"
"No, we have not," said I, struggling to overcome the disappointment
which I found creeping over me. The source of this disappointment was
the thin and faded appearance of the coloring, which at first
suggested to me the idea of a water-colored sketch. It had evidently
suffered barbarously in the process of cleaning, a fact of which I had
been forewarned. This circumstance has a particularly unfavorable
effect on a picture of Raphael's, because his coloring, at best, is
delicate and reserved, and, as compared with, that of Rubens,
approaches to poverty; so that he can ill afford to lose any thing in
this way.
Then as to conception and arrangement, there was much which annoyed
me. The Virgin and Child in the centre are represented as rising in
the air; on one side below them is the kneeling figure of Pope Sixtus;
and on the other, that of St. Barbara. Now this Pope Sixtus is, in my
eyes, a very homely old man, and as I think no better of homely old
men for being popes, his presence in the picture is an annoyance. St.
Barbara, on the other side, has the most beautiful head and face that
could be represented; but then she is kneeling on a cloud with such a
judicious and coquettish arrangement of her neck, shoulders, and face,
to show every fine point in them, as makes one feel that no saint
(unless with a Parisian education) could ever have dropped into such a
position in the _abandon_ of holy rapture.
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