while he menaces him with the knife ; the draperies are all cast aside, and the broken flute and Apollo's violin lie upon the ground. This picture was painted for the cover of

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a. clavichord, and is somewhat triangular in its shape at the left side.

Unfortunately the very unpleasant flaying of the defeated Marsyas is extremely popular in art. The Apollo and Marsyas of Guido Reni in Munich, would be horrible if it were not grotesque. As it is, the incident is a thoroughly unpleasant one to portray. Sir Charles Eastlake denounces it thus : " Apollo, whose form is distinguished by chalky flesh-tones, stretches himself diagonally across the canvas, in order to kneel on the abdomen of Marsyas, for the apparent purpose of commencing operations by dissecting his biceps. This Marsyas naturally resents, and, throwing his arms about like the sails of a windmill, yells, with a horrible grimace."

At the Villa Aldobrandini, Domenichino painted frescoes relating stories of Apollo and the Muses, and also his punishment of Marsyas, which, as Doc- tor Moore justly observes, " does no honour to Apollo. Marsyas was, unquestionably, an object of contempt and ridicule on account of his presumption, but the punishment said to have been inflicted upon him exceeds all bounds, and renders the inflicter more detestable in our eyes than the insolent satyr himself."

Donatello restored an antique white marble figure of Marsyas, but there is some doubt whether it is

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the one now in the Uffizi, for the work is rather inferior.

In the Prado is a copy of Rubens, representing Apollo conquering Marsyas in musical contest; among these copies also is one of Apollo pursuing Daphne. In Dresden is a painting of Apollo and Marsyas by Langhetti, and in the Pitti Palace are two, one by Guercino and one by Biliverti all equally unpleasant.

Another more attractive legend in connection with Apollo is his love for the wood-nymph Daphne, daughter of a river-god. The beginning of this love is told by Ovid. Cupid had been strutting before Apollo, and Apollo had reproved him, asking him, what such a mere " wanton boy " wanted of such "gallant arms." Then Cupid took his revenge; he " drew two weapons out of his arrow-bearing quiver, of different workmanship, the one repels, the other excites desire. That which causes love is of gold, and is brilliant, with a sharp point; that which repels it is blunt, and contains lead beneath the reed. This one the god fixed in the nymph ; but with the other he wounded the very marrow of Apollo . . . immediately the one is in love, the other flies from the very name of a lover." We all know how the story ended the god with many entreaties pur- sued the poor nymph, until her strength was spent; then, praying to Nature to protect her, she was

BERNINI APOLLO AND DAPHNE.

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turned gradually into a laurel-tree before the very eyes of her adorer ; could a more tantalizing scheme be planned? Apollo, distressed, and yet bound to make the best of it, exclaimed, " Since thou canst not be my wife, at least thou shalt be my tree ; my hair, my lyre, my quiver, shall always have thee, oh, Laurel!"

Of the Apollo and Daphne by Bernini in the Bor* ghese Gallery, Doctor Moore expresses himself, con- trasting it with the method in which an ancient artist would have treated the same subject. Doctor Moore criticizes it as being " deficient in simplicity," saying that Apollo is running with " affected graces," and his astonishment at seeing the transformation of Daphne " is not naturally expressed, but seems rather the exaggerated astonishment of an actor." While he admires the actual sculpture of both face and form of Daphne, Doctor Moore considers that her face is too much distorted by fear, to the sacrifice of beauty. He says that " an ancient artist would have made her less afraid, that she might have been more beautiful." Of course this is not the criticism of a modern realist ; but it is interesting to note that the Greek ideal of repose has been admired in all periods.

In the Brera Gallery in Milan is a fresco by Luini, of Apollo sitting melancholy by the side of a brook, watching Daphne turn into a tree on the opposite bank, while her father, the aged water-divinity, has

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come up out of the stream at his feet, and is reading Apollo a lesson, " pointing " the " heads " of his discourse with thumb and finger. Daphne, half- enveloped in bark, has one free hand still, with which she bids her precipitate wooer a long farewell.

The Apollo and Daphne of Giorgione in Venice is primarily a landscape, with Apollo chasing Daphne across a clearing. There is a bridge across a river at the left. Morelli pronounces this the work of Giorgione, while Crowe and Cavalcaselle ascribe it to Schiavone. It is much spoiled by restora- tions.

An Apollo and Daphne in the Corsini Gallery in Florence is an oil painting on wood, and touched here and there with gold. The handling is careful and delicate. The costumes are fanciful, reminding one of the pictures of Piero di Cosimo, while there are parts of it like the work of Del Sarto. Some critics consider it an early work of the latter.

The story of Apollo and Daphne evidently grew up through the observation of the natural phenome- non of the sun's effect upon the dew. The sun's pursuit makes the dew fly; but when it has so flown, vegetation is produced.

Apollo, as Helios, or the sun-god, is usually pre- ceded in his flight through the ether by Aurora, the goddess of the dawn, and sister of Apollo. The early Italo-Greek vase paintings show Aurora herself

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in a car like that of Apollo, going before him. In later art, she usually flies.

Guido Reni's Aurora is so well known that a description of it seems almost superfluous. The golden-haired sun-god is seated in his chariot, drawn by prancing horses, surrounded by the graceful figures of the Hours, while Aurora, not in a car in this instance, but flying, precedes him, strewing flowers with both hands. The warm glow of the colour of sunrise is caught, and the sea gives depth to the distant horizon line. Of the figure of Aurora, Fuseli remarks : " She deserves to precede a more majestic sun, and Hours less clumsy."

Guercino's Aurora on the ceiling in the Villa Ludovisi is represented as a young and vigorous woman, with almost the proportions of a peasant. She is in her car, which is quite wonderfully fore- shortened, so that in looking up from below, the chariot really seems to be going through the air above one's head. No effort at this illusion is made in Guido Reni's Aurora, which is a picture with an " up and down " to it, like any picture intended to be seen on a wall. In the case of Guercino's Aurora, the composition is more original and more consistent. Old Tithonus lies half-enveloped in his coverings, which are being raised by a Cupid. Another Cupid is playing with a basket of flowers. The chariot is preceded by three nymphs of the Dawn, on a cloud ;

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three young and joyous maidens, still in advance of these others, are extinguishing the stars as they proceed upon their course. The morning light is seen upon their faces. One can see the deep blue tones of the distant sea beyond the mists and clouds. Guercino's figures are much alive. They have not always beauty, but usually virility. Aurora is not clothed according to any Greek ideals, but rather according to the Renaissance interpretation of classic costume. Her horses are two dashing piebald steeds, with flashing eyes. A Cupid is about to crown Aurora with a floral wreath. Her face is refined, although her general build, seen at the necessarily trying angle from below, is a trifle coarse.

The Aurora of Giovanni Luteri in the Estensi Castle in Ferrara, is a small panel in the midst of much ceiling of a riotous style of Renaissance stucco. The fresco does not indicate much thought upon the subject. Aurora, crowned with a simple wreath of symmetrical roses, leads by their bridles the four horses of the sun-chariot. As she is seen in front view, the four horses simply act as a background for her figure, and no more is visible beyond. On the right are certain mythological personages grouped together, but not well differentiated.

In the ceiling of the Sala del Cambio in Perugia, Perugino's figure of Apollo is seen driving along in his chariot drawn by four vari-coloured horses.

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The god is going at great speed, balancing him- self with care, while the reins curl in the wind. Apollo is young, and very slender; the head is quite classic, probably the result of study of Greek models.

Among Giulio Romano's frescoes at the Palazzo del Te in Mantua there is one which shows Phoebus rising between distant hills in his sun-chariot, while a nude Zephyr lies among the clouds playing upon pipes. There are four horses attached to the car of Apollo.

The Apollo of Raphael, in his " Days," is the deity selected for Sunday, and is seen in his four- horse chariot, on which is wrought a series of reliefs of the nine Muses in a dance. The sun-god leans for- ward, placing one hand on the edge of the car, while with the other he holds the reins. The figure is not accurately drawn, and cannot well be the work of Raphael.

On a ceiling in Venice, Vasari and Christofano Gheradi painted an Aurora, the car in which she rides being drawn by cocks, in recognition of the early call of that bird.

Among such subjects as the Aurora may be in- cluded the " Day " of Giorgio Vasari, in the Colonna Gallery in Rome. It represents a really Greek god- dess of dawn, being waked from her slumbers by Cupid, who holds in his hands a sheaf of arrows.

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This is perhaps as acceptable as any of Vasari's pic- tures, he was a better writer than he was painter, and he gossiped better than he drew. At the left are to be seen a couple of masks, and Cupid's bow, leaning against a small stand on which is a basket of fruit.

Apollo is always associated with the Muses, who, nine in number, preside over most of the arts of literature and music. Each has a special attribute, and they occur continually in art, by themselves, or in groups, dancing with Apollo, to whom they must have been especially congenial.

One of the most interesting specimens of early art is a portrait of the Muse Polyhymnia. It is an ancient Greek painting, one of the few surviving examples of this branch of classic art, and is rendered in wax medium on slate. Of these early efforts Fuseli speaks appreciatively, when he says in his " Lectures on Ancient Art," that " Greek art had her infancy, but the Graces rocked the cradle, and Love taught her to speak." The vehicle used by the Greeks, known as Punic wax, was ordinary yellow wax, boiled three times in sea-water and nitre, to bleach it, and was used somewhat as the moderns use oil. The history of this special picture is ro- mantic. It is known as the Muse of Cortona, and is in the museum there. During the eighteenth cen- tury, a peasant found it in his farm when he was

GREEK PAINTING. MUSE OF CORTONA.

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ploughing*. Supposing it to be a picture of the Madonna, he took it home, and placed it in a con- spicuous space on his wall. The priest, however, told him that, far from being a religious picture, it was a painting by some irreligious hand, and was an idol. Fearing that he might be causing displeasure to Heaven by harbouring it, he then used it, as he con- sidered most appropriately, by stopping a hole in his oven with the slate. Later it was discovered in this position, and after various vicissitudes, became recognized as one of the greatest treasures of art, and has ever since been safely lodged in the museum. The wax medium in which it was painted is so re- markably permanent that it has suffered very few injuries. It is an example of the finest period of Greek painting, and the artist must have known something of the practices of their greatest artist, Zeuxis, for the relief and modelling are wonderfully fine. The flesh-tints have survived, and the atmos- phere is charming. The portrait is of a young girl, seen nearly to the waist, nude except for a filmy scarf which crosses her breast. Her head is crowned with laurel. The face is distinctly classical in line, the long straight nose, the square brows, and firm chin, beneath a conventional mouth, suggest the same type as that of most of the well-known Greek statues of about the same period. The eyelids are rather long and drooping, and the eyes look out from

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the picture rather below the level of the eye of the spectator, giving an abstracted air of contemplation. Altogether it is one of the most interesting and unique possessions of the art world.

Giulio Romano's dainty little panel which hangs in the Pitti Palace, shows the dance of Apollo and the Muses. Formed in a circle, holding hands, they conform to a simple and recognized method of danc- ing:

"The Muses there a lovely choir, advance With tender feet to form the skilful dance."

HESIOD.

Apollo himself is the central figure, with his quiver and bow slung across his back, and a chaplet of laurel on his head. The skirt of his tunic is shorter than those of the other nine figures, and he wears buskins. The Muses are not distinguished by their special emblems, but their names appear in impres- sionist Greek on a scroll of ribbon along the fore- ground of the panel. First, at the right hand of Apollo (the left of the picture, observe), is Mel- pomene, the Muse of Tragedy; next to her comes Clio, the Muse of History. At the end is the Muse of Epic Poetry, Calliope; while, holding her hand, and turning the circle, with her back to the spectator, but facing Apollo, is the Muse of Love Poetry, Erato. She is the only one distinguished by her

X

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head-dress. Terpsichore, who presides over the dance, comes next, occupying the space nearest the centre, opposite Apollo. Her back is most graceful, and she is a fit exponent of her art. Next to her is the Muse of Sacred Poetry, Polyhymnia, dancing with a rather sober step, and she is followed by the stately Urania, Muse of Astronomy, who is poised almost without action, and whose glance is far away. She is at the other extreme end. Her hand grasps that of Thalia, Muse of Comedy, while Euterpe, the Muse of Lyric Poetry, connects the circle again with Apollo, holding his left hand. Apollo's glance is turned toward this group at the right of the picture, and on his own left.

The celebrated antique statues of the Muses in the Vatican are familiar to all art-lovers.

Parnassus was the mount sacred to Apollo and the Muses, where poetry and music held symposiums; as a theme it has inspired many artists. Only a few of the more celebrated pictures of Parnassus can be mentioned here. First, of course, comes that of Raphael, in the Vatican ; the glowing fresco replete with beauty. The crowned divinity playing on his quaint viol, is as well known as most of Raphael's Madonnas. Criticism might be made upon the fact that Apollo is not performing upon his famous lyre ; but the fact is, this was a personal idiosyncrasy of Raphael, who had been so ravished with delight at

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hearing a celebrated violinist of his day, that he de- cided that it was the fitting instrument to place in the hands of the god of music. The Muses sit about in rapt attention; all hold their musical instruments in quiet awe, not venturing to add to the celestial melody. The great poets of early and later times are seen, Sappho, the Lesbian singer, whose soul was shaken by Eros, " as a wind on the mountain falling upon the oaks," sits with her script and lyre at the lower left side. Raphael's Parnassus is an interesting alliance between modern and ancient feel- ing. Here we see the ancient poets of Greece and the modern Italians ; we find people of varying periods in history, all in harmony. Much of the fresco might be a Greek picture ; the antique spirit is so fused with modern feeling that the two are inseparable. This is what makes it an immortal work. The lasting ele- ment the eternal quality which recognizes neither past nor present, except to weld them irrev- ocably together with the stroke of Genius, this is the truest manifestation of harmony. The figures of the three goddesses seated before Parnassus taken as a group, together with the three children, are worthy of Greece in its palmy days ; they are super- human, and deserve to rank among the immortals. Parallels have been drawn between Raphael and Spenser. When one first reads Spenser, one may find him unreal and dull ; but when once he is understood,

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and one enters into the spirit of the poem, the im- possible becomes transfigured into the miraculous, and what at first seemed formal and heavy becomes a shroud of fascinating mystery. In his Parnassus Raphael has given suitable personal forms to ab- stract elements of learning. Instead of ideas ex- pressed in literary language, he has given action and living human passions.

There is a clever little picture by Schiavone in Munich, illustrating the symposium on Parnassus. Apollo is surrounded by the Muses and the great painters. A youth is listening, writing their words in a book. Another youth stands playing a horn on the right. Genii float around the three laurel- trees, with wreaths. The drawing is rather like a study of the Roman school, but the colouring is quite Venetian. Touches of gold are used with good effect.

The Parnassus of Raphael Mengs is statuesque in its poses, but has the effect of a stage tableau. Apollo, in the centre, is crowned with laurel, and, holding his lyre, stands in a graceful attitude with one hand raised as if leading an orchestra. The nine Muses are grouped about him. Some dance; some declaim; Urania astronomizes on a large globe in the foreground, with her face turned heavenward. The whole is pleasing, and the action of each figure

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carefully considered according to her accepted char- acter.

Tintoretto's Parnassus in Dresden is a very beau- tiful, but not a restful, rendering of the subject. Each Muse is at a different angle from any other, as they strain their graceful bodies in contortions for no apparent reason, as they are not dancing. A rather fanciful Apollo, with his viol beside him, hov- ers in the air almost like an Amorino. But the beauty of the poses of the daughters of song cannot be denied, and the whole is an exquisite vibrating lyric of the flesh ; the intellectual appeal is not made.

Apollo, however, is not always the leading " hero," so to speak, of Parnassus. In a highly decorative and beautifully handled picture by Man- tegna in the Louvre, Apollo is seated quite away at the left, humbly playing for the Muses to dance. On a rocky arched central peak of the sacred mount, Venus, entirely nude, has just risen from a seat which she has been occupying with Mars, who, in full armour, stands close to her, bidding her a dis- creet farewell. Cupid, on their left, makes a sign to Vulcan, whose forge is further down the hill, to observe his wife and the gay young war-god ; Vul- can is in the act of coming out in great anger. At the right of the picture is seen Mercury, with a long caduceus, holding Pegasus, who is airing his wings for flight. Two of the Muses are turning to cast

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smiling glances at Mercury. Probably they are Thalia and Terpsichore, as these would be rather more frivolous than their sisters. There is a delicious mediaeval flavour left in this picture, which, nevertheless, has a good deal of classic knowledge displayed in the draperies and in several of the accessories.

There is a pleasing picture by Perino del Vaga, of the Muses meeting the Pierides (the daughters of King Pierus, of Thessaly, a band similar to the Muses themselves). On a summit of Parnassus is seated a group of the gods, apparently to judge of the relative merits of the two groups of maidens below. The composition is rather stiff, the three groups being thus arranged in a triangular way which is too conventional ; but each group in itself is delightfully conceived, seen against the rocky landscape background. Among the gods one easily distinguishes Apollo, in the centre, with Minerva by his side.

Poussin has painted a Parnassus of thoroughly French character. It is in the Prado. Apollo, seated against a tree, and extending his hand, smil- ing, is holding a kind of reception to his devotees. The Muses are all quite ecstatic looking, but do not convey any special impression, being rather in the background. Numerous Cupids, with laurel leaves, fly about, seeking those upon whom to bestow then:

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honours. Various poets are standing about in the foreground.

One of Franck's pictures in the Uffizi represents the dance of Cupids before a group of what are usually called " nymphs," but who appear to be the Muses. Most of these ladies, who are seated on a bank at the left, are playing upon musical instru- ments. The Amorini are dancing joyously in a circle, on a smooth meadow close by. Among them is one little negro an original " touch of colour ! " In the air float several of these loves, bearing other musical instruments; one carries the sphere of the Muse Urania. Twov are dragging a large fish or dolphin to the shore of a distant river; one is playing with a toy windmill on the end of a stick running against the wind like any modern baby ! Outside the ring of dancers there is a little couple waltzing gleefully, and one tiny Cupid is standing on his head on the turf. From a mountain peak in the distance Pegasus is seen jumping off for flight.

Tintoretto's picture of the Nine Muses, in London, shows the sisters in full length figures, grouped gracefully amidst clouds, the background being full of sunlight. One is seated with a lute; another with a spinet; Urania consults her globe, another a chart; one is floating in the air. The picture is unfolding a vision rather than portraying an actual scene.

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There is a Parnassus by Utenwael in Dresden, an interesting example of the Flemish treatment of the subject. There is also an Apollo and the Muses by Lairesse in the same gallery. In the Villa Aldobrandini there is an Apollo and the Muses by Domenichino.

Mr. Howard Walker's exquisite fresco in the Library of Congress in Washington, representing the Muse of Lyric Poetry, is worthy to rank among the great studies of the Muses in art. The Muse Euterpe is in the centre. She is clad somewhat like the Muses as figured by Giulio Romano. Figures emblematic of the emotions which inspire her are grouped on either side, some nude, some partly draped. There are few figures in art more har- monious and satisfactory than that of Passion.

CHAPTER VI.

MYTHS RELATING TO DIANA

DIANA, or Artemis, the virgin huntress and moon- goddess, is a fit companion to her brother Apollo. Her characteristics are brought out by Homer: " as when Artemis, proud of her arrows, walks over the mountains . . . and delights to follow the wild boar or the swift stag; around her play the nymphs, daughters of Zeus the ^Egis-bearer, who dwell in the meads, and Latona rejoices at heart."

Early representations of Artemis are uniformly stiff, although there is nearly always a breeziness of action, denoting that the artist had it in mind to suggest more than ordinary virility. The type began to be refined and graceful by the fourth and third centuries B. c., and the Artemis of Versailles, which is in the Louvre, is as exquisite a development of the feminine ideal as is the Apollo Belvedere of the masculine. The light poise of the limbs, suggesting swift progress, the strong grasp of the hand which

holds the bow, and the deft turn of the wrist which

no

CORREGGIO. DIANA.

"Relating to Diana m

reaches over the shoulder to take an arrow from the quiver, will be remembered by all.

Correggio's Diana in Parma is a lovely creation of expressive grace. Out of a background of cloud she shines forth radiantly. In spirit she is very Greek : she has sympathetic simplicity which seems to be above the art of realistic representation. She has all the elements of romance together with all the essentials of chastity. She is not unmaidenly in her frank gaze forward, only eager and objec- tive. Symonds calls her a " goddess of strong, calm splendour." She is one of the most satisfactory Dianas in art ; she is innocent, pagan, joyous, in the true spirit of this unique painter, who stands alone in his art for the simple portrayal of the joy of living, with no question of conscience, responsi- bility, or prudence ; in temperament a Greek, whose soul is in his flesh. The life and movement in this Parma fresco, standing in the quaint convent of San Paolo, must have been always mysterious to the inmates of the house, unless, indeed, it chanced that a Greek spirit survived in some of the hooded community. If there were such a one, Diana was understood.

Among Raphael's Days Diana presides over Monday. She is seen, stern and rather forbidding in her conscious chasteness; she is not Greek as Correggio's goddess is Greek, in the spirit, although

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she is very correctly classic in the letter. Standing in her car, she directs the two virgins who draw it, with a peremptory order, pointed with a firm fore- finger. She grasps her bow with determination ; she is not the happy pagan moon-goddess in this picture; she is the unrelenting virgin who killed Actaeon without a shudder, the goddess of one virtue, the Puritan.

The gods took dire revenge when their dignities were offended. Listen to the fate of Actaeon! Ovid speaks : " While the Titanian goddess was there bathing, in the wonted stream, behold! the grandson of Cadmus, having deferred the remainder of his sport to the next day, came into the grove, wandering through the unknown wood, with uncertain steps : thus did his Fate direct him." Surely there was no malice or evil intent in this; but the goddess never stopped to inquire into motives. " Soon as he entered the grotto, dripping with its springs, the nymphs, all naked as they were, on seeing a man, smote their breasts and filled all the wood with sudden shrieks, and gathered round Diana, covering her with their bodies. . . . She, although sur- rounded by the crowd of her attendants, stood side- ways, and turned her face back . . . and so she took up water . . . and threw it over the face of the man, and, sprinkling his hair with the avenging

Delating to Diana 113

stream, she added these words : ' Now thou mayest tell, if thou canst, how that I was seen by thee with- out my garments.' Threatening no more, she places on his sprinkled head the horns of a lively stag ; she adds length to his neck ; she sharpens the tops of his ears, and she changes his hands into feet, and his arms into legs, and covers his body with a spotted coat of hair." The sad sequel was, that Actaeon, running away, in the guise of a stag, fell a prey to his own hounds, who turned on him and tore him limb from limb. His inadvertent peep at the unclothed goddess cost him his life, which was even a worse penalty than that of the rogue whose eye withered when he looked at Godiva! " And the rage of the quiver-bearing Diana is said not to have been satiated until his life was ended by many a wound."

One of the most complete and conscientious repre- sentations of the fate of Actason is to be seen in a picture by Breughel in the Corsini Gallery. The drawing of many of the figures is faulty, and the picture has little beauty ; but the episode is respected in all its details. Breughel was illustrating Ovid, rather than producing a decorative canvas. The nymphs are bathing in a grotto. There are two large cave-like openings in the rocky back ; through one, Actaeon is seen, standing, looking in, while Diana, near the opening, is in the act of raising a

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handful of water to dash in his face. Through the other opening, the history is continued ; Actaeon, as a stag, is seen dashing across the country, the hounds in hot pursuit.

Lefebre, with quite another object in view, namely, that of painting some pretty nude girls, has given us, in his picture, a group of shuddering bathers, one of whom has a crescent moon on her forehead. In the dim distance a man is seen. The nymphs are French; not Greek. There is little thought of the episode, but the execution is charm- ing.

The Diana and Actaeon of Titian was painted when the artist was a man of eighty-two. Actaeon appears, his quiver on his back, and his dogs beside him. He holds up his hands in surprise, and drops his bow when he sees Diana on the opposite side of a little brook. She is nude, sitting on her clothes, with the crescent on her brow. A nymph beside her is drying her feet. On the bank lies a purple mantle. Diana bows her head in shame when she sees Ac- taeon, and a negress, who is in attendance on her, vainly tries to cover her by pulling her clothes over her. The nymphs are bathing in a marble fountain, with decorative architectural features. In an ex- quisite landscape by Corot a few small figures are seen disporting themselves in a river and on the banks. This is called Diana's Bath. Actaeon does

Delating to HMana "5

not appear at all in this case it may be any bath of Diana which is represented.

In a painting in the Prado in Madrid, Diana, figured by an artist of the German school, is seen transforming the intruder into a stag by throwing water over him from a pitcher ; this is quite a Teu- tonic touch of genre!

The learned Doctor Messer Barnada del Pozzo engaged Pordenone to paint a lovely Diana and Ac- tseon in his garden; but, owing to its exposed situation, this fresco has perished.

Schidone's Diana and Actaeon, in St. Petersburg, displays the goddess of the chase with three nymphs up to their knees in the river, while Actaeon, on the right, has been already changed into a stag, and is flying, among his dogs, from the scene.

Pictures of Diana in hunting scenes are often delightful, and present the goddess in one of her most interesting aspects. There is a celebrated pic- ture by Domenichino in the Villa Borghese in Rome, representing a sort of target-practice scene, a contest between the nymphs of Diana in skill with the bow. The scene is in a meadow; there are some bushes here and there. In a little pool in the foreground some of the nymphs are seen bathing, while another is restraining a fine hound who sees some observ- ing intruders in the bushes at the right. On a slight eminence Diana herself stands, cheering on

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the contest of skill, her hands above her head, hold- ing her bow and empty quiver high, while she shouts encouragement to her followers. The archers are ranged at the left, some kneeling and some standing. These girls are all in the act of shooting or setting arrows to their bows. One of them has just shot a bird, which comes hurtling down through the air. The arrow of another is stuck fast in the top of a twig. The attitude of surprise and delight exhibited by a child at Diana's left is charmingly portrayed. In the background are seen two nymphs carrying a dead stag slung on a pole; others are running a race. The figure of Diana is not tall enough, or sufficiently imposing, to do justice to her character; but the whole scene is as sylvan and as glad as one of Correggio's conceits. Domenichino is unlike Guido, for he is more earnest and natural. The little nymphs bathing and sporting with Diana are charmingly girlish and arch, if a trifle vulgar and rustic. Morelli says that this picture is worthy of a purer period of art. He considers it equally de- serving of popularity with Guide's Aurora.

Diana's Hunt by Rubens, in Berlin, has no classic feeling at all; heavy peasants are masquerading as deities, chasing a stag to its death among the dogs. The picture is ferocious and uninteresting. It is highly finished, and evidently the master himself took pride in it. Another Rubens bearing the same

IRelatfng to S>iana 7

name, but showing a more peaceful scene, is in Munich. Here the chase has taken place, and the goddess and her nymphs are regaling their eyes with watching a stag disembowelled. More peace- ful, but hardly more attractive. The figures are all coarse, and past early youth. On the right, a pair of sturdy nymphs are lifting a dead boar, with much pride, from the back of a donkey. Other dead game lie on the ground, and a stalwart bugler is blowing her horn to assemble those who have strayed aside. The scene is in a thicket.

Vertagnan has painted a curious, dry, stiff pic- ture of Diana, presiding over a sylvan dance. The painting is in Berlin. In an open field, a satyr and a nymph are indulging in a gay springing dance oppo- site to each other. Diana and her retainers are sit- ting on a bank at the left, watching their diversions. There is a great deal of carefully painted detail about the landscape and foreground, but the whole pic- ture is not interesting.

