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 SYMMETRY AND INCIDENT. 
 
 The art of Japan Eas none but an exterior part in the history of the 
 art of nations. Being in its own methods and attitude the art of 
 accident, it has, appropriately, an accidental value. It is of acci- 
 dental value, and not of integral necessity. The virtual discovery 
 of J apanese art, during the later years of the second F rench Empire, 
 caused Europe to relearn how expedient, how delicate, and how 
 lovely Incident may look when Symmetry has grown vulgar. The 
 lesson was most welcome. Japan has had her full influence, Euro- 
 pean art has learnt the value of position and the tact of the unique. 
 But Japan is unlessoned and (in all her art worthy the name) content 
 with her own conventions ; she is local, provincial, alien, remote, 
 incapable of equal companionship \i^ith a world that has Greek art 
 in its own history — that has Pericles ‘‘to its father.” 
 
 Nor is it pictorial art, or decorative art only, that has been touched 
 by Japanese example of Incident and the Unique. Music had 
 attained the noblest form of symmetry in the eighteenth century, 
 but in music, too, symmetry had since grown dull ; and momentary 
 music, the music of phase and of fragment, succeeded. The sense of 
 symmetry is strong in a complete melody — of symmetry in its most 
 delicate and lively and least stationary form — balance ; whereas the 
 leit-motif is isolated. In domestic architecture Symmetry and Inci- 
 dent make a familiar antithesis — the very commonplace of rival 
 methods of art. But the same antithesis exists in less obvious forms. 
 The poets have sought “ irregular ” metres. Incident hovers, in the 
 very act of choosing its right place, in the most modern of modern 
 portraits. In these we have, if not the Japanese suppression of 
 minor emphasis, certainly the Japanese exaggeration of major 
 emphasis ; and with this a quickness and buoyancy. The smile, 
 the figure, the drapery — not yet settled from the arranging touch 
 of a hand, and showing its mark — the restless and unstationary 
 foot, and the unity of impulse that has passed everywhere like a 
 single breeze, all these have a life that greatly transcends the life of 
 Japanese art, yet has the nimble touch of Japanese incident. In 
 passing, a charming comparison may be made between such por- 
 traiture and the aspect of an aspen or other tree of light and liberal 
 leaf ; whether still or in motion the aspen and the free-leafed poplar 
 have the alertness and expectancy of fiight in all their flocks of 
 leaves, while the oaks and elms are gathered in their station. All 
 this is not Japanese, but from such accident is Japanese art inspired, 
 with its good luck of perceptiveness. 
 
 VOL. LVI. N.S. 3 A 
 
706 
 
 SYMMETEY AND INCIDENT. 
 
 What symmetry is to form, that is repetition in the art of orna- 
 ment, Greek art and Gothic alike have series, with repetition or 
 counterchange for their ruling motive. It is not necessary to draw 
 the distinction between such motive and that of the Japanese. The 
 Japanese motives may be defined as uniqueness and position. 
 And these were not known as motives of decoration before the 
 study of Japanese decoration. Repetition and counterchange, of 
 course, have their place in Japanese ornament, as in the diaper 
 patterns for which these people have so singular an invention, but 
 here, too, uniqueness and position are the principal inspiration. 
 And it is quite worth while, and much to the present purpose, to 
 call attention to the chief peculiarity of the Japanese diaper patterns, 
 which is interruption. Repetition there must necessarily be in these, 
 but symmetry is avoided by an interruption which is, to the Western 
 eye, at least, perpetually and freshly unexpected. The place of the 
 interruptions of lines, the variation of the place, and the avoidance 
 of correspondence, are precisely what makes Japanese design of this 
 class inimitable. Thus, even in a repeating pattern, you have a curi- 
 ously successful effect of impulse. It is as though a separate inten- 
 tion had been formed by the designer at every angle. Such renewed 
 consciousness does not make for greatness. Greatness in design has 
 more peace than is found in the gentle abruptness of Japanese lines, in 
 their curious brevity. It is scarcely necessary to say that a line, in 
 all other schools of art, is long or short according to its place and 
 purpose ; but only the Japanese designer so contrives his patterns 
 that the line is always short ; and many repeating designs are 
 entirely composed of this various and variously-occurring brevity, 
 this prankish avoidance of the goal. Moreover, the Japanese ev^ade 
 symmetry, in the unit of their repeating patterns, by another simple 
 device — that of numbers. They make a small difference in the 
 number of curves and of lines. A great difference would not make 
 the same effect of variety ; it would look too much like a contrast. 
 Tor example, three rods on one side and six on another would be 
 something else than a mere variation, and variety would be lost by 
 the use of them. The Japanese decorator will vary three in this 
 place by two in that, and a sense of the defeat of symmetry is imme- 
 diately produced. With more violent means the idea of symmetry 
 would have been neither suggested nor refuted. 
 
