Before any knowledge of painting was brought to Florence, there

were already painters in Lucca, and Pisa, and Arezzo, who feared

God and loved the art. The workmen from Greece, whose trade it

was to sell their own works in Italy and teach Italians to imitate

them, had already found in rivals of the soil a skill that could fore–

stall their lessons and cheapen their labours, more years than is

supposed before the art came at all into Florence. The pre-eminence

to which Cimabue was raised at once by his contemporaries, and

which he still retains to a wide extent even in the modern mind, is

to be accounted for partly by the circumstances under which he

arose, and partly by that extraordinary purpose of fortune born with

the lives of some few, and through which it is not a little thing for

any who went before if they are even remembered as the shadows

of the coming of such an one, and the voices which prepared his

way in the wilderness. It is thus, almost exclusively, that the

painters of whom I speak are now known. They have left little, and

but little heed is taken of that which men hold to have been sur–

passed; it is gone like time gone,—a track of dust and dead leaves

that merely led to the fountain.

Nevertheless, of very late years and in very rare instances, some

signs of a better understanding have become manifest. A case in

point is that of the triptych and two cruciform pictures at Dresden,

by Chiaro di Messer Bello dell' Erma, to which the eloquent pam–

phlet of Dr. Aemmster has at length succeeded in attracting the

students. There is another still more solemn and beautiful work,

now proved to be by the same hand, in the Pitti gallery at Florence.

It is the one to which my narrative will relate.

This Chiaro dell' Erma was a young man of very honourable

family in Arezzo; where, conceiving art almost for himself, and

loving it deeply, he endeavoured from early boyhood towards the

imitation of any objects offered in nature. The extreme longing

after a visible embodiment of his thoughts strengthened as his years increased, more even than his sinews or the blood of his life; until

he would feel faint in sunsets and at the sight of stately persons.

When he had lived nineteen years, he heard of the famous Giunta

Pisano; and, feeling much of admiration, with perhaps a little of

that envy which youth always feels until it has learned to measure

success by time and opportunity, he determined that he would seek

out Giunta, and, if possible, become his pupil.

Having arrived in Pisa, he clothed himself in humble apparel,

being unwilling that any other thing than the desire he had for

knowledge should be his plea with the great painter; and then,

leaving his baggage at a house of entertainment, he took his way

along the street, asking whom he met for the lodging of Giunta. It

soon chanced that one of that city, conceiving him to be a stranger

and poor, took him into his house and refreshed him; afterwards

directing him on his way.

When he was brought to speech of Giunta, he said merely that he

was a student, and that nothing in the world was so much at his

heart as to become that which he heard told of him with whom he

was speaking. He was received with courtesy and consideration,

and soon stood among the works of the famous artist. But the

forms he saw there were lifeless and incomplete; and a sudden

exultation possessed him as he said within himself, “I am the master

of this man.” The blood came at first into his face, but the next

moment he was quite pale and fell to trembling. He was able, how–

ever, to conceal his emotion; speaking very little to Giunta, but

when he took his leave thanking him respectfully.

After this, Chiaro's first resolve was, that he would work out

thoroughly some one of his thoughts, and let the world know him.

But the lesson which he had now learned, of how small a greatness

might win fame, and how little there was to strive against, served to

make him torpid, and rendered his exertions less continual. Also

Pisa was a larger and more luxurious city than Arezzo; and when,

in his walks, he saw the great gardens laid out for pleasure, and the

beautiful women who passed to and fro, and heard the music that

was in the groves of the city at evening, he was taken with wonder

that he had never claimed his share of the inheritance of those

years in which his youth was cast. And women loved Chiaro;

for, in despite of the burthen of study, he was well favoured and

very manly in his walking; and seeing his face in front, there was

a glory upon it as upon the face of one who feels a light round his

hair.

So he put thought from him, and partook of his life. But one

night, being in a certain company of ladies, a gentleman that was

there with him began to speak of the paintings of a youth named

Bonaventura, which he had seen in Lucca; adding, that Giunta Pisano might now look for a rival. When Chiaro heard this, the

lamps shook before him, and the music beat in his ears. He rose up,

alleging a sudden sickness, and went out of that house with his teeth

set. And, being again within his room, he wrote up over the door

the name of Bonaventura, that it might stop him when he would

go out.