In his charmingly quaint volume on Italy, that unequalled conversationalist, Doctor Moore, says that there is one story about Diana which he must consider malicious and untrue ; " I do not mean her rencounter with Actaeon," chuckles Doctor Moore, " for the goddess of chastity may, without incon- sistency, be supposed cruel ; but it is quite impossible

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to reconcile her general character with the stories of her nocturnal visits to Endymion ! "

Nevertheless, Endymion, the beautiful youth whom the moon-goddess saw sleeping one night as she rode along, was the recipient of unchaperoned favours from the virgin goddess. Probably that very glance, so happy and gratified, which is per- petuated by Correggio in his delightful Diana in the convent, was bestowed upon the unconscious Endymion. At any rate Diana saw him, and left her car, night after night, to embrace and admire him; this much is as certain as that Diana rides the moon- chariot at all.

In the Uffizi is a beautiful sleeping Endymion by Guercino ; he is seated, but is leaning on a wall, sleeping with one hand beneath his head, while a crescent moon peeps from the clouds above. He has charming ringlets and beautiful eyelashes. The Greeks credited their deities with certain human frailties. Those attributes seemed to them the most desirable compliments which they could bestow. The most human thing about Diana is her devotion to the youthful Endymion.

Caracci has painted a very solid and stolid person under the name of Endymion, whose head is being embraced by a very mature Diana.

The Sleep of Endymion, by Girodet, in the Louvre, shows a most degenerate young man lying

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in an affected pose, on a bank draped with Greek stuffs and leopard skins. A Cupid, more in the nature of a " Puck," is pirouetting in the moon- light, indulging in a step which has since become associated with the " cake-walk," leaning his body back and stepping high. The picture is mawkish in the extreme, although the elfin Cupid is drawn with masterly skill.

The Diana and Endymion in Dresden, ascribed to Parmigiano, is now attributed to Dosso Dossi, but Morelli considers it a Garofolo.

Vasari, having chronicled how he himself painted a picture of Psyche with a lamp, bending over Cupid, who is just awakening, proceeds to tell an amusing story : " These figures, which were of life- size, and entirely nude," he writes, " caused Alfonso di Tomasso Cambi (then a most beautiful youth) ... to desire that I should make a portrait of hin> self also nude and life-size, in the character of Endymion, that hunter beloved of the moon; the fair form of the youth and a landscape of fanciful composition amidst which he is seen, received their light from the splendour of the moon, which, pene- trating, or rather dissipating the darkness of the night, gives the view a tolerably natural and pleas- ing appearance, for I laboured with all diligence to imitate the peculiar tints communicated by the pale

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yellow light of the moon to such objects as are struck by the same."

One of the instances of the heartlessness of the pure goddess of the fair moon is the myth of Niobe. " Niobe might be pronounced the happiest of mothers, if she had not seemed so to herself," re- marks Ovid, sagely. She refused to offer homage to Latona, but boasted that she herself was as worthy all honour, having seven sons and seven daughters, while Latona's only offspring were Apollo and Diana. This caused the anger of Latona to descend upon her. She called her son and her daughter in her indignation, and stated her case. Then did Apollo and Diana plan a truly Olympian vengeance. " By a speedy descent through the air " they arrived, covered with clouds, at the Citadel of Cadmus. Then did the tragedy begin. The sons of Niobe were out exercising their horses. Suddenly an invisible arrow hit one; then another; two of the sons were enjoying a wrestling-match, when an arrow " pierced them both, just as they were united together." Until all seven of the sons of Niobe are slain, Apollo does not cease his cruel work. Then commences the same course of destiny upon the daughters, slain by Diana, the huntress. " The sisters were standing in black array, with their hair dishevelled, before the biers of their brothers. One of these, drawing out the weapon

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sticking in her entrails, about to die, swooned away, with her face placed upon her brother. Another, endeavouring to console her wretched parent, was suddenly silent, and was doubled together with an invisible wound, and did not close her mouth until after the breath had departed." So the ghastly slaughter went on, until " the last only remains. The mother, covering her with all her body and with all her garments, cries, ' Leave me but one ' ; " but no pity is shown. The relentless Diana pursues her bloodthirsty vengeance, and Niobe is left utterly alone. There, in her grief, she is turned to stone, " in her features is a colour without blood . . . her eyes stand unmoved in her sad cheeks ... in her form there is no appearance of life . . . within her entrails, too, it is stone."

The arrangement of the Niobe group of antique statues in Florence is admirable. All around a large hall stand those figures emblematic of human woe. Niobe herself, as Taine expresses it, " stands hope- less, her eyes raised to heaven, contemplating with admiration and horror the dazzling deadly nimbus, the outstretched arms, the merciless arrows, and the implacable serenity of the gods." The German editor of Winckelmann says : " No one can prize the Laocoon more highly than we do ; but a godlike spirit streams from the Niobe, and impels heaven- ward the feelings of the spectator." Niobe and her

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daughters are represented with the same restraint as the Apollo Belvedere. Suffering and woe are only suggested in a conventional way, so that the beauty which, to the Greeks, consisted so largely in repose, might not be interfered with by the ex- pression of pain. Winckelmann says : " All the mental powers are completely overwhelmed and paralyzed by the near approach of death." The difference between the Niobe and the Laocoon is felt at once. One is calm, still, mental suffering, and the other violent physical anguish. The preference for beauty at the expense of realism is marked in the statue of Niobe, A naive remark from Doctor Moore on this subject explains the motive of the Greeks in thus making beauty predominant. " It is unjust, you will say," comments Doctor Moore, " that men should not sympathize with homely women in distress in the same degree as they do with the beautiful. That is very true : but it is the busi- ness of the sculptor to apply his art to men as he finds them, not as they ought to be." A very commercial view of art-ideals, but very practical! Mercury presided over the business side of art, doubtless, and mischievously inspired his votaries with this cautious tact.

On the top of a sarcophagus in the Vatican is a relief of the dying daughters of Niobe. These re- cumbent figures are beautifully modelled.

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Diana's relentlessness was inherited from her mother, Latona. " Some countrymen of old," so goes the story, as Ovid tells it, " once insulted the goddess, but not with impunity." Latona, journey- ing with her two little children, Apollo and Diana, was stopping to drink at a stream, when some ill- bred rustics refused to allow her to quench her thirst. They certainly made themselves disagree- able ; " they muddy the lake itself with their feet and hands, and they raise the soft mud from the very bottom of the water, by spitefully jumping to and fro." The goddess turns upon them in her wrath. " Raising her hands to heaven, she says, ' For ever may you live in that pool.' The wish of the goddess comes to pass. . . . Their voice, too, is low and hoarse, and their bloated necks swell out ; and their very abuse extends their dilated jaws. Their backs are united to their heads; their necks seem as though cut off; their backbone is green; as new- made frogs they leap about in the muddy stream."

In Munich is a picture by Rubens of Latona and her children kneeling by the stream, while the coarse faces of the clowns are seen on the left. One of them has already turned into a frog, and the mouth and eyes of the other are gradually spreading and losing their human look.

The Sacrifice of Iphigenia is a dramatic episode which has occurred now and then in a.rt. This is

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one of the occasions where Diana appears in the light of a benefactress instead of as an avenger. Iphigenia's father, Agamemnon, having killed a stag which was sacred to Diana, the virgin goddess punished the offence by sending pestilence into the army. When they applied to the soothsayer for advice how to stay the plague, they were told that Iphigenia, the daughter of the wrong-doer, must be sacrificed on the altar. Accordingly, with much pain, Agamemnon brought his daughter to the sacrifice. The maiden behaved with noble fortitude, and, believing that the health of the whole army hinged upon her submission, agreed to yield herself to the knife. Euripides draws the scene boldly. " She, standing near him that begot her, spake thus : ' O father, I am here for thee, and willingly I give my body on behalf of my country . . . that, leading it to the altar of the goddess, they may sacrifice it, since this is ordained. . . . Furthermore, let no one of the Greeks lay hands on me, for with a stout heart I will present my neck in silence.' . . . Thus much she spoke, and every one marvelled on hearing the courage and valour of the virgin. . . . But the Atrides and all the army stood looking on the ground, and the priest, taking the knife, prayed, and viewed her neck, that he might find a place to strike." At this point, Diana, touched by the fortitude of the virgin, snatched her away, and in

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her place sent a stag to be sacrificed. " Then was a marvel to behold ; for every one could clearly per- ceive the sound of the blow, but beheld not the virgin, where on earth she had vanished. But the priest exclaimed, and the whole army shouted, be- holding an unexpected prodigy from some one of the gods, of which, though seen, they scarcely had belief. For a stag lay panting on the ground . . . with whose blood the altar of the goddess was abundantly wetted."

There is a famous old fresco found in the House of the Tragic Poet in Pompeii, and now in the Naples Museum, in which the sacrifice of Iphigenia is represented. Agamemnon, the father, stands at the left, with his face veiled in his cloak. Iphi- genia, in the centre, is being carried to the altar by two men, while the priest, with a wreath on his head, his tall figure clad in long robes, stands at the right, ready to perform the grim ceremony. In the clouds are two small visions of Diana, one with her bow, and one bringing the stag for sacrifice. Iphigenia appears to see these manifestations in the sky, for she turns and reaches out her hand to Artemis.

The fact of the father's face being veiled has been criticized in various ways, some contending that it adds the strength of mystery, and others that it was adopted by the artist simply because he felt unable

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to portray such suffering as Agamemnon's on this occasion. By the side of the figure is a pedestal with a small statuette of Diana.

In the Uffizi is an effective painting by Tiepolo, broadly executed on a rough canvas, representing the moment when Iphigenia, of her own accord, lays her head upon the altar that her throat may receive the wound. The light lies strongly on the figure of the girl, while a kneeling man, binding a fagot in the foreground, is almost a silhouette in deep shade. The effect is very good, although it is artificial. Behind Iphigenia is seen the virgin god- dess, and the stag, in the shadow; nymphs (and also Cupids, for some unknown reason), enveloped in a fleecy bright cloud, are in the act of laying hold of Iphigenia to bear her away. The costumes are not strictly Grecian, the heroine wearing a laced bodice; but the strong lights and shades bring out the graceful proportions and turn of the head and shoulder, and the picture is, on the whole, a pleas- ing one for its period.

In Munich there are also two pictures by Tiepolo, one showing Iphigenia led from the harbour of Aulis to the temple, near the columns of which she awaits the priest. In the foreground are pages with dogs, vessels lie at anchor in the water, and in the clouds Diana is seen with Cupids and the stag. The presence of Cupid may indicate the fact that

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Iphigenia was lured to the temple originally by promises of her immediate marriage. In the other picture, Iphigenia lies fainting in the arms of a kneeling man, while the priest reads prayers from a book held by a youth. The statue of the goddess is partly covered by clouds, upon which Artemis, with the stag and Cupids, is seen riding.

Diana transported Iphigenia to Tauris, where was a famous temple dedicated to her worship, and she made the noble virgin priestess of this fane. A dramatic meeting took place at this temple later, when Orestes, the brother of Iphigenia, came to Tauris with intent to carry off the statue of Diana. He and his companions were caught and brought bound to the temple, to be slain, as was the custom among those savage people in welcoming strangers; imagine the amazement of Orestes, in discovering his long-lost sister serving there as priestess! He was released, and Iphigenia joined them in their plot, and the three sailed away, statue and all. It is recorded that in the first century there existed a statue of Diana near Marathon which the natives claimed was the Artemis brought by Iphigenia on the occasion of her flight from Tauris ; but Pausanias will not accept this story, saying that, indeed, there is an ancient statue of Diana at this place, but assuring us that he has reason to know that the Tauris statue is elsewhere!

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Benjamin West painted a picture of the meeting of Iphigenia with Orestes in the temple; he and his companions are bound, and brought before her, and she recognizes them, chiding the barbarians who are treating them with such indignity. The picture is not a great production, but it portrays the scene with sincerity, with an effort at realism in garb and settings ; although, like nearly all historic paintings, except where they are academically exact, one can detect the period of the artist by the style in which the hair is dressed; nearly all painters will uncon- sciously draw the head according to the ideal of their own day.

CHAPTER VII.

PALLAS, MARS, MERCURY, AND VULCAN

ATHENA, or Minerva, was originally portrayed only as the goddess of war; the legend of her birth being that " her life as the lightning was flashed from the light of her father's head " ; in other words, that she sprang fully armed from the brain of Jove. The Homeric Hymn thus outlines the myth : " She sprang on a sudden from out the im- mortal head, shaking her pointed lance; huge Olympus was shaken to its base under the weight of the gray-eyed goddess, and all around the earth groaned terribly." But by degrees this myth was amplified, and Minerva presided over the art of heal- ing, and was patron of all learning; so that by the fifth century B. c. Pallas Athena was a deity of great moral and intellectual force.

The famous statue by Pheidias became the type of Minerva. This statue was a stately figure, in repose, witK a Helmet, in tHe middle of which, says Pausa-

nias, " is the figure of the sphynx and on each side

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are wrought gryphons." The shield showed the Gorgon's head, and the figure was clad in a chiton, falling to the ground, while her spear stood by disused. The thoughtful and intellectual predomi- nated over the pugilistic.

The fine figure of the Minerva Medica is very familiar to most of us as the statue of Pallas. The quiet dignity of the conventional figure, standing at ease, one hand holding the spear, at the foot of which writhes a serpent, is well carried out by the heavy clinging folds of drapery which fall from the shoulder with a graceful sweep toward the right side. She wears helmet and breastplate in the antique representations. When painted by later artists the tendency has been rather to emphasize her ascendency over learning and the arts, than her warlike character.

In the National Museum in Athens is another equally famous, but less poetically beautiful, statue of Pallas; one hand, resting on a column, bears a small figure of Nike, or Victory, while Minerva holds the shield, about which a serpent twines. In this statue she wears a helmet set with a species of crested horses, which are most decorative.

Tintoretto has painted Pallas in a charming fresco in the Ducal Palace in Venice. She is here in her character as the healer, for, though she wears the ac- coutrements of war, she is soothing Venus, who

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has received a wound from Mars. (Armour is evidently not the proper costume for embracing 1 !) The figure of Pallas driving back the bold Mars with her charming hand is an almost coquettish view of the goddess; the cuirass which she wears in good warrior fashion is in coy contrast with her exquis- itely feminine shoulder and leg. Venus, at the right, is holding a cloth to her breast, while an attendant brings a crystal basin of water. Mars looks rather guilty, and, at any rate, he has no intention of intrud- ing further. The head of Pallas is among the love- liest creations of the art of Tintoretto. Henry James calls it " one of the sweetest things in Venice," and says, " It reminds one afresh of those wild flowers of execution that bloom so profusely and so un- heeded in the dark corners of all the Tintoret's work. . . . ' Pallas chasing away Mars' is, I believe, the name that is given to the picture; and it represents in fact a young woman of noble appearance adminis- tering a gentle push to a fine young man in armour, as if to tell him to keep his distance. It is of the gentleness of this push that I speak, the charming way in which she puts out her arm, with a single bracelet on it, and rests her young hand, with its rosy fingers parted, upon his dark breastplate. She bends her enchanting head with the effort, a head which has all the strange fairness that the Tintoret always sees in women, and the soft, living, flesh-like glow

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of all these members, over which the brush has scarcely paused in its course, is as pretty an example as all Venice can show."

The Minerva in Ricci's painting in the Louvre claims to display her as instructing Ignorance; but it exhibits the goddess in a trivial character, holding up a bauble between her thumb and finger, af- fected, valueless as a contribution to the understand- ing of Pallas.

Minerva is not often selected for representation by the Renaissance artists. When a myth of some other god includes her, she appears (in these cases, usually, rather conventionally, as a figure in a breast- plate and helmet, without much facial expression.) The artist who has emphasized the literary and artistic side of the character of the goddess, and who has drawn her as an attractive virgin, who, in spite of warlike propensities and medical knowledge, and literary achievement, could still retain her sweet feminine charm and beauty, is Botticelli. Of all his lovely, thoughtful women, none is so satisfying as the Pallas with the Centaur in the Pitti Palace in Florence. Crowned and gowned, one might almost say, with the olive-branches which are among her attributes, the only warlike sign is the tall battle-axe which she carries, and the shield slung far behind her. The goddess holds firmly in subjection all brute force as symbolized in the Centaur, which she grasps

pallas, /iDars, ADercurs, ant) Dulcan 133

by the hair of his head. Evidently Botticelli felt that the humane arts, healing and knowledge, were to be more powerful than arms in subduing evil passions and savage force, and in that he was not far behind the twentieth century.

Garofolo has painted Pallas with Neptune, from a drawing by Raphael. The picture is in Dresden.

Peruzzi painted a Pallas preparing for the hunt, on the ceiling of the garden-lodge of the Farnesina Palace. His style, however, is stiff and affected; the subjects are painted as if they were bas-reliefs, and are rigid.

The Homeric Hymn to Ares, or Mars, calls him " of the golden helm, the shield-bearer, . . . clad in bronze armour, strong of hand, and untiring." Mars, god of war and power, has always been represented as the athlete, usually nude, and of great size. Among the ancient statues of Mars, the Ares Ludo- visi in Rome is the most beautiful; the figure is seated, at rest, with a little Cupid playing fearlessly about his feet, thus showing that the god of war was not a bully, but a protector of helplessness; using his strength in a good cause. The Greeks made less of their war-god, strange to say, than did the Romans at a later period. The feminine Minerva was more invoked than the stern Ares.

Mars is generally represented by the Greeks as young and beardless. But he was not a Hercu-

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les, most of the finest ancient statues of Mars (notably the seated figure with the Cupid at his side) are without much action, and suggest rather a god of gentle warfare, with Venus and Cupid, than the deity presiding over battering-rams and cavalry charges.

In the Prado is a picture of Mars by Velasquez. The attitude is not altogether unlike that of the Ares Ludovisi. He is seated, apparently lost in thought.

The Mars and Venus by Botticelli in the National Gallery is as early a representation as we find of the war-god in modern art, and this depicts him in the peaceful character of taking a nap, while Venus watches his slumbers. Botticelli was too much a medievalist to be able to create classic pictures in an appropriate spirit. Symonds calls our attention to this fact, when he says that " this combination or confusion of artistic impulses in Botticelli, this treatment of pagan themes in the spirit of mediaeval mysticism, sometimes ended in a bathos of grotesque- ness." This criticism may be made of his Mars, who is nothing more nor less than a young Italian, with a very well-drawn throat and torso, but with most unheroic legs. He lies asleep, with the facial expres- sion of one who snores; his mouth relaxed, and his appearance uninspiring. Venus, thin, haggard, and tired, sits opposite to him, regarding him. She ig

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clothed in that gauze of which Botticelli is so fond, and which he handles so inimitably. But the key of sadness in her bearing, the taking thought for the morrow, the indifference to personal appear- ance, would never have satisfied a Greek as repre- senting his goddess of love. There are two little satyrs, or Cupids, with goats' feet, playing with the discarded armour of the warrior. They are well executed. There is a certain quaint note about the whole picture which is not without its own peculiar charm, best summed up by Symonds, when he says, " It gives us keen pleasure to feel exactly how a painter like Botticelli applied the dry naturalism of the early Florentine Renaissance, as well as his own original imagination, to a subject he imperfectly realized." Symonds also commends highly the grace of the line leading up the side of the recumbent Mars from hip to elbow.

There is a picture of Mars and Venus by Piero di Cosimo in Berlin, which is not unlike the one just described, except that Venus is an eminently cheerful lady, who lies at her ease, opposite the sleeping Mars, with a very attractive and young- looking Cupid in her arms. Of Mars there is little to be said in justification ; but of Venus, although the body is twisted so as to be out of drawing from a technical point of view, it may certainly be said that she has an individual grace which is quite fascinat-

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ing, in spite of the hard, dry, mediaeval handling which she received from the conscientious Cosimo. The baby, with a little gauze scarf twisted about him, is gazing over the top of his head in a very human way at his mother, calling her attention to a fat white rabbit which has joined the group. In the distance, on a delightful stretch of meadow country, several loves are sporting with the armour of the war-god. The god in question, with his ridiculous long, fat fingers, is as awkward a figure as could be designed. This Mars and Venus was originally the property of Giorgio Vasari, who says that he has always taken much pleasure in the " singular ca- prices " of Piero. He speaks of Mars " lying asleep in a meadow enamelled with flowers; hovering around are troops of Loves, who carry off the hel- met, armlets, and other portions of the armour of Mars; a grove of myrtles forms part of the land- scape ; and here there is a Cupid alarmed at the sight of a rabbit: the doves of Venus are also depicted, with other attributes and emblems of love."

Veronese's Mars and Venus, in the Hermitage, shows the war-god in golden armour, with a deep rose-coloured mantle, kneeling before Venus, who places her left hand upon his shoulder. Her right hand is upon her heart. The scene is near a ruined edifice, decorated with the statue of a faun. A mis- chievous Cupid is seen tying Mars' right foot to the

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left foot of Venue. Another little Love, in the dis- tance, holds the horse of the war-god. This picture was in the famous collection of Christina of Sweden. Mars and Venus are supposed to be portraits of Alphonse d'Este and his mistress.

In Perugia is a ceiling painted by Perugino, on which a medallion shows Mars, in helmet and armour, speeding along in a chariot drawn by two rampant steeds.

In Raphael's Days, Mars stands for Tuesday. He is seen in a curious, high-backed chariot, like a chair on wheels. He stands at ease, a graceful figure, one hand on his hip, and the spear and reins in the other. Behind him rests his shield, and a large swirling scarf of drapery circles about him in the breeze.

The armour of Mars is usually mediaeval plate- armour, instead of the classic armour formed of overlapping scales, which was more common among the ancients. The nomadic tribes constructed coarse coats of mail, described by Pausanias as being made out of the hoofs of horses, split, and laid one over- lapping the other, making of them " something like dragons' scales," explains Pausanias, assuming that every one must know these by sight; but in case there are any so ignorant as to be unfamiliar with the anatomy of the dragon, he adds, " Whoever has not yet seen a dragon, has, at any rate, seen a pine-

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cone still green. These," he says, " are equally like in appearance to the surface of this armour."

Hermes, Mercury, the swift-footed messenger of the gods, whose speed is usually typified by the winged heel, is also a son of Jupiter, and an impor- tant element in nearly all myths. He stands, as it were, for the vital element, the emotional quality; it is he who leads the three goddesses to Paris for judgment; he is with Perseus when he slays the Gorgon ; he presides over the trial of Marsyas, and he leads souls on their long dark journey to Hades. While there are not as many actual legends about him as about many of the gods, he is a participator in most of the scenes which have dramatic possi- bilities. In Greek statues he is usually of slender, active form, as in the bronze figure found at Hercu- laneum, which, though seated, is leaning forward as if to rise at an instant's notice, and in the muti- lated but exquisite Hermes of Praxiteles, that grace- ful fragment of lithe manhood, fascinating even in its incompleteness.

One of the first acts recorded of Mercury's youth, is his finding of the shell of a tortoise, which he hollowed out, and across which he stretched strings, thus inventing the lyre. Next, he stole and hid the oxen which Apollo was guarding. " Some cows are said to have strayed unobserved into the plains of Pylos." Ovid then tells us that Mercury observed

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them, and " with his usual skill, hides them, driven off, in the woods." Phoebus would not allow the theft to go unpunished, but immediately arrested the young rascal, and had him tried by the Olympian Court. The guilty Mercury had to confess that two of them had been eaten, but he restored the others, and gave the lyre to Apollo, in payment for the two which he was unable to replace. This incident occurs in a picture by Albano in the Corsini Gallery, in Flor- ence. Jupiter, in the clouds, is pronouncing sen- tence against the wayward Hermes, who, with glid- ing movement and considerable lightness, is coming down from Olympus through the air, to Apollo, who is resting on a rock, holding his herdsman's stick. Mercury gives him the lyre; at the same time he points to a grove near by where the Muses are assembled, and where Pegasus stands, thus invoking the god of Music to make the new instrument useful at once. The returned cattle are seen at the left. In Rome Mercury was also worshipped as the presiding genius of business prosperity, and small figures of him adorned the shopping district. Ovid naively remarks when some dishonest traders are praying to Mercury to further their investments, " Hearing their prayers, Mercury smiled, remember- ing how he, too, had stolen away the oxen." In truth, the Greeks and Romans had no use for gods who had no human frailties. Keats calls him " foot-

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feathered Mercury," while his caduceus is described by Goldsmith as

"a snake-encircled wand, By Classic authors termed Caduceus And highly famed for several uses."

There is an interesting Mercury in the museum at Naples, an ancient mosaic in relief. This art of raised mosaic was a curious one, and it is very effective. Mercury, holding a dish in one hand, places his other hand on the head of a ram at his side. The folds of his mantle are strikingly well indicated.

On Perugino's ceiling in Perugia there is a figure of Mercury in a medallion, showing the god holding the Caduceus, standing on one leg, being drawn through the air by cocks attached to his car. Mer- cury is extremely thin, as is suitable to his character. The composition is rather dry, but nevertheless there is a certain poetical charm in all these classical sub- jects as treated by Perugino, because of their very rarity.

Giovanni da Bologna had really a streak of classic art in him ; his Mercury is not a copy of any antique, and yet it is conceived as a Greek would have conceived it. Taine compares it with the statue of a young Greek athlete near it. " The for- mer," remarks Taine, " springing on his toe, is a

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tour de force, which is to do honour to the artist, and prove an attractive spectacle to fix the eyes of vis- itors. The young Athenian, on the contrary, who says nothing, who does nothing, who is content to live, is an effigy of the city, a monument of its Olympic victories, an example for all the youths in its gymnasia; he is of service to education as the statue of a god is to the service of religion."

There is a picture by Correggio of Mercury and Venus playing with Cupid. This interpretation of Hermes is quite a charming one, as he seems as young and playful in spirit as Cupid himself. He is smiling with the arch smile of the faun, and wears the flat- winged cap in which he usually appears.

Raphael's Mercury flying through the air, in a fresco in the Farnesina Palace, is interesting. The impression of descent instead of ascent is skilfully given by the movement of the full drapery mantle which floats behind him. The eyes of Mercury are very large, and the countenance that of what we would call an " honest rogue; " he is a light-hearted Greek god, with all the human weaknesses fully developed in him, and yet with no conscience to keep him awake at night ! He is nothing but an awkward boy in the Farnesina fresco; but Raphael has por- trayed him as " Wednesday " in his Days, as an older and more staid personage. Here he sits in a chariot which is drawn by cocks ; the reins lie across

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his hand in so careless a fashion that it is evident that Hermes does not fear that they will fly away with him. He carries the caduceus, and wears the winged cap, as he does in the Farnesina fresco; in both of these representations, his heels, too, are winged.

Jacopo Tatti, better known as Sansovino, made a statue of Mercury for the Loggietta of the Cam- panile at Venice. Here it would seem as if the god were especially needed in his famous business ca- pacity, on account of the great lotteries being held in the Loggietta. Mercury stands with one foot on the severed head of a giant, and raises one hand, while he looks out from his shell-like niche with his head on one side. The winged cap is on his head, and he is completely clothed, an unusual circum- stance in figures of Mercury. He has a little tunic, which, buttoning at the throat, and girt with a sash at the hips, falls to his knees. Below this garment he wears long trousers, which are turned up about the ankles. The costume is suggestive of pajamas. The whole is a strange conception of Hermes. He has no caduceus.

Turner's Mercury and Argus in London is pri- marily a landscape, and shows a deep vale with a mountain on the farther side of a river. On a bank on the left are two seated figures, Argus, the many-eyed servant of Juno who was employed to watch the white heifer, lo; and Mercury, who

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has been sent by Jove to tire Argus out so that he will sleep. Mercury is in the act of telling long and tedious stories to Argus, and on the opposite bank of the river may be seen the beautiful heifer, glow- ing white among the thick grasses and bushes.

