the Duomo’s fit ally: “There is, as far as I know, only one Gothic building in Europe, the Duomo of Florence, in which the ornament is so exquisitely finished as to enable us to imagine what might have been the effect of the perfect workmanship of the Renaissance, coming out of the hands of men like Verocchio and Ghiberti, had it been employed on the magnificent framework of Gothic structure.”--Ruskin in ‘Stones of Venice’. 36. Shall I be alive that morning the scaffold Is broken away, and the long-pent fire, Like the golden hope of the world, unbaffled Springs from its sleep, and up goes the spire, While, “God and the People” plain for its motto, Thence the new tricolor flaps at the sky? At least to foresee that glory of Giotto And Florence together, the first am I! -- St. 36. and up goes the spire: Giotto’s plan included a spire of 100 feet, but the project was abandoned by Taddeo Gaddi, who carried on the work after the death of Giotto in 1336. “The mountains from without In silence listen for the word said next. What word will men say,--here where Giotto planted His Campanile like an unperplexed Fine question heaven-ward, touching the things granted A noble people, who, being greatly vexed In act, in aspiration keep undaunted?” --Mrs. Browning’s ‘Casa Guidi Windows’, Pt. I., vv. 66-72. Pictor Ignotus. {Florence, 15--.} I could have painted pictures like that youth’s Ye praise so. How my soul springs up! No bar Stayed me--ah, thought which saddens while it soothes! --Never did fate forbid me, star by star, To outburst on your night, with all my gift Of fires from God: nor would my flesh have shrunk From seconding my soul, with eyes uplift And wide to heaven, or, straight like thunder, sunk To the centre, of an instant; or around Turned calmly and inquisitive, to scan {10} The license and the limit, space and bound, Allowed to truth made visible in man. And, like that youth ye praise so, all I saw, Over the canvas could my hand have flung, Each face obedient to its passion’s law, Each passion clear proclaimed without a tongue: Whether Hope rose at once in all the blood, A-tiptoe for the blessing of embrace, Or Rapture drooped the eyes, as when her brood Pull down the nesting dove’s heart to its place; {20} Or Confidence lit swift the forehead up, And locked the mouth fast, like a castle braved,-- O human faces! hath it spilt, my cup? What did ye give me that I have not saved? Nor will I say I have not dreamed (how well!) Of going--I, in each new picture,--forth, As, making new hearts beat and bosoms swell, To Pope or Kaiser, East, West, South, or North, Bound for the calmly satisfied great State,