 Leaving mere repeating patterns and diaper designs, you find, in 
 J apanese compositions, complete designs in which there is no point of 
 symmetry. It is a balance of suspension and of antithesis. There 
 is no sense of lack of equilibrium, because place is, most subtly, 
 made to have the effect of giving or of subtracting value. A small 
 thing is arranged to reply to a large one, for the small thing is placed 
 at the precise distance that makes it a (Japanese) equivalent. In most 
 
SYMMETRY AND INCIDENT. 
 
 707 
 
 countries of Europe (and perhaps also in Japan) the “steel-yard” 
 is furnished with only a single weight that increases or diminishes 
 in value according as you slide it nearer or farther upon a horizontal 
 arm. It is equivalent to so many ounces when it is close to the up- 
 right, and to so many pounds when it hangs from the farther end of 
 the horizontal rod. Distance plays some such part with the twig or 
 the bird in the upper corner of a Japanese composition. Its place 
 is its significance and its value. Such an art of position implies a 
 great art of intervals. The Japanese chooses a few things and 
 leaves the space between them free, as free as the pauses or silences 
 in music. But as time, not silence, is the subject, or material, of 
 contrast in musical pauses, so it is the measurement of space — that 
 is, collocation — that makes the value of empty intervals. The space 
 between this form and that, in a Japanese composition, is valuable 
 because it is just so wide and no more. And this, again, is only 
 another way of saying that position is the principle of this apparently 
 wilful art. 
 
 Moreover, the alien art of Japan, in its pictorial form, has helped 
 to justify the more stenographic school of etching. Greatly tran- 
 scending Japanese expression, the modern etcher has undoubtedly 
 accepted moral support from the islands of the Japanese. He too 
 etches a kind of short-hand, even though his notes appeal much to 
 the spectator’s knowledge, while the Oriental short-hand appeals to 
 nothing but the spectator’s simple vision. Thus the two artists work 
 in ways dissimilar. Nevertheless the French etcher would never 
 have written his signs so freely had not the Japanese so freely drawn 
 his own. Furthermore still, the transitory and destructible material 
 of Japanese art has done as much as the multiplication of newspapers, 
 and the discovery of processes, to reconcile the European designer — 
 the black and white artist — to working for the day, the day of publi- 
 cation. Japan li’^s much of its daily life by means of paper, 
 painted ; so does Europe by means of paper, printed. But as we, 
 unlike those Orientals, are a destructive people, paper with us means 
 short life, quick destruction, transformation, reappearance, a very 
 circulation of life. This is our present way of surviving ourselves — 
 the new version of that feat of life. Time was when to survive 
 ourselves meant to secure, for a time indefinitely longer than the life 
 of man, such dull form as we had given to our work ; to intrude 
 upon posterity. And every artist was assumed to hope for that 
 security — “ the honours of immortality ” — as the commonplace of his 
 ambition. To survive ourselves, to-day, is to let our work go into 
 daily oblivion and to achieve the honours of mortality. Whether is it 
 better, to be vivid for a day — a day with a name and a date secured 
 to it for ever — or to be, for an unlimited time, tedious ? 
 