In the Mercury and Argus by Velasquez in the Prado, Argus is seen falling limply asleep in the deep shadow, while Mercury steals up beside him, half crawling ; the heifer lies behind Mercury. His winged cap and the sharp horns of lo show up clearly against a sunset sky with weird effect.

Mercury and the Woodman by Salvator Rosa annoys Ruskin because of its atmospheric effects, which he pronounces impossible. He particularly objects, and with reason, to the " pure sky-blue mountain."

In Munich is a picture by Jan Both, of Mercury and Argus. This is really a landscape with figures in the foreground. By a curious arrangement of lights, the artist has portrayed a dark background, the sun having set, while the figures are in broad daylight! In Munich there is also a painting by Forest representing Mercury slaying Argus, who is falling over a rock upon which Juno, with two peacocks, sits triumphant. Mercury is preparing for flight.

One of the most beautiful interpretations of Mer- cury is the figure in Mantegna's Parnassus, in the

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Louvre, where the volatile deity is seen leading Pegasus, and casting a smiling glance backward at the Muses.

The Mercury in Botticelli's Primavera is an ascetic; although thin, wiry, and lithe enough to be the messenger of the gods, one feels that he is a per- son who would have serious scruples about killing Argus to order, or in arranging a rendezvous for Jove!

A quaint conceit is recorded by Vasari, of Domen- ico Beccafumi, who painted a fanciful picture of the Olympian deities striving to bind Mercury. They have laid him in a crucible, strapped, while Vulcan and Pluto build a fire about him; but just as they expect to see him turned into a solid metal, he flies off, dissolved in smoke and vapours.

The fire-god, Vulcan, must early have held a prominent place in myth. In lands where lightning and volcanic eruptions did much damage, the power of flame must always have been respected. Some- times it was as a baleful deity, and sometimes as a benign one, that he was recognized ; but his virility can never have been questioned. He is supposed to have worked at forging steel with the Cyclops, in a cavern; and it is in this capacity that he usually appears in art. Hesiod has drawn the scene in his Theogony :

frallas, flDars, flDercurs, ant) IDulcan us

" Under the caverns of the sacred ground Where Vulcan works and restless anvils sound ; Beneath the hand divine the iron grows Ductile, and liquid from the furnace flows."

Vulcan and the Cyclops made the armour of Achilles. Venus was the spouse of the grim armourer, and often appears in the cavern of the Cyclops with her lord. No wonder the handsome young god Mars attracted her more than did this surly personage.

Velasquez's treatment of the Forge of Vulcan is one of the most beautifully rugged and yet refined examples of Spanish art. It is in the Prado at Madrid. A dramatic moment has been chosen for illustration. The sun-god Apollo has just descended to the Cyclops' forge to impart to Vulcan the news that he has discovered the intrigue between his wife, Venus, and Mars. It was a little inconsiderate in him to break the news to Vulcan in the midst of his fellow workers, but it makes a better picture. Phoebus, with light irradiating in an exquisite way from his head, stands at the left, in the attitude of one who relates a narrative; one hand is raised, and his re- marks punctuated with his forefinger. Vulcan, listening, enraged, shows his fury in his twisted shoulders and his fiery eyes. The Cyclops are stand- ing by, also listening ; they have paused a moment in their work, and this halt is well portrayed. The

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focus of interest is directed to Apollo, and the picture is well balanced, in form and in chiaroscuro.

The Forge of Vulcan by Tintoretto, in the Ducal Palace in Venice, is hardly a good example of this master. Not only are the muscular forms of the four workers overdrawn, but the figure with its back to the spectator, the chief and central figure of the group, is in shockingly bad drawing. The legs and feet, hideous, sprawling, drawn with rippling lines in irrelevant bulges, could hardly be worse. Some- times Tintoretto did work which would disgrace a tyro ; again, he painted pictures that no man before or since has excelled.

In the great barn-like studio in Brussels where the works of the eccentric genius Wiertz are all col- lected in their weird immensity, there is a picture of the Forge of Vulcan. Wiertz has painted the armourer at work upon an anvil, with a stern ex- pression of countenance, while Venus caresses him, standing by him, ministered to with wine and grapes, by various nymphs who fill the right of the picture. On the left in the darkness are seen the heavy but undefined bodies of the other workers. A Cupid leans on Venus's knee, looking angry also. Perhaps the scene represents Venus trying to appease Vul- can's wrath after he has heard of her escapade with Mars.

Among the drawings in the Louvre is one by

pallas, /IDars, flDercurs, anb Iflulcan 147

Annibale Caracci of the Forge of Vulcan. The sturdy armourer is on his knees, holding the helmet of Achilles on the anvil with pincers, while the three Cyclops are drawing off to hammer it. Their hammers are lifted each at a different angle, so that the strokes shall be timed to follow one another in quick succession. At the left a glimpse of Venus and Cupid is vouchsafed, but they are only indicated, as it were, on the margin of the scene. The composi- tion is excellent, and the figure of the kneeling Vul- can especially fine.

Giulio Romano's Vulcan at the Forge was painted over the mantel in the house of a friend of his, an organist in Mantua. But there is a similar picture in the Louvre. Vulcan is holding in a pair of tongs an iron which he is forging into an arrow-head; Venus, near by, is tempering the finished arrows in a vase, and then putting them into the quiver of Cupid.

Domenichino, too, painted a Forge of Vulcan, in the Villa Aldobrandini in Rome.

Thorwaldsen's relief of the Forge of Vulcan is beautifully classic and very satisfactory. The figures, on a single plane, without deep perspective, express their meaning clearly and easily, and are all well composed. Vulcan, at the left, is hammering an arrow at his anvil; Venus, dipping the finished arrows in a bowl, is turning to look upon the figure

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of the handsome young Mars, who, led by Cupid, brings a broken arrow to be repaired.

There is a picture of the Forge, too, by Cornelis Schut, where Vulcan and three others are seen working at an anvil, while a boy brings coals. At the right is seen a cannon, evidently recently forged by the armourers.

In the Hermitage Gallery is a painting of the Forge of Vulcan by Luca Giordano.

In the Forge of Vulcan in the Louvre, painted by Luini, the figure of Mars is firm, but the others are rather invertebrate. Venus, in her attitude, holding Cupid standing on her knee, is unpleasantly suggestive of a preliminary study for the pose of a Madonna.

What could be more fanciful, more unreal, than the fairy-palace entitled the Forge of Vulcan, by Boucher! A French courtier of the period, seen, (an uncommon circumstance) devoid of his cloth- ing, sits, masquerading as Vulcan, on an indefinite couch-like bank of rocks and clouds combined. Smiling, with his best society manner, he holds aloft a sword, in its scabbard, the whole wound with a sash. Beside him are an anvil, a vise, and several implements of the armourer's craft. Opposite him, on clouds, with a background of sky and general fleeciness of atmosphere, sits Venus, simpering, with Thetis and a couple of attendant Graces. Cupids are

Pallas, /Cars, flDercun?, anfc Dulcan 149

dotted about wherever they are demanded by the exigencies of the 'composition. Two of them hold aloft a gorgeous helmet heavily crested with ostrich plumes. The whole scene is laid in a cave of cloud- stuff, and there are no suggestions of such unrefined people as Cyclops about! Doves and wreathes of flowers are thrown in at intervals.

CHAPTER VIII.

BACCHUS AND HIS TRAIN

BACCHUS is a familiar figure in ancient and modern art. The son of Jupiter and Semele, he presides over wine and conviviality in general. He- siod, in his Theogony, introduces him thus:

"Cadmean Semele, a mortal dame Gave to th' Almighty's love a child of fame, Bacchus, from whom our cheerful spirits flow; Mother and son alike immortal now."

Bacchus has much popular sympathy and affec- tion, as irresponsible, cheerful beings usually have. " He shall know Bacchus, the son of Jupiter," says Euripides, " who is in fact to men at once the most terrible and the mildest of deities." He is described again by Euripides : " Whose hair is fair and curled, and his head scented, and his black eyes have all the charm of Aphrodite." Tenderly Euripides speaks of Bacchus as " he who produces the rich

clustering vine for mortals."

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Bacchus, on his entrance in the drama, speaks of himself as follows : " I have come to this city first of the Grecian . . . fitting a deer-skin on my body, and taking a thyrsus in my hand, an ivy-clad weapon." And again : " The son of Semele has invented the liquid drink of the grape, and intro- duced it among mortals, which delivers miserable mortals from grief, when they are filled with the stream of the vine ; and gives sleep and oblivion of daily evils; nor is there any other medicine for troubles. He who is a god is poured out in libations to the gods, that by his means men may have good things."

In archaic art Bacchus had a beard, and was a mature man. He was a person old enough to know better, as one might say, so that he was a deliberate transgressor. Later a more indulgent set of dev- otees chose to think of the vine-god as an effemi- nate young man : " In the bloom of youth," Callis- tratus says, " soft and voluptuous." The rollicking youth soon became the accepted type of Bacchus; he was generally clad in the skin of a faun or a panther, adjusted carelessly, sometimes over a short tunic, and sometimes forming his sole garment. His feet were protected by high boots, and he carried a thyrsus as his attribute, while a panther accom- panied him. Bacchus, bereft of his reason by Juno, wandered through the world as it was then known

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to the Greeks. On his return from his travels, he became the centre of a cult of adorers, and has ever since been the recognized patron of dissipation, yet withal of a generally benignant character. Among the most interesting statues of Bacchus is that by Michelangelo, in the Bargello in Florence. It is rather more than life-size, and shows the youth somewhat overcome with wine. It is not what might be called a comfortable presentment of this condition. Bacchus is not simply jovial in his tipsi- ness; his eyes stare wide open, and his look is con- fused. The action of the figure is marvellous, the exact way in which Michelangelo has caught and portrayed the transient effect of a stagger, is beyond praise. He holds a cup in his hand, raised toward his lips, while his head is crowned with grapes.

Another quite different treatment of the figure of the god of wine is by Sansovino. As it is also in the Bargello, it may be easily compared with that of Michelangelo. Bacchus is in a light-hearted, merry mood, but is firm and steady on his feet. He lifts high above his head the flat cup from which he is about to drink, and smiles as he contemplates its brimming contents. The figure is slender and supple, and the face young and handsome. Sanso- vino's Bacchus has about it one feature which, ac- cording to Vasari, had not been attempted before

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by any artist in marble. One arm is raised, entirely detached from the figure, and in the hand is a tazza, or flat cup, cut in the same piece of stone. The figure is well balanced, and is seen to equal advantage from all points of view. Symonds thinks it really superior to Michelangelo's so far as classic feeling is con- cerned. There is a story that the boy who posed for this figure of Bacchus was driven insane by the constant exposure in the cold studio, and in his madness he would continually assume this pose.

The charming child Bacchus of Guido Reni, in the Pitti Palace, is a mirthful little elf, full of mischief, and preparing for his future career by raising a brimming bowl of wine to his lips.

Bouguereau's Youth of Bacchus is one of the merriest and prettiest sylvan scenes imaginable. The fair-haired child, raised on high in the midst of a band of nude revellers, makes a beautiful centre of interest. Here may be seen Euripides's " Bac- chant rejoicing like a foal with its mother at pas- ture," and " stirring its swift foot in the dance." The individual figures in this painting are of won- derful power.

Pictures of Bacchus as a single figure or attended by satyrs and nymphs are too numerous to be cata- logued here; among them, however, are two, one especially pleasing and one especially unpleasant, which deserve mention.

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The first of these is in the Louvre, a Bacchus usually supposed to be by Leonardo da Vinci. It rep- resents a youth, in figure nearly life-size, seated at the foot of a hill, and holding, carelessly laid against his shoulder, the thyrsus, or Bacchic wand. His legs are crossed, and his attitude easy, except for the rather forced pointing of one forefinger toward the thyrsus, in a way which Da Vinci often adopted in his figures. The face is like that of a beautiful girl, clustering short curls framing it in below its wreath of leaves. The expression is smiling, and the eyes surrounded with a heavy " make-up." The whole composition recalls St. John the Baptist in the desert, and, if the thyrsus were only a cross instead of an emblem of dissipation, the picture might, with equal propriety, be called St. John the Baptist. But it is a most beautiful study, and thoroughly decorative.

The other is by Rubens, and is in the Uffizi. As an absolutely disagreeable study of a fat, ill- natured, self-indulgent beast, it is quite the most perfect of its kind, which, let us be thankful, is not prevalent in art. The revolting nude creature is sitting upon a cask, and an equally dissipated bac- chante is filling his glass, while he looks around, scowling, as if to chide a Silenus who is drinking from a pitcher on his left side. Two tipsy babies accompany him, and his foot rests upon the head of an execrably drawn panther. He looks like an

LEONARDO DA VINCI (ATTRIBUTED). BACCHUS.

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overfed Nero, and is far removed from the jovial attractive god of Greek myth.

There is a quaint little picture in Venice, said to be by Giovanni Bellini. It must be a very early work if this is the case. It represents Bacchus Triumphant in his ear, drawn by a few ridiculously inadequate straining infants. Bacchus, almost thin, and quite sober, holds in his hand a harmless-looking little basket of fruit, while a nude personage, with a very flowing scarf of drapery and a shield and spear, is running beside the chariot. The picture is almost comic in its immaturity, as a design and as a result. It was one of a series of five panels. They are about eight inches high, on wood, and painted in tempera. They were probably used originally as ornaments to some piece of furniture. Ruskin expresses considerable interest in them. Crowe speaks of the Bacchus as having " vivid colour, easy action, and classic shape." Indeed, Lay- ard alludes to these paintings in the very highest terms, saying : " They are remarkable for their exquisite grace of the figures, and for depth and richness of colouring, and for poetical feeling, qualities which place them almost on a level with the finest productions of classic art." This criticism certainly applies more to the other panels than to the Bacchus.

A Bacchus by Cornells van Haarlem, in the Rot-

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terdam Museum, is hard and heavy in colour, but well drawn. For a Dutch artist, born in 1420, Haarlem approaches nearer than most of his con- temporaries the Italian manner.

The pictures of Bacchus which are most interest- ing are those dealing with his marriage with Ariadne. When Theseus so meanly sneaked off and left the sleeping maiden on the Isle of Naxos, it proved to be an evil out of which good was des- tined to come. For the god Bacchus was disporting himself on the same island upon that very day, and, chancing to come upon the deserted maiden, he made so favourable an impression that she promptly transferred her allegiance, as people of primitive tastes are reported to have done, from her faithless lover to this new and ardent admirer. The subject of their marriage is a favourite one with artists of the Renaissance.

The most beautiful picture of this incident is by Tintoretto, in the Ducal Palace in Venice. The picture is in the Sala dell Anti-Collegio, on the left as you enter. It has all the Greek feeling in it which the myth demands, with all the richness of tone that Venetian art could give. The colouring is nearly all in soft tones of brown, yet it is so skil- fully managed that each object seems to have such colour as befits it. Ruskin alludes to it as being " miserably faded," but says that " it was once one

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of the noblest pictures in the world." Ariadne sits by the river shore, her mantle falling across her knees; she extends her right hand in welcome to Bacchus, who is advancing from below, and who holds the ring with which he is to wed her. The delicious aerial poise of Venus, who hovers above the pair, ready to crown Ariadne with stars, cannot be too highly praised. The faultless figure is fore- shortened wonderfully, and seems to be sweeping through the air like a bird. Bacchus is a figure of infinite grace, languid, yet eager, beautiful, crowned and girt with vine-leaves, an ideal concep- tion of physical pleasure. Ruskin says : " The de- sign and forms of the leafage round the head of the Bacchus and the floating grace of the female figure above, will, however, always give interest to this picture, unless it be repainted." The lights all fall from the left of the picture, illuminating first the beautiful form of Ariadne, and seeming, through her, to be transmitted to the others. The sea view beyond is a very imaginative and soft bit of colour. Altogether, as a painted love-lyric, it has hardly an equal. Symonds expresses himself strongly in re- gard to this work of art : " In this picture we have the most perfect of all modern attempts to realize an antique myth; more perfect than Raphael's Galatea, or Titian's meeting of Bacchus and Ariadne, or Botticelli's Birth of Venus from the Sea." Sy-

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monds wearily relates how, while he sat, rapt in wonder, before this picture, some Germans saun- tered in to look at it. After a moment one of them remarked, " Bacchus was the wine-god," and they moved on.

Speaking of Venus, Taine says : " She is the sublime beauty of nude flesh as she appears on rising from the waves vivified by the sun and graduated by shadows. The goddess swims in liquid light . . . as a fish swims in a lake, and the atmosphere em- braces and caresses her." Benson speaks of the " lovely amber and silver tones of this picture." " In no other picture," says Woltmann, " has a poem of feeling and fancy, a romance of varied lights and shadows, and symphony of delicately blended hues, a play of attitude and movement (transitory, but in no sense forced or violent) been more successfully expressed, by means more sirqple, or with effect more satisfactory. Something of the mytho-poetic faculty must have survived in Tintoretto, and en- abled him to inspire the Greek tale with this intense vitality of beauty."

Symonds calls the Bacchus and Ariadne of Tinto- retto " that most perfect lyric of the sensuous fancy from which sensuality is absent." Paul Veronese never reached this ideal; these silver lights and transparent golden shadows were beyond his gay decorative sense; Titian, too, never equalled the

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floating movements of Venus. D'Annunzio illumi- nates with his poetic touch the undercurrent of mean- ing in this beautiful picture, calling it an Allegory of Autumn, typifying the perennial glory of Venice. " Seated on the shore like a divinity, Venice receives the ring from the young vine-crowned god who has descended into the water, while Beauty soars on her wings with the diadem of stars to crown the wonderful alliance."

Luca Giordano's Ariadne in Dresden is lying still sleeping, while Bacchus and his train have just arrived upon the scene, and are about to awake her.

In one particular the Bacchus and Ariadne by Titian, in the National Gallery in London, lacks con- viction, because Ariadne is not attractive. She is a short, sturdy little woman, with a long nose and a high forehead, with voluminous drapery, which she gathers up about her in such a way that it empha- sizes her stockiness. As she walks through the woods at the left of the picture, with a protesting hand raised, there seems to be no incentive for Bac- chus to leap so incontinently from his car to pursue her. For he is, indeed, leaping rather flying right over the side of the chariot. The leopards, who draw the car, turn and look at each other, as if they were saying, " What next ? " They were probably used to sudden enthusiasms. A Bacchanalian revel is taking place on the right. Nymphs and satyrs

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are dancing and playing on cymbals. A little faun in the central foreground is stepping along in high spirits, singing, with his head thrown back. A spaniel is barking at him. One satyr waves aloft the leg of a deer, while he holds a thyrsus in his other hand. Another is completely entwined with snakes. Ruskin would call our attention to the vine- leaves in this picture.

A ceiling fresco in Venice by Tiepolo represents Bacchus and Ariadne reclining upon the clouds, in a kind of apotheosis of debauch. The wine-god, with his coarse face turned toward the rather vacant countenance of Ariadne, holds above her head a crown of stars, while he hugs lovingly a chianti flask under the other arm. Cupids with grapes are falling about in a way that suggests danger to those in the apartment below.

The marriage of Bacchus and Ariadne by Guido Reni in the Academy of San Luca in Rome, is treated in a very serious and almost reverent spirit. Ariadne, seated upon a rock, and partly draped, is welcoming the handsome young Bacchus whom Venus is presenting to her. Bacchus is perfectly sober. While he has not the sweet grace of Tinto- retto's hero, he is still a manly earnest young wooer. His hand is placed on his heart in a conventional pose, but the general attitude of the figure is good, and the action of the head especially pleasing. In

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the background a nymph is giving a small faun a drink from a flask, which he seems to be enjoying immensely. The Venus is a rather ineffective figure, with her hand partly extended in the recognized gesture of introduction. Cupids, one with the starry crown, and one with bow and arrows, fly above. Fauns are seen dancing on the beach.

In Munich is a Bacchus by Breughel, sitting under an apple-tree, with satyrs, Bacchantes, and Cupids about him. These are offering him wine. In the foreground are vegetables, fruits, and dead game. In the landscape background are men ploughing, and others gathering grapes. This picture is one in a series of four by the same artist, representing the Seasons. The Bacchus typifies Autumn.

Bacchus is the subject, often together with Ari- adne, of pictures by Giulio Romano, Garofolo, Car- pione, Guido Reni, Miglione, Luca Giordano, Balen, Jordaens, Meiris, and Plazer, all in the Dresden Gallery.

The Bacchus and Ariadne of 1'Orbetto is in the Hermitage. The two lovers are seated on the shore of the Isle of Naxos, while Venus crowns Ariadne. In the distance, may be seen a drunken Silenus sup- ported by two satyrs.

In the Prado is a Bacchanale by Titian. Ariadne lies, nude, in the foreground, while in the back- ground a Silenus, lying among the grapes, squeezes

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them in his hands, and dancers drink from the stream of juice which proceeds from them. The ship of Theseus is seen sailing away in the dis- tance.

The well-known ancient statue of the sleeping Ariadne, with its restless arms, and vast limp shoul- ders and limbs, is familiar to all. She is a massive woman, who looks as if she would be able to avenge herself if ever she met her deserter again. But in spite of the colossal proportions of Ariadne, the statue is most graceful, and deserves its popularity.

In the Vatican is a Greek sarcophagus on which is represented Bacchus and Ariadne on the Isle of Naxos.

Among the ancient Herculaneum frescoes in the Naples Museum, is a Bacchus and Ariadne. Ariadne is sleeping with her head on the knee of a winged genius. Bacchus is being led by Cupid toward her. A faun is pulling Silenus up the hill at the left, and the train of Bacchus follows.

Ariadne by Danneker at Frank fort-on-the-Main, is a well-modelled group, representing the nymph half-reclining upon the back of a panther, and look- ing eagerly up. The head is not interesting, however, and the composition lacks virility.

The satyrs and fauns were wild woodland crea- tures. They occur in Bacchic scenes as frequently as Cupids occur in pictures of Venus. Hesiod sums

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them up in a drastic sentence : " They are a cowardly race, and good for nothing."

The well-known Faun of the Capitol, immortal- ized by Hawthorne, has no brutish attributes except the slightly pointed ears, which play such an im- portant part in the romance of the " Marble Faun." He is a charming figure, slender and graceful in poise.

The tipsy satyr at Naples is similar in form, as he tosses back his head and snaps his fingers in merriment, stepping airily as one who has not yet gotten beyond the exhilarating stage of drunkenness.

There is a young satyr by Jordaens in the Trip- penhuis in Amsterdam, forcefully painted, the flesh- tones reminding one of Rubens.

The Satyr and Nymph by Giorgione in the Pitti Palace is an exquisite bit of subdued yet glowing colour; "All is bathed in shadow," writes Taine, in his " Italy," in speaking of this picture. " but the ardent, motionless face, lovely shoulder and bosom, all issue forth like an apparition; one must see the living flesh emerging from the deep shadow, and the intense splendour of scarlet tones in deep and bright gradation from the blackness of night to the radiance of open day."

Silenus was the Greek origin of a type called Sileni, who, in Greek art, were usually portrayed as comic characters. They were an older species

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of satyr, with heavy limbs, usually fat, and carrying wine-skins. The Silenus in the Vatican, bearing the infant Bacchus in his arms, is much more re- spectable than most of his comrades, and is no longer in the flabby fat stage. Doctor Moore alludes to him as " one of the gayest figures that can be imagined." Pausanias infers that Sileni are mortal, " from their tombs; for there is a tomb of one Silenus in the country of the Hebrews, and of another at Per- gamus."

Pan himself, the presiding genius of these wild woodland mongrels, appears occasionally in art, but is as likely to be represented by a troop of his kind.

Among the Pompeian frescoes in Naples is a fly- ing figure of a Bacchante, carrying a long and grace- ful thyrsus and a tazza swinging in her right hand.

There is a reclining Bacchante by Caracci in the Ufftzi, to whom a Silenus is offering a dish of fruit. The back of the woman is seen, and is finely painted. Her hair, however, is too conventionally arranged to be characteristic of her class.

There is a charmingly coloured picture attributed to Titian, in Munich, representing Venus initiating a young Bacchante. The group is life-size, and the subjects are shown as far as the knees. Venus, seated, is holding a veiled cup of some kind. The flesh-tones are dazzlingly white, while a young Bac- chus behind her acts as a rich foil in colour. Venus

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has been criticized for having lips much too red for her complexion. The Bacchante who kneels before the goddess is no rival in personal appearance. One of the most telling details of the picture is a silver dish of fruit held high in the air by a satyr, and seen against the brilliant blue sky. The robe of Venus is green, so that the colouring, though rich, remains rather cool and luminous. The paint on the picture is very thick, and has, unfortunately, cracked badly.

Among the paintings discovered in the Baths of Constantine, is a fourth-century representation of a Bacchante playing upon a tambour. The figure, which is partially draped, has good poise.

In Luca Signorelli's " Pan listening to Olympus," there is more classic feeling than is generally dis- played by this artist in his treatment of mythological subjects. The nymph, the faun, with his girdle of vine-leaves, and the two shepherds are all nude, and display a delicate appreciation on the part of the painter for subtle and melodious line. It is spoken of in the highest terms by Crowe and Cavalcasselle, who consider it " most poetically conceived and beautifully arranged." In continuation: "a sure proof of the artist's talent in drawing nudes, admi- rable for the select classicism of the Olympus, and charming for the variety of expressions embodied in the group." Pan is seen seated on a throne of

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rocks, a leopard's skin thrown over his shoulders. In one hand he holds the reed pipes, while he has a staff a species of thyrsus in the other. A well-drawn figure of Apollo, in a fine pose, stands on one side of him, playing upon a long pipe, while a couple of rustics listen with rapt attention. There is a vine-crowned faun lying on the ground, and a nude nymph standing-. The faun is playing upon a pipe; the nymph probably represents Echo. It is an exquisite scene, among the most beautiful things ever painted by Signorelli.

CHAPTER IX.

CLASSIC LOVE - STORIES

THE pathetic story of the unfulfilled loves of Orpheus and Euridice is one which has appealed to many artists. The untimely death of the bride is thus described by Ovid : " The new-made bride, while she was strolling along the grass, attended by a train of Naiads, was killed, having received the sting of a serpent on her ankle." But most ver- sions of the myth refer to her having been pursued by a disappointed lover; the ancient representations show her having fled to a cave for shelter, and being there attacked by two serpents. In the Virgil of the Vatican, a manuscript of the fourth century, may be seen a miniature of the death of Euridice by the bite of the serpent; having traversed the meadows, " nor at her heels perceived the deadly snake," Euridice had fallen a prey to two serpents. She was transported to Hades in due form 1 . Thither after her went her lover, Orpheus ; " and amid the phantom inhabitants, and ghosts who had enjoyed

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the tomb" (Ovid appears to employ this term as the country-people do, who allude to " enjoying poor health"), "he went to Persephone and him that held these unpleasing realms, the Ruler of the Shades." . . . Then, accompanying himself on his lyre, he indulged in a long recitative imploring the return of his bride who had been thus prematurely filched from him. " By these places rilled with horrors," he pleaded, " By this vast chaos," not a very propitiatory appeal, one would think. But his lack of tact seems to have been condoned. The next miniature in the Vatican Virgil shows Orpheus in the act of conducting Euridice to the upper air:

"All dangers past, at length the lovely bride In safety goes, with her melodious guide . . He first, and close behind him followed she."

