ti, allowance being made for the fact that he
was working in a material with which he was not familiar, and which no
sculptor of the highest rank has ever found congenial.

7. The Flagellation. Tabachetti has a chapel with this subject at
Varallo, and the Saas group is obviously a descent with modification from
his work there. The figure of Christ is so like the one at Varallo that
I think it must have been carved by Tabachetti himself. The man with the
hooked nose, who at Varallo is stooping to bind his rods, is here
upright: it was probably the intention to emphasise him in the succeeding
scenes as well as this, in the same way as he has been emphasised at
Varallo, but his nose got pared down in the cutting of later scenes, and
could not easily be added to. The man binding Christ to the column at
Varallo is repeated (_longo intervallo_) here, and the whole work is one
inspired by that at Varallo, though no single figure except that of the
Christ is adhered to with any very great closeness. I think the nearer
malefactor, with a goitre, and wearing a large black hat, is either an
addition of the year 1709, or was done by the journeyman of the local
sculptor who carved the greater number of the figures. The man stooping
down to bind his rods can hardly be by the same hand as either of the two
black-hatted malefactors, but it is impossible to speak with certainty.
The general effect of the chapel is excellent, if we consider the
material in which it is executed, and the rudeness of the audience to
whom it addresses itself.

8. The Crowning with Thorns. Here again the inspiration is derived from
Tabachetti's Crowning with Thorns at Varallo. The Christs in the two
chapels are strikingly alike, and the general effect is that of a
residuary impression left in the mind of one who had known the Varallo
Flagellation exceedingly well.

9. Sta. Veronica. This and the next succeeding chapels are the most
important of the series. Tabachetti's Journey to Calvary at Varallo is
again the source from which the present work was taken, but, as I have
already said, it has been modified in reproduction. Mount Calvary is
still shown, as at Varallo, towards the left-hand corner of the work, but
at Saas it is more towards the middle than at Varallo, so that horsemen
and soldiers may be seen coming up behind it--a stroke that deserves the
name of genius none the less for the manifest imperfection with which it
has been carried i