The Massacre of the Infants by Baccio Bandinelli, contrived chiefly to exhibit his anatomic skill, is a complicated tableau of every contortion of human attitude and limbs that precedes dislocation; the expression floats between a studied imagery of frigid horror and loathsome abomination. The stormy brush of Tintoretto swept individual woe away in general masses. Two immense wings of light and shade divide the composition, and hide the want of sentiment in tumult. To Rubens, magnificence and contrast dictated the actors and the scene. A loud lamenting dame, in velvet robes, with golden locks dishevelled, and wide extended arms, meets our first glance. Behind, a group of steel-clad satellites open their rows of spears to admit the nimble, naked ministers of murder, charged with their infant prey, within their ranks, ready to close again against the frantic mothers who pursue them: the pompous gloom of the palace in the middle ground is set off by cottages and village scenery in the distance. Le Brun surrounded the allegoric tomb of Rachel with rapid horsemen, receiving the children whom the assassins tore from their parents' arms, and strewed the field with infant slaughter. Poussin tied in one vigorous group what he conceived of blood-trained villany and maternal frenzy. Whilst Raphael, in dramatic gradation, disclosed all the mother through every image of pity and of terror; through tears, shrieks, resistance, revenge, to the stunned look of despair; and traced the villain from the palpitations of scarce initiated crime to the sedate grin of veteran murder.