27 JUNE 1908, Page 8

The Cicerone : an Art Guide to Painting in Italy.

By J. Burck- hardt. Edited by P. G. Konody. (T. Werner Laurie. 6s. net.)- Considering how often the editor has had to correct the German critic of fifty years ago, it is a question whether it was worth while to have reprinted his book. Although it contains an enormous amount of information, the author's views in important instances are very different from those of to-day. Take, for example, the following condemnation. The pictures under notice, we are told, are "among his best, but are cheerlessly conceived, ugly in action ; see how Venus flies up in the Coronation of Ariadne." Can it be believed that the picture which is "ugly in action" is Tintoretto's "Bacchus and Ariadne" !