nished with the distance; but, in spite of
these praiseworthy efforts, I could never bring myself to believe that
the warm breath of life comes and goes in that beautiful body. It seems
to me that if I laid my hand on the firm, rounded throat, it would be
cold as marble to the touch. No, my friend, the blood does not flow
beneath that ivory skin, the tide of life does not flush those delicate
fibres, the purple veins that trace a network beneath the transparent
amber of her brow and breast. Here the pulse seems to beat, there it is
motionless, life and death are at strife in every detail; here you see
a woman, there a statue, there again a corpse. Your creation is
incomplete. You had only power to breathe a portion of your soul into
your beloved work. The fire of Prometheus died out again and again in
your hands; many a spot in your picture has not been touched by the
divine flame."

"But how is it, dear master?" Porbus asked respectfully, while the young
man with difficulty repressed his strong desire to beat the critic.

"Ah!" said the old man, "it is this! You have halted between two
manners. You have hesitated between drawing and color, between the
dogged attention to detail, the stiff precision of the German masters
and the dazzling glow, the joyous exuberance of Italian painters. You
have set yourself to imitate Hans Holbein and Titian, Albrecht Durer
and Paul Veronese in a single picture. A magnificent ambition truly,
but what has come of it? Your work has neither the severe charm of a dry
execution nor the magical illusion of Italian _chiaroscuro_. Titian's
rich golden coloring poured into Albrecht Dureras austere outlines has
shattered them, like molten bronze bursting through the mold that is not
strong enough to hold it. In other places the outlines have held firm,
imprisoning and obscuring the magnificent, glowing flood of Venetian
color. The drawing of the face is not perfect, the coloring is not
perfect; traces of that unlucky indecision are to be seen everywhere.
Unless you felt strong enough to fuse the two opposed manners in the
fire of your own genius, you should have cast in your lot boldly with
the one or the other, and so have obtained the unity which simulates one
of the conditions of life itself. Your work is only true in the centres;
your outlines are false, they project nothing, there is no hint of
anything behind them. There is truth here," said the old man, pointing
to the breast of the Saint