INTRODUCTION xlv

volume was the glory of Venetian colour, and much of the quality which he described passed into his own brilliant pages. The descriptions of the approach to Venice and of the first vision of St. Mark’s are familiar to every reader, and not less celebrated is the imaginative piece in which he pictures “that difference between the district of the gentian and of the olive which the stork and the swallow see far off, as they lean upon the sirocco wind” (ch. vi. § 8). To some of the new notes in Ruskin’s message, contained in this volume, we shall presently refer, but here we may remark also, that in various passages of this volume Ruskin introduces references to illuminated manuscripts (see pp. 257, 321, 385), and in the next volume illustrations from them (vol. iii. Plate 1). He had begun the collection of such things a year or two before, and in 1853-1854 he devoted much time to them-studies which had result in some lectures given in the latter year (Vol. XII.), and which for the remainder of his life were one of his principal interests. We may remark also, in the eight chapter, the passages by the way on Dante and Spenser, which with the chapter “Of Imagination Contemplative” in the second volume of Modern Painters, were among the earliest of his excursions into literary criticism. Even in the most methodical of his books Ruskin often digressed, but his readers recognised that whatever he touched he adorned with fresh and suggestive flashes of insight.

All this was fully recognised in the reviews of the volumes at the times of their publications.¹ “Mr. Ruskin,” wrote on of them, “is the first really popular writer we have ever had upon architecture; and paradoxical as this may seem, it is because he is almost the first truly profound writer we have had on that subject.”² “The Stones of Venice,”

¹ In addition to the reviews cited in the text the following may be referred to:-The Globe, July 21, 1853; Literary Gazette, July 30, August 16, October 29; Critic, August 1, November 1; Examiner, August 6; Guardian, August 24; Edinburgh Guardian, October 22 (“far in advances of all Mr. Ruskin’s previous works”); the Ecclesiastic, October 1853, vol. 15, pp. 467-476 (unfavourable); the Monthly Christian Spectator, October 1853, vol. 3, pp. 589-595 (“the Turner of modern literature and the Johnson of art”); the Gentleman’s Magazine, October 1853, N. S., vol. 40, pp. 392-394, December 1853, pp. 607-609; the British Quarterly Review, November 1853, vol. 18, pp. 460-483; the Electic Review, November 1853, N. S., vol. 6, pp. 553-563; the National Miscellany, November 1853, vol. 2, pp. 30-38 (a review still worth reading: see a reference below, p. 335); the Ecclesiologist, December 1853, vol. 14, pp. 415-417; the Illustrated London News, December 3, 17, 31 (hostile); the Westminster Review, January 1854, N.S., vol. 5. pp. 315-319; the Prospective Review, February 1854, vol. 10, pp. 19-51; and Fraser’s Magazine, February and April 1854, vol. 49, pp. 127-138, 463-478. The Builder reviewed the second volume on August 6, 1853; and published hostile articles, written from the professional point of view, by “Z.” on August 13 and October 22. Ruskin’s father sent him the former article; “it is a species of encouragement to me,” he replied (Aug. 15), “in showing what paltry opponents I have to deal with.”

² Daily News, August 1, 1853.

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