re without variety. He was scholar and son-in-law of Volpato, of
Rome; himself scholar of Wagner, of Venice, whose homely round faces
were not high models in art. The AURORA, OF GUIDO, and the LAST
SUPPER, OF LEONARDO DA VINCI, stand high in engraving, especially the
latter, which occupied Morghen three years. Of his two hundred and one
works, no less than seventy-three are portraits, among which are the
Italian poets DANTE, PETRARCH, ARIOSTO, TASSO, also BOCCACCIO, and a
head called RAFFAELLE, but supposed to be that of BENDO ALTOVITI, the
great painter's friend, and especially the DUKE OF MENCADA on
horseback, after Vandyck, which has received warm praise. But none of
his portraits is calculated to give greater pleasure than that of
LEONARDO DA VINCI, which may vie in beauty even with the famous
Pompone. Here is the beauty of years and of serene intelligence.
Looking at that tranquil countenance, it is easy to imagine the large
and various capacities which made him not only painter, but sculptor,
architect, musician, poet, discoverer, philosopher, even
predecessor of Galileo and Bacon. Such a character deserves the
immortality of art. Happily an old Venetian engraving reproduced in
our day,[8] enables us to see this same countenance at an earlier
period of life, with sparkle in the eye.

[Illustration: GIOVANNI BOCCACCIO

Firenze presso Luigi Bardi e C'Borgo degli Albizzi N^o 460]

Raffaelle Morghen left no scholars who have followed him in portraits;
but his own works are still regarded, and a monument in Santa Croce,
the Westminster Abbey of Florence, places him among the mighty dead of
Italy.

[Sidenote: Houbraken]

Thus far nothing has been said of English engravers. Here, as in art
generally, England seems removed from the rest of the world; _Et
penitus toto divisos orbe Britannos_. But though beyond the sphere of
Continental art, the island of Shakespeare was not inhospitable to
some of its representatives. Vandyck, Rubens, Sir Peter Lely, and Sir
Godfrey Kneller, all Dutch artists, painted the portraits of
Englishmen, and engraving was first illustrated by foreigners. Jacob
Houbraken, another Dutch artist, born in 1698, was employed to execute
portraits for Birch's "Heads of Illustrious Persons of Great Britain,"
published at London in 1743, and in these works may be seen the
aesthetic taste inherited from his father, author of the biography of
Dutch artists, and improved by study of the French masters. A