Aniella produced two paintings so excellent that many declared they were completed by Stanzioni. But Domenici says he has seen several of her original pictures, and that they are “most beautiful productions.” “Her master himself,” he continues, “avows in his writings that she equals the best masters of our time.” One of the pictures represented the Birth of the Virgin; the other, her Death. The figures are larger than life; and the boldness of design, the effects of light and shade, and the management of the drapery, drew praise from two eminent artists, who said she was an honor to her country, and that many artists might learn from her. She also did several heads of the Madonna in red chalk, pronounced equal in drawing to the works of the most renowned artists. During the earliest days when Aniella frequented Stanzioni’s studio, she became acquainted with Agostino Beltramo, a high-spirited Neapolitan youth. He soon became enamored of the beautiful girl, and his frank manners and noble bearing, with the promise his early efforts gave of his becoming a good artist, were a passport to her heart. His love was accepted, and they were betrothed. Stanzioni exerted himself in their behalf, and through his good offices the consent of the parents for the marriage of the young people was obtained. A rare similarity of tastes, and their mutual labors in art, caused all to admire and many to envy the happiness of their union. The serenity of Aniella’s disposition tended to insure the peace of their daily life; and during sixteen years which they passed together both acquired no insignificant artistic fame. The husband excelled in frescoes; the lady in oil-paintings. The superb painting of San Biagio, in the church of the Sanità, in Naples, is the result of their mutual labors. But the cloud was brooding over the happy home which was to burst in a fatal storm. An evil-minded woman, young and beautiful, entered the house of Aniella as a servant. She was in love with Agostino; and, finding all her charms and artifices ineffectual to move him from his fidelity to his noble wife, or even to win his attention, she set herself to work to accomplish the ruin of this domestic happiness. She contrived to insinuate herself into the confidence of the man she could not tempt; and then, drop by drop, with the perfidy and subtle cunning of Iago, she succeeded in instilling into his heart the poison of jealousy. By degrees she undermined his faith in the spotless virtue of Aniella.