[Illustration: XVII. Capitals from the Cloister of Monreale, Sicily.] XVII. CAPITALS FROM THE CLOISTER OF MONREALE, SICILY. The hybrid character of this work will be perfectly evident at a glance. It plainly belongs to none of the styles of the North, but nevertheless has a distinct character and unmistakable charm. The use of mosaic originally placed in the channels of the shafts added greatly to the decorative effect and airiness of these columns. [Illustration: XVIII. Capitals from the Cloister of Monreale, Sicily.] XVIII. CAPITALS FROM THE CLOISTER OF MONREALE, SICILY. A common device in most of the Romanesque cloisters for adding interest to the long colonnade was the grouping of two columns of dissimilar design. This plan is followed here in treating the mosaic inlay vertically in one and horizontally in the other. [Illustration: XIX. Capitals from the Cloister of Monreale, Sicily.] XIX. CAPITALS FROM THE CLOISTER OF MONREALE, SICILY. The design of the capitals shown in this plate follows the Corinthian model very closely. [Illustration: XX. The Cloister of Monreale, Sicily.] XX. THE CLOISTER OF MONREALE, SICILY. In a later number of THE BROCHURE SERIES another view of this most charming building will be given. The portion surrounding the fountain, with its groups of four clustered columns, is, in many respects, the most beautiful portion of the structure This will be taken up later. Ravenna Capitals. With the reign of Constantine, and the introduction of Christianity as the acknowledged religion of Rome, Byzantine art, as such, made its appearance. The culture of Rome was transferred to Byzantium, henceforth to be known as Constantinople. Governed alternately by Greek and by Persian, it had received a strong Oriental character from the Eastern nations, and had added to the Greek subtlety and delicacy of expression the Oriental love of detail. When converted by Constantine into New Rome, it became a perfect treasure house of Eastern and Grecian art. The Byzantine work, which spread over the East in the sixth, seventh, and eighth centuries, is therefore a union of the refinement of the Greek, the desire for color and detail of the Oriental, and the vigor of constructional invention and conception of mass and grandeur of the Roman. A portion of it was transplanted to Ravenna during Justinian's reign, and there is a glorious afterglow in the Venetian splendor of the tenth and eleventh centuries. The three great centres of Byzantine art work are Constantinople, Ravenna, and Venice; and the three most noted examples, the churches of Sta. Sophia, S. Vitale, and St. Mark's. Apart from these, the cathedral at Monreale, and the Capella Palatina in Palermo, Sicily, represent a variation from the Byzantine type affected by Moslem design.