garth. Longhi abandoned his false decorative style, the
style of the Palazzo Sagredo, at some time after 1734. This date
corresponds with Hogarth's triumphant entrance upon his career as a
satirical painter of society. Possibly Longhi may have met with the
engravings of the _Marriage a la Mode_, and may have been stimulated by
them to undertake the work, which he carried on with nothing of
Hogarth's moral force, and with a small portion of his descriptive
faculty, yet still with valuable results for the student of
eighteenth-century manners.

VI.

In 1763 an Academy for the study of the arts of design was opened by
some members of the Pisani family in their palace at S. Stefano. The
chiefs of that patrician house were four sons of the late Doge Alvise
Pisani. According to Lazari, my sole authority for this passage in
Longhi's biography, the founder of the Academy was a Procuratore di S.
Marco, who had a son of remarkable promise. This son he wished to
instruct in the fine arts; and Pietro Longhi was chosen to fill the
chair of painting, which he occupied for two years. At the end of that
time young Pisani died, and the institution was closed--now that the
hopes which led to its foundation were extinguished.[94]

Among the few facts of Longhi's life this connection with the Pisani
Academy has to be recorded. It is also of some importance in helping us
to decide whether a large portrait-picture, representing the chiefs of
the Pisani family, together with the wife and children of one of its
most eminent members (Luigi, a godchild of Louis XIV.), is rightly
ascribed to him. The huge canvas, which is now in the possession of the
Contessa Evelina Almoro Pisani, was found by her rolled up and hidden
away in a cabinet beneath the grand staircase of the Palazzo Pisani at
S. Stefano.[95] It proved to be in excellent preservation; and it is
signed in large clear text letters--_opus Petri Longi_. So far there
would seem to be no doubt that the picture is genuine; and I, for my
part, am prepared to accept it as such, when I consider that Longhi
enjoyed the confidence of the Pisani family and presided over their
Academy about the period when it was executed. Yet the student of his
works cannot fail to be struck by marked differences of style between
this and other authentic pictures from his hand.

The central group consists of the noble Lady Paolina Gambara, wife of
Luigi Pisani, seated with her children round her.[96] Her hus