He now took to work diligently, not returning to Arezzo, but

remaining in Pisa, that no day more might be lost; only living

entirely to himself. Sometimes, after nightfall, he would walk

abroad in the most solitary places he could find; hardly feeling the

ground under him, because of the thoughts of the day which held

him in fever.

The lodging Chiaro had chosen was in a house that looked upon

gardens fast by the Church of San Petronio. It was here, and at

this time, that he painted the Dresden pictures; as also, in all

likelihood, the one—inferior in merit, but certainly his—which is

now at Munich. For the most part he was calm and regular in his

manner of study; though often he would remain at work through

the whole of a day, not resting once so long as the light lasted;

flushed, and with the hair from his face. Or, at times when he

could not paint, he would sit for hours in thought of all the greatness

the world had known from of old; until he was weak with yearning,

like one who gazes upon a path of stars.

He continued in this patient endeavour for about three years, at

the end of which his name was spoken throughout all Tuscany. As

his fame waxed, he began to be employed, besides easel-pictures,

upon wall-paintings; but I believe that no traces remain to us of

any of these latter. He is said to have painted in the Duomo; and

D'Agincourt mentions having seen some portions of a picture by

him which originally had its place above the high altar in the

Church of the Certosa; but which, at the time he saw it, being very

dilapidated, had been hewn out of the wall, and was preserved in

the stores of the convent. Before the period of Dr. Aemmster's

researches, however, it had been entirely destroyed.

Chiaro was now famous. It was for the race of fame that he had

girded up his loins; and he had not paused until fame was reached;

yet now, in taking breath, he found that the weight was still at his

heart. The years of his labour had fallen from him, and his life was

still in its first painful desire.

With all that Chiaro had done during these three years, and even

before with the studies of his early youth, there had always been a

feeling of worship and service. It was the peace-offering that he

made to God and to his own soul for the eager selfishness of his aim.

There was earth, indeed, upon the hem of his raiment; but this was

of the heaven, heavenly. He had seasons when he could endure to think of no other feature of his hope than this. Sometimes it had

even seemed to him to behold that day when his mistress—his

mystical lady (now hardly in her ninth year, but whose smile at

meeting had already lighted on his soul,)—even she, his own

gracious Italian Art—should pass, through the sun that never sets,

into the shadow of the tree of life, and be seen of God and found

good: and then it had seemed to him that he, with many who, since

his coming, had joined the band of whom he was one (for, in his

dream, the body he had worn on earth had been dead an hundred

years), were permitted to gather round the blessed maiden, and to

worship with her through all ages and ages of ages, saying, Holy,

holy, holy. This thing he had seen with the eyes of his spirit; and

in this thing had trusted, believing that it would surely come to pass.

But now, (being at length led to inquire closely into himself,)

even as, in the pursuit of fame, the unrest abiding after attainment

had proved to him that he had misinterpreted the craving of his own

spirit—so also, now that he would willingly have fallen back on

devotion, he became aware that much of that reverence which he

had mistaken for faith had been no more than the worship of beauty.

Therefore, after certain days passed in perplexity, Chiaro said within

himself, “My life and my will are yet before me: I will take another

aim to my life.”

From that moment Chiaro set a watch on his soul, and put his

hand to no other works but only to such as had for their end the

presentment of some moral greatness that should influence the

beholder: and to this end, he multiplied abstractions, and forgot the

beauty and passion of the world. So the people ceased to throng

about his pictures as heretofore; and, when they were carried

through town and town to their destination, they were no longer

delayed by the crowds eager to gaze and admire: and no prayers or

offerings were brought to them on their path, as to his Madonnas,

and his Saints, and his Holy Children, wrought for the sake of the

life he saw in the faces that he loved. Only the critical audience

remained to him; and these, in default of more worthy matter,

would have turned their scrutiny on a puppet or a mantle. Mean–

while, he had no more of fever upon him; but was calm and pale

each day in all that he did and in his goings in and out. The works

he produced at this time have perished—in all likelihood, not

unjustly. It is said (and we may easily believe it), that, though

more laboured than his former pictures, they were cold and un–

emphatic; bearing marked out upon them the measure of that

boundary to which they were made to conform.

