I have before treated of Squarcione, and of his method, reserving for a fitter place the consideration of his disciples, more especially Andrea Mantegna. He will, however, be included in the present list as a scholar; although, as a master of the school of Lombardy, we are bound to speak of him with more commendation, in another chapter. But even the first essays of great characters are valuable; and Vasari does not scruple to commend Andrea's first altarpiece as a work worthy of his old age. It was placed in Santa Sofia, where the artist has signed himself _Andreas Mantinea Patavinus annos VII. et X. natus sua manu pinxit, 1448_. Squarcione was so much delighted with his early genius, that he adopted him for his son. But he afterwards regretted his own generosity, when the young artist took to wife the daughter of his rival, Jacopo Bellini; so that he then began to blame him, yet at the same time to instruct him better. Andrea having been educated in an academy which adopted the study of marbles, indulged great admiration of several Greek bassi relievi, in the ancient style, such as is that of the Primarii Dei, in an altar of the capitol. He was therefore extremely bent upon acquiring the chasteness of the contours, the beauty of the ideas and of the bodies; but not content with adopting that straitness of the garment, those parallel folds, and that study of parts which so easily degenerates into stiffness, he neglected that portion of his art which animates the otherwise uninformed images--expression. In this respect he greatly failed in his picture of the Martyrdom of S. Jacopo, placed in the church of the Eremitani, and from which Squarcione took occasion to reprehend him severely. These complaints led him to adopt a better method, and in his representation of the history of S. Cristoforo, placed opposite his S. Jacopo, he threw more expression into his figures; and in particular, his production about the same period of San Marco, in the act of writing the gospel, painted for Santa Giustina, displays in the features the absorbed mind of the philosopher and the enthusiasm of a saint. If Squarcione thus contributed by his reproaches to render this artist great, the Bellini, perhaps, co-operated with him by friendship and relationship, in producing the same result. He resided little in Venice, but during that time he did not fail to avail himself of the best portion of that school; and we thus perceive in some of his pictures, landscapes and gardens quite in the Venetian character, besides a knowledge of colours not inferior to the best Venetian artists of the age. I am uncertain whether he or some other communicated to the Bellini that species of perspective so much commended by Barbaro; but I know that Lomazzo, in his "Tempio della Pittura," page 53, has put on record _that Mantegna was the first who gave us true notions relating to this art_: and I know that the most distinguished characters of those