The hosts of Hades, at a cavelike opening, stand watching the exit of Orpheus, bearing his lyre, and the veiled Euridice, who is seen still within the opening. Ixion, bound to his wheel, may also be seen at the entrance to Hades. But Orpheus for- gets the condition on which Persephone allows Euridice to follow him. He is on no account to look upon Euridice until she is quite out of Hades, or he will lose her. Alas !

" Th' unwary lover casts his eyes behind, Forgetful of the law, nor master of his mind."

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The decree is carried out amidst much wailing:

" from his eyes the fleeting fair Retired like subtle smoke dissolved in air, And left the hopeless lover in despair."

Or, in the words of Ovid : " He enamoured, fear- ing lest she should flag, and impatient to behold her, turned his eyes: and immediately she sank back again. . . . And now she pronounced the last fare- well, which scarcely did he catch with his ears."

Corot, in his delightful hazy olive colouring, has painted an exquisite study of Orpheus leading Euridice from the shades. The graceful figures are seen flitting in the half-light, through a wooded country skirting a small lake. Orpheus has not yet glanced back at his wife, and they glide toward the light, with all prospect of escape. The gloom lies behind them, and figures of some of the other shades may be distinguished across the water in the misty landscape.

After this agonizing experience Orpheus became a sort of hermit, refusing all the advances of the Thracian maidens, and dwelling alone in a cave, with nothing to comfort him but his music. As Landor has drawn him:

" Beneath a rock o'er Strymon's flood on high, Seven months, seven long-continued months, 'tis said, He breathed his sorrows in a desert cave, And soothed the tiger, moved the oak, with song."

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The women were so infuriated at his neglect that they finally made an onslaught, and threw their javelins at him, stoned him, and otherwise revenged themselves upon him until they had killed him ; they then tore his body to pieces and cast it abroad in their wrath. His head was thrown, with his lyre, into the river Hebrus. The Muses buried his remains, while his soul passed into Tartarus and was united to his love.

Giovanni Moreau has painted a figure of one of the Muses, who, carrying the head of Orpheus placed on the lyre, looks sadly down at the pathetic relic. The drawing of the eye of this Muse is singularly faulty: the head is in profile, and yet the eye is drawn in the proportion and position for a full-face view. The head of Orpheus is beautiful, and it is the face of a dead man. Like a fair cameo, it lies upon the mute strings of the lyre, but with no sug- gestion of a living face. It is strange that the same artist should have rendered two faces in one picture so dissimilarly, one so exquisitely, and one so poorly.

In the twelfth-century psalter in the Vatican is a very fine miniature, full of the remains of classic sentiment, representing Orpheus playing on the lyre, while the nymphs of wood and fountain gather about, and the animals are grouped in a quaint little squad in front of him. The sight of a medi-

Classic %o\>e=Stortes 17 *

tative goat, with his head cast down sentimentally, apparently moved to tears, is almost too much for twentieth-century risibles.

In the Prado is a painting by Padovanino of Orpheus. It is full length, and is a single figure. It was formerly in the collection of Charles II. in the Royal Castle of Madrid.

Orpheus and Euridice by Beyschlag represents the sorrowing Orpheus, his arm holding Euridice close, while she is falling away from his embrace. The whole flavour of this picture is modern, as is also that by Sir Frederic Leighton, although the latter is a much stronger picture, and is exceedingly beautiful in composition.

Two scenes from the story of Orpheus are painted in the medallions at Orvieto by Luca Si- gnorelli. " Mediaeval intensity," says Symonds, " curiously at variance with antique feeling, is dis- cernible throughout. The Satellites of Hades are gaunt and sinewy devils, eager to do violence to Euridice. . . . The tranquillity and self-restraint of Greek art yield to a passionate and trenchant realization of the actual romance. ... A whole cycle of human experience separates these medal- lions from the antique bas-reliefs at Naples, where Hermes hands the veiled Euridice to Orpheus, and all three are calm."

statue of Orpheus appeasing Cer-

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berus is based upon the Apollo Belvedere, the figure being adapted to another attitude.

In the Boston Art Museum is a statue of Orpheus, executed by Crawford, in marble. Orpheus is seek- ing his bride among the dead in Hades. The lyre is in his hand, while he shades his eyes with the other hand, rather a work of supererogation, one would think, in so dark an atmosphere. Cerberus is seen beside him.

The loveliest series of pictures of the story of Cupid and Psyche are to be found in the Villa Farnesina in Rome. They are by Raphael, and occupy the spaces of triangular form between arches. In these spandrels the artist has presented the myth of Cupid and Psyche in a series of frescoes, some of them containing several figures, and each framed in with decorative garlands of flowers and fruits. This series may be called a decorative poem. Raphael made various drawings for these pictures, some of which are extant. The drawings were evi- dently submitted to his friend Count Castiglione, for, in a letter from Raphael to him, there is the following allusion : " I have executed in more than one manner the designs of the subjects you pro- posed to me. I am told that they have obtained general approbation. For myself I am very chary of trusting to my own judgment; I fear much that I shall not satisfy ypurs. I send them to you.

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Select such, if such there be, as seem to merit your choice."

Undoubtedly the frescoes were partly the work of his favourite pupils ; but Raphael is in them very largely, in all the vigour of his Roman manner.

The first of these frescoes represents Venus, who is jealous of the success of Psyche (the maiden being beloved by too many men to suit the goddess of Love) , directing her son Cupid to wound Psyche with one of his arrows, so that the proud girl may fall in love with some unworthy object, and cease to be so universally fascinating. Venus is holding Cupid close to her, while she points down to earth, telling him where to search for Psyche. Cupid is here shown as a youth. He stands at his mother's knee obediently, and raises a dart in his right hand. Cupid did his mother's bidding, and aimed his arrow at Psyche while she lay asleep ; but when he saw her beautiful eyes open, he started, and wounded himself with one of his own arrows, thereby becoming him- self the victim. This, of course, greatly enraged Venus, who began a systematic course of persecution against Psyche.

In the next spandrel Cupid is seen showing Psyche to the three Graces. They sit among the clouds, but are listening to Cupid, who points earthward. The three nude women are exquisitely drawn, but

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have rather more the muscular Amazonian type than the usual tender beauty of the Graces.

Then Venus, in her car, with linked doves to draw her, is seen starting off to seek aid from Jupiter. This figure is not as graceful as one would naturally expect of a Venus painted by Raphael. Her arms are out at ungainly angles.

The story of the very unsatisfactory relations upon which these two young unfortunates then entered, is known to all: how Cupid would never allow Psyche to see him in the light, preferring to play the lover incognito, and how Psyche, goaded to deceit, carried her lamp to gaze upon him while he slept, whereupon he took to his wings and flew away, like little Cock Sparrow, not to be seen again for many a day. The frescoes depart from these main incidents of the story; in one, Venus is seen imploring aid of Jupiter, who sits upon his eagle, nursing a thunderbolt as calmly as if it were an infant. Another one presents Venus, turning away from Juno and Ceres, who haughtily refuse to be of any comfort.

In another spandrel Mercury is seen descending in search of Psyche, who by this time has been sent to Hades to procure for Venus a small portion of the beauty of Proserpine, which Venus has sent Psyche to fetch for her. Then Psyche is shown floating up among Cupids to take the box of beauty

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to Venus. She is holding the box high with her left hand, and the figure is full of light, airy motion. In another spandrel Psyche is kneeling by Venus, presenting her with the jar of Proserpine's beauty. The exacting mother-in-law looks far from satis- fied, as she raises both hands with a gesture which might indicate horror.

Then Cupid appears on the scene again, beg- ging Jupiter to intercede for him and his bride. Jupiter is holding the boy close, and promising assistance. In the fresco Jupiter is whispering in Cupid's ear, and he seems affectionately inclined. He has even relinquished his petted thunderbolt, and has given it to his eagle to hold for the nonce. The drawing for this fresco has been preserved, and is, in most essentials, like the painting, but Jupiter is without his beard. Presumably the master's method was to draw his heads and faces with correct anatomy before he endowed them with beard and flowing locks.

Finally Mercury is seen conducting Psyche to the celestial regions, where, after drinking of the cup presented to her by Jove, she becomes immortal. The figure of Psyche as she is thus wafted up to Olympus conducted by Mercury, is very lovely. Throughout the pictures she suggests the type of Raphael's Galatea.

On the ceiling of the Farnesina Palace Raphael

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painted two majestic frescoes representing the Coun- cil of the Gods, and the Banquet of the Gods. In criticizing these compositions Quatremere de Quincy writes: "Certainly the most difficult labour . . . of the painter transported to the regions of the mythological world, must be the representing to the eyes that series of personages, so various in nature, physiognomy, character, proportion, age, costume, with which the imagination of the Greeks peopled the sky, borrowing from humanity the diversity of forms, by means of which all moral qualities, all intellectual ideas were rendered sensible to the eye." Raphael, in these works, did not attempt to paint in the perspective usually recognized as appropriate for ceiling decoration. The pictures are planned as if they were to be seen in a vertical position. To make this arrangement appear justifiable, Raphael has imitated the edges of a tapestry around the pic- tures, so that they look like large tapestries which had been placed on the ceiling, but had not been designed with that end in view ; a naive way of es- caping the usual exigencies of ceiling painting.

In the Council of the Gods Jupiter is enthroned at the right, listening to the case which Cupid is pleading. The love-god stands before the throne with his arms stretched out, in supplication. Jupiter is resting his chin on his hand, regarding the enthu- siastic youth thoughtfully. Juno sits by Jupiter,

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and Pallas, with her helmet and spear, is seen behind him. Neptune, distinguished by his trident, and Pluto, with his twotined fork, stand by. Psyche follows Cupid, rather shyly. Her figure is not equal to the demands of the situation, being rather squat. Mars is seen behind her, and Bacchus, in the very attitude of Leonardo da Vinci's Bacchus in the Louvre, is pointing at Psyche with his forefinger. A little farther along, Janus may be seen; and the Sphynx is crouching on the ground at the feet of Mercury, who, with his caduceus in one hand, takes a cup from Hebe with the other. A dignified assem- bly it is, and Raphael has certainly succeeded in differentiating his types so that all these deities stand out distinctly.

In the Banquet of the Gods Cupid and Psyche are resting upon a couch at the right, next to Jupiter, who is seen accepting a cup of wine from Ganymede. The Graces are anointing Psyche from a little vase, held by one of them, while Bacchus is pouring wine from a flagon. The Muses are entertaining the company with a dance at the left. Nymphs with butterfly wings are showering flowers upon the guests.

These Farnesina frescoes are roughly worked, in a masterly impressionism; an eye is often found to be only a black dot and a white dot placed to- gether; and yet it glows with life. Many of the

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deities in the Olympian feasts are simply hulking blacksmiths and wrestlers. Symonds considers that there is " something savouring of over-bloom . . . as though the painter's faculty had been strained beyond its natural force." He suggests that the muscles and open mouths are exaggerated. Ra- phael's pupils assisted in the execution of the Cupid and Psyche episodes, while he himself painted the Galatea.

Camuccino has depicted the scene of Psyche being brought to Jupiter and receiving the nectar, in a manner not unlike that of David or Canova in treat- ing Greek scenes. The feeling is very classical. Jupiter and Juno, enthroned formally on the right, are surrounded by the other deities, and all are more or less reminiscent of the Greek statues of the gods. Minerva might well be the famous Minerva Medica in another position; the Barberini Juno seems to have seated herself beside Jove. The Jupiter Olym- pus himself, in almost the exact attitude of his famous statue, is administering the draught to Psyche; in short, the picture is a sort of compila- tion, an editing of the Greek masterpieces in a definite scene. Perhaps the figure of Mercury is more like that by Giovanni da Bologna than like any one ancient statue, but Apollo is the Belvedere god, sitting in an attitude of ease on the left, his lyre and quiver beside him. The little girlish Psyche suggests

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the Psyche at Naples, and is also like the Venus de Medici. It is Praxiteles's Cupid who is leaning on Psyche's breast.

In the Palazzo del Te in Mantua Giulio Romano has painted delightful frescoes on general mythologi- cal subjects, among them a set of charming pictures of the myth of Cupid and Psyche, selected somewhat after the order of those in the Farnesina.

Psyche, in Charon's boat, being rowed into the 'dark entrance to the Styx, is charmingly portrayed by Neide, a modern painter. The stalwart figure of Charon standing against the light sky, and the delicate white flesh-tones of Psyche, silhouetted against the dark rock of the cavern, are in delight- ful contrast.

The Cupid and Psyche by Canova is restless, fluttering, and transitory. It is a very popular group, but has been made somewhat too common in small Carrara models. It must be conceded, how- ever, that the spirit of youthful passion, timid, and yet intense, has been caught by the artist.

A refined and delicate torso, suggestive of youth, is the Psyche at Naples. The head, too, is both graceful and aristocratic. A fragment of a sarcopha- gus found at Ostia, and now in the Vatican, displays man being created by Prometheus, while Mercury presents the new human being with a soul, typified by the figure of Psyche.

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In Munich is a Psyche by Antonio Belucci, about to stab the sleeping Cupid with a dagger, but draw- ing back as she sees his beauty, which her lamp has revealed to her.

Cupid and Psyche have been painted by innumer- able modern artists in a most inadequate way. Guido Reni has perpetrated several dreadful sleeping Cupids, presumably awaiting the arrival of Psyche.

Volterrano's Sleeping Love in the Pitti Palace is the most attractive example of this subject in art. It is a bit of fresco, now framed and hung on the wall, and shows a most exquisite boy in quite Greek feeling. Raphael Mengs' picture of Cupid sharpen- ing his arrow is rather a fat, uninteresting infant, holding the arrow-point ready to rub on a flat stone, while he gazes up into the air to give the artist an opportunity to paint his eyes in that position. Michelangelo's Sleeping Cupid was so Greek in its sentiment that Cardinal Raffaello Riario bought it as an antique.

The intrepid Leander who swam the Hellespont nightly for the sake of meeting his love, is a well- known figure to every one. . Bodenhausen's picture of his tragic death, in being cast upon the shore at the feet of Hero, is very familiar. The poor girl, holding her hands to her temples in despair, while she looks down at the beautiful dead youth, is a harrowing example of the difference between the

VOLTERRANO SLEEPING LOVE.

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classic restraint and the modern preference for a realistic scene. A beautifully executed work of art, its message is only a morbid and hopeless one.

Ruskin considers the painting of the sky in the Hero and Leander of Turner to be " a characteristic and noble example, as far as any individual work's can be characteristic, of the universality of this noble mind." He also highly commends the painter for the forms of his waves in this picture, saying, how- ever, " but there the drawing was rendered easier by the powerful effect of light which disguised the foam." He says, too : " Any surveyor or engineer could have drawn the steps and balustrade, . . . but there is no man living but himself who could have thrown the accidental shadows upon them."

Piero di Cosimo has much in common with Botti- celli, in his romantic treatment of classical subjects. He makes no attempt to try and reproduce the historic Greek feeling. In his picture of the Death of Procris this is marked.

There are two legends of the death of Procris; one as related by Austin Dobson in his poem on this subject seems to be the version of the story which Piero di Cosimo selected for portrayal. Cephalus, a young huntsman, was happily married to Procris. But the fascinating goddess of the Dawn, Aurora, came and tried to alienate his affections, and ap- peared to his wife to have succeeded. Very likely

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this myth originated through the well-known love of the hunter for the early morning; at any rate, the narrative has it that Procris was quite miserable at the changed condition of affairs, and suspected some wily nymph of having gained the fickle heart of her young husband. So, with dread of finding aught amiss, and yet with fear of not finding what might be wrong, she went forth to follow Cephalus on his hunting expedition one morning. She came upon him, but without allowing herself to be seen, she hid in the thicket to watch what he might do. Let us follow the story in the modern version, as Austin Dobson tells it :

"Leaping he went, this hunter Cephalus, But in his hand his cornel bow he bare,

Supple he was, round-limbed and vigorous, Fleet as his dogs, a lean Laconian pair.

He, when he spied the brown of Procris' hair Move in the covert, deeming that apart

Some fawn lay hidden, loosed an arrow there; Nor cared to turn and seek the speeding dart Bounding above the fern, fast following up the hart.

"But Procris lay among the white wind-flowers Shot in the throat. From out the little wound The slow blood drained, as drops in autumn showers

Drip from the leaves upon the sodden ground. None saw her die but Lelaps, the swift hound,

That watched her dumbly with a wistful fear, Till, at the dawn, the horned woodmen found And bore her gently on a sylvan bier Tp lie beside the sea with many an uncouth tear,"

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This is the version of the story which Piero di Cosimo has painted. The dead Procris, with the wound in her throat, lies on the sward, on a low, marshy land, such as hunters select when they are searching for birds. Her scarf has slipped off, and her body, although it is painted in the firm wooden manner of this artist, has, nevertheless, a certain look of death about it. The hands are limp, and lie as a dead person's hands might, although there are faults in the drawing. The faithful dog sits mute at her feet, and Cosimo has given an expres- sion of sympathetic concern to the eye of this dog which reminds one of the human-eyed dog in Car- paccio's picture of two Courtesans in Venice, and which Mr. Ruskin commends so highly. The little satyr who is kneeling at the left, and who has laid his hand upon the shoulder of Procris, is a strictly imaginative being, and is in some details strangely misconceived. As Symonds says : " In creating this satyr the painter has imagined for himself a being half-human, half-bestial, and yet wholly real; nor yet has he portrayed in Procris a nymph of Greek form, but a girl of Florence. The strange animals and gaudy flowers introduced into the landscape background further remove the subject from the sphere of classic treatment. Florentine realism and quaint fancy being thus curiously blended, the artistic result may be profitably studied

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for the light it throws upon the so-called paganism of the early Renaissance." Cosimo's satyr has fur legs, but, speaking anatomically, they are not goat's legs; for this strange little hybrid is represented as kneeling on his little lean, dark shanks, just as a man would kneel in other words, the knee-joints turn the wrong way for a goat, and the effect is weird. His feathery moustache and light growth of beard are evidently intended to convey the impres- sion of a hirsute monster. The fringed ears which extend in long points high up among his curling locks are quite unlike any ears seen elsewhere in art.

Of this Death of Procris, by Piero di Cosimo, Ver- non Lee says : " The poor young woman, lying dead by the lake, with the little fishing-town in the distance, the swans sailing and cranes strutting, and the dear young faun no Praxitelian god with invisible ears, still less the obscene beast whom the later Renaissance copied from antiquity, a most gentle furry, rustic creature, stooping over her in puzzled, pathetic concern, at a loss, with his want of the practice of cities, and the knowledge of womankind, what to do for this poor lady, lying among the reeds and the flowering scarlet sage."

The other version of the myth of Cephalus and Procris is similar to this, except that Procris became jealous of Aurora, because she heard her husband murmur, in the woods, " Come, gentle Aura, sweet

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goddess of the Breeze, and allay the heat that burns me." When she heard this languid utterance she sobbed, in the hiding-place where she was concealed. Cephalus, supposing the sound to come from some animal lurking in the bushes, threw his javelin. A cry coming from the spot was his answer. He rushed to the bush, he found Procris mortally wounded. Cephalus raised her in his arms, and her last words to him, as her life ebbed away, were, "If you have ever loved me, do not marry that hateful breeze! "

Guido Reni has selected the moment of the death of Procris, according to this version, for his attract- ive picture in the Brunswick Gallery. In the deep shadows of the wood (here we see that Guide's idea of a hunter was that of one who chased larger game than birds on marshes) Procris, laid gracefully upon a satin robe, but quite nude, is breathing her last. Cephalus supports her shoulder on his knee, while with his right hand he is making a dainty attempt to extract the long weapon which extends from a wound in her chest. He looks somewhat pained, but is not apparently in deep distress. Intellectually, the picture is valueless, but a more faultless, beauti- ful rendering of the human body it would be diffi- cult to find. Every line is ideal ; the outline of the body of the girl, as it lies white and luminous amidst its dark surroundings, is as perfect as any in art.

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Yet with all this mere external beauty the picture lacks interest except as a study of the nude.

In the Boston Art Museum is a Greek Cylix which has an archaic drawing- of Aurora, with spread wings, pursuing and trying to detain Cephalus, who is doing his best to escape. It is a curious example of the art of the early fifth century B. c.

Guercino has painted a Cephalus and Procris which is in Dresden. It is in no way satisfactory. Cephalus and Procris are both in Renaissance clothes. Procris, in an attitude of suffering and grief, is expiring, reclining at the right, propped up against a bank, the arrow sticking straight out of her chest; while Cephalus, sitting on a stone near by, makes no effort to help her or to comfort her, but with his legs crossed, and his hands clasped around his knee, is looking in quite the opposite direction, into the clouds. Two greyhounds stand near impassively. In the sky, occupying as large a space above as does a distant city in the landscape below, kneels Cupid, on a cloud mattress, rubbing his eyes with his knuckles. Nothing could be more inexpressive either of the scene or of the period.

In the Cephalus and Procris of Turner, in the Liber Studiorum, Ruskin is particular to tell us to " note the sympathy of those faint rays that are just drawing back and dying between the trunks of the far-off forest, with the ebbing life of the nymph ; "

Classic Xove^Stories 187

the idea is a poetic one, and the effect inspires the imagination. Cephalus holds the dying Procris at the left, but the figures are subordinate. Primarily the picture is a landscape with a beautiful vista, and a clear dawn-light on a hill at the right.

There is rather a fanciful painting by Guerin in the Louvre representing Aurora coming to woo Cephalus with flowers. He is a pretty, sleeping youth, reclining on a cloud, while Aurora is a lovely nymph of the Empire period, showering minute field-flowers upon the object of her affections. Her attitude is an example of simpering eighteenth- century mannerisms.

CHAPTER X.

HERCULES

HERCULES was conceived of first as a very fully- armed and protected soldier or warrior. The ideal of superb human strength and muscular develop- ment as a more perfect protection than armour, did not obtain before the seventh century B. c., when a poet of Rhodes described a Hercules with a club and lion's skin instead of his earlier attribute, the bow. By the fifth century he was recognized as an athlete, without armour, but trusting in the power of his own firm body.

The Farnese Hercules is perhaps the most obvious of this type. Taine speaks of him as " a vigorous porter, who has just lifted a piece of timber, and thinking that a glass of wine would not come amiss." One would know that this critic was a Frenchman, and not a Briton an English critic would have alluded to a " pot of beer " instead of a " glass of wine." Of this Hercules Doctor Moore observes: " The Farnese Hercules is faulty both in form and

Ibercules 189

attitude; the former is too unwieldy for active ex- ertion, and the latter exhibits vigour exhausted. . . . A reposing Hercules is almost a contradiction." He tells a little tale in naively gossiping style, of a lady in the party who found this figure most unsatis- factory; she turned away from it in disgust. Doctor Moore asking her what had shocked her, received the reply that she could not bear the stern severity of his countenance, his large, brawny limbs, and the club with which he was armed; she complained that he looked more like one of those giants that used to carry away virgins in old ro- mances, than he did like the lover of Omphale; she was, in fact, convinced that this could not be a just presentment of Hercules, as no man of such pro- portions could ever have been a reliever of dis- tressed damsels!

The first exploit chronicled of Hercules is the marvellous story of his strangling two large ser- pents which Juno had sent to attack him as he lay, as an infant, in his cradle. " Hercules throttling snakes according to tradition," as Pausanias has it, was a favourite subject with sculptors. There are several antique marbles of this subject, allowing play of imagination as to just what muscular devel- opment would be necessary to make such a feat possible in a young child.

In the Pitti Palace may be seen a picture in fairly

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classic spirit, representing the young Hercules, hold- ing a snake in each hand, while his father is hurry- ing up carrying a lamp; a good piece of light painting, by the way. The mother, half nude, is seen rising from her couch.

Of Sir Joshua Reynolds's painting of Hercules Strangling the Serpents, Barry, in his lectures, observes that " nothing can exceed the brilliancy of light, the force, the vigorous effect " of the picture : it possesses, he claims, all that we look for in Rem- brandt, " united to beautiful forms, and an elevation of mind, to which Rembrandt had no pretensions."

The Pompeian painting from the House of the Vettii, of Hercules strangling the serpents, repre- sents the child slender and yet firm in his build, sunk on one knee while he holds the two snakes tightly. The mother runs to call for help, but the admiring father does not even leave his throne nor cast down his sceptre, so engrossed is he in watching the infant prodigy. A human terror seems to animate an attendant; but otherwise the young Hercules is allowed to work out his own fate.

Vasari tells of a series of pictures painted by Dosso Dossi and Batista, his brother, of the history of Hercules, executed on the walls of the court of the Ducal Palace in Ferrara. These pictures were in chiaroscuro, and still remain, though much re- stored.

fcercules 191

In the Naples Museum is an interesting picture by Annibale Caracci, of Hercules making his his- toric choice between Virtue and Vice. The young hero, athletic and stalwart, is seated on a rock, meditating. He leans upon his club, and his brow is drawn with thought. Two charming women stand on either side of him; at a first glance it is difficult to distinguish between Vice and Virtue, but we must infer that the one who smiles and wears the scantier drapery stands for Caracci's impression of evil. This choice of Hercules is sometimes called the strife between Pleasure and Duty, and probably it was this interpretation which the artist had in mind. Duty, the figure on the right of Hercules (the left in the picture), is pointing to a distant prospect, a rugged mountain path, over a shadeless tract of country. Her figure is extremely noble, the head very beautiful, and the pose easy and graceful. Pleasure, on the other hand, stands with her back to the spectator, poised lightly, and smiling in a cheerful and apparently innocent way. She indi- cates a charmingly shaded grove, where palms, pines, and grapes seem to abound in equal profusion. At the feet of Pleasure lie two masks and a book. Literature and the drama would appear to be the limit of the temptations which she offers. At the left, seated on the ground, appears Jove, with an open book ; he is probably playing the role of record-

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ing angel, and is registering the stern determination of Hercules.

Juno, having failed to dispose of Hercules by the means of the serpents which she sent to attack him in his infancy, caused him, while still young, to become insane, and to slay his children. This scene has occasionally been employed in art. Alessandro Turchi's picture of Hercules slaying his children may be seen in the old Pinakothek in Munich. It is well drawn, and technically clever. While the general composition and treatment show the influ- ence of Michelangelo, the colour scheme is Venetian.

When he recovered his sanity, Hercules, having become subject to a domineering relative by the name of Eurystheus, was sent forth upon his noted " Twelve Labours." Among these adventures some are much more common in art than others.

A fresco in the Farnesina, by Peruzzi, exhibits the first of these exploits, the conquering and slaying of the Nemean Lion. In its style it chal- lenges comparison with Pollajuolo's paintings of Hercules. The action of the leg, breaking the lion's back, is powerful.

His next labour was to make way with the Hydra, a ravaging water-serpent with innumerable heads, which had been causing the people of Argos much discomfort. Pollajuolo's picture of Hercules over- coming the Hydra, which is in the Urfizi, is well

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described, though quaintly, by Vasari. He calls it " an admirable work," and goes on to qualify his statement : " More especially the reptile, the colour- ing of which has so much animation and truth that nothing more lifelike could possibly be seen; the venomous nature, the fire, the ferocity, and the rage of the monster, are so effectually displayed, that the master merits the highest encomiums." The Hydra is certainly convincing, as being an anatomical pos- sibility, which quality many monsters in art quite fail to attain. Hercules, thin, young, and active, is a very different type from the Farnese ; but he sug- gests wiry strength and agility, and the figure is full of action and force.

This little panel of Pollajuolo's proves, as the Misses Horner remark, that " grandeur of drawing and composition does not depend on size." As to technical qualities, the outlines are hard, and the colour monotonous. He had no eye for values, painting by the inch instead of by the foot, and not considering the final effect of the whole picture.

