May 12,

1905.

extremely powerful, the tail being twisted into a knot.

An even finer statue is that of Bartolomeo Colleoni, another Captain - General of the Venetian forces, who died in 1475, and was one of the first to use field cannon in war (Fig. 5). He is sheathed in richly decorated armour, and wears the Venetian salade and short rowelledspurs. The horse, like that by Donatello, resembles those of St. Mark's, but with more vigorous action. The saddle is high, back and front, and richly decorated like the harness; the feet are in stirrups. The statue stands in front of the church of SS. Giovanni e Paolo, in Venice. It was modelled by Andrea Verrocchio, who, however, died in 1488, leaving it to be cast by Alessandro Leopardi, who completed it in 1496. This is probably the finest equestrian statue in existence, the pose is superb, and horse and rider present an irresistible force.

Passing over the French equestrian portrait statues, most of which were destroyed in the Revolution, we come to those of our own country. The only one still remaining of the seventeenth century is that of Charles I. at Charing-cross, by Hubert le Soeur, a French pupil of John of Bologna. It was cast in London in 1633, at the expense of the Howard family, and saved from destruction during the Rebellion by John Rich, a brasier, who presented it to Charles II., in whose reign it was re-erected in 1674. This graceful and commanding bronze statue has been erroneously described as of lead. The same artist commemorated James I. by a bust over the principal entrance to the Banquetting-house, and both James I. and Charles I. by statues now on each side of the choir at Winchester Cathedral. An equestrian portrait of Charles II. was set up in the Stocks' Market by Sir Robert Vyner in 1672, which had a similar fate to the George II., of lead, brought from Canons, the seat of the Chandos family, and set up in Leicestersquare in 1754. The statue of George III. in Cockspur-street was not erected till 1837, and is by Matthew Wyatt, and the George IV. in Trafalgar-square was not completed till after the artist's (Sir Francis Chantrey) death in 1843. It would be easy to produce faithful representations of at least Elizabeth, Cromwell, William III., and Marlborough, and who would all form splendid subjects for commemoration in this manner.

Statuary was formerly rendered realistic by colouring, and the material chosen mainly for texture, more than one material being used

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for producing a single figure. Ivory for the flesh and golden drapery was most favoured, but Parian, Naxian, and Pentelic marble, probably left white for the flesh, with coloured hair, eyes, &c., and drapery, were most often used for female figures. Sometimes the head and limbs only would be marble and the rest of porous stone filled in with stucco and strongly coloured. There can be little doubt as to bronze having been chosen to represent athletes and demigods from its colour resembling the sunburnt bodies of these, and probably the original colour was carefully maintained. Otherwise the pallor of death given to Jocasta by alloying with silver, and the red blush of shame to Athamas, by iron, as Pliny says, would have disappeared under the ordinary patina, even under Grecian skies, after a few days' exposure. We are accustomed to admire bronze for its patina, and to take pleasure in the varying shades of rich browns and greens it assumes everywhere away from our fuliginous cities, and cannot understand the obvious admiration of the ancients for the natural golden glint of the well scoured metal, often replaced by actual gilding. But then we are equally unable to realise their love for polychromatic statuary, the idea of painting or staining marble being repugnant to us. We even dislike, or are slow to replace, the gorgeous blue, scarlet and gold decoration of the carved stone interiors of our perpendicular churches and screens.

Admitting that art bronzes are to be patinated, the question of the best means of controlling and producing the tones becomes of interest. The Japanese excel in this. Our own empiric methods range from inhumation in a dung heap, to suspension up a smoky chimney-preferably where wood or peat fires are burnt, besides acids and alkalis and trade solutions, the components of which are secrets. The exhaustive researches on the cooling of bronze alloys carried on within the past few years shows that the metals remain separate and crystalline, but present structures as diverse as those of the porphyries, gneisses, and granites, according to the rate at which they are cooled. The tones of the more delicate natural patinas would be considerably affected by the internal structure of the alloy. The chemicals useful for the purpose will be found chiefly among the muriates, ammoniates, and sulphides.

The time remaining at my disposal must be given up to a form of monument which was practically never known in England, an I

the high symbolic import of which is even yet scarcely appreciated.

