=XXI. Bassano, Genre, and Landscape.=--Venetian painting would not have been the complete expression of the riper Renaissance if it had entirely neglected the country. City people have a natural love of the country, but when it was a matter of doubt whether a man would ever return if he ventured out of the town-gates, as was the case in the Middle Ages, this love had no chance of showing itself. It had to wait until the country itself was safe for wayfarers, a state of things which came about in Italy with the gradual submission of the country to the rule of the neighbouring cities and with the general advance of civilisation. During the Renaissance the love of the country and its pleasures received an immense impulse from Latin authors. What the great Romans without exception recommended, an Italian was not slow to adopt, particularly when, as in this case, it harmonised with natural inclination and with an already common practice. It was the usual thing with those who could afford to do so to retire to the villa for a large part of the year. Classic poets helped such Italians to appreciate the simplicity of the country and to feel a little of its beauty. Many took such delight in country life that they wished to have reminders of it in town. It may have been in response to some such half formulated wish that Palma began to paint his "Sante Conversazioni,"--groups of saintly personages gathered under pleasant trees in pretty landscapes. His pupil, Bonifazio, continued the same line, gradually, however, discarding the traditional group of Madonna and saints, and, under such titles as "The Rich Man's Feast" or "The Finding of Moses," painting all the scenes of fashionable country life, music on the terrace of a villa, hunting parties, and picnics in the forest. Bonifazio's pupil, Jacopo Bassano, no less fond of painting country scenes, did not however confine himself to representing city people in their parks. His pictures were for the inhabitants of the small market-town from which he takes his name, where inside the gates you still see men and women in rustic garb crouching over their many-coloured wares; and where, just outside the walls, you may see all the ordinary occupations connected with farming and grazing. Inspired, although unawares, by the new idea of giving perfectly modern versions of biblical stories, Bassano introduced into nearly every picture he painted episodes from the life in the streets of Bassano, and in the county just outside the gates. Even Orpheus in his hands becomes a farmer's lad fiddling to the barnyard fowls.