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man of about thirty, in a red cap and a black doublet, relieved by two bands of brown. In spite of a vigour of modelling worthy of Rembrandt, the work lacks freedom and individuality. The expression is sullen. The painter seems to have taken little pleasure in his task. The excessive brownness of the colour also injures the general effect. The picture, too, is hardly more than a sketch.1

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MERCURY OR ARGUS. A FRESCO BY BRAMANTE (?). (The Castle of Milan.)

The second portrait in the Ambrosiana is a halflength of a young woman in profile. The face is rather long and thin, but exquisitely pure in outline. It is painted in brownish tones, and relieved against a dark background. There is a slight smile on the lips, the corners of which are strongly marked; the eye,

dark, deep, and limpid, is put in with a rich, generous brush. The painting is firm rather than fused, but the firmness is fat and luscious. Leonardo has worked a miracle, and painted a portrait while creating a type. The admirably modelled head combines certain defects-a turned-up nose, slightly atrophied-with beauties that disarm criticism; a tender, almost voluptuous mouth, a long veiled

1 According to the Cicerone (Burckhardt), this is a portrait of the young Gian Galeazzo Sforza, Il Moro's nephew, the lawful ruler of Milan. But besides the fact that the apparent age of the sitter does not agree with that of the young Duke, the face shows no trace of resemblance to the refined and fragile Gian Galeazzo, as known to us by Caradosso's exquisite little medal. Signor Morelli attributes the male portrait in the Ambrosiana to the anonymous painter of the Virgin of the Rocks in the National Gallery of London. (Die Galerie Borghese, p. 235.) I confess that my connoisseurship does not go so far.

XIII

Portrait of a Young Princess.

(THE AMBROSIANA, MILAN.)

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