inference is irresistible that in this case the head of the school
borrowed much and without disguise from the painter who has always been
looked upon as one of his close followers. In size, in distribution, in
the arrangement and characterisation of the chief groups, the two
altar-pieces are so nearly related that the idea of a merely accidental
and family resemblance must be dismissed. This type of Christ, then, of
a perfect, manly beauty, of a divine meekness tempering majesty, dates
back, not to Gian Bellino, but to Cima. The preferred type of the elder
master is more passionate, more human. Our own _Incredulity of St.
Thomas_, by Cima, in the National Gallery, shows, in a much more
perfunctory fashion, a Christ similarly conceived; and the beautiful
_Man of Sorrows_ in the same collection, still nominally ascribed to
Giovanni Bellini, if not from Cima's own hand, is at any rate from that
of an artist dominated by his influence. When the life-work of the
Conegliano master has been more closely studied in connection with that
of his contemporaries, it will probably appear that he owes very much
less to Bellini than it has been the fashion to assume. The idea of an
actual subordinate co-operation with the _caposcuola_, like that of
Bissolo, Rondinelli, Basaiti, and so many others, must be excluded. The
earlier and more masculine work of Cima bears a definite relation to
that of Bartolommeo Montagna.

[17] The _Tobias and the Angel_ shows some curious points of contact
with the large _Madonna and Child with St. Agnes and St. John_ by
Titian, in the Louvre--a work which is far from equalling the S.
Marciliano picture throughout in quality. The beautiful head of the St.
Agnes is but that of the majestic archangel in reverse; the St. John,
though much younger than the Tobias, has very much the same type and
movement of the head. There is in the Church of S. Caterina at Venice a
kind of paraphrase with many variations of the S. Marciliano Titian,