 Now, though the Japanese are not a destructive people, their 
 
 3 A 2 
 
708 
 
 SYMMETRY AND INCIDENT. 
 
 paper does not last for ever, and that material has clearly suggested 
 to them a different condition of ornament from that with which they 
 adorned old lacquer, fine ivory, or other perdurable things. For the 
 transitory material they keep the more purely pictorial art of land- 
 scape. What of Japanese landscape ? Assuredly it is too far 
 reduced to a monotonous convention to merit the serious study of 
 races that have produced Crome and Corot. Japanese landscape- 
 drawing reduces things seen to such fewness as must have made the 
 art insufferably tedious to any people less fresh -spirited and more 
 inclined to take themselves seriously than these Orientals. A pre- 
 occupied people would never endure it. But a little closer attention 
 from the Occidental student might find for their evasive attitude to- 
 wards landscape — it is an attitude almost traitorously evasive — a 
 more significant reason. It is that the distances, the greatness, the 
 winds and the waves of the world, coloured plains, and the flight of 
 a sky, are all certainly alien to the perceptions of a people intent 
 upon little deformities. Does it seem harsh to define by such a 
 phrase the curious Japanese search for accidents ? Upon such search 
 these people are avowedly intent, even though they show themselves 
 capable of exquisite appreciation of the form of a normal bird and of 
 the habit of growth of a normal flower. They are not in search of 
 the perpetual slight novelty which was Aristotle’s ideal of the lan- 
 guage poetic (“a little wildly, or with the flower of the mind,” says 
 Emerson of the way of a poet’s speech) — and such novelty it is, like 
 the frequent pulse of the pinion, that keeps verse upon the wing ; 
 no, what the Japanese are intent upon is perpetual slight disorder. 
 The Japanese in the fields had eyes less for the sky and the crescent 
 moon than for some stone in the path, of which the asymmetry strikes 
 his curious sense of pleasure in fortunate accident of form. For love 
 of a little grotesque strangeness he will load himself with the stone 
 and carry it home to his garden. The art of such a people is not 
 liberal art, not the art of peace, and not the art of humanity. Look 
 at the curls and curves whereby this people conventionally signify 
 wave or cloud. All these curls have an attitude which is like that 
 of a figure slightly malformed, and not like that of a human body that 
 is perfect, dominant, and if bent, bent at no lowly or niggling labour. 
 Why these curves should be so charming it would be hard to say ; 
 they have an exquisite prankishness of variety, the place where the 
 upward or downward scrolls curl off from the main wave is delicately 
 unexpected every time, and — especially in gold embroideries — is 
 sensitively fit for the material, catching and losing the light, while 
 the lengths of waving line are such as the long gold threads take by 
 nature. 
 
 A moment ago, this art was declared not human. And, in fact, in 
 no other art has the figure suffered such crooked handling. The 
 
SYMMETRY AND INCIDENT. 
 
