PLATE VII.--Next to this subject of the preaching comes the Baptism: and then, the circumstances of St. John's death. First, his declaration to Herod, "It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother's wife:" on which he is seized and carried to prison:--next, Herod's feast,--the consultation between daughter and mother, "What shall I ask?"--the martyrdom, and burial by the disciples. The notable point in the treatment of all these subjects is the quiet and mystic Byzantine dwelling on thought rather than action. In a northern sculpture of this subject, the daughter of Herodias would have been assuredly dancing; and most probably, casting a somersault. With the Byzantine, the debate in her mind is the only subject of interest, and he carves above, the evil angels, laying their hands on the heads, first of Herod and Herodias, and then of Herodias and her daughter. PLATE VIII.--The issuing of commandment not to eat of the tree of knowledge. (Orvieto Cathedral.) This, with Plates X. and XII., will give a sufficiently clear conception to any reader who has a knowledge of sculpture, of the principles of Giovanni Pisano's design. I have thought it well worth while to publish opposite two of them, facsimiles of the engravings which profess to represent them in Gruiier's monograph [1] of the Orvieto sculptures; for these outlines will, once for all, and better than any words, show my pupils what is the real virue of mediaeval work,--the power which we medievalists rejoice in it for. Precisely the qualities which are _not_ in the modern drawings, are the essential virtues of the early sculpture. If you like the Gruner outlines best, you need not trouble yourself to go to Orvieto, or anywhere else in Italy. Sculpture, such as those outlines represent, can be supplied to you by the acre, to order, in any modern academician's atelier. But if you like the strange, rude, quaint, Gothic realities (for these photographs are, up to a certain point, a vision of the reality) best; then, don't study mediaeval art under the direction of modern illustrators. Look at it--for however short a time, where you can find it--veritable and untouched, however mouldered or shattered. And abhor, as you would the mimicry of your best friend's manners by a fool, all restorations and improving copies. For remember, none but fools think they can restore--none, but worse fools, that they can improve. [Footnote: The drawings are by some Italian draughtsman, whose name it is no business of mine to notice.] Examine these outlines, then, with extreme care, and point by point. The things which they have refused or lost, are the things you have to love, in Giovanni Pisano.