In the early part of the century, an artist of the name of Gentile da Fabriano, had been employed in the public palace at Venice, highly distinguished in his time, but of whom I must not here repeat what has been said in the first volume of this work. He there depicted a naval battle scene, a production greatly extolled in former times, which has long since perished. He produced, also, some disciples, as we find mention of a Jacopo Nerito, from Padua, who, in a painting at San Michele di Padova, according to Rossetti, subscribes himself one of his pupils. Nasocchio di Bassano, the elder, is to be ranked also, either as one of his scholars or his imitators, if, indeed, a small picture pointed out to me by the late Signor Verci was by his hand. Among other Venetians, Jacopo Bellini, at once the father and the master of Gentile and Giovanni of the same name, of whom more hereafter, was certainly a pupil of Gentile da Fabriano. Jacopo, however, is better known by the celebrity of his sons, than by his own works, at this time either destroyed or unknown. He had painted in the school of S. Giovanni Evangelista at Venice, and in the chapel of the Gatta Melata, at the Santo di Padova, about 1456; but these labours survive only in history, nor have I met with any other specimen besides a Madonna, discovered by Sig. Sasso, bearing the signature of its author. The style appears taken from that of Squarcione, to which he is supposed to have applied himself in his more advanced years. There was also another Jacopo in very high repute,[17] called Jacobello del Fiore, who has been falsely accused by Vasari, of having drawn his figures all resting on the tip of their toes, in the manner of the Greeks. His father, Francesco, was considered in the light of a Coryphæus of the art, and his tomb is still to be seen at Santi Giovanni e Paolo, with a figure of him in his toga, and a commendatory epitaph in Latin verse. No works of his, however, are to be seen in Venice,[18] a dittico, or small altar, with his name having been conveyed to London, bearing the date of 1412. It was obtained by the Chevalier Strange, together with some other productions of the old Venetian artists. The son of Francesco rose to a still higher degree of celebrity. He began to make himself known as early as 1401, by producing an altarpiece at San Cassiano di Pesaro, in which city I discovered another, with the date of 1409, and both bear the signature of _Jacometto de Flor_. A much nobler work is a coronation of the Virgin, in the cathedral of Ceneda, extremely rich in figures, insomuch as to have deserved the name of the "Painting of Paradise," in a MS. of the lives of the bishops of that place, which is preserved in the episcopal residence, and declares the work to have been executed, _ab eximio illius temporis pictore Jacobello de Flore_, 1432, at the expense of the bishop, Ant. Correr. There is a Madonna, indisputably by his hand, in possession of Sig. Girolamo