Beneath the floor of Milan Cathedral, below the dome and in front of the choir, is the Cappella of Carlo Borromeo. His remains lie in a silver coffin, supported on a silver altar, each elaborately engraved and embossed. The hexagonal chamber has the whole surface of its walls coated with plates of silver, on which are reliefs representing a series of scenes from his life. In one he is giving alms to the plague-stricken: in a second he is baptizing children in a plague hospital: in a third he is walking with feet and head bare, and with a halter round his neck, in a plague procession, preceding the sacred relics that are carried beneath a canopy.
Portraits of S. Carlo in Milan, those in the Cathedral, in the Borromeo Palace and elsewhere, all in profile, show the prominent nose and receding forehead and a degree of ugliness that would almost seem to forbid enrolment in the catalogue of the saints. A rugged full-faced portrait by Annibale Carracci (1560-1609), now in the Hermitage at St. Petersburg, seems less discordant with the halo.
Pietro da Cortona (1596-1669) painted a picture of [Borromeo heading a plague procession], which is one of the best of its kind. It is now over the altar of S. Carlo Catinari at Rome, but hidden from view by a brazen symbol of rays of glory.
The familiar theme of innumerable pictures both in Italy and France is Carlo Borromeo carrying the Sacrament to the plague-stricken. Some of the best known are those by Jakob van Oost (le Vieux) (1600-71) in the Louvre: by Lemonnier in the Musée at Rouen: by Cigoli (1559-1613) in the church of Santa Maria Nuova at Cortona: by Francesco Gossi in the church of Poveri at Bologna: and by Baldassare Franceschini in the church of the Barnabites at Pescia.
The Flemish painter Gaspard de Crayer (1585-1669) has varied somewhat the hackneyed features of the subject. In his picture, Carlo Borromeo, in red episcopal robes, followed by two acolytes carrying the taper and cross, bends down and offers the Sacrament to a dying man, who kneels before him with head bandaged and shirt thrown open over his bare chest. Behind the man are two women, one of whom supports his body, while the other in the shadow of a doorway carries a glass of water in her hand. Kneeling beside the man, with hands joined in prayer, a little boy awaits the Sacrament: in the foreground lies a dead child. Before this little corpse a man is seated on the ground, supporting his head, his legs bare and covered with ulcers. Behind him are two women, one of whom covers her mouth with a handkerchief, while the other stretches out her hands to an attendant deacon, who is distributing alms. The background is a street of Milan with a vista of open country beyond.
PLATE XXIII (Face Page 174)
BORROMEO
LEADING A PLAGUE PROCESSION
By Pietro da Cortona