A Popular Handbook to the National Gallery, Volume I, Foreign Schools. National Gallery (Great Britain)

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СКАЧАТЬ is on the left-hand side something without doubt intended for a rocky mountain, in the middle distance, near enough for all its fissures and crags to be distinctly visible, or, rather, for a great many awkward scratches of the brush over it to be visible, which, though not particularly representative either of one thing or another, are without doubt intended to be symbolical of rocks. Now no mountain in full light, and near enough for its details of crags to be seen, is without great variety of delicate colour. Salvator has painted it throughout without one instant of variation; but this, I suppose, is simplicity and generalisation; – let it pass: but what is the colour? Pure sky blue, without one grain of grey, or any modifying hue whatsoever; the same brush which had just given the bluest parts of the sky has been more loaded at the same part of the pallet, and the whole mountain thrown in with unmitigated ultramarine. Now, mountains can only become pure blue when there is so much air between them that they become mere flat dark shades, every detail being totally lost: they become blue when they become air, and not till then. Consequently this part of Salvator's painting, being of hills perfectly clear and near, with all their details visible, is, as far as colour is concerned, broad, bold falsehood, the direct assertion of direct impossibility.

      In connection with Salvator's want of sense for colour one should take his insensitiveness to other beauty. For instance, his choice of withered trees, which are here on both sides of us, "is precisely the sign of his preferring ugliness to beauty, decrepitude and disorganisation to life and youth" (Modern Painters, vol. i. pt. ii. sec. ii. ch. ii. § 4; vol. v. pt. vi. ch. viii. § 7).

      85. ST. JEROME AND THE ANGEL

Domenichino (Eclectic-Bologna: 1581-1641). See 48.

      For St. Jerome, see under 227. The apparition of the angel implies the special call of St. Jerome to the work of translating the Scriptures.

      88. ERMINIA AND THE SHEPHERDS

Annibale Carracci (Eclectic-Bologna: 1560-1609). See 9.

      A scene from the "Jerusalem Delivered" by Carracci's contemporary, Tasso. Erminia from the beleaguered city of Jerusalem had beheld the Christian knight, Tancred, whom she loved, wounded in conflict. Disguised in the armour of her friend Clorinda, wearing a dark blue cuirass with a white mantle over it, she stole forth at night to tend him. The sentinels espy her and give her chase. But she outstrips them all, and after a three days' flight finds herself amongst a shepherd family, who entertain her kindly. The old shepherd is busily making card-baskets, and listening to the music of his children. Their fear gives place to delight as the strange warrior, having dismounted from her horse and thrown off her helmet and shield, unbinds her tresses and discloses herself a woman —

      An old man, on a rising ground,

      In the fresh shade, his white flocks feeding near,

      Twig baskets wove; and listen'd to the sound

      Trill'd by three blooming boys, who sat disporting round.

      These, at the shining of her silver arms,

      Were seized at once with wonder and despair;

      But sweet Erminia sooth'd their vain alarms,

      Discovering her dove's eyes and golden hair.

      "Follow," she said, "dear innocents, the care

      Of heaven, your fanciful employ;

      For the so formidable arms I bear,

      No cruel warfare bring, nor harsh annoy

      To your engaging tasks, to your sweet songs of joy."

From Landseer's Catalogue, p. 214.

      This picture has sometimes been ascribed to Domenichino; as the latter was occasionally employed by Annibale to execute his designs, both masters may have had a share in the work.

      91. VENUS SLEEPING

Nicolas Poussin (French: 1593-1665). See 39.

      93. SILENUS GATHERING GRAPES

Annibale Carracci (Eclectic-Bologna: 1560-1609). See 9.

      Silenus in a leopard skin, the nurse and preceptor of Bacchus, the wine-god, is being hoisted by two attendant fauns, so that with his own hands he may pick the grapes. This and the companion picture, 94, originally decorated a harpsichord.

      94. BACCHUS PLAYING TO SILENUS.92

Annibale Carracci (Eclectic-Bologna: 1560-1609). See 9.

      A clever picture of contrasts. The old preceptor is leering and pampered, yet with something of a schoolmaster's gravity, "half inclining to the brute, half conscious of the god." The young pupil – like the shepherd boy in Sidney's Arcadia, "piping as though he should never be old" – is "full of simple careless grace, laughing in youth and beauty; he holds the Pan's pipe in both hands, and looks up with timid wonder, with an expression of mingled delight and surprise at the sounds he produces" (Hazlitt: Criticisms upon Art, p. 6).

      These two pictures – together with the "Lot" and "Susannah" of Guido (193 and 196) – used to hang in the Lancellotti Palace in Rome. Lanzi describes our picture, No. 94, as one of the principal treasures of that collection. It is exquisitely finished, he says; the figures are "at once designed, coloured, and disposed with the hand of a great master" (Bohn's translation, iii. 79).

      95. DIDO AND ÆNEAS

Gaspard Poussin (French: 1613-1675). See 31.

      Dido, Queen of Carthage, enamoured of the Trojan Æneas, the destined founder of Rome, sought to detain him by strategy within her dominions. The goddess Juno, who had espoused Dido's cause, contrived that a storm should befall when the Queen and her guests were on a hunting party (Æneid, iv. 119). In front of the cave a Cupid holds the horse of Æneas, and two others are fluttering above. High in the clouds is Juno, accompanied by Venus, who had contrived all this for Dido's undoing.

      As for the execution of the picture, "the stormy wind blows loudly through its leaves, but the total want of invention in the cloud-forms bears it down beyond redemption. Look at the wreaths of cloud (?), with their unpleasant edges cut as hard and solid and opaque and smooth as thick black paint can make them, rolled up over one another like a dirty sail badly reefed"93 (Modern Painters, vol. i. pt. ii. sec. iii. ch. iv. § 23; vol. ii. pt. iii. sec. ii. ch. ii. § 18).

      97. THE RAPE OF EUROPA

Paolo Veronese (Veronese: 1528-1588). See 26 & p. xix.

      (A study for a larger picture now at Vienna.) Jupiter, enamoured of Europa, a Phoenician princess, transformed himself into a white bull, and mingled with her father's herds whilst she was gathering flowers with her attendants. Europa, struck by the beauty and gentle nature of the beast, caressed him, and even mounted on his back. Two of her attendants are here assisting her, while a third remonstrates with her on her foolhardiness. Europa is replying that she has no fears. The amorous bull meanwhile is licking her foot. He is garlanded with a wreath of flowers, which is held by his master Cupid, forming thus the leading-string of Love. With the other hand Cupid has "taken the bull by the horn"; whilst above, two little winged loves are gathering fruit and scattering roses. In the middle distance Europa and the bull appear again, about to enter the sea; whilst farther on, the bull is swimming with her toward the land. For the story goes that as soon as Europa had seated herself on his back Jupiter crossed the sea and carried her safely to the island of Crete, and from this rape of Europa comes the name of the continent to which she was carried.

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