To understand the hill towns of Umbria, and to see them in all their peaceful, sunny slumber, a visit must be paid to Città della Pieve. Perugino's works find a more fitting resting-place in his old birthplace than in any place that I know. The town is solemnly quiet and strangely beautiful. It is like a petrified city, suddenly stopped in its growth, left high and dry by the moving waters of civilisation. It is untouched and unspoiled, and the visitor to-day finds the town very much as it was when Perugino left it. It is a city of peace, and the peace glows on the faces of the people. They are the kindest and most courteous of people; many of them look as though they had stepped from the master's pictures: they stand in quiet, meditative postures, and in church kneel in solemn ecstacies of prayer. They are purely a pastoral people, working hard in the day, coming quietly home at night, and full of tender devotion in their religion, of ardent faith, and of deep domestic love in their family circles. The very influence of Perugino's pictures seems still to dwell in this little Umbrian town. [Illustration: _Private photo_] [_Città della Pieve_ THE ADORATION OF THE MAGI, 1504] Another little town is Panicale, and here, in the following year, Perugino painted a "San Sebastian." Lo Spagna, his pupil, is said to have lived in this town, and therefore, Crowe suggests, had a hand in the work; but the fresco is signed by Perugino, dated on the columns =A.D. MDV.=, and is thoroughly typical of Perugino's work in every way. There is no need to look for Lo Spagna's hand in the fresco, or to expect it; but it is, of course, quite possible that he assisted Perugino in painting it. This work is not a true fresco, but _a secco_--that is, it was painted on the dry wall. The church of San Agostino, in the same town, contains a fresco of the "Virgin and Child," and here the spectator will be safe in attributing the greater part of the work to Lo Spagna. It was in this year that Isabella d'Este Gonzaga, Duchess of Mantua, commissioned a picture for her boudoir in the Ducal Palace. She gave very definite instructions as to its subject, writing to the artist in the following words: "My poetical idea, which I desire you should paint, is a battle of Chastity against Love--that is, Pallas and Diana fighting against Venus and Love. Pallas must have almost conquered Love; after breaking to pieces the gold arrow and silver quiver that she has cast down before her feet, she holds him with one hand by the bandage that the blind one wears over his eyes, and she raises her other hand to strike him. Between Diana and Venus victory must seem to be doubtful; Venus shall be injured in some part of her dress only; as to Diana, her clothes shall be set on fire by the torch of Venus, but the bodies of the two goddesses shall suffer no wound."