248 SKETCHES OF THE OLD MASTEES. 



placed the name of Michael Angelo at the head of the list of 

 perspective painters. 



Titian. TITIAN YECELLIO, (born near Venice in 1477, died at 

 Venice in 1576), began at the early age of ten to show indications 

 of the surprising talent that was in him. He lived a long and 

 active life, and was a life-long painter. It is not strange there- 

 fore that his always beautiful productions abound in every old 

 collection. It is hard to specify his best, since everything from 

 his hand is so highly prized. His loving countrymen have 

 selected and carved in relief on his tomb " The Assumption of 

 the Virgin," and on each side the martyrdoms of St. Lawrence 

 and St. Peter. The last is the one which is generally considered 

 his best work. The Venetian School is noted for its mastery in 

 colors, but is accused of being faulty in design. Titian as a 

 colorist is unexcelled. As the delineator and painter of the 

 human form he is matchless. His portraits are perfectly mag- 

 nificent. Those that go by the name of " Titian's Mistress," as 

 the Flora in the Uffizi and La Bella di Tiziano in the Pitti, are 

 masterly productions. At the age of thirty-four he married a 

 Venetian lady, by whom he had three children. He lived to be 

 almost a hundred years old, and then may be said to have died 

 before his time, for he was carried off in the midst of his work 

 by the pestilence that has so often ravaged Italian cities. Those 

 who died of this disease were not allowed the honors of burial, 

 but an exception was made in his case, and he was buried in the 

 church of the Franciscans in Venice. His monument is one of 

 the finest works in marble that has ever been made. 



Raphael. RAPHAEL SANTI was born at Urbino, a city on the 

 opposite side of Italy from Florence, in 1483, and died in Rome 

 in 1520. Like nearly all the geniuses of painting he developed 

 very early, his father teaching him in the art before he was ten 

 years old, and at sixteen he was filling orders. He entered the 

 Vatican at twenty-five and died twelve years after. His time 

 was short, but he accomplished a glorious work and left an 

 undying name. He was unquestionably the first of the Italian 

 painters, and withal so gentle and lovely in his character as to 

 make only friends wherever he went ; as Vasari said of him, 



