its pendant in subtle truth of characterisation, it has in the opinion
of the writer been somewhat overpraised. For once, Titian approaches
very nearly to the northern ideal in portraiture, underlining the truth
with singular accuracy, yet with some sacrifice of graciousness and
charm. The daughter of the learned and brilliant Isabella looks here as
if, in the decline of her beauty, she had become something of a
_précieuse_ and a prude, though it would be imprudent to assert that she
was either the one or the other. Perhaps the most attractive feature of
the whole composition is the beautiful landscape so characteristically
stretching away into the far blue distance, suggested rather than
revealed through the open window. This is such a picture as might have
inspired the Netherlander Antonio Moro, just because it is Italian art
of the Cinquecento with a difference, that is, with a certain admixture
of northern downrightness and literalness of statement.

About this same time Titian received from the brother of this princess,
his patron and admirer Federigo Gonzaga, the commission for the famous
series of the _Twelve Cæsars_, now only known to the world by stray
copies here and there, and by the grotesquely exaggerated engravings of
Ægidius Sadeler. Giulio Romano having in 1536[20] completed the Sala di
Troja in the Castello of Mantua, and made considerable progress with the
apartments round about it, Federigo Gonzaga conceived the idea of
devoting one whole room to the painted effigies of the _Twelve Cæsars_
to be undertaken by Titian. The exact date when the _Cæsars_ were
delivered is not known, but it may legitimately be inferred that this
was in the course of 1537 or the earlier half of 1538. Our master's
pictures were, according to Vasari, placed in an _anticamera_ of the
Mantuan Palace, below them being hung twelve _storie a olio_--histories
in oils--by Giulio Romano.[21] The _Cæsars_ were all half-lengths,
eleven out of the twelve being done by the Venetian master and the