in other times than ours were their strength and their beauty, and the delight of the masters who practised them. In water-colours, for instance, the charm of the transparent blotted pigment on the white paper is passed over in the attempt to emulate by means of body-colour painting in oils as it is known at the Exhibitions. And what is this painting in oils as it is known at the Exhibitions? An attempt, shall we say, to vie with the Venetians, to make the subtle greys of the solid painting gleam through the rich colour of the glazes, such as Titian was master of? Not altogether, I fear. In sculpture, again, the treatment of eyes or hair is the preferred problem, matters entirely beside the true office of the art. So in wood-cutting the great attempt is to imitate a wash drawing. Indeed, anything is aimed at but a delight in the precious quality it possesses, the vigour of the white and black. But enough of such protest. Let us rather turn to the better part and endeavour to see of what this wood-cutting with its vigour of black and white consists. Let us, in other words, try and understand something about it as a decorative art, for it is essentially a decorative art, and the decorative quality must largely enter into any attempt in it which is to be made with success.

If we analyse the various ways of treatment which the many differing schools of wood-engravers have from time to time legitimately employed, we shall find that they resolve themselves into two distinct methods. Of these, the one more usually met with might be called the draughtsman's method. Nearly all the early woodcuts are examples of this manner of treatment, as for instance the illustrations to the "Hypnerotomachia" of Poliphilo, Venice, 1499, or the Bible cuts of Hans Holbein, or the three sheets of the Fortunes, fol. A to A 2, in Sigismondo Fanti's "Triompho di Fortuna," 1527. In this method the draughtsman treats the surface of the block, which really represents one even, black mass, as if it were a sheet of white paper and draws his design in black and white upon it, in fact makes a pen and ink drawing; the engraver then proceeding to cut away those parts of the surface of the block that have not been covered by the ink lines. The second method, which is a complete reversal of the first, and the one natural to a woodcutter, might be called the engraver's method. Here the

block is treated as the mass of unrelieved black which it really is, and out of it the white lights are cut straight away by the graver. Among the early examples of this method I do not know any finer, so far as the design and treatment are concerned, than the more delicately cut of the illustrations, in the Florentine edition of 1508, to the Quadriregio of Federico Frezzi, of which a selection is given in facsimile with this number. But these beautiful cuts, as I shall show later on, were not engraved by the artist who designed them, and consequently have not that complete directness of method and economy of labour which we find in some of the early German cuts on metal, and in a few other rare examples on wood. But we must turn to more recent times if we want a really accessible instance, to William Blake's illustrations to the Pastorals of Virgil, and to the cuts of Thomas Bewick, who carried the powers of this method for minute and delicate expression as far as they legitimately could be.

The reason why the woodcuts which have been done by this second or engraver's method are comparatively so few in number is, I think, because there have been but few engravers who designed their own cuts. We know certainly, for instance, that Albert Dürer did not himself engrave his designs for the "Little Passion;" and could the truth be known, I am inclined to believe it would be found that all the early cuts by manifest Italian and German masters, not treated according to this second method, were cut by men other than those who designed them. For is it in accordance with what we know of these men, that they should spend many days in cutting a pen and ink drawing which only took them as many hours to make, when by the process natural to the engraver an effect in every way as satisfactory, could be obtained by a tithe of the labour? In more recent times, whenever a man with the instincts of a master cuts his own blocks, as was the case with Blake and Bewick, we find him employing the engraver's method.

It is exceedingly to be regretted that we have no accomplished draughtsman, with a sense of style and design, who could adorn our books with cuts executed in this manner, for it possesses an artistic charm arising from its mere technical process which the other method cannot give us. It is the charm which results from any effect being produced

by only such expense of labour as is altogether necessary to its production. It is the charm of the brush-work of Veronese and of the pen work of Raphael, and like all such artistic qualities cannot be put at a value. But perhaps my meaning would be more plain were I to give an example. Let me take the cross-hatching which we find in the woodcuts of Albert Dürer. This, although drawn with the utmost ease with a pen, could only be cut by an amount of labour truly surprising when we consider the state of the art at that time, the face of the block being cut parallel, and not as now at right angles, to the grain of the wood, and a knife in shape somewhat like a lancet being used in lieu of our graver.

