[147] Vat. Urb. MSS. No. 1374 and 632. The manuscripts by him, mentioned in No. 131 of the Quarterly Review, as in the possession of his descendant, Count Marini, of Borgo S. Sepolcro, no longer exist; and a small portrait there of himself does not appear to be by his hand. As a further specimen of the Friar's ideas on this matter, we may offer an extract from his De Divina Proportione Epistola (Venice, 1509), wherein he compares perspective to music, ranking both with the geometrical sciences, since just as "the former refreshes the mind with harmony, the latter delights it greatly by correct distance and variety of colours." "Who, indeed, is there that, seeing an elegant figure with its exact outlines well defined, and seeming to want nothing but breath, would not pronounce it something rather divine than human? And painting imitates nature as nearly as can be told, which is proved to our eyes in the exquisite representation, so worthily composed by the graceful hand of our Leonardo, of the ardent desire after our salvation; wherein it is impossible to imagine greater attention than that of the apostles, aroused on hearing, in the words of infallible truth, 'One of you shall betray me,'—when, interchanging with each other attitudes and gestures, they seem to converse in startled and sad astonishment."
[*148] "He was perhaps the first," says Mr. Berenson, "to use effects of light for their direct tonic or subduing or soothing qualities." He uses light as the "plein air" school of France uses it. See a chapter devoted to his work in my Cities of Umbria (Methuen, 1904).
[*149] They are in quite fair preservation as things go.
[*150] There are two greyhounds lying side by side facing opposite ways.
[151] Passavant conjectures this group to be a satire upon three neighbouring princes who were Duke Federigo's enemies, and seems to consider the picture influenced by some Flemish master. If painted after the visit of Justis of Ghent, it can hardly represent Oddantonio. See below, [ch. xxx.]
[152] It is very unsatisfactorily engraved in Bonnard's Costumes du Treizième au Quinzième Siècle.
[*153] None of these three belongs to Piero.
[*154] It is a curious comment on this that a man like Mr. E.V. Lucas, certainly not "a connoisseur," tells us in his book, A Wanderer in London (Methuen, 1906), that he "once startled and embarrassed a dinner table of artists and art critics by asking which was the best picture in the National Gallery. On my modifying this terrible question to the more human form—Which picture would you choose if you might have one? and limiting the choice to the Italian masters, the most distinguished mind present named at once Tintoretto's Origin of the Milky Way.... After very long consideration," he continues, "I have come to the conclusion that mine would be Francesca's Nativity. Take it for all in all, I am disposed to think that Francesca's Nativity appeals to me as a work of compassionate beauty and charm before any Italian picture in the National Collection."
[155] Such is the magnificent Annunciation in a small chapel three miles west from Pesaro, known as the Madonna del Monte, but properly the oratory dedicated in 1505 to the Madonna dell'Annunziata di Calibano, by Ludovico del Molino, alias degli Agostini. Its pure and beautiful countenances are less beatified in expression than earlier Umbrian works, but in composition and draperies it yields to none, and excels all others in gorgeous effect. The gilding is freely laid on in broad masses, and a scintillation in solid gold streams from the Almighty upon the Madonna's bosom, while the angels' wings are starred with peacock's plumage. Yet, as in Gentile da Fabriano's best works, all this glitter is subdued by an earnest and solemn feeling becoming the theme. The panel is inscribed "Ludovicho di Jachomo Aghostini merchatanti da Pesaro a fato [fare] deta tavola a di xxiv. di Decienbre, mdx." How unfortunate that the pious donor had not recorded the artist's name as well as his own! I was unable to visit an altar-piece at Montebaroccio ascribed to Fra Carnevale's pencil.
[*156] There is a predella picture by him at S. Domenico, in Siena, and another in the Uffizi Gallery. He was the pupil of Vecchietta.