Of all the other victories of Hercules, hardly any have appeared in art except the last : the strangling of Antaeus, and the overthrow of Cacus. Antaeus was a noted wrestler and athlete whose strength could not be matched so long as his feet remained on the earth. But his strength was derived entirely from the ground; when Hercules discovered this,

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he lifted him by main force, and crushed out his life, holding him high in the air.

Pollajuolo's Hercules and Antaeus in the Uffizi is a specimen of the fierce and savage kind of subject which this artist loved. He enjoyed showing what Symonds calls " a frenzy of mur- derous enthusiasm." The picture is described by Vasari; but it is thought that the critic has reference to a larger picture which has since disappeared. He tells us of a picture of Her- cules strangling Antaeus : " The force employed by him," remarks Vasari, " in crushing his antagonist is clearly apparent, every muscle and nerve of the body being strained to ensure the destruction of his opponent. The teeth, firmly set, are in perfect accord with the expression of the other parts of the figure, all of which, even to the points of the feet on which he raises himself, give manifest imitation of the efforts used. Nor is less care displayed in the figure of Antaeus, who, pressed by the arm of Hercules, is seen to be sinking, and deprived of all power of resistance; his mouth is open; he is breathing his last sigh." This description certainly applies also to the bronze statue in the Bargello, where it is quite evident that Pollajuolo made a sculptural study as well as a painting of this subject.

Ammanati has treated his Hercules worse, in a fountain at Costello, where he makes the athlete

POLLAJUOLO. HERCULES AND ANTVEUS.

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squeeze Antaeus so hard that the fountain gushes from his mouth! It is not a pretty thought for a drinking-water supply.

Cacus was a great giant who lived in a cave on Mount Aventine, and tried, by a subterfuge, to steal the oxen of Geryon, which Hercules was driving. Hercules took summary vengeance on him, killing Cacus at once.

Michelangelo had intended making a statue of Hercules and Cacus to adorn the Piazza Signoria in Florence, together with his David ; and, while work- ing in the Carrara mountains, he had selected a block on purpose for this group. During the reign of Leo X., he made several studies for the statue, but on the death of this Pope, Clement VII. kept him so busy in working for the glory of the Medici, that he found no time to carry out his intention, and later the marble was obtained by Baccio Bandinelli, who finally made the statue. One cannot help feeling, however, what a different inspiration would have been shown by Michelangelo. When it was time for the block of marble to be transported from Carrara, it was conveyed by water, under the di- rection of Bandinelli. On its way from Signa to Florence, it upset, and, being of enormous weight, it sunk so deep in the mud of the Arno that it was thought impossible to raise it. An old builder, how- ever, who was an ingenious person, devised and

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carried out a plan for turning the Arno aside from its course, and, with much digging, and many wind- lasses, recovered the valuable monolith. The wits of the period turned the story to good account; one of them composed verses, the import being that the fair marble, finding that it was to fall into the hands of Baccio Bandinelli, had thrown itself into the Arno with suicidal intent, rather than submit to such a fate ! When the Hercules of Bandinelli was placed upon its allotted pedestal, Baccio recognized that the finish was too smooth for a statue in the open air ; so, with very good appreciation for his period and school, he had a scaffolding built, and worked the entire surface of the figures over again with a chisel. Perhaps the group deserves Cellini's sarcasm, how- ever. It is indeed no better than " a wrestling bout between a porter and a coal-heaver." Vasari greatly admired the Hercules and Cacus, alluding to Bandi- nelli as " him who had placed the Hercules and Cacus almost alive in marble on the Piazza." Rus- kin disposes of it simply as " unimaginative."

Of the three ignominious years which Hercules was condemned to spend in the service of Queen Omphale, the artists have taken some advantage. Omphale is usually dressed in lion's skins, while Hercules is obliged to wear women's clothes. Sit- ting by the distaff, he is mocked by the queen and her attendants.

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A Hercules and Omphale in Naples, found in Pompeii, represents the hero leaning on the neck of a bearded man, with a playful expression, while Omphale, holding a club, looks on in displeasure.

In Munich is a treatment of this episode by Turchi. Omphale and her maids are jeering at the uncouth efforts of Hercules to spin.

Luca Giordano has painted an out-of-door scene representing Hercules and Omphale, which looks more like a Bacchanale. If it were not for the spindle in the hand of Hercules, it would be diffi- cult to determine the subject, except for the presence of a little emblematic Hercules strangling serpents on the left.

Spranger's Hercules and Omphale in Vienna is not a satisfactory picture. The large, and yet effem- inate Hercules sits spinning in the garb of a woman, while the queen, entirely nude, stands by, her back to the spectator, turning her head much farther than any human head will turn, with a glance intended to be coy. Neither the back nor the head are in anatomically perfect drawing.

A picture by Gleyre shows the Hero sitting tamely at the feet of Omphale; but this time he is not in female guise, nor is she assuming male attire; in- deed, she looks at him with pity and interest, and Cupid, leaning on her knee, seems to be suggesting to her gentle thoughts of the captive.

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Canova has modelled a terrific Hercules, quite as gigantic as the Farnese statue, which is in the Torlonia, in Rome. Hercules, having thrown aside his lion's skin, is seen completely nude, in the act of casting into the sea the harmless and unfortunate messenger of evil, Lichias. The muscular develop- ment of this enormous torso is almost repulsive, and the strained skin, stretched in wrinkled folds across the chest and abdomen, is a very unlovely touch, which we are asked to believe is realistic.

CHAPTER XL

THESEUS AND THE CENTAURS

THESEUS, although a real prince of Athens, is the subject of several mythological and apocryphal narratives which have been chosen by artists as scenes to be perpetuated. Among the most famous of these are, the battle of the Amazons, and the battle between the Centaurs and Lapithae.

And Theseus, too, was that whilom lover of Ariadne, who, having carried away the maiden (who had performed an inestimable service in pro- viding him with the clue to escape from his en- counter with the Minotaur in the famous laby- rinth), basely deserted her on the shores of Naxos, and sailed heartlessly away, as has been mentioned in another place.

Dear old gossiping Pausanias relates many en- tertaining accounts of this hero, which anecdotes, not having been immortalized in art, we must deny ourselves the pleasure of rehearsing. One pretty little scandal, however, cannot be resisted, for it

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paints the hero in two different characters, as a well-dressed courtier, who, in an instant, could be converted into a Hercules. It seems that Theseus was floating about Athens, incognito, while the roof was being placed upon the Temple of the Delphian Apollo. Theseus was evidently something of a dandy : " having a long garment down to his feet," says Pausanias, " and his hair being elegantly plaited; when he came near to this temple, those who were building the roof asked him jeeringly why a maiden, ripe for marriage, was wandering about alone? And his only answer," continues the narrator, " was, it is said, unyoking the oxen from the wagon which stood by, and throwing it in the air higher than the roof they were building." There now! See what one gets for trifling with demi- gods ! We moderns can only wonder why Theseus should have drawn the line at the oxen; the whole team would have been such an imposing aerial dis- play, and would have provided an adequate origin for the nursery rhyme about the cow that jumped over the moon. Theseus, always a patron of ath- letics, established regular training-schools for wres- tling; Pausanias explains, " Before the time of Theseus only size and strength were made use of in wrestling."

After Theseus had so unkindly deserted Ariadne, he had occasion to enter into battle with those

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terrible female warriors, the Amazons. Pausanias describes the event, and accounts for the victory that Theseus obtained over Antiope, the Queen of the Amazons. He records that there is a monument to Antiope the Amazon, in Athens. He then quote, the two accounts of the fame of Antiope; he says that one authority claims that she was carried off by Theseus, but that another states that Antiope, " being enamoured of Theseus (who was besieg- ing the place with Hercules), handed the place over to him." Plutarch corroborates this statement, say- ing : " That this war was ended by a treaty is evi- dent." Theseus, however, was volatile in his affec- tions, and selected the Amazon Hyppolite for his bride, and apparently behaved in a very unseemly way. His faithful Plutarch observes : " There are also other traditions of the marriages of Theseus, neither honourable in their occasions, nor fortunate in their events." But it is not our purpose to follow the amorous career of Theseus, but to con- sider the artistic representations of the battle of the Amazons.

On the frieze of the Temple of Apollo in Phiga- leia, the Amazonian conflict is sculptured in detail. Here may be seen the powerful masculine figures contrasting with those of the women ; in one place, a Greek has seized an Amazon by her hair, while another has administered a death-blow, and the

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woman sinks to the ground. Judging from the treatment of this frieze, it would not have been necessary to account for the victory of the Greeks by anything but brute force. In one, it is easy to recognize Theseus by the lion's skin which he wore, and the club, which, in imitation of Hercules, he always carried. The draperies of the Amazons in these sculptures are of the highest beauty, and of great diversity. Some wear long tunics, while others have short vests only to the knees ; one of the Amazons, on horseback, has long sleeves, and long trousers in her undergarment. Most of them wear boots, and all are belted. Unfortunately the sculp- tures are much defaced, and it happens that in no instance is the weapon of an Amazon discernible, except bows and spears, which were used at a dis- tance. For hand-to-hand conflict there must have been other provision made.

Symonds calls attention to the bas-reliefs on the temple at Selinus, now in the Museum of Palermo (especially one of Hercules fighting with the Amazons), where the trick of using plain sandstone for the figures of the men, and white marble for the flesh of the women, has been employed with really artistic success. " Most beautiful is the con- trast between the young unarmed Hercules and the Amazon he overpowers. His naked man's foot grasps with the muscular energy of the athlete her

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soft and helpless woman's foot, the roughness of the sandstone and the smoothness of the marble really heightening the effect of difference."

The Battle of the Amazons occurs on other reliefs and slabs; one, on a sarcophagus, is striking in its symmetry and beauty, the two central figures being Amazons mounted on curvetting steeds. All the figures, male and female, are splendidly modelled.

Rubens's Battle of the Amazons in Munich is an animated scene. In the centre of a bridge which spans the river, Theseus and the Queen of the Amazons are in violent conflict, with many of their respective followers. The animus spreads even to the horses, who are biting one another in real spite. A half-nude warrior grasps the banner of an Ama- zon, who is fleeing the scene of carnage, but who, resisting his onslaught, is dragging backward and is falling from her horse, owing to a wound re- ceived from the leader's sword. The conquered, and the horses who have lost their riders, are flying in wild confusion on the right. On the left side, the warriors and Amazons ride fiercely on, over dead bodies, until they reach the river, where some of them are seen plunging in, unable to check their fiery progress in time. Under the central bridge is seen a boat, so overloaded with fugitives that it is sinking. In the far distance, a town, enveloped in flames, completes the scene of destruction.

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Among the chief exploits of Theseus may be noted the battle between the Centaurs and Lapithae. At the wedding of Pirithous and Hippodamia, the Centaurs were among the guests. One of them, Eurytion, was indiscreet enough to take too much to drink, and then became unduly familiar in his manner toward the bride. Led by Theseus, the guests arose, and a mighty war was waged at once.

The Centaurs were among the quaintest of the classic monstrous conceptions. Half man and half horse, they were represented originally with only the hind legs of a horse, the fore legs being human, with men's feet, which arrangement is far more weird and grotesque than the more usual horse with a man's torso and head.

The origin of the antipathy between men and the Centaurs is indicated by the legend told in the Odyssey : " Was it not wine that ... led astray the famous Centaur Eurytion when he came to the feast of the Lapiths? Overmuch wine subdued his wits, and in his madness he did shameful deeds within the palace. Keen wrath fell upon the heroes ; they arose and with the sharp bronze did they cut his ears and nostrils, and drew him out of the por- tals, all blood-stained, with venom in his heart. And from that time . . . was there war kindled between men and the Centaurs."

The metopes of the Parthenon are the best-known

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representations of the battle between the Centaurs and Lapiths. All remember the struggling couples, apparently so unequally matched; one Centaur is about to brain his adversary with a wine-jug, while the Lapith, instead of defending himself, holds his shield at his side. e

In the first metope a Centaur is overcome, and has sunk upon his knees, while the victor, with his arm around the neck of the Centaur, is about to ad- minister the final blow. One shows a Centaur lifting and carrying off a female guest, and another ex- hibits a barbarian attempt to embrace a woman. Among these powerful little groups is one of a man and a Centaur with locked knees, in a critical moment. The Centaur has the man by the throat, while the man's fist is striking the Centaur in the eye. It is a moment of transition, we do not know the outcome.

Wonderful vitality and activity are exhibited in all these metopes, and they should be carefully studied by all lovers of Greek art.

On the Temple of Theseus at Athens were the most remarkable sculptures, now in the British Museum, representing the battle between the Cen- taurs and Lapithae. A similar frieze existed at the Temple of Apollo at Phigaleia. Of these last frag- ments the grouping is more complex than is the case on the Parthenon sculptures; incidents and

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episodes of great excitement occur. One Centaur is biting a man's shoulder, while he kicks furiously with his hind legs. One is trying to abduct a woman with a child in her arms; one is being forcibly dragged back from a group of three women; another is seen held down by the hair of his head, while the knee of a Lapith is planted firmly in his back; numerous encounters of the most thrilling character are depicted.

On the Temple of Theseus, at Athens, the scenes portrayed are similar to those on the Temple of Apollo just enumerated. One of the Centaurs is hurling a stone upon his prostrate enemy, but, as a rule, out of compliment to Theseus, the victory seems to be with the Lapithae.

" In the Temple of Theseus," saith Pausanias, " is also painted the fight between the Centaurs and Lapithae. Theseus is represented as having just slain a Centaur, but with all the rest of the picture, the fight seems to be on equal terms."

In the Casa Buonarotti in Florence may be seen the bas-relief by Michelangelo of this scene. It is extremely confused heads, bodies, and legs (both human and equine) are inextricably mixed. The bodies of the Centaurs are difficult to distinguish from those of the heroes; but, as all the wounded persons in the foreground are bipeds, it must be assumed that Michelangelo believed that four feet

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were better than two, at any rate when it came to warfare. Such a natural cavalry would probably have overcome foot-soldiers, had the numbers not been unequal!

Canova's statue of Theseus and the Centaur in the Volksgarten, in Vienna, displays the great power of the hero, who has forced his opponent down upon his knees, crumpling his legs in a most regardless way; he has him by the throat, and, with his club in his right hand, is about to bring it down upon the monster's averted head. The figure is full of power, and, although a little academic, is among the best works of the master.

In the Louvre is an antique marble group of a Centaur ridden by Cupid. The Centaur, with both hands behind him, steps serenely on, his head thrown back, while the little conqueror urges him forward with his infant hand. The facial expression of the poor hybrid is pathetic full of yearning and suffer- ing. This view of him is milder and more human than most representations of its class.

In speaking of the statue of a Centaur ridden by Cupid, in the Borghese, Doctor Moore contributes a valuable thought. He says : " Among the antiques there is a Centaur in marble, with a Cupid mounted on his back. The latter has the cestus of Venus and the ivy-crown of Bacchus, in allusion to Beauty and Wine. He beats the Centaur with his

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fist, and seems to kick with violence to drive him along. The Centaur throws back his head and eyes with a look of remorse, as if he were unwilling, though forced, to proceed. The execution of this group is admired by those who look upon it merely as a jeu-d' esprit; but it acquires additional merit when considered allegorical of men who are hurried on by the violence of their passions, and lament their own weakness while they find themselves unable to resist."

Lucian tells of an interesting picture by Zeuxis, the famous Greek artist of the fourth century B. c., the subject being a family of Centaurs. Lucian saw a copy of this picture in Athens, and describes it vividly. There is much originality displayed in the details, considering the early date of its production. In this picture " on a grass-plat of the most glossy verdure lies the Centauress, with the whole equine part of her stretched on the ground, the hind feet extending backwards, while the upper female part is gently raised and reclining on one elbow." Two young ones are with her ; one, in her arms, is a Cen- taur baby. The male Centaur stands near them, " looking down upon her with a complacent smile, holding up in one hand the whelp of a lion, as if jocosely to frighten his little ones with it." A curi- ous domestic scene, truly!

The Centaurs, however, indulged in occasional

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civil warfare; all scenes were not as peaceful as that just described. Antonio Pollajuolo, who loved a clear line better for its own sake than for where it might lead his pencil, left us a strange conception of Centaurs in his engraving, The Strife of the Cen- taurs. Two weird creatures, one rather like the usual Centaur represented in art, and the other with the body and feet of a lion, are fighting vigorously before an admiring group of three men in elaborate armour chiefly of Roman conceit. The Centaur with the horse's body is in the centre of the compo- sition, and is down on one front knee (by the way, his hoofs are carefully shod with nailed shoes), while with both arms he raises above his head a formi- dable weapon composed of a club with three great metal balls attached to it by long chains. With this flail-like club he is about to strike his adversary, who, with the body of a lion, thickly clustered with tufts of hair, and with long claws, is attacking him with both his well-armed forefeet, as well as with a similar weapon, which he holds on high. The faces and heads of these creatures are brutish, with shocks of unkempt hair, and their gnarled muscles show up clearly through their skin.

The solemn ascetic Centaur of Botticelli, which occurs in his great picture in the Royal Gallery in Florence, of Pallas and the Centaur, is a myth out of season. He has survived longer than he is

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needed, and he feels his loneliness and redundancy in the days of the Medici. He is not a classic beast; he could not meet Theseus in battle; he is kindly disposed, tired, and worn out, wishing only to be let alone, and not teased.

In the Capitoline Museum is a fine statue of a jovial Centaur stepping along gaily, snapping his fingers, and carrying a garlanded twig over his shoulder. The skin of a wild animal is slung care- lessly across his arm. This figure is perhaps the most typical of any of the artistic representations of the Centaurs.

The statue of the Centaur being slain by Hercules in the Loggia di Lanzi in Florence, is one of Giovanni da Bologna's most powerful creations. The brute seems anatomically possible, as he crouches on his four legs under the strong pressure of the demigod, who is bending the human part of the creature's spine backward at a terrible angle. Hercules evidently has designs upon his solar plexus, which he is about to strike with his club. The vanquished Centaur is feebly resisting, with his hands, but is unable to do much in his own defence.

ANTIQUE BRONZE. A CENTAUR.

CHAPTER XII.

PERSEUS

PERSEUS was the son of Jupiter and Danae. On the pedestal of the statue of Perseus, by Cellini, in the Loggia di Lanzi in Florence, is a statuette of Danae, the boy Perseus seated at her feet. The figure is extremely charming, it is also the work of Cellini.

The first adventure of Perseus was the quest of Medusa. She was the most terrible of the Gorgons ; the mere sight of her face had the power of turn- ing a man to stone. This uncanny quality made her a difficult foe to attack. Apollodorus describes the Gorgons : " Their heads were wreathed with snakes, they had teeth like the tusks of a wild boar, hands of bronze, and golden wings."

Perseus set out with the determination of reduc- ing these terrible sisters to subjection. Mercury and Minerva aided him. Minerva gave him her own shield, which reflected images like a mirror. Mer-

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cury gave him his own winged sandals, so that Perseus might fly through the air upon this perilous undertaking, while Pluto lent him a magic helmet, which had the power of rendering the wearer invis- ible.

The sea-maidens bore these gifts to Perseus. Burne-Jones has composed a beautiful decorative picture of the arming of Perseus on the shore. He is in the act of adjusting one of the winged sandals, while the three maidens, sober as Botticelli's Graces, stand by, with the helmet and the other sandal. In their statuesque grace these figures, with their beautiful clinging draperies, are a delightful link- ing between mediaeval sentiment and a cultivated appreciation and accurate knowledge of all things Greek. At a temple of Athena among the Lace- daemonians, Pausanias tells us of a relief of " the nymphs giving Perseus, as he is starting for Libya and Medusa, the invisible cap and the sandals with which he could fly through the air."

First Perseus visited the cave of the Graie, three grim sisters who lived in loneness and sorrow, hav- ing but one eye between them, which they passed about from one to the other. Perseus, invisible, swooped down upon the poor blind creatures, and stole the eye as it was on its way from one sister to another. Before he would restore this, their one priceless possession, he forced them to tell him the

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way to the Gorgon's island. Burne- Jones again has painted the Graie with all the feeling of a poet; the three bent forms, lovely in their impotence, reaching helplessly about for their missing member, are pathetic in their rhythmical decorative grace. The expression of yearning and groping is wonder- fully portrayed.

Knowing the fate which awaited any one who should behold the face of Medusa, Perseus winged his way carefully, and approached the Gorgon while she slept. Then, descending rapidly through the air, holding the burnished shield so that it reflected the image of Medusa, by its aid, as it were in a mirror, he cut off her head.

One of the metopes, from a temple of Selinous in Sicily, represents Perseus slaying the Gorgon, in the presence of Minerva. At first glance one would sup- pose that this was intended for a burlesque, so absolutely ridiculous are the human proportions and the facial expressions. The work is that of the early sixth century B. c. Individually each leg and arm are studied carefully, probably from living models ; but the relations of the various parts to the whole is absurd. Medusa, kneeling, has Pegasus cuddled under her arm. Her face is as large as her whole body, and the expression that of a staring grin ; Perseus, holding her by the hair with one hand (the top of his person facing the spectator, while

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his legs are in profile), is in the act of applying a knife to the Gorgon's throat, while he smiles genially from between an enormous pair of ears. He wears a hat like Mercury's, and a couple of Ionian volutes appear to be strapped to his ankles in lieu of wings. Minerva, with a peevish expres- sion, faces straight out, while her feet are both seen at full length turning to the right. All the person- ages are slightly cross-eyed, which adds to the general effect. This metope may be seen reproduced in Von Reber's " History of Ancient Art," and is well worth examining.

The Perseus and the Gorgon, in the Farnesina, by Peruzzi, is original, although it is stiff and too con- ventional in treatment. The figures are on the clouds. A colossal Victory blows her horn above them.

One of the most famous statues in the world is the Perseus of Benvenuto Cellini. As it stands in the Loggia di Lanzi, it has intense life and sinewy grace. Cellini, while he had the wit of a courtier, had the soul of an animal. In making statues he expressed, not his wit, but his soul, and the result is vacuity of facial expression, with fine animal proportions. The account of the casting of this statue in Cellini's biography is one of the most thrilling chapters in art history. The episode is also well given by Longfellow in his " Michael Angelo."

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"And ah! that casting! What a wild scene it was as, late at night, A night of wind, and rain, we heaped the furnace With pine of Serristori . . ."

Benvenuto relates how discouraged they all be- came, standing around the great blaze, and yet not seeing the result for which they had hoped:

"They all stood

" Bewildered and desponding ; and I looked Into the furnace, and beheld the mass Half-molten only, and in my despair I fed the fire with oak, whose terrible heat Soon made the sluggish metal shine and sparkle. Then followed a bright flash, and an explosion As if a thunderbolt had fallen among us. The covering of the furnace had been rent Asunder, and the bronze was flowing over, So that I straightway opened all the sluices To fill the mould. The metal ran like lava, Sluggish and heavy; and I sent my workmen To ransack the whole house, and bring together My pewter plates and pans, two hundred of them, And cast them one by one into the furnace, To liquify the mass, and in a moment The mould was filled ! I fell upon my knees And thanked the Lord ; and then we ate and drank And went to bed, all hearty and contented."

In spite of the fact that many criticisms may be made upon the Perseus, it is certainly a triumph of ornamental sculpture. The rearing grace of the

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figure, extended by the arm held aloft, and by the fact that it is standing on the fallen Gorgon, gives a soaring impression to the whole work suggestive of victory. His contemporaries were wild with enthusiasm; sonnets and poems were written to the statue, and Cellini was the hero of the hour.

Canova sculptured " an elegant effeminate figure " of Perseus, as Taine calls it; that characterizes the work. Yet, in spite of all, the thoroughly classical head and general bearing are very beautiful. It is in the Vatican ; the profile is wonderfully Greek, and the turn of the helmeted head is reminiscent of the Apollo Belvedere. Ruskin, who is nothing if not intolerant about details which do not appeal to him, remarks that the Perseus of Canova is " entirely spoiled by an unlucky tassel in the folds of the mantle, which the next admirer of Canova who passes would do well to knock off." He goes on to qualify this almost iconoclastic advice by say- ing that it is because the tassel is an unnecessary truth to nature. There are certain " truths to nature " which Ruskin highly advocates ; for in- stance, a button, where a button is manifestly essen- tial; but a tassel where it is not needed is a sin against aesthetics.

The head of Medusa was a regularly recognized emblem of terror. In early days, appearing on coins, it was undisguised as a mask of hideousness. By

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degrees the type changed, and in later art Medusa was usually portrayed as a beautiful woman. In the Villa Ludovisi is a head of Medusa which is quite lovely, with no vestiges of the supernatural except tiny wings on the head, and, of course, the snaky locks.

Minerva, pleased at the prowess of her protege, took the head of Medusa as an ornament for her shield. In all periods of art this is usually seen in the centre of the goddess's shield. It typifies intense cold. Serpents were associated with the idea of coldness by the Greeks. The Gorgon's head on Minerva's shield signifies the " cloudy coldness of knowledge, and its venomous character," accord- ing to Ruskin.

The most realistic and thrilling Medusa's head is that in the Uffizi, usually attributed to Leonardo da Vinci. Later critics generally agree that this was painted afterward from a description by Vasari, taken from the original, which was for a long time in the possession of Cosimo I. de Medici. It was, un- doubtedly, one of the greatest works of Leonardo, and this copy from Vasari is made with sympathy and appreciation. The original was on a panel cut from the heart of a fig-tree, and shaped like the shield of Perseus. Vasari speaks of it as " the most strange and extravagant invention that could possi- bly be conceived." The story goes that Leonardo,

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when about to paint this head of Medusa, brought into his house one day a regular collection of creatures, toads, vipers, newts, lizards, all varieties of reptiles upon which he could lay his hands. And the result was this horrible, loathsome bit of realism, too convincing and well-executed to be relegated among things simply disgusting, this " snake-enwoven head," says Symonds, " exhal- ing poisonous vapour from the livid lips."

There seems to have been a substratum of history to the story of Medusa. Pausanias says : "To omit fable, it has been recorded of her that . . . she ruled over the people that lived near the Tritonian Marsh, and used to go out hunting, and led the Libyans to battle, and moreover resisted with her army the power of Perseus, though picked men followed him from Peloponnese, but she was treacherously slain by night, and Perseus, marvelling at her beauty even after death, cut off her head and brought it home to display to the Greeks."

Among modern works, the Perseus of M. Blanc stands out strikingly. The vigorous youth, mounted on Pegasus, is flying high over the low shore coun- try, with the Gorgon's head held aloft in his hand, its mouth still open, and a very restrained growth of snakes writhing above the brow. The horse is flying away from the spectator, thus exhibiting the splendid muscles in the back of the hero. He turns

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his head, displaying his powerful throat and Greek profile.

When Perseus had successfully slain the Gorgon, he grasped the severed head firmly by the snaky hair, and, " bearing the memorable spoil of the viperous monster," says Ovid, " cut the yielding air on hissing wings," as he flew away over seas with his hideous burden, taking care to hold it so that he could not see the evil countenance.

