left shoulder a slender reed cross,
such as is given him in all the old works of art as a symbol of his
prophetic character.

[Illustration: THE HOLY FAMILY. _Uffizi Gallery, Florence._]

You may say when you look at the picture that this is such a group
as you might see any day in some Tuscan village. The people are indeed
very plainly of the peasant class, and the artist did not go far out
of his way to find his figures. Perhaps he thought this was after all
the best way to show that the Holy Family was not unlike other
families in enjoying the simple pleasures of home life. We may feel a
closer sense of kinship with them on that account.

In studying the artistic qualities of this picture we have to remember
that Michelangelo was more of a sculptor than a painter, and that he
went to work upon a painting with the same methods he used in marble.
The central figures are grouped in a solid mass as if for a
bas-relief, as we may see by comparing this illustration with that of
the Madonna and Child. The mother's arms are so "modelled," to use a
critical term, that they seem to start out from the canvas "in the
round," just as if cut from marble. The folds of her dress, as well as
those of Joseph's garment, are arranged in the long beautiful lines
artists call "sculpturesque."

The sculptor's methods are also plainly seen in the peculiarity of his
background. In a picture of this kind most painters would have painted
there a landscape, but Michelangelo did nothing of the kind. Instead
there is a semicircular parapet upon which five slender unclothed
youths are playing together. Three sit upon the wall and two lean
against it.

The figures bear no relation to the story of the picture. They are
introduced merely for the sake of decoration. To Michelangelo there
was nothing so beautiful in decoration as the human form. The lines
made by different positions of the body trace patterns more beautiful,
he thought, than any arabesques. The Greeks had the same idea when
they decorated the pediments of their temples with bas-reliefs of nude
figures. Applying this principle of sculpture to his painting,
Michelangelo arranged these boys so that their slender limbs
intertwine in graceful patterns, making a decorative background to
fill in the picture. The lightness and delicacy of the design heighten
the effect of solidity in the figures of the foreground, giving them
the prominence of figures in relief.

VI

THE PIETA