Shortly afterwards, Sansovino having completed the construction of the library, the procurators instructed the architect to arrange with Titian as to a choice of painters to decorate it in competition. Veronese was immediately designated, together with Zelotti, Batista Franco, Giuseppe Salviati, Lo Schiavene and Il Fratina, who were to divide the twenty-one ceiling panels between them. Three round compartments fell to the lot of Veronese, who filled them with figures representing _Music_, _Geometry with Arithmetic_, and _Honour_. Under Veronese's brush these cold abstractions took on the most charming forms; they were represented by graceful women, each surrounded by the attributes of the science which she symbolized. A recompense was promised by the procurators to the artist whose paintings should be adjudged most beautiful. Titian was enthusiastic over those of Veronese. Loyal and noble artist that he was, he himself solicited the votes of the painters who had taken part in the competition, and thus Veronese was declared winner by the voice of his own competitors. The senate offered him a golden chain which he delighted to wear on solemn occasions. These great official works did not diminish the number of his productions for churches, convents, or private persons of wealth. No other artist affords an example of similar fecundity. And what verges upon prodigy is that he never employed collaborators, as so many other celebrated painters have done; the only one that he is known to have had is his brother Benedetto Caliari, whose artistic aid was limited to painting in the prospective of the vast architectural designs with which it pleased Veronese to embellish all his canvases. The epoch of his most fertile production was between 1562 and 1565; it was also the period in which he executed his largest and most celebrated paintings, notably his famous canvas of the _Wedding at Cana_, his _Feast at the House of the Pharisee_, his _Feast at the House of the Leper_, and his _Feast at the House of Simon_. These four pictures are known under the name of the four _Feasts_. Two of them belong to France and hang in the museum of the Louvre, in the room known by the name of the _Salon Carré_; these are the _Feast at the House of Simon the Pharisee_ and the _Wedding at Cana_. THE WEDDING AT CANA Veronese has treated this subject twice. Accordingly the picture in the Louvre must not be confounded with that of the same name in the Brera museum at Milan. In spite of the value of the latter, it bears no comparison to the gigantic canvas in the national museum of France. [Illustration: PLATE V.--THE FAMILY OF DARIUS (In the National Gallery, London)