crusader or knight-errant, and had to be content with Harmodius and
Aristogeiton. Even the Perseus legend, which in so many ways reminds
one of St. George, was far less appreciated as an incident by
classical art than by the Renaissance; and even then not until patron
and artist were growing tired of St. George. M. Reymond has pointed
out the relation of Donatello's statue to its superb analogue, St.
Theodore of Chartres Cathedral. "_C'est le souvenir de tout un monde
qui disparaît._"[36] Physically it may be so. The age of chivalry may
be passed in so far that the prancing steed and captive Princess
belong to remote times which may never recur. But St. George and St.
Theodore were not merely born of legend and fairy tale; their spirit
may survive in conditions which, although less romantic and
picturesque, may still preserve intact the essential qualities of the
soldier-saint of primitive times. The influence of the St. George upon
contemporary art seems to have been small. The Mocenigo tomb, which
has already been mentioned, has a figure on the sarcophagus obviously
copied from the St. George; and elsewhere in this extremely curious
example of plagiarism we find other figures suggested by Donatello's
statues. The little figure in the Palazzo Pubblico at Pistoja is
again an early bit of piracy. In the courtyard of the Palazzo
Quaratesi in Florence, built by Brunellesco between 1425 and 1430, an
early version of the head of St. George was placed in one of the
circular panels above the pillars. It is without intrinsic importance,
being probably a cast, but it shows how early the statue was
appreciated. A more important cast is that of the bas-relief now in
London, which has a special interest from having been taken before the
original had suffered two or three rather grievous blows.[37]
Verrocchio made a drawing of the St. George,[38] and Mantegna
introduced a similar figure into his picture of St. James being led to
execution.[39] But Donatello's influence cannot be measured by the