spirited and resolute strokes are to be met with as seem to imprint upon every object the true character of nature, attain at once the points that have been long laboriously aimed at, and perfectly delight professors. To this practice he adhered in the zenith of his fame; nor was it until near the close of his existence, falling a victim to the plague when within a year of completing a century, that both his hand and eye failing him, his style became less elegant, being compelled to paint with repeated efforts of the brush, and with difficulty mingling his tints. Vasari, who saw him once more in 1566, even then was no longer able to recognize Titian in Titian, and it must have been much more difficult in the few following years. Yet, as is customary with old age, he was not at all aware of his failings, and continued to receive commissions until the final year of his life. There remains at S. Salvatore, one of these pictures of the Annunciation, which attracts the spectator only from the name of its master. Yet when he was told by some that it was not, or at least appeared not to have been executed by his hand, he was so much irritated, that in a fit of senile indignation, he affixed to it the following words, "_Tizianus fecit fecit._" Still the most experienced judges are agreed that much may be learned even from his latest works; in the same manner, as the poets pronounce judgment on the Odyssey, the product of old age, but still by Homer. Several of these last specimens, distributed throughout private collections, are nevertheless doubtful, as well as a few copies made by his pupils, but retouched by his hand; and in particular some Madonnas and Magdalens, which I have seen in various places, displaying little or no variety. Upon this point we ought not to omit the account given by Ridolfi, of his having purposely left his studio open for the free access of his disciples, in order that they might secretly take copies of such pictures as he had placed there. That afterwards when he found such copies became vendible, he gladly took possession of them, and retouching them with little trouble, they were passed as his originals. The reporter of this incident added a marginal note to his account, as follows: _Vedi che accortezza!_ behold what a degree of forecast! And to this I might rejoin with another of my own: "Note, that the worth of Titian ought not to be estimated, as is too often the case, by this multiplication of originals."