The four wood-cuts from the Florence, 1508, edition of the "Quadriregio," of which facsimiles are given with the present number, form part of a series of an hundred and twenty-six illustrations, though of this number several are but repetitions of the same cut, one being repeated as many as three times, and several twice. Nothing is known as to who designed them, except that the cut on the first page of the poem, which is one of these repeated cuts, bears the initials LV: and although they have been attributed to Signorelli, both Mr. Fairfax Murray who made the suggestion, as well as Mr. Colvin, are now inclined to think the whole matter undecidable. From internal evidence it would appear that the artist who designed these illustrations did not engrave them himself, since at least four distinct hands are traceable, perhaps five. Unfortunately, eighty-seven out of the entire hundred and twenty-six blocks, have been so angularly cut by two of these engravers, and with so little feeling for the original drawing, as to be almost ruined. All the cuts in quires A to E, except the five cuts on leaves C3 to C5, and perhaps that on leaf C, have been engraved by these two hands. Of the more delicately engraved blocks, the greater number are to be found together at the end of the volume. There are two copies of the book in the British Museum.

Perhaps there is no other wood-cut in the series so entirely satisfactory in its execution as the two cuts occurring on leaves M5 and M6 of the original, which are reproduced as a frontispiece to the present number. The foreground throughout seems to have been left to the skill of the en

graver to treat as he best could; and in these two cuts only is its tone, in relation to the rest of the design, quite admirably managed. There is, also, in them a finer sense for the drawing, and a truer artistic feeling than elsewhere in the book. The other two cuts given at the commencement of this article, from leaves C5 verso and O4 verso of the original, show a somewhat too heavy hand in the foreground, but otherwise the engraver seems to have caught the charm of the original drawing. In all these four cuts the one dominant quality is that decorative element to which all else in them has been made subservient. The raising of the dark foreground so that the figures may stand out against it, the treatment of the trees with their white trunks, and the simple border surrounding the whole, are full of instruction for whoever has the interests of true wood-engraving at heart. In the last cut, "the Presentation to Mars," the effective use of the dark, architectural panels should prove a valuable suggestion as to what might be done this way. It recalls the singular employment of the black masses in Hans Burgkmair's Triumph of Maximilian.

HERBERT P. HORNE.

HE Quadriregio, from which the accompanying illustraof Foligno in the early part of the fifteenth century, composed by him in imitation of Dante. The title-page of the first edition, 1481, reads in English as follows:-"Quatriregio of the course of human life by Messer Federico Frezzi. Divided into four books according to the four kingdoms. In the first is treated of the kingdom of the God Cupid. In the second of the kingdom of Satan. In the third of the kingdom of the Vices. In the fourth and last of the kingdom of the Goddess Minerva, and of Virtue." Little is known of the author's life except that he was a Dominican, a native of Foligno, and that he was made Bishop of that city on October 17, 1403; that he was present at the Councils of Pisa and Constance, and died in the latter city in 1416. His poem shows him to have been a man of great learning, and MSS. on canon law, mathematics, and astronomy, formerly in his possession, existed in the eighteenth century in the library of the Dominican convent at Foligno. His merits as a

poet have been variously estimated, but Tiraboschi and Quadrio, the chief literary historians of Italy, speak of him with great respect. His appreciation of Dante is at all events to his honour. His own poem, moreover, was in high repute at the revival of literature, six editions having appeared from 1481 to 1511. It has since been only once reprinted, Foligno, 1725. This edition contains a copious commentary, a life of the author, a vindication of his authorship against other claimants, and an exhaustive discussion of all points connected with him and his work.

The only edition of Frezzi's poem, however, with which we are in this place concerned is that printed at Florence in 1508, at the expense of Piero Pacini da Pescia, and this on account of the singular and beautiful engravings with which it is illustrated. It is singular that neither the Foligno editors, nor Brunet in his "Manuel du Libraire," who describes the edition in other respects very fully, take any notice of these remarkable illustrations. An account, however, will be found in Lippman, "Der Italiänische Holzschnitt," p. 30, this book itself being a reprint from the 'Jahrbuch der Preussischen Kunstsammlungen" for 1885. They have been attributed to Luca Signorelli on account of the initials L V on the first cut, these having been supposed to represent his real name, Luca Egidio di Venturi. It appears, however, that he never signed L V, but that his usual signature was L C for Luca di Cortona. No other candidate has been proposed, and the only certain facts respecting them are their publication in 1508 and their affinity to Botticelli's designs in illustration of Dante. Of their general character the specimens given in our present number will enable our readers to judge.

It remains to give some account of the subjects of the wood-cuts selected for reproduction.

Plate 1 (M 5 of original text) represents the meeting of the author and his guide Minerva with Dives in the portion of the Inferno reserved for gluttons.

Plate 2 (M 6 of original text) represents the author's pursuit of Cupid, who appears in the Inferno in his true character as an evil spirit, and seeks to conceal himself.

Plate 3 (fol. C 5 verso of original) represents the descent