[Illustration: MORETTO.--MADONNA IN GLORY.]

In the glorified Madonna of St. John the Evangelist, Brescia, the
pyramidal effect is accentuated by curtains draped back on either side
of the upper part of the composition. In the Madonna of San Giorgio
Maggiore, at Verona, we have a much more attractive picture. The
"gloria" encompassing the vision is clearly defined, giving so strong
an effect of the supernatural that we cease to judge the composition
by ordinary standards of natural law. The Virgin's white veil flutters
from her head as if caught by some heavenly breeze. Her cloak floats
about her by the same mysterious force, held in graceful festoons by
winged cherub heads.

Below is a group of five virgin martyrs, with St. Cecilia in the
centre, wearing a crown of roses; St. Lucia holds the awl, the
instrument of her torture, looking down at St. Catherine, who leans
against her terrible wheel; St. Agnes, on the other side, reads
quietly from a book while she caresses her lamb, and St. Barbara
stands behind her, with eyes lifted to the sky. They are all splendid
young Amazons, recalling Moretto's fine St. Justina of the Vienna
Gallery. There is no trace of ascetism in their strong, well-developed
figures, and in their faces no suggestion of an unhealthy pietism.

Moretto's ideals were an anticipation of the most advanced ideas of
the modern science of physical culture. His Madonna and saints derive
their beauty neither from over refinement on the one hand, nor from
sensuous charms on the other, but from sane and harmonious
self-development.