ated to the productions of modern and living artists, and has three cabinets attached to it. The second will contain the old German pictures, including the famous Boisserée gallery, and has four cabinets attached to it. The third, fourth, and fifth soloons (of which the central one, the hall of Rubens, is eighty feet in length) are devoted, with the nine adjoining cabinets, to the Flemish and Dutch schools. The sixth, with four cabinets, will contain the French and Spanish pictures; and the seventh and eighth, with three cabinets, will contain the Italian school of painting. All these apartments communicate with each other by ample doors; but from the corridor already mentioned, which opens into the whole suite, the visitor has access to any particular gallery or school of painting, without passing through the others: an obvious advantage, which will be duly estimated by those who, in visiting a gallery of painting, have felt their eyes dazzled, their heads bewildered, their attention distracted, by too much variety of temptation and attraction, before they have reached the particular object or school of art to which their attention was especially directed.

To this beautiful and most convenient corridor, or, as it is called here, loggia, we must now return. I have said that it is four hundred feet in length, and lighted by five-and-twenty arched windows, which, by the way, command a splendid prospect, bounded by the far-off mountains of the Tyrol. The wall opposite to these windows is divided into twenty-five corresponding compartments, arched, and each surmounted by a dome; these compartments are painted in fresco with arabesques, something in the style of Raffaelle's Loggie in the Vatican; while every arch and cupola contains (also painted in fresco) scenes from the life of some great painter, arranged chronologically: thus, in fact, exhibiting a graphic history of the rise and progress of modern painting-from Cimabue down to Rubens.

Of this series of frescos, which are now in progress, a few only are finished, from which, however, a very satisfactory idea may be formed of the whole design. The first cupola is painted from a poem of A. W. Schlegel "Der Bund der Kirche mit den Künsten," which celebrates the alliance between religion (or rather the church) and the fine arts. The second cupola represents

the crusades, because from these wild expeditions (for so Providence ordained that good should spring from evil) arose the regeneration of art in Europe. With the third cupola commences the series of painters. In the arch, or lunette, is represented the Madonna of Cimabue carried in triumphal procession through the streets of Florence to the church of Santa Maria Novella; and in the dome above, various scenes from the painter's life. In the next cupola is the history of Giotto; then follows Angelico da Fesole, who, partly from humility and partly from love for his art, refused to be made Archbishop of Florence; then, fourthly, Massaccio; fifthly, Bellini: in one compartment he is represented painting the favourite sultana of Mahomet II. We pass over several succeeding cupolas till we arrive at Leonardo da Vinci, painting the queen Joanna of Arragon; then Michael Angelo, meditating the design of St. Peter's, then the history of Raffaelle: in the dome are various scenes from his life. The lunette represents his death: he is extended on a couch, beside which sits his virago love, the Fornarina "in disperato dolor;" Pope Leo X.

VOL. II.

Ꭰ

and Cardinal Bembo are looking on overwhelmed with grief; in the background is the Transfiguration.

I wonder, if Raffaelle had survived this fatal illness, which of the two alternatives he would have chosen-the cardinal's hat or the niece of Cardinal Bibbiena? M. de Klenze gave us, the other night, a most picturesque and animated description of the opening of Raffaelle's tomb,at which he had himself assisted-the discovery of his remains, and those of his betrothed bride, the niece of Cardinal Bibbiena, deposited near him. She survived him several years, but in her last moments requested to be buried in the same tomb with him. This was at least quite in the genre romantic.

"Charming!" exclaimed one of the ladies pre

sent.

"Et genereux! exclaimed another et d'autant plus genereux que ce n'etait pas précisement pour elle qu'il est mort."

The series of the Italian painters will end with the Carracci. Those of the German painters will begin with Van Eyck, and end with Rubens. Of many of the frescos which are not yet exe

cuted, I saw the cartoons in Professor Zimmermann's studio.

Though the general decoration of this gallery was planned by Cornelius, the designs for some particular parts, and the direction of the whole, have been confided to Zimmermann, who is assisted in the execution by five other painters. One particular picture, which represents Giotto exhibiting his Madonna to the Pope, was pointed out to my especial admiration, as the most finished specimen of fresco painting, which has yet been executed here; and in truth, for tenderness and freshness of colour, softness in the shadows, and delicacy in the handling, it might bear comparison with any painting in oils. We were standing near it on a high scaffold, and it endured the closest and most minute consideration; but when seen from below, it may possibly be less effective. It shows, however, the extreme finish of which the fresco painting is susceptible. This was executed by Hiltensperger, of Swabia, from the cartoon of Zimmermann. At one end of this gallery there is to be a large fresco, representing his majesty King Louis, introduced by the muse of Poetry to the assembled poets and painters of