When not only palaces and pleasances, but every edifice, sacred or lay, and every city, was closed with defensible and well-nigh impregnable gates, the question as to whether these would be found open or shut must have been of the most momentous. The hope of the night's shelter, warmth, and food hung upon the contingency, and oft the traveller must have been met with the stern rebuke, "Too late, too late; you cannot enter now." Inevitably the imagination fenced in the places to be desired in a future life with gates, inexorably closed except to the favoured few. The keys of the gates of Heaven or Paradise were committed to St. Peter, rarely to be opened to anyone without intercession, but the gates of Hell and Purgatory gaped wide. Open or shut, gates were the focus of interest, and could not be approached in primitive days without awe, curiosity, or emotion. It is hence not surprising that they were sump-. tuously and magnificently decorated. The Roman triumphal arch was only the apotheosis of the gate, recalling difficulties gloriously Overcome. The question, figuratively, of the open or closed door to commerce is almost the only one about which civilised nations might still go to war.

In the days when iron was little used, the massive, wooden doors were sheathed, for protection from fire and for strength, in bronze, and revolved upon massive bronze hinges. Upon these were sometimes pictured the mighty deeds of the monarch of the country. The bronze portions of two pairs of enormous doors were found many years since by Mr. Harmuzd Rassam in excavating at Balawat in Assyria. The city contained a palace standing in a long rectangular enclosure, with four entrances, near two of which the remains of the doors were found. The larger were about 22 ft. high, 6 ft. wide, and 3 inches thick, each leaf being attached to a cylindrical post, about 18 inches in diameter, to which strong bronze pivots were fixed, working in stone sockets. Across each door seven or eight plates of bronze 11 inches wide were fixed by nails at regular intervals, these plates lapping round the post. On each of these plates are representations of the Assyrian army on its war path, and other events of the first 9 years of the reign of Shalmaneser II. These are in two bands of repoussé work, executed with great fidelity and spirit, and much freedom of drawing. Between

embossed bands narrow spaces are left, relieved at regular intervals with the rosettes through which the nails are passed that fixed the plates to the woodwork of the doors. The "brazen gates" of antiquity were probably of this kind, and we are singularly fortunate in the possession of these splendid examples by our national museum.

Of the Roman period, there are several bronze doors, but of a different type and not depending on wood for their construction, still preserved in Rome itself. These are the largé central doors of St. John Lateran, decorated with foliage, and brought from the Æmilian Temple in the Forum, and of about the date of Our Lord. Another pair, brought from the baths of Caracalla, and of about the third century, close the oratory of St. John the Baptist, in the church of S. Giovanni in Fonte, the ancient baptistery in Rome. The vast bronze doors of the Pantheon remain in their original position, dating possibly from the time of Agrippa, 31 B.C. The doorway of marble, 39 feet high and 19 feet wide, contains their massive framing, consisting of two bronze pilasters, to which the doors are hinged, and the lintel over them which is a pierced bronze scale pattern grille. The doors themselves are not decorated in relief, but are of severe and dignitied simplicity..

Next in point of antiquity are the Byzantine gates which revert to the partly wood construction of the East. Examples of these still exist in Constantinople, but the best known are the bronze doors to the vestibule of St. Mark's, in Venice. Some of these were brought from Constantinople, it is supposed from S. Sophia, after its reconstruction by Justinian, and may date back to the sixth century. Three of the oldest are divided into four panels of double arches with crosses and foliage rising out of vases under each arch. The other two are in the later Byzantine style, the central one, of early eleventh century, divided into forty-two framed panels inlaid with figures of saints in silver, the heads of some in relief, and a lower row of six panels decorated with bosses only. The frames are broad and studded with bossed nails, and twisted pillars separate each row of panels vertically. The remaining door is treated similarly, but divided into twenty-eight panels with figures, and is older since the inscriptions are in Greek characters. The framing of the panels are richly decorated with geometric and florid designs, and there is a central row of six lions' heads among the bosses. In the large

at the base are like those of the earlier doors of St. Mark's. The Cathedral at Amalfi has doors similarly ornamented; and the doors of the Cathedral at Salerno, erected by Robert Guiscard, are also inlaid with silver, and were éxecuted at Constantinople in 1099. Other examples exist.

The central doors of the Cathedral of Benevento are divided in seventy-two panels, filled with bas-reliefs, except four containing lions' heads with ring handles. Those above represent scriptural scenes crowded with figures, and below are single saints under

Bronze doors of Italian make first appear in the twelfth century, the earliest artist of whom we have definite records being Barisano da Trani. The bronze doors to Trani cathedral, made in 1160, are his work, and are divided into 32 panels of subjects in relief with rich scrolled borderings, and mounted on hard wood. The side doors of Monreale are by the same artist, but somewhat later, divided into 28 panels with reliefs and excessively rich borderings. Even finer are the doors of the Cathedral of St. Pantaleone, at Ravello, by the same artist, and produced in 1179. The figures are