in her portraits so well that she had made concerning him the not very flattering observation, that “he was worth more as a tailor than a painter.” He was rewarded by marrying her, the condition being exacted that Lavinia should remain free to follow her professional career. Besides portraits, she produced several compositions on sacred subjects; some church pictures now in Bologna, and some on worldly themes, as the picture of Venus in the Berlin Museum. In her later works, after her lessons with Caracci, she acquired a softness and warmth of coloring that remind one of the masters of the Venetian school. One of her productions--Saint Francis de Paula raising a dead person--preserved in the Pinacothek of Bologna--has been noticed for this. Of her pictures besides are the Crucifixion, the Miracle of the Loaves, and the Annunciation. These were for churches of Bologna. Lavinia lived at the close of what was peculiarly the period of Christian art, and it seems just to place her among the artists who labored while the Christian ideal, in all its splendor, was yet above the horizon. On this period Raphael and Michael Angelo had set their seal, and the Christian ideal was exhausted in the Transfiguration, and the frescoes of the Sistine chapel; they could not be surpassed. One of Lavinia’s works--the Nativity of the Virgin, at nighttime--is still exhibited in her native city. The infant Mary is surrounded by a cloud of angels, and a saint is pointing to two children below. A figure in magnificent bishop’s robes, on the other side, is in the act of sprinkling holy water on two beautiful kneeling girls. This picture, Bolognini asserts, alone justifies the artist’s fame. In the Escurial at Madrid is a piece by her, representing a Madonna uplifting a veil to view her sleeping child, who reposes on richly-embroidered cushions; St. Joseph and St. John stand near. “A picture,” says Mazzolari, “so vivid, so gay and graceful, and of such glorious coloring, so full of beauty, that one is never weary of admiring it.” A picture which has especially contributed to her artistic fame represents the Queen of Sheba in the presence of Solomon; but it has also an allegorical reference to the Duke and Duchess of Mantua, and various personages of their court. Lanzi considers this production worthy of the Venetian school. Another represents a royal infant, playing on a bed, wrapped in blankets, and adorned with a splendid necklace. A “Judith, seen by torch-light,” is in the possession of the Della Casa family. A Virgin and Child, which she painted for Cardinal Ascoli, and sent to Rome, has been thought her best production, and brought her so much fame, that, a large painting being required for a church, the commission was intrusted to Lavinia, in preference to many first-class artists, who sought it. She painted a stoning of Stephen, with a number of figures, and a halo above representing heaven opening. The figures were larger