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The Picture described.

which this elaborate planning must have cost. A general glance at the picture could never suggest that there was a hair trunk in it; the Hair Trunk is not mentioned in the title even, which is, 'Pope Alexander III. and the Doge Ziani, the Conqueror of the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa.' You see the

title is actually utilised to help divert attention from the trunk; thus, as I say, nothing suggests the presence of the trunk by any hint, yet everything studiedly leads up to it, step by step. Let us examine into this, and observe the exquisite artful artlessness of the plan.

At the extreme left end of the picture are a couple of women, one of them with a child looking over her shoulder at a wounded man sitting with bandaged head on the ground. These people seem needless; but no, they are there for a purpose. One cannot look at them without seeing the gorgeous procession of grandees, bishops, halberdiers, and banner-bearers which is passing along behind them. One cannot see the procession without feeling a curiosity to follow it and learn whither it is going. It leads him to the Pope in the centre of the picture, who is talking with the bonnetless Doge— talking tranquilly, too, although within twelve feet of them a man is beating a drum, and not far from the drummer two persons are blowing horns, and many horsemen are plunging and rioting aboutindeed, twenty-two feet of this great work is all a deep and happy holiday serenity and Sunday-school

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procession, and then we come suddenly upon eleven and a half feet of turmoil, and racket, and insubordination. This latter state of things is not an accident, it has its purpose. But for it, one would linger upon the Pope and the Doge, thinking them to be the motive and supreme feature of the picture; whereas one is drawn along, almost unconsciously, to see what the trouble is about. Now at the very end of this riot, within four feet of the end of the picture, and full thirty-six feet from the beginning of it, the Hair Trunk bursts with an electrifying suddenness upon the spectator, in all its matchless perfection, and the great master's triumph is sweeping and complete. From that moment no other thing in those forty feet of canvas has any charm. One sees the Hair Trunk, and the Hair Trunk only-and to see it is to worship it. Bassano even placed objects in the immediate vicinity of the supreme feature whose pretended purpose was to divert attention from it yet a little longer and thus delay and augment the surprise; for instance, to the right of it he has placed a stooping man with a cap so red that it is sure to hold the eye for a moment to the left of it, some six feet away, he has placed a red-coated man on an inflated horse, and that coat plucks your eye to that locality the next moment. Then, between the trunk and the red horseman, he has intruded a man, naked to his waist, who is carrying a fancy flour-sack on the middle of his back, instead of on his shoulder this admirable feat interests you, of course

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The World's Masterpiece.

-keeps you at bay a little longer, like a sock or a jacket thrown to the pursuing wolf-but at last, in spite of all distractions and detentions, the eye of even the most dull and heedless spectator is sure to fall upon the world's masterpiece, and in that moment he totters to his chair or leans upon his guide for support.

Descriptions of such a work as this must necessarily be imperfect, yet they are of value. The top of the Trunk is arched; the arch is a perfect halfcircle, in the Roman style of architecture, for in the then rapid decadence of Greek art the rising influence of Rome was already beginning to be felt in the art of the Republic. The Trunk is bound or bordered with leather all around where the lid joins the main body. Many critics consider this leather too cold in tone; but I consider this its highest merit, since it was evidently made so to emphasize by contrast the impassioned fervour of the hasp. The high lights in this part of the work are cleverly managed, the motif is admirably subordinated to the ground tints, and the technique is very fine. The brass nail-heads are in the purest style of the early Renaissance. The strokes here are very firm and bold-every nail-head is a portrait. The handle on the end of the Trunk has evidently been retouched--I think, with a piece of chalk-but one can still see the inspiration of the Old Master in the tranquil, almost too tranquil, hang of it. The hair of this Trunk is real hair-so to speak-white

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in patches, brown in patches. The details are finely worked out; the repose proper to hair in a recumbent and inactive attitude is charmingly expressed. There is a feeling about this part of the work which lifts it to the highest altitudes of art; the sense of sordid realism vanishes away-one recognizes that there is soul here. View this Trunk as you will, it is a gem, it is a marvel, it is a miracle. Some of the effects are very daring, approaching even to the boldest flights of the rococo, the sirocco, and the Byzantine schools -yet the master's hand never falters-it moves on, calm, majestic, confident-and with that art which conceals art, it finally casts over the tout ensemble, by mysterious methods of its own, a subtle something which refines, subdues, etherealizes the arid components, and endues them with the deep charm and gracious witchery of poesy.

Among the art-treasures of Europe there are pictures which approach the Hair Trunk---there are two which may be said to equal it, possibly-but there is none that surpasses it. So perfect is the Hair Trunk that it moves even persons who ordinarily have no feeling for art. When an Erie baggagemaster saw it two years ago, he could hardly keep from checking it; and once when a customs inspector was brought into its presence, he gazed upon it in silent rapture for some moments, then slowly and unconsciously placed one hand behind him with the palm uppermost, and got out his chalk with the other. These facts speak for themselves.

CHAPTER XLIX.

ONE lingers about the Cathedral a good deal, in Venice. There is a strong fascination about it— partly because it is so old, and partly because it is so ugly. Too many of the world's famous buildings fail of one chief virtue-harmony; they are made up of a methodless mixture of the ugly and the beautiful ; this is bad; it is confusing, it is unrestful. One has a sense of uneasiness, of distress, without knowing why. But one is calm before St. Mark, one is calm within it, one would be calm on top of it, calm in the cellar; for its details are masterfully ugly, no misplaced and impertinent beauties are intruded anywhere; and the consequent result is a grand harmonious whole, of soothing, entrancing, tranquillising, soul-satisfying ugliness. One's admiration of a perfect thing always grows, never declines; and this is the surest evidence to him that it is perfect. St. Mark is perfect. To me it soon grew to be so nobly, so augustly ugly, that it was difficult to stay away from it, even for a little while. Every time its squat domes disappeared from my view, I had a despondent feeling; whenever they reappeared, I felt an honest rapture-I have not known any happier hours