 709 
 
 Japanese have generally evaded even the local beauty of their own 
 race for the sake of perpetual slight deformity. Their beauty is 
 remote from our sympathy and admiration ; and it is quite possible 
 that we might miss it in pictorial representation, and that the 
 Japanese artist may have intended human beauty where we do not 
 recognise it. But if it is not easy to recognise, it is certainly not 
 difficult to guess at. And, accordingly, jmu are generally aware 
 that the separate beauty of the race, and its separate dignity, even — 
 to be very generous — has been admired by the Japanese artist, and 
 is presented here and there occasionally, iii the figure of warrior or 
 mousme. But even with this exception the habit of Japanese 
 figure-drawing is evidently grotesque, derisive, and crooked. It is 
 curious to observe that the search for slight deformity is so constant 
 as to make use, for its purposes, not of action only, but of perspec- 
 tive foreshortening. With us it is to the youngest child only that 
 there would appear to be mirth in the drawing of a man who, 
 stooping violently forward, would seem to have his head “ beneath 
 his shoulders.” The European child would not see fun in the living 
 man so presented, but — unused to the same efiect “ in the flat ” — he 
 thinks it prodigiously humorous in a drawing. But so only when 
 he is quite young. The Japanese keeps, apparently, his sense of this 
 kind of humour. It amuses him, but not perhaps altogether as it 
 amuses the child, that the foreshortened figure should, in drawing 
 and to the impractised eye, seem distorted and dislocated ; the simple 
 Oriental appears to find more derision in it than the simple child. 
 The distortion is not without a suggestion of ignominy. And, more- 
 over, the Japanese shows derision, but not precisely scorn. He does 
 not hold himself superior to his hideous models. He makes free 
 with them on equal terms. He is familiar with them. 
 
 And if this is the conviction gathered from ordinary drawings, no 
 need to insist upon the ignoble character of those that are intentional 
 caricatures. 
 
 Perhaps the time has hardly come for writing anew the praises of 
 symmetrj^ The world knows too much of tlie abuse of Greek 
 decoration, and would be glad to forget it, with the intention of 
 learning that art afresh in a future age and of seeing it then anew. 
 But whatever may be the phases of the arts, there is the abiding 
 principle of symmetry in the body of man, that goes erect, like an 
 upright soul. Its balance is equal. Exterior human symmetry is 
 surely a curious physiological fact where there is no symmetry 
 interiorly. For the centres of life and movement within the body 
 are placed with Oriental inequality. Man is Greek without, and 
 Japanese within. But the absolute symmetry of the skeleton 
 and of the beauty and life that cover it is accurately a principle. 
 It controls, but not tyrannously, all the life of human action. Atti- 
 
710 
 
 SYMMETRY AND INCIDENT. 
 
 tude and motion disturb perpetually, with infinite incidents — in- 
 equalities o£ work, war, and pastime, inequalities of sleep — tbe 
 symmetry of man. Only in death and “ at attention ” is that 
 symmetry complete in attitude. Nevertheless, it rules the dance 
 and the battle, and its rhythm is not to be destroyed. All the more 
 because this hand holds the goad and that the harrow, this the 
 shield and that the sword, because this arm rocks the cradle and 
 that caresses the unequal heads of children, is this rhythm the law ; 
 and grace and strength are inflections thereof. All human move- 
 ment is a variation upon symmetry, and without symmetry it would 
 not be variation ; it would be lawless, fortuitous, and as dull and broad- 
 cast as lawless art. The order of inflection that is not infraction 
 has been explained in a most authoritative sentence of criticism of 
 literature, a sentence that should save the world the trouble of some 
 of its futile, violent, and weak experiments : Law, the rectitude of 
 
 humanity,” says Mr. Coventry Patmore, “ should be the poet’s only 
 subject, as, from time immemorial, it has been the subject of true 
 art, though many a true artist has done the Muse’s will and knew it 
 not. As all the music of verse arises, not from infraction but from 
 inflection of the law of the set metre ; so the greatest poets have 
 been those the modulus of whose verse has been most variously and 
 delicately inflected, in correspondence with feelings and passions 
 which are the inflections of moral law in their theme. Law puts a 
 strain upon feeling, and feeling responds with a strain upon law, 
 Furthermore, Aristotle says that the quality of poetic language is a 
 continual slight novelty. In the highest poetry, like that of Milton, 
 these three modes of inflection, metrical, linguistical, and moral, all 
 chime together in praise of the true order of life.” 
 
 And like that order is the order of the figure of man, an order 
 most beautiful and most secure when it is put to the -proof. That 
 perpetual proof by perpetual inflection is the very condition of life. 
 Symmetry is a profound, if disregarded because perpetually inflected, 
 condition of human life. 
 
