be beautiful, owing to the absence of the variations that come with
waves of shadow. By letting out the reins of imagination we might feel
that in this a tenth century Giorgione has given off the mental
impressions of all the golden autumn of his life. His material gave him
an advantage over his great followers of the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries, insomuch that glass has a living and glowing quality of light
not existing in the somewhat clouded purity of oil or fresco.

In St. Mark's we have an example of the superb treatment in deepest and
most Titianesque scales applied to curved forms, but to find a similarly
complete example of the use of lighter tones and on flat surfaces, we
must turn to Ravenna. I can give you no adequate description of the wall
mosaics of Ravenna. In the sense of delicate color they remind me of
some of the subtile harmonies of many of the finest works of the modern
French school--of the Impressionists and others who combine that quality
with a true instinct for design. In standing before them you feel that
the Dagnan Bouverets, the Mersons, the Cazins, the Puvis de Chavannes,
etc., of the fifth century have had a hand in the conception and
realization of the beautiful compositions to be found on the nave walls
of the two churches of St. Appollinare Nuovo and St. Appollinare in
Classe. Here all the scales are of delicate degrees of light tones,
supreme in their beauty, completeness, and, most important to us, their
true decorative instinct. In the Baptistery we find what I may term a
third essay in color, by weaving in rich, dark, and glowing colors on
figures and bold sinuous forms of ornament in such a skillful and
judicious manner that the whole dome seems to be alive with harmonies,
although they are mostly primaries.

As you know, rules for the disposition of color are futile, yet some
details that struck me as eminently satisfactory may interest you. In