50 THE STONES OF VENICE

di squisiti intagli s’ alza uno stylovate-etc. Sotto le colonne, il predetto stilobate si muta leggiadramente in piedistallo, poi con bella novità di pensiero e di effetto va coronato da un fregio il più gentile che veder si possa-etc. Non puossi lasciar senza un cenno l’ arca dove sta chiuso il doge; capo lavoro di pensiero e di esecuzione,” etc.

There are two pages and a half of closely printed praise, of which the above specimens may suffice; but there is not a word of the statue of the dead from beginning to end. I am myself in the habit of considering this rather an important part of a tomb, and I was especially interested in it here, because Selvatico only echoes the praise of thousands. It is unanimously declared the chef d’œuvre of Renaissance sepulchral work, and pronounced by Cicognara, (also quoted by Selvatico)

“Il vertice a cui l’arti Veneziane si spinsero col ministero del scalpello,”-“The very culminating point to which the Venetian arts attained by ministry of the chisel.”

To this culminating point, therefore, covered with dust and cobwebs, I attained, as I did to every tomb of importance in Venice, by the ministry of such ancient ladders as were to be found in the sacristan’s keeping. I was struck at first by the excessive awkwardness and want of feeling in the fall of the hand towards the spectator, for it is thrown off the middle of the body in order to show its fine cutting. Now the Mocenigo hand, severe and even stiff in its articulations, has its veins finely drawn, its sculptor having justly felt that the delicacy of the veining¹ expresses alike dignity and age and birth. The Vendramin hand is far more laboriously cut, but its blunt and clumsy contour at once makes us feel that all the care has

¹ [The MS. adds, but erases, a reference to Shakespeare-Antony and Cleopatra, ii. 5: “my bluest veins to kiss.” This was a reference made by Ruskin in his diary, when he posted up his notes made at the time. The following additional description of the tomb is there given:-

“On one of the pedestals it has two vulgar shields tied up with a bit of narrow riband-2d. a yard. Below, a dragon with a woman’s head on helmet. The spiral of the helmet is chiselled as sharply as a nautilus shell. The body is covered in centre with scales of various size, beautifully set on the back; it has sturgeon spines; on the belly, jointed mail; its wings are cut to as sharp a point in each plume as needles; and crescent-eyed. It stands holding the helmet distinctly with its claw, looking as though it would slip off. It ends in a woman’s head with an insipid grin and a straight nose ... [some words illegible], turned up hair behind, drawing-room fashion. The tail curls elaborately like a riband-no invention,

[Version 0.04: March 2008]