Now, if indeed you are interested in old art, you cannot but know the
power of the thirteenth century. You know that the character of it was
concentrated in, and to the full expressed by, its best king, St.
Louis. You know St. Louis was a Franciscan, and that the Franciscans,
for whom Giotto was continually painting under Dante's advice, were
prouder of him than of any other of their royal brethren or sisters. If
Giotto ever would imagine anybody with care and delight, it would be
St. Louis, if it chanced that anywhere he had St. Louis to paint.

Also, you know that he was appointed to build the Campanile of the
Duomo, because he was then the best master of sculpture, painting, and
architecture in Florence, and supposed to be without superior in the
world. [Footnote: "Cum in universe orbe non reperiri dicatur quenquam
qui sufficientior sit in his et aliis multis artibus magistro Giotto
Bondonis de Florentia, pictore, et accipiendus sit in patria, velut
magnus magister."--(Decree of his appointment, quoted by Lord Lindsay,
vol. ii., p. 247.)]

And that this commission was given him late in life, (of course he
could not have designed the Campanile when he was a boy;) so therefore,
if you find any of his figures painted under pure campanile
architecture, and the architecture by his hand, you know, without other
evidence, that the painting must be of his strongest time.

So if one wanted to find anything of his to begin with, especially, and
could choose what it should be, one would say, "A fresco, life size,
with campanile architecture behind it, painted in an important place;
and if one might choose one's subject, perhaps the most interesting
saint of all saints--for him to do for us--would be St. Louis."