all the Pre-Raphaelite art. It is a mediaeval note,
and Rossetti learned it from Dante. Symbolism runs through the "Divine
Comedy" in such touches as the rush, emblem of humility, with which
Vergil girds Dante for his journey through Purgatory; the constellation
of four stars--

"Non viste mai fuor ch' alla prima gente"--

typifying the cardinal virtues; the three different coloured steps to the
door of Purgatory;[6] and thickening into the elaborate apocalyptic
allegory of the griffin and the car of the church, the eagle and the
mystic tree in the last cantos of the "Purgatorio." In Hunt's "Christ in
the Shadow of Death," the young carpenter's son is stretching his arms
after work, and his shadow, thrown upon the wall, is a prophecy of the
crucifixion. In Millais' "Christ in the House of his Parents," the boy
has wounded the palm of his hand upon a nail, another foretokening of the
crucifixion. In Rossetti's "Girlhood of Mary Virgin," Joseph is training
a vine along a piece of trellis in the shape of the cross; Mary is
copying in embroidery a three-flowered white lily plant, growing in a
flower-pot which stands upon a pile of books lettered with the names of
the cardinal virtues. The quaint little child angel who tends the plant
is a portrait of a young sister of Thomas Woolner. Similarly, in "Ecce
Ancilla Domini," the lily of the annunciation which Gabriel holds is
repeated in the piece of needlework stretched upon the 'broidery frame at
the foot of Mary's bed. In "Beata Beatrix" the white poppy brought by
the dove is the symbol at once of chastity and of death; and the shadow
upon the sun-dial marks the hour of Beatrice's beatification. Again, in
"Dante's Dream," poppies strew the floor, emblems of sleep and death; an
expiring lamp symbolises the extinction of life; and a white cloud borne
away by angels is Beatrice's departing soul. Love stands by the couch in
flame-coloured robes, fastened at the shoulder with the scallop shell
which is the badge of pilgrimage. In Millais' "Lorenzo and Isabella" the
salt-box is overturned upon the table, signifying that peace is broken
between Isabella's brothers and their table companion. Doves are
everywhere in Rossetti's pictures, embodiments of the Holy Ghost and the
ministries of the spirit, Rossetti labelled his early manuscript poems
"Poems of the Art Catholic"; and the Pre-Raphaelite heresy was connected
by unfriendly critics with the Anglo-Catholic or Tractar