On this flight he espied a maiden chained to a rock

Andromeda in all her nude beauty. He paused

at a glance he saw the situation. A nai've bit of realism slips into Ovid's account of the scene : " Un- consciously he takes fire and is astonished; capti- vated with the appearance of her beauty, he almost forgets to wave his wings in the air." Imagine the double disaster which would have ensued if such a state of things had quite come to pass ! He sees the monster advancing; he must act. He quickly de- scends to the earth, and drives a bargain with the parents of the maiden, that she is to be his if he preserves her life; they are hardly in a position to refuse. Ovid gives a glowing description of the attack upon the monster, which advanced, " moving the waves by the impulse of its breast." Suddenly, " the youth, spurning the earth with his feet, rose on high into the clouds. As the shadow of the hero was seen on the surface of the sea, the monster

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vented his fury on the shadow so beheld. And as the bird of Jove, when he has espied on the silent plain a serpent exposing his livid back to the sun, seizes it behind, and, lest it should turn upon him its raging mouth, fixes his greedy talons in its scaly neck, so did the winged hero, in his rapid flight through the yielding air, press the back of the monster, and thrust his sword up to the very hilt in its right shoulder, as it roared aloud."

Tatius, in the Greek novel, " Cleitophon and Leucippe," has given a graphic picture of Perseus and Andromeda, the earliest description of a painting of this subject which has come down to modern times. " For the painter," he says, " had roughened the bosom of the rock just as it comes from mother earth. And on this place stood An- dromeda, and the sight was, if you regarded the beauty alone, like to some newly carved statue; but if you considered only the chains and the great sea- monster, like to a rude and rough-hewn tomb. And in her face were mingled beauty and fear, for on her cheeks sat fear and in her eyes bloomed beauty, but neither was the pallor of her cheeks untinged by red, for a gentle blush o'erspread them, nor was the beauty of her eyes untroubled, since they were like to violets which were just beginning to fade. Even thus had the painter fashioned her beau- teous for all her fear. And her hands were stretched

Perseus 221

to the rock, arid a chain across them held them fast thereto. ... So she, bound thus, awaited death, standing all arrayed as a bride, and bedecked as one who should be the bride of Adonis. Her tunic fell to her feet, all white, of subtlest mesh, like to a spider's web; not made of the fleece of lambs, but of the wool of trees, such as the wives of India weave and spin, dragging it from the trees." This is an interesting allusion to cotton, which the Greeks em- ployed in their thinner draperies. " And right oppo- site to the maiden," continues Tatius, " from below, the great sea-monster is coming up, scattering the waves on either side of him." Then follows a real- istic description of the dragon, with his scales, ridges, and fins, and twisting tail. " Long and wide were his jaws, which opened right back to where his shoulders joined, and then came his stomach at once." A formidable beast, surely; and one admirably adapted to his work of consuming human victims. Then comes the climax of the scene. " Be- tween the monster and the maiden Perseus was painted, descending upon the monster all naked except for a cloak upon his shoulders, and sandals on his two feet like unto wings, and a cap covered his head ; ... in his left hand he grasped the Gorgon's head and held it before him like a shield. Fearful it is even in colours, . . . this was the weapon Perseus

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held in his left hand ; and his right hand was armed with a two-bladed weapon."

Pausanias says that at the spot where Perseus slew the dragon the water of a certain spring is '* reddish," and " very like blood ; " adding that " Perseus, after killing the sea-monster, to whom the daughter of Cephus was exposed, washed away the blood there."

There are in the Naples Museum, among a series of frescoes from Pompeii, scenes from the exploits of Perseus. In one of these, Perseus is seen refusing to show the Gorgon's head to Andromeda, after her deliverance. He finally compromises, and satisfies her justifiable curiosity by holding it over a stream of water, and letting her look at the reflection.

The rescue of Andromeda is depicted in a paint- ing by Titian in the Hermitage. For several years it was catalogued and considered to be by Tintcn retto, but it is now stated to be by Titian, or by one of his pupils. Andromeda is chained to the rock, quite nude; Perseus, making a mighty onslaught upon the dragon, is armed and protected by the shield with the Gorgon's head upon it. Andromeda is an example of the type usually chosen by Titian, and much less like that selected by Tintoretto.

Piero di Cosimo, a decorative painter of the Renaissance, when he painted the legend of Perseus and Andromeda, executed five little mediaeval land-

Perseus 223

scapes, with figures sprinkled in to tell his story, a very magnificent dragon careering among them. The landscapes are spoken of by Symonds as " made up by a strange amalgam of the most eccentric details; rocks toppling over blue bays, sea-caverns, and fantastic mountain ranges." Nevertheless, there is -not another Andromeda in art who is so appealing and so human ; her natural action in turning away, fainting and heartsick, at the sight of the brute, could not be more satisfactory. Vasari says of the dragon in the Perseus of Piero di Cosimo, " a more singular and fanciful specimen of a sea-monster could not easily be conceived than that which Piero has here imagined and depicted; the attitude of Perseus is fierce and menacing, as, lifting the sword in the air, he is preparing to destroy the monster. Andromeda is seen bound, and trembling between hope and despair; her countenance, finely express- ing those emotions, very beautiful. In the fore- ground are numerous figures, clothed in strange habiliments, and singing to the sound of various instruments; some of the heads of these figures, smiling in joy at the deliverance of Andromeda, are divinely beautiful; the landscape also is very fine, the colouring being exceedingly soft and grace- ful, every tint blended with the most perfect har- mony." Undoubtedly there is a sweet old-world charm about these quaint, stiff pictures of Peiro's;

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there is still left in them the thought and the striv- ing for intellectual expression, which is so character- istic of the earlier painters, and, alas ! so lacking in their more technically skilful successors.

Of course Rubens has painted Perseus and An- dromeda. There is no story, sacred or profane, in which nude women could be introduced, which has not been celebrated by a picture from this prolific hand. The painting is about what one would ex- pect. A short, fat, pink Dutchwoman, bound with clothes-line, leans in a distressed manner against a rock ; Perseus, in full armour, aided by two Cupids, is unfastening the cords in a whirl of exertion; the winged Pegasus stands by, rather annoyed that two other little Cupids are trying to mount his back. The dragon in the distant water is wallowing out his reptile existence. Taine observes that Rubens is the only artist who seems to have comprehended the " fluid softness of flesh," the " instantaneous." This may be true; but some of us prefer a firmer style of flesh than that. Certainly all humanity is not of jelly-fish texture.

The terrible dragon slain, Perseus assists An- dromeda to freedom. " Released from her chains, the virgin walks along, both the reward and the cause of his labours."

Among the earliest examples of Perseus and Andromeda in art is a marble relief in the Capitoline

Perseus

Museum. The dragon lies slain in the water, an amazing beast a cross between a dolphin and a shark and Perseus, one arm behind him in an attitude of rest, extends his right hand to a fully draped Andromeda, who is descending from the rock.

There is a Pompeian painting of Perseus leading Andromeda down from the rock, which is full of realism. Andromeda has lifted one foot to take a forward step; her arm is extended, and Perseus places his hand under her forearm, giving a very natural feeling of support. The figures are shapely and muscular.

Of these Pompeian and Herculaneum paintings Doctor Moore remarks : " The paintings brought from Herculaneum are perfect proofs that the ancients had made that progress in art which those pictures indicate; but do not form even a presump- tion that they had not made a much greater. The same school which formed the sculptor to correct- ness would form the painter to equal correctness in his drawings. . . . The best statues are correct in their proportions . . . these paintings are not cor- rect in their proportions."

From the spilt blood of Medusa sprang Pegasus, the winged steed afterward dear to the Muses. In many of the pictures of Perseus he is seen riding on this trusty poetic charger.

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In Rome, in the gallery of the Rospigliosi Palace, is the picture of Andromeda by Guido Reni, where Perseus, on Pegasus, is seen whirling through the air, his sword brandished nobly, but very badly ren- dered. The " strident " figure of Andromeda in this painting is inadequate from every point of view. Taine says, quite justly, we must admit, that this figure has " no form or substance ... in fact, is not a living existence, but only a combination of pleas- ing contours." Guido used to boast that he had " two hundred ways of making the eyes look up to heaven." This picture is one of the rare instances where a heroine of Guide's looks down instead of up intent upon the monster from below the deep !

Coypel's picture in the Louvre represents the scene in a tempestuous and brilliant way. Androm- eda, resting in a comfortable pose on her rock, is in the centre of a wild sea of waves. She lifts one shackled hand toward Perseus with the air of an ennuyee granting a favour. Perseus is hurtling down head first in an alarming way upon the beast, who is an exotic creation composed of plate-armour, with search-lights for eyes. There are numerous sea-nymphs disporting in the billows, who all show so much more terror at Perseus than at the dragon, that one comprehends that, to the aquatic mind, a flying man was more to be dreaded than a sea-ser- pent. On the shore at the right, on rocks by a battle-

Perseus 227

mented citadel, are the parents of Andromeda (who, by the way, were a king and queen), in accepted stage attitudes of despair and supplication. Cupid hovers over all with torch and bow, ready to put the finishing touches.

As one rehearses the numerous Andromedas in art, one is more and more struck with the truthful simplicity of stiff little Piero di Cosimo after all.

CHAPTER XIII.

MINOR MYTHS

FLORA was a goddess who grew up in Roman days ; she is not of Greek origin. There is a statue of Greek workmanship, called Flora; but Winckel- mann says that this was intended for one of the Muses, and was renamed later.

The best known Flora in the world that beauti- ful glowing canvas of Titian, with the smiling face above the dark rich white of the robe is the Flora of the Uffizi. So satisfying is the colour, tone, and form of this picture that one forgets to ask whether the woman be Roman or Venetian. Titian has been true to the tradition of the goddess, however, in one particular, she is a flower, and not a bud. She is no coy maiden, unacquainted with the world, but a fully developed woman, who has tried the pleasures which are her due, and is offering the roses which she has culled to others. The delicate draperies, of

finely creped muslin, contrast well with the deep

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TITIAN. FLORA

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damasks in tone and texture. The violet tone, such as is to be seen in this picture, is peculiar to Titian.

A charming idyll of the woods is a painting which was first exhibited in the Royal Academy some years ago, by Henrietta Rae, entitled Zephyrus wooing Flora. An exquisitely formed, slender girl, nude, with only a garland of flowers about her, is seated on the ground, in the midst of all kinds of spring verdure and roses, while a youth, light of tread, passing airily by, half-walking, half-flying, pauses to kiss her in his flight. The delicate touch of Zephyrus is portrayed with the utmost apprecia- tion. There is nothing Greek about the types; in the letter, it is British ; but in the spirit, classic.

One of the best-known and most charming Floras is that of Botticelli in his Allegory of Spring ; with her beautiful flowery gauzes, and her quaint, long- faced smile, she is like an old friend which every one recognizes, stepping along in her stilted jaunti- ness. Usually called an Allegory of Spring, Botti- celli's delightful silvery tempera painting at the Florentine Academy deals with classic subjects in his usual mediaeval way. The picture has been variously explained; upon the whole, the most generally accepted interpretation is, that the central figure, Venus, is a portrait study of one of the Medici; people in high life were often painted as divinities; we all remember Lady Hamilton as " Diana," and a

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French court beauty as " Hebe " ; why not a Medi- cean favourite as " Venus " ? The Graces dance be- fore her; Mercury is there, and Cupid, aiming an arrow at the three contorted and wistful Graces. The North Wind, at the right, is flying briskly about, blowing a torrent of air toward the figure which represents Spring: the wild flowers are bub- bling forth from her lips, and not in a very artistic way. The detail of the fine worker and the goldsmith is employed in this painting. The people are half pagan, with mediaeval church consciences. Vernon Lee calls them " goddesses and nymphs, whose clinging garments the gentle Sandro has assuredly studied from some old statue of Faustina or Agrippina; but what strange, livid tints are there beneath these draperies; what eccentric ges- tures are those of the nymphs ; what a green, ghost- like light illumines the garden of Venus ! " They are, as she says, " incorporeal daughters of dew and gossamer and mist." Highly ornamental and decor- ative, the Primavera was probably a votive picture to the charms of this particular local Venus; as W. J. Stillman suggests : " Mercury indicates com- mercial prosperity; Cupid, her fascination; the Graces, her personal charms; the Spring group, the awakening life and Renaissance of the regime; the orchard, the prosperity of the realm," etc. The general form of the composition is pyramidal,-*

flDinor flDstbs 23*

Cupid considered as an apex in the triangle, the lines fall off slightly below on each side. The picture is generally conceded to have been inspired by a pas- sage of Lucretius in " De Rerum Natura." I quote from Busby's translation :

"Lo! Spring advances with her kindling powers, And Venus beckons to the laughing hours; Fly the winged zephyrs forth, and all things move The earth to beauty, and the soul to love : Maternal Flora wakes her opening buds, With sweetest odours fills the groves and woods With flowers of richest dyes prepares the way For rosy Pleasure and the genial May."

The picture is " exquisitely poetic," as Symonds observes, " and yet the true spirit of the Latin verse has not been seized, but something special to the artist, and significant to the Medici, has been added. There is none of the Roman largeness and freedom in its style. Venus and her Graces are even some- what melancholy, and their movements savour of affectation."

The Three Graces were originally known as the Charites. The grace for which they stood was a mental and spiritual grace, which later came to signify beauty of body. This may be said to be something of a degeneration in the myth. They are associated with the Fates. They were at first

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represented, like Venus, entirely draped, as in an early bas-relief in the Vatican ; but by degrees they, too, were despoiled of their draperies, and perfection of limb superseded purity of intention, while beauty of face predominated over kindness of heart. One of the most beautiful representations of the Graces, after their emancipation from clothes, is a marble group in Siena, which is reported to have served Raphael as a model and inspiration while he worked in that city.

The Three Graces of Bonifazio Bembo, in Turin, is a gracefully disposed group of figures. The nude girls have little of the feminine in their proportions ; the general outlines of their bodies are more like those of youths. Two of the heads are rather ex- pressionless, and far from beautiful, but the head of the Grace at the right, turned in profile, is ex- tremely effective.

Taine gives such an exquisite description of the fresco of Tintoretto in the Ducal Palace, repre- senting the Three Graces, that it is a temptation to quote it entire; at any rate, an extract from these interesting criticisms will be welcome. Taine says : " All three are deflected : with Tintoretto a body is not a living one when its posture is passive. . . . One of them, seated, extends her arms, and the light that falls on her flank makes portions of her face, neck, and bosom glow against the vague pur-

ANTIQUE MARBLE. THE THREE GRACES.

/BMnor flDstbs 233

pie of the shadow. Her sister, kneeling, with down- cast eyes, takes her hand; a long gauze, fine, like those silvery webs of the fields brightened by the morning dawn, clings around the waist and expands over the bosom whose blush it allows to appear. In the other hand she holds a blooming bunch of flowers, ascending upward, and resting their snowy purity on the ruddy whiteness of the ample arms. The third, tortuous, displays herself in full, and from neck to heel the eye follows the embracing of the muscles covering the superb framework of the spine and hips."

There is a picture in the Villa Borghese by Titian, which is officially called the Three Graces, but some- times goes by the name of the Arming of Cupid. In either case, the Graces are carrying out this good work. One is occupied in tying a bandage about the eyes of the willing little victim, a second " Amor " is leaning on her shoulder, giving her some whispered hints, which she pauses to hear. Another of the Graces has the quiver, well filled, which she is ready to present to Cupid, while the third, stand- ing, offers the bow. The figures are seen in half- length. The glowing colouring and soft modelling constitute the most marked charms of the picture.

In the Uffizi is a group of the Three Graces by Rubens. These nude women have not as much superfluous flesh as is usual in Rubens's ideals ; they

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are rather graceful as they stand in statuesque poses, and the fact that the work on them is rough and sketchy adds a charm which we often miss in the overblown smooth pinkness of Rubens's flesh.

Palma Vecchio painted a picture usually called the Three Sisters, sometimes alluded to as Three Graces. They are simply grandly tricked out Vene- tian gentlewomen, handsome and disdainful, in no wise suggesting a classic theme.

The Graces of Raphael, in the Farnesina frescoes (which, as a connected whole, form the story of Cupid and Psyche), are finely modelled women on the order of the Galatea. While they are nude, they are so arranged as to form a perfectly modest and very harmonious group. They occupy a triangular space on a spandrel. One of them sits with her back toward the spectator, her lower limbs extending down into the point of the triangle ; one is seated so that her figure balances the one just alluded to (and that of Cupid on the left), and the other, seen only to the waist, fills the space left at the broad top of the composition.

An attendant of Juno in heaven is Iris, goddess of the rainbow. The most familiar picture of Iris is that by Guido Head, in the Gallerie san Luca in Rome. The figure flies through the air, with a full scarf of drapery bowing out behind her, and holds above her head a small jug-shaped vase with a single

/IMnor flDstbs 235

handle. The picture lacks force, but is a favourite for popular reproduction. The rainbow is seen crossing the background.

Hebe and Ganymede, the cup-bearers to the gods, are minor divinities in Olympus, who appear con- stantly in the heavenly gatherings, and yet are not frequently seen alone as subjects for the painter. Hebe was a daughter of Jupiter and Juno; she is reported to have resigned her office as attendant on her parents to become the wife of Hercules. Crawford's marble group in the Boston Art Mu- seum represents Hebe reluctantly giving the cup to Ganymede, while he looks upon her with sympathy as he takes it.

Hebe occurs seldom in art. Ancient statues of her are not numerous. One bas-relief represents her on her knees, in the attitude of supplicating, hav- ing been superseded as cupbearer by Ganymede. As a rule her dress is tucked up away from her feet, so that she may be unhampered by draperies in the performance of her duties.

Canova's Hebe is rather familiar to most of us; it is a marble statue, nude to the waist, young delicate the head refined and elegant one hand high above her head holding a small vase, quite in- adequate to the demands of her calling, unless it be understood to be constantly replenished by miracle. In her other hand she holds a cup.

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A rather graceful but affected piece of work is the Hebe of Pellegrino, in the Gallerie san Luca in Rome. Hebe, half-sitting, half-reclining on a couch, holds aloft in both hands a cup of exquisite design, from which an eagle drinks. The bird in this case represents Jupiter in one of his many disguises. Pellegrino signifies " the rare " " the extraordi- nary." While this title seems hardly justified by the results of Pellegrino's labour, yet, comparing him with other painters of his school, that of Fruili, it is not remarkable that he was so con- sidered.

Ganymede, the beautiful Trojan boy whom Jupi- ter carried off to succeed Hebe in heaven, is more frequently represented in art than his predecessor. Even in helping himself to his servants, Jupiter considered it necessary to assume a disguise, in the case in point, he descended upon Ganymede in the form of an eagle. " Yet into no bird does he vouchsafe to be transformed, but that which can carry his bolts . . . striking the air with his ficti- tious wings," continues Ovid, " he carries off the youth . . . who even now mingles his cups for him."

The antique statue of Ganymede and the eagle, in the museum in Naples, is a charming boy's figure. He stands with his arm around the shoulders of the bird of Jove, which looks into his face. Ganymede

PELLEGRINO. HEBE.

rtMnor jflD^tbs 237

wears a little shepherd's cap, and has luxuriant curls. This is not a work of the best period of Greek art, but is very pleasing.

The Ganymede of Leochares is another famous group, in which the eagle is seen soaring aloft, with the youth held just below the shoulders, as he is being lifted from the ground, one arm raised, and an expression of fear on his face. His dog sits barking at the side, a naturalistic touch which Correggio afterward adopted for his Ganymede in Vienna. In this beautiful picture the rampant bird has grasped the boy by his scarf and his shoulder, and the graceful little figure droops below, one arm about the eagle's neck, and his face turned with wistful gaze toward the spectator. The little dog, on the ground below, whose back is seen, is objecting strenuously. The eagle and the boy in this picture are flying in a most convincing way, far above the earth. The arrangements of foreshortening and perspective are most beautiful, and in Correggio's best vein.

Rembrandt has burlesqued this incident in his famous caricature in Dresden, where he represents Ganymede as a howling infant, being borne off against his will by the eagle.

A Ganymede seated on the back of the eagle, and thus being carried off actually riding, is the con- ception of the subject as treated by the sculptor

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Bartholomew. The figure is charmingly graceful, and the composition agreeable. The boy, however, is holding by the edge of the eagle's wing a mani- fest impossibility during flight!

Michelangelo's Ganymede has been copied twice, once in miniature, by Giulio Clovio, and once in oils for the palace at South Kensington.

A Ganymede by an unknown artist, in the Na- tional Gallery in London, is given by J. B. Stough- ton to Tintoretto. It was probably painted for a ceil- ing, but can be better appreciated as it is now hung.

Above the fresco of Polyphemus hurling the rock at Acis, Caracci has painted the Rape of Ganymede. The arrangement is quite usual, the eagle bearing the boy in his talons, one arm of Ganymede about the neck of the bird, while both have equal appearance of flying.

In Dresden is a Ganymede attributed to Parmigi- ano, which Morelli gives to Dosso Dossi.

The story of the Calydonian Hunt, given by Ovid, is one of the most dramatic scenes in Greek mythol- ogy. It is as picturesque as that of Perseus and Andromeda. A terrible boar of supernatural pro- portions and powers, one of Diana's inflictions upon a people from whom she did not receive what she deemed sufficient homage, was laying waste the fields of Calydon, and he was finally put to death by the young Meleager, who, by this act of prowess,

239

won for his bride the fair Atalanta. This is Ovid's account of the adventure. Describing the beast, he says : " His eyes shine with blood and flames, his rough neck is stiff, bristles, too, stand up like spikes, thickly set; like palisades do those bristles project, just like high spikes." The youths who go out to kill him are described by name, the pedigree of each being given in the conscientious way habitual with Ovid, ending up with Atalanta, " the glory of the Lycian groves." Ovid says that her dress and bear- ing was such as would suggest a boy, if one con- sidered her as a maid, while she was too feminine in her loveliness to be a boy. The young hero Mele- ager fell in love at first sight. When Meleager killed the boar, as, of course, was his destiny, he laid the hideous but gratifying trophy at the feet of the maiden, who accepted it ; " the giver of the present, as well as the present, are a source of pleasure to her."

In Pompeii there was found a charming fresco of Atalanta and Meleager, which is now in Naples. Meleager, with two hounds, holding his spear, is seated, with the dead boar on the ground near by. Atalanta accepts the offering, her figure delightfully drawn. There are two youths standing near, and the statue of Diana is seen behind Meleager.

Meleager bringing the boar's head to Atalanta has been painted by Rubens in his customary manner.

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Two brawny Flanders peasants are looking into one another's eyes the man lovingly, as he under- stands love, and the woman simperingly, with her stupid big eyes and her receding chin. Meleager presents the dripping boar's head to Atalanta, who expresses her joy at the delicate tribute by placing her hand on her heart. The dead body of the boar lies on the ground, and the dogs sniff about, while a Cupid, who is so stiff with fat that one marvels to see him able to get about, assists at the presentation.

There is a statue in the Vatican of Meleager with the boar's head by him. The head of this Meleager has a square shape, not unlike that of Napoleon ; the expression of the face is that of an obstinate, deter- mined man, full of vigour, a hunter-warrior, not intellectual, but entirely beautiful in the physical sense. The torso is magnificent, the neck powerful, and the thigh and ankle as much an indication of his characteristics as the head.

The Fates sometimes appear in scenes of the Death of Meleager.; in Rubens's picture a hag is seen in the clouds, but she suggests a Fury much more than a Fate, and is probably the departing spirit of the boar which has been slain. In alluding to the Furies Pausanias says : " ^schylus first represented them with snakes twined in their hair; but in the statues here, either of them or any other of the infernal gods, there is nothing horrible."

flDinor flD$tbs 241

In the Prado is a picture by Poussin, representing Atalanta heading the boar-hunt. The landscape is effective, showing statues of Pan and Diana.

There seem to have been shrines with relics even in classic times ; according to Pausanias, Meleager's spear which killed the Calydonian Boar was kept in the Temple of Persuasion, in Corinth. " Here, too," adds Pausanias, " are deposited the flutes of Marsyas." The hide of the Calydonian Boar itself was also reported by him as being enshrined in a temple in Tegea; he describes it attractively as " rotten with lapse of time, and nearly devoid of hair."

There was another maiden named Atalanta, who won fame for herself as well as did the Calydonian huntress. This Atalanta was also a sporting damsel. She was a great athlete, and, among other things, celebrated for her speed in running. An oracle had once been so indiscreet as to tell this lovely maiden that marriage would be fatal to her happiness. Therefore Atalanta would see nothing of the youths who came to woo. Finally she consented to marry such a man as should conquer her in a race, but the understanding was that, if she won the race, the man was to die. Hippomenes, the son of Neptune, fell in love with the damsel, and consented to the terms. But before he entered the race, Venus gave him three golden apples, and, herself invisible to the con-

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course of people, whispered to Hippomenes how to use them in the contest.

"They both started, he by one stride first, For she half-pitied him, so beautiful, Running to meet his death; yet was resolved To conquer."

Thus has Walter Savage Landor drawn in a few expressive words the scene of this start. But as Atalanta was overtaking him, Hippomenes, true to the instructions of Venus,

" From his hand now dropped A golden Apple; she looked down and saw A glitter on the grass, yet on she ran. He dropped a second; now she seemed to stoop; He dropped a third, and now she stooped indeed, Yet swifter than a wren picks up a grain Of millet, raised her head; it was too late Hippomenes had touched the maple goal."

i

Thus was Atalanta won, through her feminine curiosity in not being able to pass an object which she could not understand!

This scene is made familiar by the charming painting by Poynter. The spectators are gathered along the course, the steps of the temple are crowded, and a little theatre is seen beyond. All eyes turn to the two figures in the open space on the race-track. Hippomenes, a stalwart youth, is speed-

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ing forward, in splendid action and poise, while Atalanta, her draperies all whirling with the sudden reversal, has stooped, turning back to pick up the apple. The foreshortening of this exquisite girl's figure is one of the technical triumphs of modern art.

A less well-known rendering of the scene is by Guido Reni, in a picture in the Naples Museum. In this, the background is so dark that one loses thought of the multitude. The two figures are alone, and occupy the whole canvas. The incident is the same as that selected by Poynter, Atalanta stoops to reach the apple, and in that instant Hippomenes darts by, and wins the race. A spirited scene, in both cases : there is more thought in the painting by Poynter, but Guido Reni, too, has put much skill, action, and beauty, into his figures, although the fly- ing scarfs with which they are draped are the very last sort of handicap which Greeks would have permitted in a contest of speed!

Among earthly heroes who tried to rival the powers of the gods was Daedalus, architect and sculptor in the reign of Theseus. He tried to fly with wings of his own manufacture, and he and his son, who were imprisoned in a labyrinth which Daedalus himself had constructed, determined to make their escape in this manner. In the Villa Albani in Rome is a bas-relief showing Daedalus at

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work at a bench, while Icarus stands by, with one wing held ready to be adjusted, and the other behind him. Systematically did the father go to work upon the wings. One could almost construct such a pair from Ovid's description of their manufacture : " He arranges the feathers in order, beginning from the least, the shorter ones succeeding the longer, so that you might suppose they grew on an incline. Thus does the rustic pipe sometimes rise by degrees, with unequal straws. Then he binds those ... in the middle with thread, and the lowermost ones with wax, and thus ranged, with a gentle curvature, he bends them so as to imitate the real wings of birds."

There is a delightful modern painting by Vien, representing the episode of fastening the wings to the shoulders of Icarus. The eager boy, pointing to the distant sky, holds in his hand a bunch of feathers from which his father, standing behind him, is selecting a few to make some finishing touches. The pan of melted wax is on the ground. The figure of the boy is excellently modelled.

But the most interesting conception of this scene is a sculptured group by Canova in the Venice Academy. It is one of the best things that Canova ever did, both in its modelling and in its appreciative delineation of character. For Daedalus, intent on this success, is working eagerly, strapping the first

CANOVA DAEDALUS AND ICARUS.