And the weight was still close at Chiaro's heart: but he held in

his breath, never resting (for he was afraid), and would not know it.

Now it happened, within these days, that there fell a great feast in Pisa, for holy matters: and each man left his occupation; and all

the guilds and companies of the city were got together for games

and rejoicings. And there were scarcely any that stayed in the

houses, except ladies who lay or sat along their balconies between

open windows which let the breeze beat through the rooms and over

the spread tables from end to end. And the golden cloths that their

arms lay upon drew all eyes upward to see their beauty; and the

day was long; and every hour of the day was bright with the sun.

So Chiaro's model, when he awoke that morning on the hot

pavement of the Piazza Nunziata, and saw the hurry of people that

passed him, got up and went along with them; and Chiaro waited

for him in vain.

For the whole of that morning, the music was in Chiaro's room

from the Church close at hand; and he could hear the sounds that

the crowd made in the streets; hushed only at long intervals while

the processions for the feast-day chanted in going under his windows.

Also, more than once, there was a high clamour from the meeting of

factious persons: for the ladies of both leagues were looking down;

and he who encountered his enemy could not choose but draw upon

him. Chiaro waited a long time idle; and then knew that his

model was gone elsewhere. When at his work, he was blind and

deaf to all else; but he feared sloth: for then his stealthy thoughts

would begin to beat round and round him, seeking a point for attack.

He now rose, therefore, and went to the window. It was within a

short space of noon; and underneath him a throng of people was

coming out through the porch of San Petronio.

The two greatest houses of the feud in Pisa had filled the Church

for that mass. The first to leave had been the Gherghiotti; who,

stopping on the threshold, had fallen back in ranks along each side

of the archway: so that now, in passing outward, the Marotoli had

to walk between two files of men whom they hated, and whose

fathers had hated theirs. All the chiefs were there and their whole

adherence; and each knew the name of each. Every man of the

Marotoli, as he came forth and saw his foes, laid back his hood and

gazed about him, to show the badge upon the close cap that held his

hair. And of the Gherghiotti there were some who tightened their

girdles; and some shrilled and threw up their wrists scornfully, as

who flies a falcon; for that was the crest of their house.

On the walls within the entry were a number of tall narrow

pictures, presenting a moral allegory of Peace, which Chiaro had

painted that year for the Church. The Gherghiotti stood with their

backs to these frescoes; and among them Golzo Ninuccio, the

youngest noble of the faction, called by the people Golaghiotta, for

his debased life. This youth had remained for some while talking

listlessly to his fellows, though with his sleepy sunken eyes fixed on them who passed: but now, seeing that no man jostled another, he

drew the long silver shoe off his foot and struck the dust out of it on

the cloak of him who was going by, asking him how far the tides

rose at Viderza. And he said so because it was three months since,

at that place, the Gherghiotti had beaten the Marotoli to the sands,

and held them there while the sea came in; whereby many had been

drowned. And, when he had spoken, at once the whole archway

was dazzling with the light of confused swords; and they who had

left turned back; and they who were still behind made haste to come

forth: and there was so much blood cast up the walls on a sudden,

that it ran in long streams down Chiaro's paintings.

Chiaro turned himself from the window; for the light felt dry

between his lids, and he could not look. He sat down, and heard

the noise of contention driven out of the church-porch and a great

way through the streets; and soon there was a deep murmur that

heaved and waxed from the other side of the city, where those

of both parties were gathering to join in the tumult.

