f kneeling feminine saints among whom we can recognise St.
Agnes, St. Catherine and St. Helen, and behind them a line of male
saints, amongst them St. Cyprian, St. Clement, St. Thomas, St.
Erasmus, and others whose names are written on their mitres. Still
higher King David, St. John Baptist and the prophets Jeremiah,
Zaccariah and Habakkuk. The faces are painted with great delicacy and
accuracy, and although they show some variety of lineament, the
expression is rather mannered. The outlines of the feminine saints are
full of grace and those of the other sex do not lack great dignity.
Although the work is of minor proportion, it shows a noteworthy
progress when compared with the conceptions of Orcagna.

The greater part of the draperies are rendered with most refined
colouring, so delicately toned and judiciously contrasted, that no
part of the painting appears either crude, or of exaggerated richness;
while the gold used in every part of the background contributes to
give great harmony to the whole. In the pictures placed at the end of
the predella, the Dominicans are depicted in their white robes and
black mantles.

[Illustration: PREDELLA. (National Gallery, London.)]

This delightful work, which roused the admiration of Vasari, contains
not less than 266 figures and may justly be considered as one of the
gems of the collection. Executed with all the delicacy of an
illumination, it sparkles with bright but harmonious colours, while
the spirit of devotion which penetrates the whole is entirely
characteristic of the painter.[22]

Angelico reached greater perfection in the picture of the
"Annunciation" of which Vasari says: "In a chapel of the same church
is a picture from the same hand, representing Our Lady receiving the
Annunciation from the angel Gabriel, with a countenance which is seen
in profile, so devout, so delicate, and so perfectly executed, that
the beholder can scarcely believe it to be by the hand of man, but
would rather suppose it to have been delineated in Paradise. In the
landscape forming the background are seen Adam and Eve, whose fall
made it needful that the Virgin should give birth to the
Redeemer."[23]

This picture (purchased in 1611 by Duke Mario Farnese) is now in the
Museum at Madrid. The Virgin is seated on the right under a graceful
portico sustained by small columns. Her head inclines a little towards
the Angel, in the same attitude as in the Cortona altar-piece and the
fresco at S