faces it is unique, while the mystic calm and resignation, so
misplaced in his Aphrodites, find a meaning here[187]. There is only one
other picture in Italy, a "Madonna and Child with S. Catherine" in a
landscape by Boccaccino da Cremona, that in any degree rivals the peculiar
beauty of its types[188].

Sandro Botticelli was not a great painter in the same sense as Andrea
Mantegna. But he was a true poet within the limits of a certain sphere. We
have to seek his parallel among the verse-writers rather than the artists
of his day. Some of the stanzas of Poliziano and Boiardo, in particular,
might have been written to explain his pictures, or his pictures might
have been painted to illustrate their verses[189]. In both Poliziano and
Boiardo we find the same touch upon antique things as in Botticelli; and
this makes him serviceable almost above all painters to the readers of
Renaissance poetry.

The name of Piero di Cosimo has been mentioned incidentally in connection
with that of Botticelli; and though his life exceeds the limits assigned
for this chapter, so many links unite him to the class of painters I have
been discussing, that I can find no better place to speak of him than
this. His biography forms one of the most amusing chapters in Vasari, who
has taken great delight in noting Piero's quaint humours and eccentric
habits, and whose description of a Carnival triumph devised by him is one
of our most precious documents in illustration of Renaissance
pageantry.[190] The point that connects him with Botticelli is the
romantic treatment of classical mythology, best exemplified in his
pictures of the tale of Perseus and Andromeda.[191] Piero was by nature
and employment a decorative painter; the construction of cars for
pageants, and the adornment of dwelling rooms and marriage chests,
affected his whole style, rendering it less independent and more quaint
than that of Botticelli. Landscape occupies the main part of his
compositions, made up by a strange amalgam of the most eccentric
details--rocks toppling over blue bays, sea-caverns, and fantastic
mountain ranges. Groups of little figures disposed upon these spaces tell
the story, and the best invention of the artist is lavished on the form of
monstrous creatures like the dragon slain by Perseus. There is no attempt
to treat the classic subject in a classic spirit: to do that, and to fail
in doing it, remained for Cellini.[192] We have, on the contrary, before
us a