Chiaro sat with his face in his open hands. Once again he had

wished to set his foot on a place that looked green and fertile; and

once again it seemed to him that the thin rank mask was about

to spread away, and that this time the chill of the water must leave

leprosy in his flesh. The light still swam in his head, and bewildered

him at first; but when he knew his thoughts, they were these:—

“Fame failed me: faith failed me: and now this also,—the hope

that I nourished in this my generation of men,—shall pass from me,

and leave my feet and my hands groping. Yet because of this are

my feet become slow and my hands thin. I am as one who, through

the whole night, holding his way diligently, hath smitten the steel

unto the flint, to lead some whom he knew darkling; who hath kept

his eyes always on the sparks that himself made, lest they should

fail; and who, towards dawn, turning to bid them that he had

guided God speed, sees the wet grass untrodden except of his own

feet. I am as the last hour of the day, whose chimes are a perfect

number; whom the next followeth not, nor light ensueth from him;

but in the same darkness is the old order begun afresh. Men say,

‘This is not God nor man; he is not as we are, neither above us: let

him sit beneath us, for we are many.’ Where I write Peace, in that

spot is the drawing of swords, and there men's footprints are red.

When I would sow, another harvest is ripe. Nay, it is much worse

with me than thus much. Am I not as a cloth drawn before the

light, that the looker may not be blinded; but which sheweth

thereby the grain of its own coarseness; so that the light seems

defiled, and men say, ‘We will not walk by it.’ Wherefore through

me they shall be doubly accursed, seeing that through me they reject

the light. May one be a devil and not know it?”

As Chiaro was in these thoughts, the fever encroached slowly on

his veins, till he could sit no longer and would have risen; but

suddenly he found awe within him, and held his head bowed, without

stirring. The warmth of the air was not shaken; but there seemed

a pulse in the light, and a living freshness, like rain. The silence

was a painful music, that made the blood ache in his temples; and he

lifted his face and his deep eyes.

A woman was present in his room, clad to the hands and feet with

a green and grey raiment, fashioned to that time. It seemed that

the first thoughts he had ever known were given him as at first from

her eyes, and he knew her hair to be the golden veil through which

he beheld his dreams. Though her hands were joined, her face was

not lifted, but set forward; and though the gaze was austere, yet her

mouth was supreme in gentleness. And as he looked, Chiaro's

spirit appeared abashed of its own intimate presence, and his lips

shook with the thrill of tears; it seemed such a bitter while till the

spirit might be indeed alone.

She did not move closer towards him, but he felt her to be as much

with him as his breath. It was as though, scaling a great steepness,

he heard his own voice echoed in some place much higher than he

could see, and the name of which was not known to him. As the

woman stood, her speech was with Chiaro: not, as it were, from her

mouth or in his ears; but distinctly between them.

“I am an image, Chiaro, of thine own soul within thee. See me,

and know me as I am. Thou sayest that fame has failed thee, and

faith failed thee; but because at least thou hast not laid thy life unto

riches, therefore, though thus late, I am suffered to come into thy

knowledge. Fame sufficed not, for that thou didst seek fame: seek

thine own conscience (not thy mind's conscience, but thine heart's),

and all shall approve and suffice. For Fame, in noble soils, is a fruit

of the Spring: but not therefore should it be said: ‘Lo! my garden

that I planted is barren: the crocus is here, but the lily is dead in

the dry ground, and shall not lift the earth that covers it: therefore

I will fling my garden together, and give it unto the builders.’ Take

heed rather that thou trouble not the wise secret earth; for in the

mould that thou throwest up shall the first tender growth lie to

waste; which else had been made strong in its season. Yea, and

even if the year fall past in all its months, and the soil be indeed, to

thee, peevish and incapable, and though thou indeed gather all thy

harvest, and it suffice for others, and thou remain vexed with

emptiness; and others drink of thy streams, and the drouth rasp thy

throat;—let it be enough that these have found the feast good, and

thanked the giver: remembering that, when the winter is striven

through, there is another year, whose wind is meek, and whose sun

fulfilleth all.”

While he heard, Chiaro went slowly on his knees. It was not to

her that spoke, for the speech seemed within him and his own. The

air brooded in sunshine, and though the turmoil was great outside,

the air within was at peace. But when he looked in her eyes he

wept. And she came to him, and cast her hair over him, and took

her hands about his forehead, and spoke again:—

“Thou hast said,” she continued gently, “that faith failed thee.

This cannot be. Either thou hadst it not, or thou hast it. But who

bade thee strike the point betwixt love and faith? Wouldst thou

sift the warm breeze from the sun that quickens it? Who bade

thee turn upon God and say: ‘Behold, my offering is of earth, and

not worthy; thy fire comes not upon it: therefore, though I slay not

my brother whom thou acceptest, I will depart before thou smite

me.’ Why shouldst thou rise up and tell God He is not content?

