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r, which is now at Florence, was executed by the young artist in 1490, probably to carry with him as a souvenir of home. Muendler says, "For beauty and delicacy of modelling, this portrait has scarcely been surpassed afterwards by the master, perhaps not equalled." It was claimed by certain old biographers that the eminent Martin Schongauer of Colmar was Duerer's first master; but this is now contested, although it is evident that his pictures had a powerful effect on the youth. Schongauer was the greatest artist and engraver that Germany had as yet produced, and exerted a profound influence on the art of the Rhineland. He renewed the fantastic conceits and grotesque vagaries which the Papal artists of Cologne had suppressed as heathenish, and prepared the way for, or perhaps even suggested, the weird elements of Duerer's conceptions. At the same time he passed back of his Netherland art-education, and studied a mystic benignity and dreamy spirituality suggestive of the Umbrian painters, with whose chief, the great Perugino, Martin was acquainted. Herein Duerer's works were in strong contrast with Schongauer's, and showed the new spirit that was stirring in the world. Next to Schongauer, the great Italian artist Mantegna exercised the strongest influence upon Duerer, who studied his bold and austere engravings with earnest admiration, showing his traits in many subsequent works. Probably he met the famous Mantuan painter during the _Wander-jahre_, in Italy; and at the close of his Venetian journey he was about to pay a visit of homage to him, when he heard of his death. During his three years of study we have seen that the delicate and sensitive youth suffered much from the reckless rudeness and jeering insults of his companions, rough hand-workers who doubtless failed to understand the poignancy of the torments which they inflicted on the sad-eyed son of genius. But his home was near at hand, and the tender care of his parents, always beloved. How often he must have wandered through the familiar streets of Nuremberg, with his dreamy artist-face and flowing hair, and studied the Gothic palaces, the fountains adorned with statuary, and the rich treasures of art in the great churches! Beyond the tall-towered town, danger lurked on every road; but inside the gray walls was peace and safety, and no free lances nor marauding men-at-arms could check the aspiring flight of the youth's bright imagination. "And when the
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