on of a member of the house of Barbarelli and a
peasant girl of Vedelago, came down to Venice, we gather that he had
nothing of the provincial. Vasari, who must often have heard of him
from Titian, describes him as handsome, engaging, of distinguished
appearance, beloved by his friends, a favourite with women, fond of
dress and amusement, an admirable musician, and a welcome guest in the
houses of the great. He was evidently no peasant-bred lad, but probably,
though there is no record of the fact, was brought up, like many
illegitimate children, in the paternal mansion. His home was not far
from the lagoons, in one of the most beautiful places it is possible to
imagine, on a lovely and fertile plain running up to the Asolean hills
and with the Julian Alps lying behind. We guess that he received his
education in the school of Bellini, for when that master sold his
allegory of the "Souls in Paradise" to one of the Medici, to adorn the
summer villa of Poggio Imperiale, there went with it the two small
canvases now in the Uffizi, the "Ordeal of Moses" and the "Judgment
of Solomon," delightful little paintings in Giorgione's rich and
distinctive style, but less accomplished than Bellini's picture, and
with imperfections in the drawing of drapery and figures which suggest
that they are the work of a very young man. The love of the Venetians
for decorating the exterior of their palaces with fresco led to
Giorgione being largely employed on work which was unhappily a grievous
waste of time and talent, as far as posterity is concerned. We have a
record of facades covered with spirited compositions and heraldic
devices, of friezes with Bacchus and Mars, Venus and Mercury. Zanetti,
in his seventeenth-century prints, has preserved a noble figure of
"Fortitude" grasping an axe, but beyond a few fragments nothing has
survived. Before he was thirty Giorgione was entrusted with the
important commission of decorating the Fondaco dei Tedeschi. This
building, which we hear of so often in connection with the artists
of Venice, was the trading-house for German, Hungarian, and Polish
merchants. The Venetian Government surrounded these merchants with the
most jealous restrictions. Every assistant and servant connected with
them was by law a Venetian, and, in fact, a spy of the Republic. All
transactions of buying and selling were carried out by Venetian brokers,
of whom some thirty were appointed. As time went on, some of these
brokerships mus