26o FIELD AND HEDGEROW. 



tender ; how poor are goddesses beside her ! At forty, 

 fifty, sixty yards, still looking back, though the details 

 now disappeared, the wonderful outline of the torso and 

 hips was as powerful as ever. Ascending the steps 

 which lead from the gallery I paused once more, stand- 

 ing close against the wall, for other figures interfere with 

 a distant view, and even at that distance (eighty yards 

 or more) the same beauty was recognisable. Yet there 

 is no extended arm, no attitude to force attention — 

 nothing but the torso is visible ; there is no artificial 

 background (as with the Venus of Milo) to throw it into 

 relief; the figure crouches, and the love expressed in the 

 action is conveyed by the marvel of the work as far as 

 it can be seen. 



Returning next morning I took the passage on the 

 left (not as before on the right), and so came at once to 

 the top of the steps, and to a spot whence a view can 

 with little trouble be obtained. Perhaps it is more 

 than eighty yards away, but the effect is the same 

 despite the distance. The very best place to view the 

 statue is exactly in front of it, two or three yards away, 

 or as close as you like, but precisely in front. It 

 requires no careful choice of position so as to give a 

 limb more prominence, or render the light more effec- 

 tive (the light just there is bad, though it is near a 

 window). The sculptor did not rely upon ' artistic ' and 

 selected attitudes — something made up for the occasion. 

 No meretricious aid whatever has been called in — no 

 trick, no illusion of the eye, nothing theatrical. He 

 relied solely and simply upon a true representation of 

 the human body — the torso, the body itself — as he 

 really saw it in life. When we consider that the lines 

 of the body seen in front are gentle, and in no way 

 prominent, it is apparent how beautiful the original 



