uncivilized times, such species of boasting was not esteemed offensive: and surely, if the literati of the fourteenth century were in the habit of extolling themselves in their own works; if the typographers were so fond of exalting themselves and their editions by superb titles, and more vaunting epigrams, even to a ridiculous degree; the more modest ambition of sometimes handing down their own features to posterity, may be excused in our painters.

The colours of these artists are likewise simple and natural, though not always in union, more especially with the ground, nor sufficiently broken by the chiaroscuro. But above all, they are most remarkable for the extreme simplicity of the composition of their pieces. It was very seldom they inserted histories, it being sufficient for the ambition of those times to give a representation of our Lady upon a throne, surrounded with a number of saints, such as the devotion of each was supposed to require. Nor were those drawn in the manner they had before been, all erect at equal distances, and in the least studied motions; but their authors attempted to give them some degree of contrast, so that while one was drawn gazing upon the Virgin, another appeared reading a book; if this were in a kneeling attitude, that is seen standing erect. The national genius, always lively and joyous, even then sought to develop itself in more brilliant colours than those of any other school. And, perhaps, in order that the figures, of such glowing tints, might stand in bolder relief, they kept the colour of the airs most generally pale and languid. They aimed, indeed, as much as lay in their power, at enlivening their compositions with the most pleasing images; freely introducing into their sacred pieces, sportive cherubs, drawn as if vieing with each other in airy grace and agility; some in the act of singing, some of playing: and not unfrequently bearing little baskets of fruit and flowers so exquisitely drawn as to appear moist with recent dew. In the drapery of their figures they were simple and natural; the most exempt perhaps from that trite and exact folding, as well as from that manner of bandaging the bodies so common in Mantegna, and which infected some other schools.

Nor did they lay small stress upon certain accessaries of their art, such as the thrones, which they composed in the richest and most ostentatious manner; and the landscapes, which they drew with an astonishing degree of truth from nature, besides the architecture frequently constructed in the forms of porticos or tribunes. It may sometimes be observed, also, that adapting themselves to the workmanship and to the design of the altar, they feigned a continuation of it within the painting, so that by the resemblance of colour and of taste, the eye is deceived, the illusion produced rendering it doubtful where the exterior ornament^[27] terminates, and where the picture begins. We ought not, therefore, easily to give credit to certain writers who have undervalued the merits of such masters, pronouncing their labours mechanical, as those of mere practical artificers, inasmuch as Serlio is known to have supplied several of them with architectural designs.^[28] We ought rather to subscribe to the opinion of Daniel Barbaro, whose extensive learning did not prevent him, in his work entitled Pratica di Prospettiva, from expressing his admiration of them, even from the commencement, as follows: "In this art they left many fine remnants of excellent works, in which we behold not only landscapes, mountains, woods, and edifices, all admirably designed; but even the human form, and other animals, with lines drawn to the eye, as if to a centre placed in the most exact perspective. But in what manner, and by what rules they proceeded, no author of whom I am aware, has left any account to instruct us."