Mr. Lewis Gruner, the engraver and author of the work
" Fresco De- corations and Stuccoes of Churches and Palaces in Italy in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries," whose approaching return to Germany has been announced, leaves behind him, as the result of years of labour, tho greatest work of engraving from a classic picture which has appeared for a long time in England. His subject is the renowned Raphael in the Blenheim Gallery, the Virgin and Child throned under a canopy, flanked by St. John the Baptist and St. Nicholas of Bari. The work was painted in 1505, for the Ansidei family of Perugia, to grace their chapel of St. Nicholas in the church of San Fiorenzo ; and did not change hands till 1764, when it was bought by the brother of the Duke of Marlborough, and presented to the latter. The engraving measures 16 inches by 23 ; it is done entirely with the graver; and is the first which has been taken from the painting, except a small outline, also by Mr. Gruner, for Passavant's Life of Raphael. The picture is spoken of by Waagen as exhibiting the transition from Raphael's Perugian to his Florentine style. In the exact centre, on a canopied throne of rather elaborate design in the taste of the period, and bearing the inscription " Salve Mater Christi," sits the Virgin. Her countenance is somewhat more matronly than in later works of Raphael, being in affinity with the type presented in the upright Franeia of our National Gallery : she is directing the eyes of the Divine Infant to a book open in her lap. St. John, wearing a mantle with an embroidered hem over his ascetic garb of camel-skin, looks up with adoring love to the Madonna, while his mission as the precursor is indicated by his keep- ing his right hand pointing to Christ. St. Nicholas, an aged man with a head of dignified individuality, stands in his episcopal robes, and does not raise his eyes from the breviary which he is reading.
The eminence of the original, and the engraver's skill and elaboration, render this plate a work of the highest class of engraving. The effect of light and dark is true to the character of Raphael ; and the expres- sions, forms, and detail, are conveyed with firmness and precision.
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