f the Baptist when he came forth from the desert
"clothed with camel's hair and with a girdle of skin about his loins,"
the artist has represented the child John as a dark, faun-like boy, with
a little skin garment girt about him,--a picturesque figure to contrast
with the fair beauty of the Christ-child.

The two boys are most charming, when, as in the Madonna of the Pearl,
the little John seeks with childish eagerness to please his cousin.
Here he is running gleefully to Jesus, with his skin garment full of
newly gathered fruit. The Christ-child, seated on his grandmother's
knee, beside his mother, stretches out his hands for the gift, his face
shining with simple, child-like pleasure. At another time Saint John
brings a goldfinch to the Virgin's knee, and the two children lean
lovingly against her, Jesus turning his earnest eyes towards the bird,
which he thoughtfully strokes. A very pretty incident is embodied in the
Aldobrandini Madonna, where the Christ-child reaches from his mother's
arms to smilingly bestow a flower upon Saint John.

Other pictures introduce, more or less definitely, an element of
devotion on the part of the infant Baptist, as in the Madonna of the
Meadow, where he kneels to receive the cross from the hands of the
Christ-child. The devotional relation is still more marked in the Belle
Jardiniere of the Louvre. In the Holy Family of Casa Canigiani, Jesus is
giving Saint John a banner with the words _Ecce Agnus Dei_.

The two boys, as the central figures of the Holy Family, have engaged
the brush of nearly every great religious painter, some producing
familiar and domestic scenes, others emphasizing the symbolic and
religious significance of the theme. Andrea del Sarto treated the
subject many times, and usually portrayed the children in a natural and
playful intimacy. Pinturicchio painted them running across a flowery
meadow to get water from a fountain. Guilio Romano has given us the
decidedly domestic scene of Jesus in the bath, with Saint John merrily
pouring water upon him. Sometimes, as in a lovely work by Angiolo
Bronzino, Saint John is affectionately kissing the sleeping Babe.

It was a beautiful thought on the part of some few artists,--notably
Palma Vecchio, Luini, and Murillo,--to introduce a lamb as a playmate
for the children, the suggestion having its origin in the Baptist's
description of Jesus as the "Lamb of God."

In Botticelli's Holy Family, Saint John stands by with clasped