S. Maria "di Loretto." Our Lady of Loretto. The origin of this title is the famous legend of the Santa Casa, the house at Nazareth, which was the birthplace of the Virgin, and the scene of the Annunciation. During the incursions of the Saracens, the Santa Casa being threatened with profanation, if not destruction, was taken up by the angels and conveyed over land and sea till it was set down on the coast of Dalmatia; but not being safe there, the angels again took it up, and, bearing it over the Adriatic, set it down in a grove near Loretto. But certain wicked brigands having disturbed its sacred quietude by strife and murder, the house again changed its place, and was at length set down on the spot where it now stands. The date of this miracle is placed in 1295. The Madonna di Loretto is usually represented as seated with the divine Child on the roof of a house, which is sustained at the corners by four angels, and thus borne over sea and land. From the celebrity of Loretto as a place of pilgrimage this representation became popular, and is often found in chapels dedicated to our Lady of Loretto. Another effigy of our Lady of Loretto is merely a copy of a very old Greek "Virgin and Child," which is enshrined in the Santa Casa. S.M. "del Pillar," Our Lady of the Pillar, is protectress of Saragossa. According to the Legend, she descended from heaven standing on an alabaster pillar, and thus appeared to St. James (Santiago) when he was preaching the gospel in Spain. The miraculous pillar is preserved in the cathedral of Saragossa, and the legend appears frequently in Spanish art. Also in a very interior picture by Nicolo Poussin, now in the Louvre. * * * * * Some celebrated pictures are individually distinguished by titles derived from some particular object in the composition, as Raphael's _Madonna de Impannata_, so called from the window in the back ground being partly shaded with a piece of linen (in the Pitti Pal., Florence); Correggio's _Vierge au Panier_, so called from the work-basket which stands beside her (in our Nat Gal.); Murillo's _Virgen de la Servilleta_, the Virgin of the Napkin, in allusion to the dinner napkin on which it was painted.[1] Others are denominated from certain localities, as the _Madonna di Foligno_ (now in the Vatican); others from the names of families to whom they have belonged, as _La Madonna della Famiglia Staffa_, at Perugia. [Footnote 1: There is a beautiful engraving in Stirling's "Annals of the Artists of Spain."] * * * * * Those visions and miracles with which the Virgin Mary favoured many of the saints, as St. Luke (who was her secretary and painter), St. Catherine, St. Francis, St. Herman, and others, have already been related in the former volumes, and need not be repeated here.