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section of the wing on the back of the youth's arm ; he holds it in place with one hand, while with the other he pulls the string with which it is being fastened. The boy's expression of pleasurable anticipation and importance, mixed with a little timidity, is well portrayed. He holds his head back, and looks down at his shoulder, holding his arm stiff and firm so that the work may proceed satisfactorily. When all is made ready, the father gives his advice :

" ' My Icarus,' he says, ' I warn thee, fly Along the middle track, nor low, nor high; If low, thy plumes may flag with ocean's spray; If high, the sun may dart his fiery ray.' "

OVID.

For awhile the boy obeyed, and flew smoothly through the ether; but by degrees his impetuous youth and careless enjoyment made him incautious ; flying too near the sun, the tragic fate overtook him. He fell into the river and was drowned. As Ovid tells it : " The wax was melted : he shook his naked arms, and, wanting his oar-like wings, he caught no more air." Darwin has sung a dirge upon this theme :

"With melting wax and loosened strings Sunk hapless Icarus on unfaithful wings: Headlong he rushes thro' the affrighted air With limbs distorted and dishevelled hair; His scattered plumage danced upon the wave, And sorrowing Nereids decked his watery grave."

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An exquisite painting of a decorative character is to be seen in the Tate Gallery, in London. It is entitled " The Lament for Icarus," by Herbert J. Draper. Icarus, fallen, prone, on a rocky shore, his great wings spread on either side of him, lies with his head turned on one side, while the sea-maidens cluster about, trying to aid him. The perfectly limp droop of the figure and the useless abundance of the richly feathered wings suggest a whole sermon on misapplied energy. The lights are soft and mellow, and the whole picture is a poem.

In the Palazzo del Te, Daedalus, by Giulio Ro- mano, is represented as instructing Icarus how to fly; in another picture Icarus is seen about to fall; as the painting is on the ceiling above, the illusion is quite painful. The face of the boy shows agony of dread, and the sun's power is made visible in the seared wax on the drooping wings.

The historical basis for the legend of Icarus is, probably, that Daedalus invented sails, and, as Pau- sanias tells us, he and his son escaped from prison by sailboats; " Icarus steering his boat rather awk- wardly, it upset, they say, and he was drowned."

" All the works of Daedalus," says Pausanias, " are somewhat odd to look at ; but there is a won- derful inspiration about them." He describes a statue in wood, representing Hercules. Several wooden statues of the gods were built by Daedalus.

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Jason, one of the youths in the Calydonian Hunt, was afterward famous for administering an opiate to the huge dragon who guarded the Golden Fleece, and afterward slaying the creature.

Salvator Rosa's drawing for Jason killing the dragon proves to us, just as his " Temptation of St. Jerome " in the Pitti Palace proves, that Rosa knew the great and original Jabberwock. Here is Jason in its coils; undoubtedly Teniel came here for inspiration when he was illustrating " Alice Through the Looking-glass."

Turner's Jason, in the Liber Studiorum, has, as Ruskin says, " not a bit of Greek about him. He is a simple warrior of no period in particular; nay, I think there is something of the nineteenth century about his legs." Turner is always cramped when local colour of a classical kind is demanded. Ruskin feels that the restrained quality in this picture is, however, intellectual. The tree-trunks are trans- formed into dragons, but there are " no more claws nor teeth nor manes nor stinging tails ; we have the dragon, like everything else, by the middle. We need see no more of him. All his horror is in that fearful slow grinding upheaval of the single coil." About the warrior, too, there is little flourish ; " no flaunting plumes, nor brandished lances, but stern purpose in the turn of the crestless helmet, visible victory in the drawing back of the prepared right

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arm behind the steady point." One should observe the light tree-trunk to the left of this picture, for it gives depth to the gloom which spreads over the rest of the scene.

Perhaps the Laocoon is the most expressive group of sculpture among the antique; Sir Joshua Rey- nolds points out that the expression is not complex that it is only the expression of pain. The statue is executed entirely with the chisel, even to the finishing strokes; but it has been said by some critics that it was first finished with a rasp or file, and the chisel marks added afterward to give the impression of facility and roughness combined. Whether the Greeks were capable of such duplicity we will leave it to connoisseurs to determine.

The German editor of Winckelmann says of the Laocoon, " It is a miracle, the sum and abstract of all art."

Two characteristics meet in the Laocoon; the majesty of endurance, uttering no cry, is reminiscent of the ancient formal ideal of the Greeks; the terrible subject, the realism of the composition, and the evidences of suffering in the sons, suggest the later standards of art. It is a link between the old and the new conceptions of representation.

The right leg of the elder son is considered to be one of the finest bits of modelling in ancient art. Baccio Bandinelli being employed to restore the right

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arm of the Laocoon, he made a model in wax of the same, by which a good result was obtained, and the restoration was considered satisfactory. Bandinelli then devoted himself to making a Laocoon of his own design, his study of the antique group having inspired him with a desire to try and compete with it. The statue was completed in about two years, and, in 1525, it was in the Medici Palace. It is now in the Uffizi.

CHAPTER XIV.

HEROES OF THE TROJAN WAR

THE Judgment of Paris has always been a fa- vourite and responsive subject for artists. The scene is highly pictorial in its possibilities. The Apple of Discord, thrown at a feast, and inscribed " To the Fairest," is claimed by Venus, Juno, and (strange to say) Minerva. The blue-stocking goddess has, after all, a human longing for admiration. After some debate, the young shepherd lad, Paris, is made arbiter, and he, of course, pronounces in favour of Venus. Ever after, as we know, to his temporal joy, but also to his moral cost, he is under the patronage and protection of Aphrodite.

In the National Gallery in London is Rubens's famous Judgment of Paris. The languishing shep- herd is seated at the right, with his eyes riveted upon the central figure of the group of goddesses before him. These are distinguished chiefly by their well-known attributes; Minerva is standing with

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VAN DER WERFF. JUDGMENT OF PARIS.

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her arms above her head, a shield and helmet on the ground beside her; Juno is accompanied by her peacock, which is screeching at Paris's dog.

The Judgment of Paris by Luca Giordano, in the Hermitage, represents Paris leaning his left arm carelessly against the rock by which he is seated, holding the apple in his hand. Juno is removing the sandal from her left foot; Minerva, also seated, is discarding her last garment. Venus, in quiet assurance, is looking at Paris. A little Cupid attends her, while in the air above hover two doves. Mercury is seen behind the others. There is a replica of this picture in Berlin, painted in 1768.

A refined, pleasing Judgment of Paris, in Dresden, is painted by Adriaen van der Werff, early in the eighteenth century. Paris, seated in the cool shade, under a thick tree, has just presented the apple to Venus, who stands, in good contrast to Paris, in the full sunlight, with Cupid by her side. She is entirely nude, but drawn with delicate feeling, and her figure is well proportioned, slight, and graceful. Juno and Minerva, clothed, the latter in helmet and cuirass, are turning their backs upon Paris and Venus, talking together, consoling each other, really very much as they would have been liable to do under the circumstances, cheering each other with excuses and explanations, and quoting reasons why the youth was deluded into such error of judg-

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ment. Mercury, in deep shadow, is coming up from a declivity in the background to hear the decision. The picture is somewhat fanciful, and so is the story; it is ideal, and so is the situation. On the whole, it is much more satisfactory than most treatments of the theme. Morelli sums up the characteristics of Van der Werff : " A dazzling, glaring ultra- marine," is the blue that this artist admires; the forms of his figures are long and affected ; a minia- ture-like gloss is seen in details (which applies par- ticularly to the apple which Venus holds), while the foreground is finished with the utmost delicacy and primness.

A strange French conception of the Judgment of Paris is that of Watteau in the Louvre. It is so obviously painted simply to display the nude back of Venus (the rest of the figures being sketched in carelessly and all out of drawing), that it hardly deserves to be classed among mythological subjects at all. It is a painting of a nude Parisian model of Watteau's day. The thin-legged Minerva, with her Gorgon shield, and the simpering Juno in brocade and stays, require no comment.

Marcantonio engraved a Judgment of Paris from a design of Raphael. The grave goddesses stand about the shepherd lad, while a river-god, with superb anatomy, reposes on the reedy shore.

When Paris had thus pronounced Venus the

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Queen of Beauty, she had promised him that she would give him a woman as lovely as herself to be his bride. There was but one such woman: that she was already the bride of Menelaus did not trouble Venus in the least. Fall in love with Helen of Troy Paris should; and fall in love he did. Venus was responsible for the whole thing, having planned it from the first.

The scene of the plot of Venus and Cupid to entangle Paris and Helen is displayed on an ancient bas-relief, where Cupid is seen conducting Paris to gaze on the perfections of Helen, who is seated with Venus, at the foot of a statue.

Paris became the guest of Menelaus and Helen; during his stay, he had opportunity to make love to the wife, and she agreed to elope with him.

David's picture of Paris and Helen, in the Louvre, is the most exquisite and most classic of all the representations of the subject in art. Both of these figures might be antique statues suddenly endowed with life and warmth. Paris is sitting, and Helen stands by him. It would be difficult in any picture to match so subtle a drawing of surrender as is in the beautiful half-yielding form of Helen. Her head is faultlessly lovely; her downcast eyes show that she can appreciate that her decision is not the right one, but her languishing attitude proves that the decision is made. Her beautiful arm, hanging over his

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shoulder, that he may caress it, is indicative of her whole state; not eagerly, but passively and irresisti- bly, she is drawn away by him. The architectural details of the picture are all carefully studied, and show accurate knowledge of Greek household condi- tions.

" Now many misfortunes are wont to come on men through love," as Pausanias says. And many misfortunes followed. The false step of Paris and Helen led to the Trojan War.

Pictures of the elopement are numerous. Among the quaintest and earliest is a little picture by Benozzo Gozzoli in the National Gallery. In quite a crowded thoroughfare, among Florentine nobles in all their best clothes, Paris is running violently toward the water, with Helen seated " pick-a-back " on his shoulders, holding tight around his neck. It is impossible for us to-day to take such a picture seriously, and yet we must believe that Benozzo, in his ingenuous soul, thought that this must have been the way it happened! They are making for the shore, where ships are awaiting them; various other people in the street are embracing: whether these are intended to present other episodes in the courtship of Paris and Helen, instead of an attendant crowd, is matter for conjecture. Paris is smiling broadly, as he holds his curious burden in place, she being perched with one leg on each side of his

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neck, her feet sticking out ahead. Helen looks anxious and pained.

Giulio Romano's Abduction of Helen, in Mantua, represents a shore, with a boat drawn up at the right, in which are three sailors. Paris and Helen, in a great hurry, are stepping aboard, their clothes nearly blown off them in their excitement ; at the left follow two maidens, carrying the " trousseau " in bundles. Paris looks much worried, and Helen's figure displays trepidation, but her facial expression is vacant. A general atmosphere of rush and con- fusion pervades the whole composition, quite suitable to the occasion.

Paris Abducting Helen, by Deutsche, is more of a " pretty picture," than a study of the incident. This anxious moment of peril, when they were boarding their craft, was no time for such coquettish glances and coy simpering as are here displayed.

Sir Frederick Leighton's picture of Helen on the Ramparts, awaiting the outcome of the conflict between Paris and Menelaus, is familiar. One sees in the beautiful proud bearing and anxious face that " the way of the transgressor is hard."

Raphael gives a stirring scene of the Rape of Helen in a fresco which is in St. Petersburg, the drawing for which is in Oxford. Two Trojans are conveying Helen to the boat. The Queen of Sparta, kneeling, turns toward a man who is holding part of

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her garment, and weeps. The Trojans and Greeks are seen at the right, and in the distance the palace of Menelaus. At the left is a bridge where may be seen vessels at anchor, and, farther away, a land- scape, with soldiers. This fresco is largely the work of pupils. Originally it occupied a position over a door in the Villa Raphael, in Rome. The villa was destroyed in the siege of Rome, in 1848, but the fresco had been removed in 1820 to the Camuccino collection, and was, therefore, preserved.

Pausanias tells that Menelaus and Helen are reported to be buried at Therapne ; but he adds that the Rhodians say that Helen was hung on a tree they even have a temple dedicated to " Helen Hung on the Tree."

The marriage of Peleus and Thetis, which was the famous feast when Discord threw her apple (occasioning so much trouble), has been the subject of many pictures. In the Prado is a treatment of it by Reyn, after Rubens ; and in Dresden is one by Balen.

The son of Peleus and Thetis was the famous hero Achilles. He evidently had a timid mother. While he was an infant she took the precaution of dipping him in the Styx, by way of rendering him invulner- able. No sooner had she successfully accomplished this feat than an oracle told her that his heel, by which she had held him, and which was not sub-

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merged, was as vulnerable as that of any one; and that he would die of a wounded heel in battle. Lairesse has painted the scene of Thetis dipping Achilles in the river.

So when Thetis heard of the war which was rumoured, she sent her son off to the court of Lycomedes; and, so that he might not be recog- nized, she made him assume the garb of a girl. We all know how he was discovered by the wily Ulysses, who, disguised as a peddler, brought a pack of goods for the women of the court to examine, and how one maiden showed so much pleasure at the dis- covery of a sword, which she brandished gaily, that Ulysses recognized in her his lawful companion in arms, who was straightway pressed into service in spite of his mother's prejudices.

In the Prado is a picture by Rubens of Achilles taking and wielding the sword, thus betraying his sex. There are two pictures of Achilles by Battoni in the Uffizi; one representing him at the court of Lycomedes, and the other his education by the Centaur Chiron, who taught him many things when he was a boy, before he was sent to the court. There is also a picture of this latter subject by Pencz in the same gallery.

In the Hermitage Gallery there is a painting by Paolo de Matteis, a pupil of Luca Giordano, repre- senting Achilles at the court of Lycomedes.

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Achilles, disguised as a girl, is kneeling by a chest of jewels and bagatelles of various sorts, and is taking out certain articles and showing them to the daugh- ters of Lycomedes. Diomedes and Ulysses, standing by, recognize him. Diomedes, at the left, is in Oriental costume, while Ulysses, on the right, is clothed in gray.

Several of the scenes in the life of Achilles are represented in Pompeian frescoes. There is an ancient illuminated manuscript of the fourth cen- tury at the Ambrosian Library in Milan, which is a copy of the Iliad. The miniatures are the full width of the page, but the colouring is heavy, with an undue preponderance of reds. No gold is used, but bright ochre instead. The costumes are partly Greek and partly Roman. Each god has a nimbus, in which the colours vary; Jupiter has a purple halo, and Venus a green one. There are several of blue. The backgrounds are chiefly vellum.

Separate incidents in the Trojan war have been selected by artists. Flaxman, the sculptor, made a scholarly set of drawings which practically illustrate the Iliad. Among these events, which have so appealed to sculptors and painters alike, is the death of Patroclus, one of the heroes, a close friend of Achilles.

There is a fine statue in the Loggia di Lanzi of Ajax bearing off the body of Patroclus ; and in that

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great museum-studio in Brussels, Wiertz has left a painting representing the fight between the Greeks and Trojans for the body. It is a masterly piece of true realism; men are reduced by their passions to simple knots of straining nerves and sinews, clutching at each other, and dragging at the scarf which winds the body of Patroclus at such a cruel rate that the body seems likely to be torn asunder; all are in a mad whirl, and yet the action, however complicated, is kept clear to the spectator, in a very wonderful way ; one man is stooping low, his head beneath the legs of the dead body; just below his ribs, in his bent back, a spear has been thrust, and the folds of flesh pushed back by it are rendered with fierce accuracy. The spear is bending with the power of the thrust. The nude, white body of Patroclus is extended horizontally, and shows up ghastly and startlingly against the dark skins and clashing arms. The spirit of warfare is in this picture; like all of Wiertz's, it was painted with a definite vision before him of what he intended to portray. There is no suggestion here of a head or a leg being inserted to fill a space in the composition ; the arrangement is natural rather than studied.

Another scene which has a picturesque element in it is that of Thetis, the mother of Achilles, bring- ing to him a set of armour which had been made for him in the forge of Vulcan, under her superintend-

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ence. Thetis, the daughter of Nereus, a sister of Amphitrite, naturally travelled, when convenient, by water. She and the nereids carried the armour to Achilles in a car drawn by sea-horses, and accom- panied by Tritons. The story is told in the Iliad. I use Pope's translation:

"Tkis done, whatever warrior's use requires He forged; the cuirass that outshone the fires, The greaves of ductile tin, the helm impressed With various sculptures, and the golden crest At Thetis' feet the finished labour lay;

Soon as Aurora heaved her Orient head Above the waves, that blushed with early red (With new-born day to gladden mortal sight, And gild the courts of heaven with sacred light), The immortal arms the goddess-mother bears Swift to her son."

On a sarcophagus in the Vatican may be seen a series of very pleasing reliefs of Thetis and the nereids bearing the armour of Achilles.

There is a picture by Gerard of this journey of Thetis with the armour. Thetis stands in the car, and holds the helmet, while sea-nymphs and sea-men carry the other parts. The shield, at the right, is supported by two of these finned beings, while a nereid rides on one of the sea-horses, extending her hand to show where the army is encamped. In the

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air are the usual irrelevant Cupids, and a flying Victory, with a wreath and a broad palm.

A painting in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, by Regnault, represents Automedon with the horses of Achilles. While it always seems that the red mantle of Automedon makes the colour scheme less interesting than it would be had the drapery been blue or green, it is satisfactory to many observers. The horses, which are of an active, luxuriant type which we seldom see now, may have been the exact kind of animal with which Greek battle-fields abounded ; but the bronze horses in Venice are more like the horse as he has survived with us.

A pathetic incident is that of the departure of the young Hector, leaving his wife, Andromache, and his infant son, and going to meet his death. Poor Andromache beseeches him :

"'In pity keep within the fortress here

Nor make thy child an orphan, and thy wife A widow.' . . .

Then answered Hector, great in war, 'All this I bear in mind, dear wife; but I should stand Ashamed before the men and long-robed dames Of Troy, were I to keep aloof and shun The conflict, coward-like.'"

So, as in the picture by Maignan, Hector drives off in his chariot, throwing a parting kiss to his fair

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young wife, who holds the infant up for its father's last look.

Thorwaldsen and Canova have both sculptured Hector and Andromache ; and among the drawings of Flaxman is a beautiful study of Andromache fainting on the walls of Troy when she sees her husband's body dragged at the chariot-wheels of Achilles.

Sir Frederick Leighton's Andromache is a tragic and powerful composition. The mourning woman sits in the centre of a group who are variously employed in the details of Greek daily life. The figure is full of gloom, suggesting dread anticipation for the future of her son, and sorrow for her own loss.

Homer's works being, as it were, the Bible of the Greeks, these scenes from the Iliad were fraught for them with almost sacred significance.

Of the numerous adventures of Ulysses only a few claim our attention. On his way home from the Trojan war he met with many mishaps, and some of them have formed the subjects for painters.

Turner has painted a fantastic sea-piece which he has called Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus. After escaping from the cave of the Cyclops, where his crew were nearly all eaten by the giant (possibly the origin of the story of Jack and the Bean Stalk), Ulysses and his companions sailed amid a hail of

DOSSO DOSSI. CIRCE.

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rocks, which were hurled after the vessel. This episode is the one chosen by Turner. The ship, saij- ing toward a distant sun-burst on the horizon, is, indeed, beset with perils. The Cyclops in the sky is seen, a huge, shadowy form, hurling rocks, and one can see where they hit the water from the foam and spray dashing up.

Every one knows about Circe; the enchantress, whose arts made swine of her guests, not an un- common talent in enchantresses even in our own time. Ulysses, having sent his crew ahead of him, was distressed to learn of their fate, and decided to visit Circe himself, and try to deliver them. With good advice from the shrewd Mercury, he fearlessly approached. When, after he had eaten at her table, the enchantress commanded him also to become an animal, Ulysses threatened to kill Circe instead of yielding. She, then, terrified at this unusual mani- festation of rebellion, released the companions of Ulysses from their enchantment, and in due time the travellers moved on.

The Circe of Burne- Jones, that eccentric com- position in which the human figure is made to occupy a horizontal position instead of a vertical one, is a beautiful piece of drawing. Circe, a typical British beauty, is preparing the draught for Ulysses and his men. The three boats are seen through the low win- dow. The clever use of the horizontal feeling in

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this picture suggests, almost without one's realizing it, the brooding deceit and underhand subterfuges of the sorceress.

The Circe of Dosso Dossi, at Ferrara, is a curious conception, and suggests rather a sibyl of the Renaissance than a Greek enchantress. It is a charming picture, however, and has a certain spell about it, which shows that Dossi, in his own way, felt the subtle power of the story of sorcery and witchery just as much as Burne-Jones did, though he expressed himself differently. Symonds says of Dosso Dossi's Circe, that it is worthy to rank with the best Renaissance work. Glowing with colour, there is a quaint, romantic air about its mediaeval qualities which give charm, even though it does not follow the classic ideal. " It is perfectly original," says Symonds, " not even suggesting the influence of Venice by its deep and lustrous hues."

The Circe of Riviere is a less artistic picture than either of those just described. The sorceress is not enveloped in mystery of any kind; she is simply a coarse person, of rather vulgar tastes, sitting on a step hugging her knees, surrounded by a drove of pigs. The picture is unattractive, and, if we grant that an element of miracle and enchantment should form the environment of this weird character, it may be said to be unreal.

Ulysses's adventure in being cast upon the island

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of the Phaeacians with no clothes on, is also fre- quently chosen as a subject for pictures. The fact that the king's daughter, Nausicaa, brought him what he needed, and straightway lost her heart to him, is the chief reason why this event is empha- sized.

In the Pitti Palace is a landscape by Rubens, in which the figures are introduced to represent Ulysses and Nausicaa ; but they are only accessory, and the details are not interestingly conceived.

The Ulysses and Nausicaa of Salvator Rosa, which is in the Hermitage, is an example of a stormy scene, after this artist's own heart. Ulysses, having been cast upon the island of the Phaeacians without his clothing, the philanthropic daughter of the king comes forward with raiment for him. The ingenu- ous maiden did not consider it at all necessary to send the garments by a messenger. There are three other girls in the composition who seem to be terrified at the adventure, although one of them is more concerned about the threatening weather than shy of Ulysses.

Ulysses receiving the clothing from Nausicaa is well and graphically portrayed by Guido Reni, in a picture which now hangs in Naples. The king's daughter sits upon a sort of outdoor throne, sur- rounded by her maidens. She is really lovely, not in the least affected and not rolling her eyes

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about in any direction, as Guide's ladies nearly always do. Ulysses is seen nude, at the left, singu- larly free from embarrassment in the face of the group of women. He is well-painted and handsome, wearing a pointed beard. He is almost Assyrian in type. The " wash " is hanging on a line near by, for this happened to be the day when Nausicaa and her maidens had been attending to the laundry de- partment, by the river's bank. Nausicaa holds in her hand a little bat of flat wood, such as is used in ping-pong to-day. The women had been play- ing ball when interrupted by the advent of the denuded stranger. This picture of Guido Reni's is among the most interesting that he painted, and is hardly as familiar as it deserves to be.

All this time the Patient Penelope, the wife of Ulysses, was waiting for him at home, beset by suitors, and with no tidings of her lord. Truly her example is an excellent one, in that she sat at her loom weaving, and carrying on her household duties in unwavering faith during this trying period!

In the Vatican is an ancient statue represent- ing Penelope sitting thinking (as she must occasion- ally have done), her finger pointing to her brow in a highly archaic manner, and yet reminding us a good deal of some of the attitudes of Leonardo da Vinci's characters.

Pinturicchio's charmingly quaint picture of the

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Return of Ulysses, in the National Gallery, London, cannot be too highly praised. Its peaceful domes- ticity contrasts delightfully with the strife of battle. It is a fresco, brought from the Palace of the Pe- trucci in Siena. Penelope sits at her loom, diligently working. The suitors a set of sentimental Um- brian youths, one with a hawk on his wrist seem also commendable for their patience in waiting, as they stand about in stiff attitudes in the foreground. Ulysses is seen entering the door in the guise of a beggar, while Telemachus, his son, a beautiful and spirited figure, advances toward his mother. Out of the window is seen a point of land jutting into the water, on this may be distinguished Circe and her transformed guests, and in another place Ulysses falling from a raft, which is upset by Neptune. There is also the well-rigged ship on which Ulysses is bound to the mast, in order to escape the lure of the Sirens. Harpies and Sirens originated from a common myth, and were closely allied to the pre- siding geniuses of death. The Greeks adopted their type from the human-headed bird with which the Egyptians represented the soul of man. The history of Ulysses's temptations is thus spread out, and also the situation of virtue at home is displayed. A little maid sits by Penelope, winding yarn, and a cat has gotten hold of the end of the thread and is playing With it.

268 Classic /IDptbs in art

Among the adventures of yEneas, his stay at the court of Dido is the favourite subject among painters. Guerin has painted this queen as a sort of Madame Recamier, listening to a well-bred, curly- locked personage in a very top-heavy helmet.

Among the JEg'ma Marbles in Munich, two of the figures of the warriors are known as Paris and yneas. Paris may be distinguished by his cap with the turning-over top. He is about to draw his bow, and is on one knee; ^neas is behind him, in the act of raising a weapon.

On the fall of Troy, yneas, with his family, fled from the city, and started by sea to search for a new abiding-place. With his aged father on his back, his little son by the hand, and his wife following, he left his native city in flames, and began a new career.

Perhaps the most familiar painting of this group is that of Raphael in his Incendio Borgo in the Vati- can. The stalwart young Trojan, with his father crouching on his shoulders, and the charming figure of the child who accompanies them with an ex- pression of delight at the new adventure, are all well known. It was a fanciful idea of Raphael's to introduce these classic figures into the scene of the fire in Rome; the Pope at the window quelling the conflagration, is in strange contrast with the Greek scene at the left. yEneas and his father and son

Deroes ot tbe Trojan Mat 269

escaped safely to the boats, but his wife was lost on the way.

^Eneas fleeing from Troy, by Luca Signorelli, in the Academy at Siena, is a curiously crowded panel, with a mixture of Greek and mediaeval Sienese motives, ^neas is dressed quite as a Greek might have been dressed, and yet he looks like a Sienese, playing Greek at carnival time. His father, Anchises, in well-disposed garments, sits astride upon his neck, cheering him on, while the son runs by his side. The most conspicuous thing about the picture is the figure of the leaping wife, Creusa; she is jumping, with both hands and one foot thrown high. Troy burns in the distance, and many other refugees are seen.

In Munich there are two pictures dealing with the flight of ^neas; one by Breughel, and one by Elsheimer. In the latter, the Trojan horse is visible in the background, and the scene is at night.

^Eneas in art is usually associated with his flight from Troy, or with his sojourn in Carthage, where Queen Dido was engaged in superintending the erection of a great city, she herself having been a refugee from Tyre. The story of Dido and ^Eneas is a romantic one, and an outline of their adventures is necessary to the proper appreciation of the vari- ous works of art dealing with the subject of their loves.

270 Classic flDgtbs in Brt

Venus, once again, was responsible. She led 1/Eneas to Carthage, and presented him to Dido, who, enchanted with his attractions, had a feast prepared at once, and for some time entertained the hero. When, at length, the young widower decided that his duty called him elsewhere, and he took a final and fond farewell of the queen, the unhappy Dido built herself a funeral pyre, and, mounting it, burned herself within sight of the departing ships of yEneas. It seems as though JEneas were destined always to sail by the light of some sort of conflagration !

The picture of Dido building Carthage, by Turner, is a view of the city as it lies along the river-bank. The usual sunburst of light at the horizon accom- panies the composition. A few small figures are to be seen, but they are subordinate.