Had He, of his warrant, certified so to thee? Be not nice to seek

out division; but possess thy love in sufficiency: assuredly this is

faith, for the heart must believe first. What He hath set in thine

heart to do, that do thou; and even though thou do it without

thought of Him, it shall be well done; it is this sacrifice that He

asketh of thee, and his flame is upon it for a sign. Think not of

Him; but of his love and thy love. For with God is no lust of

godhead: He hath no hand to bow beneath, nor a foot, that thou

shouldst kiss it.”

And Chiaro held silence, and wept into her hair which covered

his face; and the salt tears that he shed ran through her hair upon

his lips; and he tasted the bitterness of shame.

Then the fair woman, that was his soul, spoke again to him,

saying:—

“And for this thy last purpose, and for those unprofitable truths

of thy teaching,—thine heart hath already put them away, and it

needs not that I lay my bidding upon thee. How is it that thou, a

man, wouldst say coldly to the mind what God hath said to the heart

warmly? Thy will was honest and wholesome; but look well lest

this also be folly,—to say, ‘I, in doing this, do strengthen God

among men.’ When at any time hath He cried unto thee, saying,

‘My son, lend me thy shoulder, for I fall?’ Deemest thou that the

men who enter God's temple in malice, to the provoking of blood, and

neither for his love nor for his wrath will abate their purpose,—shall

afterwards stand with thee in the porch, midway between Him and

themselves, to give ear unto thy thin voice, which merely the fall of

their visors can drown, and to see thy hands, stretched feebly, tremble

among their swords? Give thou to God no more than He asketh of

thee; but to man also, that which is man's. In all that thou doest,

work from thine own heart, simply; for his heart is as thine, when

thine is wise and humble; and he shall have understanding of thee. One drop of rain is as another, and the sun's prism in all: and shalt

thou not be as he, whose lives are the breath of One? Only by

making thyself his equal can he learn to hold communion with thee,

and at last own thee above him. Not till thou lean over the water

shalt thou see thine image therein: stand erect, and it shall slope

from thy feet and be lost. Know that there is but this means

whereby thou mayest serve God with man:—Set thine hand and thy

soul to serve man with God.”

And when she that spoke had said these words within Chiaro's

spirit, she left his side quietly, and stood up as he had first seen her:

with her fingers laid together, and her eyes steadfast, and with the

breadth of her long dress covering her feet on the floor. And, speak–

ing again, she said:—

“Chiaro, servant of God, take now thine Art unto thee, and paint

me thus, as I am, to know me: weak, as I am, and in the weeds of

this time; only with eyes which seek out labour, and with a faith,

not learned, yet jealous of prayer. Do this; so shall thy soul stand

before thee always, and perplex thee no more.”

And Chiaro did as she bade him. While he worked, his face grew

solemn with knowledge: and before the shadows had turned, his

work was done. Having finished, he lay back where he sat, and was

asleep immediately: for the growth of that strong sunset was heavy

about him, and he felt weak and haggard; like one just come out of

a dusk, hollow country, bewildered with echoes, where he had lost

himself, and who has not slept for many days and nights. And

when she saw him lie back, the beautiful woman came to him, and

sat at his head, gazing, and quieted his sleep with her voice.

The tumult of the factions had endured all that day through all

Pisa, though Chiaro had not heard it: and the last service of that

feast was a mass sung at midnight from the windows of all the

churches for the many dead who lay about the city, and who had to

be buried before morning, because of the extreme heats.

In the spring of 18—, I was at Florence. Such as were there at

the same time with myself—those, at least, to whom Art is some–

thing—will certainly recollect how many rooms of the Pitti Gallery

were closed through that season, in order that some of the pictures

they contained might be examined and repaired without the neces–

sity of removal. The hall, the staircases, and the vast central suite

of apartments, were the only accessible portions; and in these such

paintings as they could admit from the sealed penetralia were pro–

fanely huddled together, without respect of dates, schools, or persons.

