RELATION OF ENGRAVING TO OTHER ARTS. 281 



either wind, but none of the seas, or mountain passes, by 

 which they were nourished, or directed. 



61. For instance, I am in this course of lectures to giye you 

 an account of a single and minor branch of graphic art, en- 

 graving. But observe how many references to local circum- 

 stances it involves. There are three materials for it, we said ; 

 stone, wood, and metal. Stone engraving is the art of 

 countries possessing marble and gems ; wood engraving, of 

 countries overgrown with forest ; metal engraving, of countries 

 possessing treasures of silver and gold. And the style of a 

 stone engraver is formed on pillars and pyramids ; the style 

 of a wood engraver under the eaves of larch cottages ; the 

 style of a metal engraver in the treasuries of kings. Do you 

 suppose I could rightly explain to you the value of a single 

 touch on brass by Finiguerra, or on box by Bewick, unless I 

 had grasp of the great laws of climate and country; and 

 could trace the inherited sirocco or tramontana of thought to 

 which the souls and bodies of the men owed their existence? 



62. You see that in this flag of 1300 there is a dark strong 

 line in the centre, against which you read the name of 

 Arnolfo. 



In writing our Florentine Dunciad, or History of Fools, can 

 we possibly begin with a better day than All Fools' Day ? On 

 All Fools' Day the first, if you like better so to call it, of the 

 month of opening, in the year 1300, is signed the document 

 making Arnolfo a citizen of Florence, and in 1310 he dies, 

 chief master of the works of the Cathedral there. To this 

 man, Crowe and Cavalcasella give half a page, out of three 

 volumes of five hundred pages each. 



But lower down in my flag, (not put there because of any 

 inferiority, but by order of chronology,) you will see a name 

 sufficiently familiar to you that of Giotto ; and to him, our 

 historians of painting in Italy give some hundred pages, 

 under the impression, stated by them at page 243 of their 

 volume, that " in his hands, art in the Peninsula became en- 

 titled for the first time to the name of Italian." 



63. Art became Italian ! Yes, but what art ? Your authors 

 give a perspective or what they call such, of the upper 



