is more impetuous motion in the gesture of the
Angel, who hardly pauses in his flight through air to touch his knee to
the parapet. His mouth is open and the words of his message seem
trembling on his lips. Although all the outlines are severely defined
with the sharpness of a Schiavone, the interior modeling is sensitive
and delicate and in the case of the Virgin, tender and softly varied, so
that the curve of the throat and chin seem almost to ripple with the
breathing, the young chest swells in lovely gradation of form under the
close bodice, and the whole figure has a graciousness of contour, a slim
roundness and elasticity by which it takes its place among Crivelli's
many realizations of his ideal type as at least one of the most lovable
if not the most characteristic and personal. Especially fine, also, is
the treatment of the drapery in these two admirable little panels. The
mantle surrounding the angel billows out in curling folds as eloquent of
swift movement as the draperies of Botticelli's striding nymphs; and the
opulent line of the Virgin's cloak is superb in its lightly broken swirl
about the figure. The hair, too, of both the Angel and the Virgin, waves
in masses at once free and formal, with something of the wild beauty of
Botticelli's windblown tresses. The analogy between the two painters,
the ardent and poetic Florentine and the no less ardent and at times
almost as poetic Venetian (if we accept his own claim to the title),
might be further dwelt upon, although it would be easy to overemphasize
it. One attribute, certainly, they had in common and it is the one that
most completely separates each of them from his fellows--the exultant
_verve_, that is, with which the human form is made to communicate
energy of movement in their compositions. It is impossible to believe
that either of them ever painted a tame picture. If, however, Crivelli
could not be tame he could be insipid, escaping tameness by what might
be called the violence of his affectation. The _St. George_ in the
Metropolitan Museum is an instance of his occasional use of a type so
frail and languid in its grace and so sentimental in gesture and
expression as to suggest caricature. Another example dated 1491 is the
_Madonna and Child Enthroned_ in the National Gallery. On either side of
the melancholy Madonna are St. Francis and St. Sebastian. The latter is
pierced by arrows and tied to a pillar, but so far from wearing the look
of suffering