to hang in the Sistine Chapel. (Plate facing page 64.) The
cartoons were by the great Raphael. Not only did he draw the splendid
scenes, but with his exquisite invention elaborated the borders. Thus
was set in the midst of the Brussels ateliers a pattern for the new
art that was to retire the nice perfection of the previous school of
restraint. From that time, all was regulated by new standards.

Before considering the change that came to designs in tapestry, it is
necessary that both mind and eye should be literally savants in the
Gothic. Without this the greatest point in classifying and
distinguishing is missed. The dainty grace of the verdure and flowers,
the exquisite models of the architectural details, the honest, simple
scheme of colour, all these are distinguishing marks, but to them is
added the still greater one of the figures and their grouping. In the
very early work, these are few in number, all equally accented in size
and finish, but later the laws of perspective are better understood,
and subordinates to the subject are drawn smaller. This gives
opportunity for increase in the number of personages, and for the
introduction of the horses and dogs and little wild animals that cause
a childish thrill of delight wherever they are encountered, so like
are they to the species that haunt childhood's fairyland.

[Illustration: DEATH OF ANANIAS.--FROM ACTS OF THE APOSTLES BY
RAPHAEL

From the Palace of Madrid]

[Illustration: THE STORY OF REBECCA

Brussels Tapestry. Sixteenth Century. Collection of Arthur Astor
Carey, Esq., Boston]

Indeed, the Gothic tapestries more than any other existing pictures
take us back to that epoch of our lives when we lived in romance, when
the Sleeping Beauty hid in just such towers, when the prince rode such
a horse and appeared an elegant young knight. The inscrutable mystery
of those folk of other days is like the inscrutable mystery of that
childhood time, the Mediaeval time of the imagination, and those of us
who remember its joys gaze silent and happy in the tapestry room of
the Ducal Palace at Nancy, or in Mary's Chamber at Holyrood, or in any
place whatever where hang the magic pictured cloths.

When the highest development of a style is reached a change is sure to
come. It may be a degeneration, or it may be the introduction of a new
style through some great artistic impulse either native or introduced
by contact with an outside influence. For