I fear that, through this interdict, I may have missed seeing

many of the best pictures. I do not mean only the most talked of;

for these, as they were restored, generally found their way somehow into the open rooms, owing to the clamours raised by the students;

and I remember how old Ercoli's, the curator's, spectacles used to be

mirrored in the reclaimed surface, as he leaned mysteriously over

these works with some of the visitors, to scrutinise and elucidate.

One picture which I saw that spring I shall not easily forget. It

was among those, I believe, brought from the other rooms, and had

been hung, obviously out of all chronology, immediately beneath that

head by Raphael so long known as the “Berrettino,” and now said

to be the portrait of Cecco Ciulli.

The picture I speak of is a small one, and represents merely the

figure of a woman, clad to the hands and feet with a green and grey

raiment, chaste and early in its fashion, but exceedingly simple.

She is standing: her hands are held together lightly, and her eyes

set earnestly open.

The face and hands in this picture, though wrought with great

delicacy, have the appearance of being painted at once, in a single

sitting: the drapery is unfinished. As soon as I saw the figure, it drew

an awe upon me, like water in shadow. I shall not attempt to describe

it more than I have already done; for the most absorbing wonder

of it was its literality. You knew that figure, when painted, had

been seen; yet it was not a thing to be seen of men. This language

will appear ridiculous to such as have never looked on the work; and

it may be even to some among those who have. On examining it

closely, I perceived in one corner of the canvass the words Manus

Animam pinxit , and the date 1239.

I turned to my catalogue, but that was useless, for the pictures

were all displaced. I then stepped up to the Cavaliere Ercoli, who

was in the room at the moment, and asked him regarding the subject

and authorship of the painting. He treated the matter, I thought,

somewhat slightingly, and said that he could show me the reference

in the Catalogue, which he had compiled. This, when found, was

not of much value, as it merely said, “Schizzo d'autore incerto,”

adding the inscription. ¹ I could willingly have prolonged my inquiry,

in the hope that it might somehow lead to some result; but I had

disturbed the curator from certain yards of Guido, and he was

not communicative. I went back, therefore, and stood before the

picture till it grew dusk.

The next day I was there again; but this time a circle of students

was round the spot, all copying the “Berrettino.” I contrived, how–

ever, to find a place whence I could see my picture, and where I seemed to be in nobody's way. For some minutes I remained un–

disturbed; and then I heard, in an English voice: “Might I beg

of you, sir, to stand a little more to this side, as you interrupt my

view.”

I felt vexed, for, standing where he asked me, a glare struck on

the picture from the windows, and I could not see it. However, the

request was reasonably made, and from a countryman; so I complied,

and turning away, stood by his easel. I knew it was not worth

while; yet I referred in some way to the work underneath the one

he was copying. He did not laugh, but he smiled as we do in

England: “ Very odd, is it not?” said he.

The other students near us were all continental; and seeing an

Englishman select an Englishman to speak with, conceived, I

suppose, that he could understand no language but his own. They

had evidently been noticing the interest which the little picture

appeared to excite in me.

One of them, an Italian, said something to another who stood next

to him. He spoke with a Genoese accent, and I lost the sense in the

villanous dialect. “Che so?” replied the other, lifting his eyebrows

towards the figure; “roba mistica: 'st' Inglesi son matti sul misti–

cismo: somiglia alle nebbie di là. Li fa pensare alla patria—

• ‘e intenerisce il core
• Lo di ch' han detto ai dolci amici adio.’”

“La notte, vuoi dire,” said a third.

There was a general laugh. My compatriot was evidently a

novice in the language, and did not take in what was said. I

remained silent, being amused.

“Et toi donc?” said he who had quoted Dante, turning to a

student, whose birthplace was unmistakable, even had he been ad–

dressed in any other language: “que dis-tu de ce genre-là?”

“Moi?” returned the Frenchman, standing back from his easel,

and looking at me and at the figure, quite politely, though with an

evident reservation: “Je dis, mon cher, que c'est une spécialité dont

je me fiche pas mal. Je tiens que quand on ne comprend pas une

chose, c'est qu'elle ne signifie rien.”

My reader thinks possibly that the French student was right.