 The nimble art of Japan is unessential; it may come and go, may 
 settle or be fanned away. It has life and it is not without law ; it 
 has an obvious life, and a less obvious law. But with Greece abides 
 the obvious law and the less obvious life : symmetry as apparent as 
 the symmetry of man, and life occult like his unequal heart. And 
 this seems to be the nobler and the more perdurable relation. 
 
 Alice Meynell. 
 
VENETIAN MISSALS. 
 
 The illustrations in woodcut, which adorn in great numbers the 
 pages of early Italian hooks, have more and more engrossed, 
 during the last five years, the attention, not only of the bibliographer, 
 but also of the amateur of the fine arts. In 1885, Dr. Lippmann 
 published, in a collected form, his studies, under the title of Dev 
 Italienische Hohschnitt in XV. Jahrhundert, of which an English 
 edition was afterwards published by Mr. Quaritch, in 1888 ; and it 
 might almost be said, that not until then were the beauty and signi- 
 ficance of these book-illustrations, considered as works of art, generally 
 recognised and allowed. Upon turning to such a work as Jackson 
 and Chatto’s Treatise of Wood Engraving, an admirable book of, per- 
 haps, a not very admirable kind, the second edition of which was 
 published as lately as 1861, although we find the cuts in the famous 
 Rypnerotomacliia, printed by Aldus at Venice in 1499, described at 
 •some length, the illustrations of many other Italian books of the same 
 period, which are equal in artistic importance to those of the Ryp- 
 nerotomachia, are not even alluded to ; while the whole subject of 
 Italian book-illustrations is dismissed in a few brief paragraphs ; and 
 this, too, in a general history of some 650 octavo pages. The per- 
 fection of the wood-cutter’s art, during the fifteenth and sixteenth 
 nenturies, was, at that time, still thought to be found only in the 
 productions of the great German masters. 
 
 The studies of Dr. Lippmann had already, in 1879, been preceded 
 by a work entitled, Les Illustrations des ecrits de Jerome Savonarole 
 puhlies en Italie an XV" et au XVI" siecle, by M. Gustave Gruyer, 
 which dealt with a series of the very finest Florentine cuts. In 
 England, Mr. A. TV. Pollard’s monograph. Last Words on the History 
 of the Title-page, London, 1891, and his more general study. Early 
 Illustrated Books : a History of the Decoration and Illustration of Books 
 in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries, London, 1893, have done 
 much to draw attention to the beauty of early Italian cuts ; and, 
 as I write, the author of these books is engaged in filling two 
 cases in the King’s Library at the British Museum with a series of 
 examples, illustrating the art of the two great Italian schools of 
 Florence and Venice. The Florentine cuts are already arranged 
 and exhibited : they have, in every instance, been chosen on account 
 of the artistic beauty of their design ; and they illustrate, in a very 
 felicitous manner, the characteristics of the Florentine, as distin- 
 guished from the Venetian school, namely, an extraordinary sense 
 for decorative effect, a frequent use of solid black masses and a great 
 
712 
 
 VENETIAN MISSALS. 
 
 freedom of hand, both on the part of the draughtsman and the 
 engraver. 
 