The meeting of Dido and JEneas in a wood, by Pietro da Cortona, is in the Louvre, and shows the two warriors, laden with arrows, having landed on the shore, while Dido hastens to meet them with outstretched hand of welcome. She carries a long bow in her other hand, and is accompanied by an appropriate escort of Cupids, one of whom, from above, shoots at ^)neas, who is starting back as if already hit. In the background the ships are seen unloading on the shore.

In the fourth-century Latin manuscript of Virgil in the Vatican, the adventures of ^neas are given in

Deroes of tbe Urojan War 271

a series of miniatures, which are fascinating on ac- count of their archaism. There are fifty pictures, not as artistically excellent as those in the Ambro- sian Iliad. Fluid gold is used in these miniatures, and the backgrounds are painted, and so the quality of the vellum is less emphasized than in the Iliad manuscript. The drawing shows some dawn of Byzantine influence, rather than remains of Greek grace.

The hero may be seen superintending the building of Carthage, which appears to be constructing a subway; in another miniature, he meets Dido, sit- ting on a throne upon the end of a pier; the wooden horse is seen, with the army descending from a trap- door in its side (the horse is about large enough to accommodate two men), and in another place may be observed the apparition of Hector to ^Eneas, who is sleeping on a couch quite alone in a spacious hall. Then follow scenes of his landing at Crete, and being seen off the coast of Troy; after this Dido occupies the scene; she reproaches him with large, uplifted forefinger for venturing to contemplate departure ; she is next seen in an open loggia at the top of a building, bewailing the prospect of separa- tion ; and in the next miniature she stabs herself on the funeral pile, and there expires, in the midst of an excited throng of women. Scenes from the visit to Hades ensue ; then ^Eneas is seen sailing rapidly

272 Classic flDgtbs in art

by the shores of Circe, where a row of beasts are sitting at table, apparently with bibs on, waited upon by the siren herself. The transformation of the ships of the Trojans into sea-nymphs is a surprising display; there is not a little imagination shown in this miniature, where we see mermaids terminating in gondolas, with oars out at the sides.

In the twelfth-century manuscript of Virgil in the Vatican, there is a naive illustration of Dido and yneas in the grotto ;, they have taken shelter from a pouring rain, which fills the rest of the composition with vertical lines. The chief objects of interest are seated close together (in fact, in a conventional Byzantine embrace) in a rectangular cave at the right; two horses and two soldiers remain outside in the rain. One warrior has cleverly arranged his circular shield as an umbrella, and sits beneath it, protected from the weather, with his feet serenely crossed.

A realistic shipwreck of ^Eneas was that by Perino del Vaga, in the Doria Palace in Genoa; unfortu- nately, being in oil, it was destroyed by time. Vasari describes it, and speaks of the infinite variety in the attitudes of the living and the dead, and the number of ships and galleys, some being shattered by the storm. The facial expression of horror of those who are about to perish is especially commended.

The Death of Dido by Liberate de Verona, in the

Deroes of tbc Urojan War 273

National Gallery in London, exhibits the work of this artist, who was primarily an illuminator of books, in all his leading characteristics. Dido stands aloft, perched upon the top of a superb architectural erection, which it seems a shame to burn up; it is a magnificent catafalque, which must have cost the distressed queen much thought and expense in con- struction. The entire court is assembled to watch her expire, and no one raises a hand to dissuade her from her rash purpose.

If space permitted, it would be interesting to deal with many other pictures which illustrate classic myths ; but for a volume of this proportion, it is not possible to do more than indicate the best- known works of art. We trust, however, that the subject may be of interest to the student, and that his enjoyment of certain pictures may be quickened when he recognizes in them an effort to illustrate some of the legends of Hellas.

THE END.

\

Bibliography

BARRY, OPIE, AND FUSELI. Lectures on Painting.

BULFINCH. The Age of Fable.

MAXINE COLLIGNON. Manual of Mythology.

CROWE AND CAVALCASSELLE. History of Painting in Italy.

C. L. EASTLAKE. The Louvre Gallery.

C. L. EASTLAKE. The Brera Gallery.

C. L. EASTLAKE. Notes on Pictures in Munich.

C. L. EASTLAKE. The Venice Academy.

EURIPIDES. Tragedies.

C. M. GAYLEY. Classic Myths.

GUERBER. Myths of Greece and Rome.

HANDBOOK TO GALLERIES in Dresden, Vienna, Munich, Naples,

The Netherlands, Rome, Florence, Venice, London, St.

Petersburg.

HESIOD. The Theogony. HOMER. The Iliad and the Odyssey. KARL KAROLY. Paintings in Florence. KARL KAROLY. Paintings in Venice. KERR-LAWSON. Museo del Prado. LUIGI LANZI. History of Painting in Italy. VERNON LEE. Renaissance Fancies and Studies. VERNON LEE. Euphorion. LA FENESTRE. La Louvre. LA FENESTRE. Florence.

27S

276

MAHAFFY. Greek Civilization.

MORELLI. Italian Masters in German Galleries.

MORELLI. Critical Studies of Italian Painters.

DR. JOHN MOORE. Travels in Italy.

DOMENICO MONACO. The Naples Museum.

OVID. The Metamorphoses.

PAUSANIAS. Description of Greece.

PLUTARCH. Lives.

VON REBER. Ancient Art

A. SOMOFF. La Gallerie de 1'Hermitage.

JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS. Renaissance in Italy.

TAINE. Italy.

TAINE. Philosophy of Art in Greece and Italy.

ACHILLES TATIUS. Cleitophon and Leucippe.

THEOCRITUS. Idylls.

GIORGIO VASARI. Lives of the Painters.

VIRGIL. The ^neid.

WINCKELMANN. History of Ancient Art

WORNUM. History of Painting.

Unbex

Achilles, 145-147; Armour, 256-261.

Achilles Tatius, 9, 54, 220.

Acis, 20-24.

Acrisius, 39.

Actaeon, 112-115, 117.

Adonis, 76, 82-87.

ALgma. Marbles, 268.

yneas, 268-273.

^Eschylus, 240.

Agamemnon, 124.

Agenor, 46.

Ajax, 258.

Albani (or Albano) Proserpine, 29 ; Europa, 54 ; Venus, 78 ; Venus and Cupid, 79; Mer- cury, 139.

Albani (Villa), 243.

Aldobrandini Villa, 93, 109,

147-

" Allegory of Spring," 229. Allston, 82. Amalthea, 12. Amazons, 200 et seq. Ammanati, 194. Amphitrite, 16-19, 2 6o. Anchises, 269. Andromache, 261. Andromeda, 218-227. Annunzio (G. d'), 159. Antaeus, 193.

Antiope, 57.

Antiope, Queen of Amazons,

201.

Apelles, 3, 13. Apollo, n, 88-109, I20 > l &

178.

Apollodorus, 211. Ares. See Mars. Argus, 61, 142, 143. Ariadne, 2, 156-162, 199. Artemis. See Diana. Atalanta, 238-241. Atalanta's Race, 241-243. Athena. See Minerva. Athens, 36, 130, 205, 207, 208. Aulis, 126. Aurora, 96-100, 181, 184, 186,

187.

Bacchantes, 164.

Bacchus, 2, 150-162, 177.

Balen, 161, 256.

Bandinelli, Orpheus, 171 ; Hercules and Cacus, 195 ; Laocoon, 248.

Barberini (Juno), 32, 1 78 ; (Pal- ace), 55.

Bargello, 86, 152, 194.

Barry, 190.

Bartholomew, Ganymede, 238.

Baths of Constantine, 165.

277

278

Unfcex

Battle of the Giants, 6-9, 16.

Battoni, 257.

Beccafumi, 144.

Bellini, Giovanni, Bacchus, 155.

Belucci, 1 80.

Belvedere (Apollo), 90, 122,

172, 178.

Bembo, Graces, 232. Benson, 158. Berlin Gallery, 18, 36, 69, 1 16,

135- Bernini, 26; Apollo and

Daphne, 95. Bernouille, 64. Beyle (Henri), 27. Beyschlag, 171. Bion, 84.

Blanc (Charles), 53, 218. Bodenhausen, 180. Bologna (Giovanni di), Mer- cury, 140, 178; Centaur, 210. Bordone (Paris), 2. Borghese Gallery, 37, 207. Borghese, Villa, 25, 76, 115. Boston Museum of Fine Arts,

31, 82, 186, 235; Autom-

edon, 260. Both (Jan), 143. Botticelli, Venus, 66, 134, 157 ;

Pallas, 132; Mars, 134;

Mercury, 1 44 ; Centaurs,

209; Flora, 212, 229. Boucher, 148. Bouguereau, 153. Brera Gallery, 29, 82, 95. Breughel, Proserpine, 28, 85 ;

Diana and Actaeon, 113;

Bacchus, 161 ; ^Cneas, 269. Bridgewater Gallery, 75. British Museum, 205. Bronzino, 78. Brunswick Gallery, 185. Burckhardt, 66. Burne-Jones, 212, 213, 264.

Cacus, 193, 195.

Calisto, 59.

Callistratus, 151.

Calvart, 46.

Calydonian Hunt, 238, 247.

Cambridge, 73.

Campagnola, 62.

Camuccino, 177.

Canova, 177, 179, 198, 207; Perseus, 216; Hebe, 235; Daedalus and Icarus, 244; Hector, 262.

Carthage, 269-273.

Castor and Pollux, 37.

Castiglione, 22, 172.

Cellini, 196, 211 ; Perseus, 214.

Centaurs, 199, 204-210

Cephalus, 181-187.

Cerberus, 25, 29, 172.

Ceres, 26, 27, 29-31, 174.

Cicagni, 12.

Circe, 2, 263, 264-272.

" Cleitophon and Leucippe," 9, 54, 220.

Clovio (Giulio), 238.

Colonna Gallery, 99.

Contarini, 76.

Corot, Diana's Bath, 114; Orpheus, 169.

Correggio, Danae, 2, 43 ; lo, 2, 62; Leda, 36; Antiope, 57, 58 ; Apollo and Marsyas, 92; Diana, in, 118; Mer- cury, 141 ; Ganymede, 237.

Corsini Gallery, 79, 86, 96,

US, 139-

Cortona, no; Carpione, 161 ; Dido, 270.

Cosimo (Piero di), 96; Mars and Venus, 135; Cephalus and Procris, 181-184; An- dromeda, 222, 227.

Cossins, 10.

279

Courtat, Leda, 38.

Coypel, Perseus, 226.

Crawford, Orpheus, 172 ; Hebe and Ganymede, 235.

Creusa, 269.

Crowe and Cavalcaselle, 42, 57, 72,96, 155. 165.

Cupid, 2, 24, 25, 29; Titian's, 42 ; Van Dyck's, 44, 57, 63, 64; in Art, 81-83, 94, 106, 119, 133, 147; and Psyche, 172-180 ; on a Centaur, 207,

233- Cyclops, 20, 144, 145, 147, 263.

Daedalus, 243-246.

Danae, 2, 39-46, 76, 211.

Danneker, 162.

Daphne, 94-96.

Darmstadt, 70, 74.

Darwin, 245.

David, 178 ; Paris and Helen,

253-

Decharme, 9. Deutsche, 255. Diana, 9, 11, 25, 59; in Art,

110-128, 239. Dido, 268-273. Dobson (Austin), 181-182. Domenichino, Apollo and

Marsyas, 93; Muses, 109;

Diana's Hunt, 115; Vulcan,

147.

Donatello, 93. Dossi (Dosso), Circe, 2, 264;

Endymion, 119; Hercules,

190 ; Ganymede, 238. Draper (H. J.), Lament for

Icarus, 246. Dresden Gallery, 8, 23, 28,

39. 44, 53. 70, 77, 106, 109,

"9, 133, I59> 186,237,238,

251. Dulwich Gallery, 56, 74.

Eastlake, 93. Echo, 1 66. Elsheimer, 269. Endymion, 118-120. Euridice, 167-172. Euripides, 5, 16, 124, 150,

153-

Europa, 2, 46-56. Eurytion, 204.

Farnese Palace, 34; Hercules, 188.

Farnesina Palace, 21, 133, 141, 192, 214; Villa, 234; Ra- phael's frescoes, 172-178.

Fates, 240.

Ferrara, 79, 98, 190, 264.

Fiske (John), 5.

Flaxman, 258, 262.

Flora, 228-231.

Forest, 143.

Francesco Franck, Amphitrite, 18 ; Muses, 108.

Frankfort, 162.

Fruili, 236.

Furies, 240.

Fuseli, 78, 100.

Galatea, 2, 19-24, 157, 175,

176, 234.

Ganymede, 235-238. Garofolo, 133, 161. Gayley (Professor), 4. Genoa, Doria Palace, 8, 272. Gerard, Thetis, 260. Gherardi, 12, 99. Giordano (Luca), 148, 159, 161,

197, 251. Giorgione, Venus, 70, 72 ;

Apollo and Daphne, 96 ;

Satyr and Nymph, 163 ;

Achilles, 257. Giotto, 3. Girodet, 118.

280

Gleyre, 197.

Goldsmith, 140.

Gonzaga (Eleonora), 72.

Gorgon's Head, 90, 130, 216.

Gozzoli, 254.

Graces (Three), 173, 177, 230, 231-234.

Graie (Three), 212.

Guercino, Venus, 78 ; Aurora, 97 ; Endymion, 1 1 8 ; Ceph- alus and Procris, 186.

Guerin, 187, 268.

Guido Reni, Venus, 77 ; Apollo and Marsyas, 93 ; Aurora, 97 ; Bacchus, 153, 160, 161 ; Cupid, 1 80; Cephalus and Procris, 185 ; Andromeda, 226 ; Atalanta, 243 ; Ulysses, 265.

Haarlem (C. von), Bacchus,

155-

Harpies. See Sirens. Hawthorne, 163. Head (Guido), Iris, 234. Hebe, 235. Heinz, 28. Hector, 261, 271. Helen, 253-256. Herculaneum, 162, 225. Hercules, Pollajuolo, 2,9, 188-

195-

Hermitage Gallery, St. Peters- burg, 23, 41,62, 71, 73, 75,

92, 115, 136, 148, l6l, 222, 255, 257, 265.

Hero, 1 80.

Hesiod, 6, 25, 144, 162. Hippodamia, 204. Hippomenes, 241-243. Homer, 3, 16, no, 262. Horner (Misses), 193. Hydra, 192. Hyppolite, 201.

Icarus, 244-246.

Iliad, 258, 271.

Ingres, 67.

lo, 2 ; in Art, 60-62, 142, 143.

Iphigenia, 123.

Iris, 234.

Ixion, 1 68.

" Jabberwock," 247.

James (Henry), 52, 131.

Janus, 177.

Jason, 247.

Jordaens, 161.

Jove. See Jupiter.

Juno, in Art, 32-34, 60, 151, 174, 176, 178, 188,192,234, 250-253.

Jupiter, 2, 6, 7, 1 1, 12 ; Acces- sion of, 13-15; Loves of, 32-62, 150, 176, 178, 191, 211, 236; Raphael's, 174- 175-

Kanochus, 63. Kranach, Venus, 76.

Lacedaemonians, 212.

Lairesse, 109, 257.

Landor, 169, 242.

Laocoon, 121, 248.

Lapithae, 204.

Latona, 120, 123.

Layard, 155.

Leander, 180.

Lecomte, 53.

Leda, 2, 33, 34.

Lee (Vernon), 3, 67, 69, 80, 92, 184, 235.

Lefebre, Diana, 114.

Leighton (Sir F.), Orpheus, 171; Helen, 255; Andro- mache, 262.

Leochares, 237.

flufcex

281

Liberale de Verona, 272.

Lichias, 198.

Loggia diLanzi, 211, 214, 258.

Lorraine (Claude), 23.

Lotto, Juno, 34.

Louvre Gallery, 19, 57, 92, 106,

no, 118, 132, 144, 146, 154,

187, 207, 253, 270. Lucian, 208. Lucretius, 231. Ludovisi, Juno, 34 ; Medusa,

217; Mars, 133. Ludovisi Villa, 97. Luini, Venus and Adonis, 82 ;

Apollo and Daphne, 95 ;

Vulcan, 148.

Luteri (Giovanni), Aurora, 98. Luxembourg, 38. Lycomedes, 257.

Mabuse, 45.

Madrid, Prado Museum, 8, 10,

28, 73, 77, 85, 87, 94, 107,

US, 134, MS, 161,171,241,

257.

Maignan, 261. Mantegna, Parnassus, 106;

Mercury, 143. Mantua, Palazzo del Td, 7, 23,

99, H7 *79> 246, 255. Marathon, 127. Maratta, Galatea, 23. Marcantonio, 252. Mars, u, 80, 130; in Art,

133-138, 148, 177. Marsyas, 91-94, 138. Matteis (P. de), 257. Medici, 64, 65, 179. Medusa, 211-218. Meldola, 62. Meleager, 238. Menelaus, 253. Mengs, 105, 1 80. Mercury, 29, 54, 61, 106; in

Art, 138-144; Raphael's, 174, 175, 177, 178, 211 ; Botticelli's, 230.

Michelangelo, Leda, 2, 23, 39, 8 1 ; Adonis, 86; Bacchus, 152; Cupid, 180; Hercules, 195 ; Centaur, 206 ; Long- fellow's, 215; Ganymede, 238.

Mieris, 161.

Miglione, 161.

Milan, 258, 271.

Millet (F. D.), 31.

Milo (Venus of), 64.

Milton, 88.

Minerva, II, 13; in Art, 129- 133, 178, 211, 213, 217, 250-253.

Minotaur, 199.

Moore (Dr. John), 52, 93, 95, 117, 122, 164, 1 88, 207, 225.

Moreau, 170.

Morelli, 37, 43, 70, 72, 96, 116, 119.

Moretto, 87.

Moschus, 46.

Munich Gallery, 12, 16, 30,45, 58, 93, 105, 117, 123, 126, 143, 161, 164, 180, 192, 197, 203, 268, 269.

Musagetes Apollo, 89.

Muses, 99 ; in Art, 100-109, 170; Muse of Cortona, 100, 139. !77-

Naples Museum, 17, 34, 41, 46, 64, 125, 140, 162, 163, 164, 179, 191, 197, 222, 236, 239, 243, 265.

National Gallery, Jupiter, 12; Venus, 59; Mars, 134; Bac- chus, 159; Ganymede, 238; Judgment of Paris, 250;

282

flnfcei

Paris and Helen, 254 ; Ulys- ses, 266 ; Dido, 273.

Nausicaa, 265.

Neide, 179.

Neptune, n, 13; in Art, 15- I9 2 9> 1 33> 1 77, 241.

Niobe, 120-122 ; in Florence,

121.

Ocean, 6.

Olympus, 6, 7, II.

Omphale, 189, 196-198.

Orbetto, 161.

Orestes, 127.

Orpheus, 167-172.

Orvieto, 27, 171.

Otricoli Jupiter, 35.

Ovid, 3 ; Pluto and Proserpine, 25, 26, 30; Europa, 47; Calisto, 59 ; lo, 60 ; Apollo, 90 ; Daphne, 94 ; Actaeon, 112; Niobe, 120; Latona, 123; Mercury, 138; Euri- dice, 167; Perseus, 219; Ganymede, 236 ; Calydonian Hunt, 238 ; Daedalus and Icarus, 244.

Palma, Venus, 2 ; Graces, 234.

Pan, 91, 164, 165.

Paris, 138, 250-256, 268.

Parma, 1 1 1 .

Parmigianino, 65 ; Endymion,

119, 238.

Parnassus, 103-109. Parthenon, 13 ; Metopes, 204. Pater (Walter), 67. Patroclus, 258. Pausanias, 13; Juno, 32;

Venus, 63 ; Minerva, 1 29 ;

Armour, 137; Sileni, 164;

Hercules, 189; Theseus,

199, 206; Medusa, 218-

222 ; Furies, 240 ; Relics,

241; Icarus, 246; Helen,

256.

Pegasus, 106, 139, 225. Peleus, 256. Pellegrino, Hebe, 236. Pencz, 257. Penelope, 266. Pergamus, 7.

Perseus, 40, 138, 211-227. Perugia, 80, 137, 140. Perugino, Venus, 80 ; Apollo,

98; Mars, 137; Mercury,

140.

Peruzzi, 133, 192, 214. Phidias, 3, 13, 129. Phigaleia, 201, 205. Philostratus, 16. Phrebus. See Apollo. Pinturicchio, 92 ; Penelope,

266.

Piombo (Sebastiano), 87. Pirithous, 204. Pitti Palace, 132, 153, 163,

1 80, 189, 265. Plato, 3, 4. Plazer, 161. Pliny, 13. Plutarch, 201. Pluto, ii, 13; in Art, 25-31,

144, 177. Pollajuolo, Hercules, 2, 192;

Centaurs, 209. Polyhymnia, 100. Polyphemus, 1 8 ; in Art, 20-

24, 263. Pompeii, House of Tragic

Poet, 34; Vettii, 190; Per- seus, 82, 125, 158, 225. Pordenone, 9; Diana, 115. Poussin, Parnassus, 107; Ata-

lanta, 241. Poynter, 242. Prado. See Madrid.

flnfcex

283

Praxiteles, Cupid, 7, 8 1 ; Apollo,

89; Hermes, 138. Procris, 181-187. Prometheus, 9-11, 179. Proserpine, in Art, 25-31, 168,

174.

Psyche, 172-180. Punic Wax, 100. Python, 90.

Quincy (Q. de), 176.

Rae (Henrietta), 229.

Raphael, Galatea, 2, 21, 22, 157 ; Jupiter, 15, 70 ; Venus, 75, 77 ; Apollo and Marsyas, 92 ; Apollo, 99 ; Parnassus, 103, 132; Diana, in; Pal- las, 133; Mars, 137; Cupid and Psyche, 1 72 ; Paris, 255 ; Mneas, 258 ; Mercury, 141 ; Graces, 234.

Regnault, 261.

Rembrandt, Proserpine, 28, 190 ; Ganymede, 237.

Reyn, 256.

Reynolds (Sir J.), 190, 248.

Rhea, 12.

Ribera, 10.

Ricci, 132.

Riviere, 264.

Rodin (Auguste), Ceres, 3 1 .

Romano (Giulio), Titans, 7 ; Jupiter, 12; Polyphemus, 23 ; Apollo, 99 ; Muses, 102 ; Vulcan, 147 ; Bacchus, 161 ; Cupid, 179; Icarus, 246; Paris and Helen, 255.

Rome, Capitoline Museum, 12, 50, 64, 163, 210, 225 ; House of Livia, 21, 61, 198; Ros- pigliosi, 226.

Rosa (Salvator), Mercury, 143 ; Jason, 247 ; Ulysses, 265.

Rotterdam, 156.

Royal Academy, 229.

Rubens, Neptune, 18; Pluto, 28; Venus, 81,85; Apollo, 94; Diana, 116; Latona, 123; Bacchus, 154; Ama- zons, 203 ; Andromeda, 224 ; Graces, 233 ; Atalanta, 239; Paris, 250 ; Ulysses, 265.

Ruskin, 28, 53, 143, 155, 156, 181, 183, 186, 196, 216,247.

San Luca (Gallery), 60, 78, 160,

234, 236. Sansovino, Mars and Neptune,

17; Mercury, 142; Bacchus,

152.

Sappho, 104.

Schiavone, 96 ; Parnassus, 105. Schidone, 115. Schobolt, 29. Schut, 148. Scopas, 7, 1 6, 64. Selinous, 202, 213. Semele, 150. Siena, 232, 267, 269. Signorelli, 27 ; Pan, 165 ;

Orpheus, 171; ^Eneas, 269. Silenus, 163. Sirens, 267. Sodoma, Leda, 38. Spenser, 104. Spranger, 197. Stillman (J. W.), 230. Stoughton (J. B.), 238. Symonds (J. A.), 2, 27, 37, 66,

m,i34, 153, 157, 171, 178,

183, 194, 202, 2l8, 223, 264.

Taine, 3, 26, 42, 50, 65, 91, 121, 140, 158, 163, 188,216, 226, 232.

Taraval, 19.

Tate Gallery, 246,

284

Tatti. See Sansovino.

Tauris, 127.

Telemachus, 267.

Teniel, 247.

Tennyson, 49.

Theocritus, 20, 76.

" Theogony," 6, 144, 150.

Theseus, 156, 162, 199-210,

243-

Thetis, 148, 256, 259.

Thorwaldsen, 147, 262.

Tiepolo, Neptune, 19; Iphi- genia, 126; Bacchus, 160.

Tintoretto, Bacchus and Ari- adne, 2, 156-159; Leda,35; Danae, 46; Parnassus, 1 06; Muses, 1 08; Pallas, 130; Vulcan, 146 ; Andromeda, 222 ; Graces, 232 ; Gany- mede, 238.

Titian, Bacchus and Ariadne, 2, 1 57, 159; Danae, 40-43; Europa, 56 ; Antiope, 57 ; Venus, 71-75, 86, 164; Di- ana and Actaeon, 114 ; Bac- chanale, 161 ; Bacchante, 164; Andromeda, 222; Flora, 228 ; Graces, 233.

Trojan War, 258.

Tura (Cosimo), Venus, 79.

Turchi, 192, 197.

Turin Gallery, 46.

Turner, Proserpine, 28 ; Mer- cury and Argus, 142 ; Hero, and Leander, 181 ; Cephalus and Procris, 186; Jason, 247 ; Ulysses, 262 ; Dido, 270.

Uffizi, 35, 54 ; Botticelli's Venus, 66 ; Titian's Venus, 71 ; Venus and Cupid, 78, 85, 87, 94, 108, 118, 126 154, 164; Hercules, 192-

194; Flora, 228; Laocoon,

249; Achilles, 257. Ulysses, 257, 258, 267-267. Utenwael, 109.

Vaga (Perino del), Titans, 8 ;

Muses, 107 ; Dido, 272. Van D y c k , Antiope, 59 ;

Danae, 44. Vasari, 8, 12, 99, 1 19, 136, 144, 152, 190, 193, 194,217,223, 272.

Vatican, Muses, 103 ; Niobe, 122; Europa, 49; Silenus, 164; Orpheus, 170, 179; Perseus, 216; Meleager, 240 ; Thetis, 260 ; Penelope, 266; Virgil, 167, 270, 272.

Velasquez, Venus, 78 ; Mars, 134; Argus, 143; Vulcan, 145.

Venice, Ducal Palace, 12, 17, 19. 49> I3i 146,232; Acad- emy, 76, 99, 155,244; Log- gietta, 142.

Venus, 2, 5, 11, 19,25, 29, 34; in Art, 63-87 ; de Milo, 64, 134, 145-147; Tintoretto, 157; Raphael, 173; Botti- celli, 229, 241-242, 250-253, 270.

Veronese (Paul), Europa, 2, 49-53; Leda, 38; Danae, 45 ; Antiope, 58 ; Venus, 85, 136, 158.

Versailles, 27; Diana, no.

Vertagnan, 117.

Vien, 244.

Vienna, Gallery, 40, 53, 62, 197, 237 ; Volksgarten, 207.

Vinci (Leonardo da), 2 ; Leda, 37; Bacchus, 154; Medusa, 217-

Virgil, 167, 270, 272.

285

Volterrano, 180. Von Balen, 53. Von Reber, 214. Vulcan, 11, 1 06; in Art, 144- 149, 259.

Walker (C. Howard), 109. Watteau, Judgment of Paris,

252. Werff (Van der), Judgment of

Paris, 25 1 .

West (Benjamin), Iphigenia,

128. Wiertz, Vulcan, 146; Patro-

clus, 259. Winckelmann, 22, 121, 122,

228, 248. Woltmann, 158.

Zephyrus, 229. Zeus. See Jupiter. Zeuxis, 10 1 ; Centaurs, 208.