solitude, had suffered the feeble flame of his life to die slowly out,
was to go on working for King Philip, as fierce in the intensity of his
physical passion as in the fervour of his faith, would receive
encouragement to develop to the full these seemingly conflicting
tendencies of sacred and amorous passion.

The Spanish prince whom it was the master's most important task on this
occasion to portray was then but twenty-four years of age, and youth
served not indeed to hide, but in a slight measure to attenuate, some of
his most characteristic physical defects. His unattractive person even
then, however, showed some of the most repellent peculiarities of his
father and his race. He had the supreme distinction of Charles but not
his majesty, more than his haughty reserve, even less than his power of
enlisting sympathy. In this most difficult of tasks--the portrayal that
should be at one and the same time true in its essence, distinguished,
and as sympathetic as might be under the circumstances, of so unlovable
a personage--Titian won a new victory. His _Prince Philip of Austria in
Armour_ at the Prado is one of his most complete and satisfying
achievements, from every point of view. A veritable triumph of art, but
as usual a triumph to which the master himself disdains to call
attention, is the rendering of the damascened armour, the puffed hose,
and the white silk stockings and shoes. The two most important
variations executed by the master, or under his immediate direction, are
the full-lengths of the Pitti Palace and the Naples Museum, in both of
which sumptuous court-dress replaces the gala military costume. They are
practically identical, both in the design and the working out, save that
in the Florence example Philip stands on a grass plot in front of a
colonnade, while in that of Naples the background is featureless. As the
pictures are now seen, that in the Pitti is marked by greater subtlety
in the characterisation of the head, while the Naples canvas appears the