e
picture itself.[48] But even in the reproduction this "Judith" stands
confessed as the most impressive of all Giorgione's single figures, and
it may well rank as the masterpiece of the earlier period immediately
preceding the Castelfranco picture of about 1504, to which in style it
closely approximates.

The next picture on Morelli's list is the "Fete Champetre" of the
Louvre, or, as it is often called, the "Concert." This lovely "Pastoral
Symphony" (which appears to me a more suitable English title) is by no
means universally regarded as a creation of Giorgione's hand and brain,
and several modern critics have been at pains to show that Campagnola,
or some other Venetian imitator of the great master, really produced
it.[49] In this endeavour Crowe and Cavalcaselle led the way by
suggesting the author was probably an imitator of Sebastiano del Piombo.
But all this must surely seem to be heresy when we stand before the
picture itself, thrilled by the gorgeousness of its colour, by the
richness of the paradise" in which the air is balmy, and the landscape
ever green; where life is a pastime, and music the only labour; where
groves are interspersed with meadows and fountains; where nymphs sit
playfully on the grass, or drink at cool springs."[50] Was ever such a
gorgeous idyll? In the whole range of painted poetry can the like be
found?

[Illustration: _Braun photo. Louvre, Paris_

A PASTORAL SYMPHONY]

Yet let us be more precise in our analysis. Granted that the scene is
one eminently adapted to Giorgione's poetic temperament, is the
execution analogous to that which we have found in the preceding
examples? No one will deny, I suppose, that there is a difference
between the intensely refined forms of the Venus, or the earlier
Hypsipyle, or the Daphne, and the coarser nudes in the Louvre picture.
No one will deny a certain carelessness marks the delineation of form,
no one will gainsay a frankly sensuous charm pervades the scene, a
feeling which seems at first sight inconsistent with that reticence and
modesty so conspicuous elsewhere. Yet I think all this is perfectly
explicable on the basis of natural evolution. Exuberance of feeling is
the logical outcome of a lifetime spent in an atmosphere of lyrical
thought, and certainly Giorgione was not the sort of man to control
those natural impulses, which grew stronger with advancing years. Both
traditions of his death point in this direction; and, unless I am
mistaken