nce to the influence which it exerted upon the art of
the time. Madonna pictures first appeared in the East, where the worship
of such images had gained a firm foothold as early as the ninth century,
but long before that time pictures of the Mother of God were known and
many of them had become quite famous. Saint Luke the Evangelist is
generally considered as the first of the religious painters, and the
Vladimir Church at Moscow is in possession of a Madonna which is
supposed to be the work of his hand. The Eastern Church was the first to
feel the effect of this outburst of religious art, and it is but natural
to find some of its earliest examples in various other Russian cities,
such as Kieff, Kazan, and Novgorod. Bronze reliefs of the Virgin were
also common, and in many a crude form and fashion this newly aroused
sentiment of Christian art sought to find adequate expression. The
Western Church soon followed this movement in every detail, and then by
slow degrees upon Italian soil began that evolution in artistic
conception and artistic technique which was to culminate in the
effulgent glory of Raphael's Sistine Madonna. It was the Emperor
Justinian's conquest of Italy which "sowed the new art seed in a
fertile field," to use Miss Hurl's expression; but inasmuch as artistic
endeavor shows that same lack of originality which was characteristic of
all other forms of intellectual activity at this time, the germ took
root but slowly, and for a number of centuries servile imitations of the
highly decorated and decidedly soulless Byzantine Virgins were very
common. One of these paintings may be found in almost every church
throughout the length and breadth of Italy; but when you have seen one
you have seen them all, for they all have the same expression. The eyes
are generally large and ill shaped, the nose is long, the face is wan
and meagre, and there is a peevish and almost saturnine expression in
the wooden features which shows but slight affection for the
Christ-child, and which could have afforded but scant comfort to any who
sought to find there a gleam of tender pity. These pictures were
generally half-length, against a background of gold leaf, which was at
first laid on solidly, but which at a later period was adorned with tiny
cherub figures. The folds of the drapery were stiff and heavy, and the
whole effect was dull and lifeless. But no matter how inadequate such a
picture may seem to us to-day, and no matter how