376 VENETIAN INDEX

The roof is entirely by Paul Veronese, and the traveller who really loves painting ought to get leave to come to this room whenever he chooses; and should pass the summer sunny mornings there again and again, wandering now and then into the Anti-Collegio, and Sala dei Pregadi, and coming back to rest under the wings of the couched lion at the feet of the “Mocenigo.” He will no otherwise enter so deeply into the heart of Venice.

Exercises arranged for the Lower Drawing School, 1873. The sketch was, however, removed by Ruskin from the school when he finally resigned the Professorship, and it is now at Brantwood. Ruskin’s letters to his father from Venice in 1852 describe the purchase of this and another Tintoret:-

“Feb. 13.-... I saw here yesterday the only genuine bit of Paul Veronese that ever I have seen for sale-a sketch of a woman with two dogs-life size-50 Napoleons. I name it to you, in case you yourself would like to have a bit of the great fellow, and because I never yet saw an unquestionable thing at a price that would admit of one’s thinking of it. Of course it is very slight, and a mere sketch, or it would fetch more money, but a grand thing-about a quarter of an hour of the man’s handling, altogether, but the suggestion of a complete picture. There is with it a sketch of Tintoret’s which once belonged to Rumohr, and which I believe also to be the right thing; but, as you know, Tintoret on a small scale is never so thoroughly determinable as other men. I am going to look at it again. They both belong to the painter Nerly-Rumohr made him a present of the Tintoret. I believe he would take 80 Napoleons for both, but I should not like to beat him down, as he lost all his money with that bank which failed two years ago, and I particularly wish you to understand that there is no fear of my taking to buy old pictures-nor do I care about these, but I never saw a bit of good and untouched work for sale before, and so thought I might as well name them to you. The Tintoret is a sketch for a picture in Ducal Palace-the Doge Grimani kneeling before Christ.”

“Grimani” is of course a slip of the pen for “Mocenigo.” Ruskin did not at the time buy either of the pictures. Subsequently he bought the reputed Veronese:-

“May 6.-... I was on the point of writing to you for another credit, and should have done so several days ago, but I was afraid the begging letter might arrive on your birthday; and I should not have liked that, for it must be accompanied by a sad confession,-that I gave thirty pounds the other day for the-not Paul Veronese-but Tintoret, as I afterwards discovered it to be by accident. It was put into a frame too small for it; in talking over it one day, moving it into a light, it slipped and came out, and behold, behind the frame, a piece of foliage and landscape which only one man’s hand in the world could have painted. I wrote most truly to you that I did not care about the ‘Paul Veronese,’ but a genuine sketch of Tintoret’s was another matter-not a thing likely to be offered me twice in my life-more especially a sketch containing a careful piece of foliage. I thought over it a good while, and then determined to offer thirty pounds for it,-believing that you would not be alarmed at the price of a common water-colour drawing for a piece of canvas which had been touched by the one man of old time at whose feet I should have longed to sit. I was almost surprised when-after a week’s consideration-the offer was accepted, about a fortnight ago.”

This picture, known as “Diana and her Dogs,” is at Brantwood; the “foliage and landscape” are on the extreme side of it. The “Doge” was acquired later:-

“[GLENFINLAS] July 19 [1853].-... I want 50 Napoleons sent to Venice to pay for a sketch of Tintoret’s which I wrote for last autumn, before I had any idea of buying missals, but I am very glad I have got it, as I think it thoroughly magnificent, now I see it again ... It is the Doge Mocenigo

[Version 0.04: March 2008]