peculiar, and the only instance I can
remember.

* * * * *

It appears therefore that the Life of the Virgin Mary, whether treated
as a devotional or historical series, forms a kind of pictured drama
in successive scenes; sometimes comprising only six or eight of the
principal events of her individual life, as her birth, dedication,
marriage, death, and assumption: sometimes extending to forty or fifty
subjects, and combining her history with that of her divine Son. I
may now direct the attention of the reader to a few other instances
remarkable for their beauty and celebrity.

Giotto, 1320. In the chapel at Padua styled _la Capella dell' Arena_.
One of the finest and most complete examples extant, combining the
Life of the Virgin with that of her Son. This series is of the highest
value, a number of scenes and situations suggested by the Scriptures
being here either expressed for the first time, or in a form unknown
in the Greek school.[1]

[Footnote 1: _Vide_ Kugler's Handbook, p. 129. He observes, that "the
introduction of the maid-servant spinning, in the story of St. Anna,
oversteps the limits of the higher ecclesiastical style." For an
explanation I must refer to the story as I have given it at p 249.
See, for the distribution of the subjects in this chapel, Lord
Lindsay's "Christian Art," vol. ii. A set of the subjects has since
been published by the Arundel Society.]

Angiolo Gaddi, 1380. The series in the cathedral at Prato. These
comprise the history of the Holy Girdle.

Andrea Orcagna, 1373. The beautiful series of bas-reliefs on the
shrine in Or-San-Michele, at Florence.

Nicolo da Modena, 1450. Perhaps the earliest engraved example:
very remarkable for the elegance of the _motifs_ and the imperfect
execution, engraving on copper being then a new art.

Albert Durer. The beautiful and well-known set of twenty-five
wood-cuts, published in 1510. A perfect example of the German
treatment.

Bernardino Luini, 1515. A series of frescoes of the highest beauty,
painted for the monastery Della Pace. Unhappily we have only the
fragments which are preserved in the Brera.

The series of bas-reliefs on the outer shrine of the Casa di Loretto,
by Sansovino, and others of the greatest sculptors of the beginning of
the sixteenth century.

The series of bas-reliefs round the choir at Milan: seventeen
subjects.

* * * * *

We often find the Seven