decoration of churches and
palaces Venice is rich indeed, and by anyone who would study the three
great Venetian masters of that art--Tintoretto, Titian and Paul
Veronese--it must not only be visited but haunted. Venice alone can
prove to the world what giants these men--and especially
Tintoretto--could be when given vast spaces to play with; and since they
were Venetians it is well that we should be forced to their well-beloved
and well-served city to learn it.

Let us walk through the Accademia conscientiously, but let us dwell only
in the rooms I have selected. The first room (with a fine ceiling which
might be called the ceiling of the thousand wings, around which are
portraits of painters ranged like the Doges in the great council halls)
belongs to the very early men, of whom Jacobello del Fiore
(1400-1439) is the most agreeable. It was he who painted one of the two
lions that we saw in the museum of the Doges' Palace, the other and
better being Carpaccio's. To him also is given, by some critics, the
equestrian S. Chrysogonus, in S. Trovaso. His Accademia picture, on the
end wall, is strictly local, representing Justice with her lion and S.
Michael and S. Gabriel attending. It is a rich piece of decoration and
you will notice that it grows richer on each visit. Two other pictures
in this room that I like are No. 33, a "Coronation of the Virgin,"
painted by Michele Giambono in 1440, making it a very complete ceremony,
and No. 24, a good church picture with an entertaining predella, by
Michele di Matteo Lambertini (died 1469). The "Madonna and Child" by
Bonconsiglio remains gaily in the memory too. No doubt about the Child
being the Madonna's own.

Having finished with this room, one ought really to make directly for
Room XVII, although it is a long way off, for that room is given to
Giovanni Bellini, and Giovanni Bellini was the instructor of Titian, and
Tintoretto was the disciple of Titian, and thus, as we are about to see
Titian and Tintoretto at their best here, we should get a line of
descent. But I reserve the outline of Venetian painting until the
Bellinis are normally reached.

[Illustration: THE MIRACLE OF S. MARK
FROM THE PAINTING BY TINTORETTO
_In the Accademia_]

The two great pictures of this next room are Titian's "Assumption" and
Tintoretto's "Miracle of S. Mark," reproduced opposite page 164, and
this one. I need hardly say that it is the Titian which wins the rapture
and the applause; but