the German artists who thronged the court of Filippo Maria and Francesco Sforza, they were doubtless evolving obscurely the more or less distinctive character which emerges first into notice with Vincenzo Foppa. Were the works of the earlier contemporaries of Foppa, Bonifacio Bembo, Pietro dei Marchesi, Stefano de’ Fedeli, Constantino da Vaprio, Bernardino de’ Rossi, etc., still existing, we should probably find that they were already moving in the direction which his greater talent was able to pursue definitely and to point out to his successors. Foppa’s is the first figure that stands out for real artistic excellence in the history of Milanese painting, and he is always called the founder of the school. Born at Brescia sometime in the first half of the fifteenth century, Foppa is generally supposed to have studied in the school of Squarcione. His earliest known work is the Crucifixion, at Bergamo, dated 1456. He worked chiefly in Milan and the neighbourhood, and died in 1492. He was a very serious painter, and though he had not the inspiration of genius, with sound artistic sense he grasped the material facts of nature and gave force and reality to his creations. His treatment of forms is simple and direct, and his sincerity and singleness of purpose redeem the homeliness of his types, and render his figures noble and impressive. The Squarcionesque tradition is to be seen in the classical backgrounds and inlaid marble thrones, etc., of his pictures, but the general character of his work shows a distinct departure from the Paduan style. The heavy forms and dark grey flesh tones are native qualities, and are very persistent throughout the Milanese school of painting. Zenale, born at Treviglio in 1436, died in 1526, is little more than a name to us, for in spite of his long life scarcely any of his work has survived. The altarpiece at Treviglio, in which Buttinone was associated with him, is the only work extant that can with certainty be called his. Buttinone was his contemporary and co-worker in the frescoes in S. Pietro Gessate in Milan, as well as in the Treviglio altarpiece. Zenale’s share in these frescoes is quite unrecognisable, and there is nothing else in Milan that can be identified as his work. Buttinone’s paintings are rare, but some survive in Milan and the neighbourhood. He has a good deal in common with Foppa, and probably derived his training from the same source; but there is a decided individuality in his work, an almost painful struggle after realism which results in a strange ugliness. His faces have great protruding foreheads and enormous ears, the flesh tones are dark and grey with streaks of high light, the children have large heads and disproportionately small limbs. There is something pathetic in his painstaking efforts and their poor results.