Essays on Life 



deserves the name of genius none the less for 

 the manifest imperfection with which it has 

 been carried into execution. There are only 

 three horses fully shown, and one partly shown. 

 They are all of the heavy Flemish type 

 adopted by Tabachetti at Varallo. The man 

 kicking the fallen Christ and the goitred man 

 (with the same teeth missing), who are so 

 conspicuous in the Varallo Journey to Calvary, 

 reappear here, only the kicking man has much 

 less nose than at Varallo, probably because 

 (as explained) the nose got whittled away and 

 could not be whittled back again. I observe 

 that the kind of lapelled tunic which Taba- 

 chetti, and only Tabachetti, adopts at Varallo, 

 is adopted for the centurion in this chapel, 

 and indeed throughout the Saas chapels this 

 particular form of tunic is the most usual for 

 a Roman soldier. The work is still a very 

 striking one, notwithstanding its translation 

 into wood and the decay into which it has 

 been allowed to fall ; nor can it fail to impress 

 the visitor who is familiar with this class of 

 art as coming from a man of extraordinary 



dramatic power and command over the almost 



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