He Held Continually At His Orders A Faction Of Bravi Who Drove
From Naples, With Threats And Insults And Violence, Every Artist Of
Eminence Who Dared Visit The City.
Car-racci and Guido only saved their
lives by flight, and the blameless and gifted Domenichino, it is said,
was foully murdered by his order.
It is not to such a heart as this that
is given the ineffable raptures of Murillo or the positive revelations
of Velazquez. These great souls were above cruelty or jealousy.
Velazquez never knew the storms of adversity. Safely anchored in the
royal favor, he passed his uneventful life in the calm of his beloved
work. But his hand and home were always open to the struggling artists
of Spain. He was the benefactor of Alonzo Cano; and when Murillo came up
to Madrid, weary and footsore with his long tramp from Andalusia,
sustained by an innate consciousness of power, all on fire with a
picture of Van Dyck he had seen in Seville, the rich and honored painter
of the court received with generous kindness the shabby young wanderer,
clothed him, and taught him, and watched with noble delight the first
flights of the young eagle whose strong wing was so soon to cleave the
empyrean. And when Murillo went back to Seville he paid his debt by
doing as much for others. These magnanimous hearts were fit company for
the saints they drew.
We have lingered so long with the native artists we shall have little to
say of the rest.
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