 In 1892, another bibliographical work, dealing exclusively with 
 Italian Venetian illustrated books, appeared at Paris under the title 
 BihliograpMe des Livres d figures Venitiens, 1469 — 1525, by the Due 
 de Pivoli. It contained a very valuable bibliography of books in 
 which occurred any woodcut of importance ; and it was illustrated 
 with some reproductions of the more beautiful or interesting examples 
 of such Venetian cuts. This admirable bibliography has now been 
 followed by another and more elaborate work, by the same author,, 
 upon the missals printed at Venice between the years 1481 and 
 1600^ ; and it would appear from the title-page that this latter work 
 is the first of a projected series of “ etudes sur Part de la gravure sur 
 hois a Venise.” In it, the Due de Rivoli has proceeded upon a 
 somewhat different plan from that which determined his former 
 volume. “Notre travail,” he explains in his introduction, “comprend 
 deux parties ; 1° une nomenclature alphabetique et descriptive des bois 
 les plus importants ou les plus interessants qui ornent ces volumes ^ 
 2° la bibliographie proprement dite de toutes les editions dont nous 
 avons eu connaissance. Dans cette derniere division, ou les missels 
 sont repartis par dioceses et par ordres, nous marquons d’une croix 
 tous ceux qui ont et4 compulses soit par nous-meme, soit par des 
 correspondants.” Since the first part only of this work, containing 
 a general introduction and the iconographie of these missals alpha- 
 betically digested under heads, from “Adalbert” to “Christ,” 
 now lies before me, it is perhaps a little unwise to hazard any 
 opinion as to the wisdom of this arrangement ; yet it appears to me, 
 that the book would have proved of greater service to the student, 
 had these missals, with their woodcuts and ornaments, been succes- 
 sively described in order of time, and had the bibliography of each 
 volume followed its description. But the elaborate nature of the 
 work is such, that this plan might have presented many practical 
 difficulties to the writer. 
 
 There is but one earlier bibliographical work, dealing with the 
 special subject of the missal, which need here be mentioned. I mean 
 Mr. W. H. James Weale’s Catalogus MissaUum Ritus Latini ah anna 
 M.CCCC.LXXVfi London, 1886. It is the only attempt which ha& 
 yet been made to form a complete bibliography of these service-books;, 
 and, as its title suggests, it is rather a bibliographical list than a com- 
 plete account of these books and of their contents. This new work on 
 the Venetian missals is at once not only more particular, but far more 
 elaborate and exhaustive. At the end of his introduction, the Due 
 de Pivoli gives a list of the missals printed at Venice, from 1481 to 
 1600, with reproductions of the marks of their printers, in so far as 
 
 (1) Zes Missels imprimis a Venise de 1481 d 1600. Description — Illustration — Bihlio- 
 graphie. Par le Due de Eivoli. Paris. F. Eolhschild, Editeur, 1894. 
 
VENETIAN MISSALS. 
 
 713 
 
 they are known to him. The earliest of these volumes is a Roman 
 missal in quarto, printed by Octavian Scotus, and dated 29th De- 
 cember, 1481 : and from that time no fewer than fifty-three missals 
 were issued at Venice previously to the year 1500. It is generally 
 characteristic of these incunabula, that they are printed in black 
 letter, and that they contain only one cut of Christ crucified, with 
 the Virgin and St. John standing at the foot of the cross, which is 
 usually placed before the canon of the mass. In some instances, as 
 the fine Roman missal bea^ring the imprint, “ Impressus uenetiis arte 
 & impensis Georgii de riuabenis mantuani: & Paganini de paganinis 
 brixiani sociofum : sub Inclyto Duce Joanne Mocenico, quinto kT. 
 octobris MccccLxxxiii,” this cut is designed in so vigorous and dis- 
 tinguished a manner, that an earlier and less discerning critic than 
 the author of the Bibliographie des Livres d figures Venitiens, did not 
 scruple to attribute it to Mantegna. The Due de Rivoli refers to the 
 cut in the missal printed by Georgius Arrivabenus, in 1499, as the 
 finest and most original example of the kind executed at this time. 
 In other instances, as in the little missal printed by Nicholaus de 
 Franckfordia, in 1487, this cut is of the rudest workmanship. Few 
 initial letters or engraved borders are to be found in these books. In 
 the earlier editions, blank spaces were left on which such initials 
 were intended to be illuminated or rubricated. Later on, the less 
 important letters were printed in red ; and it is not until the close of 
 the fifteenth century, that the whole of the initial letters are printed 
 throughout in red. The amateur, therefore, who is merely in search 
 of fine woodcuts, will be, on the whole, disappointed with the contents 
 of these Venetian missals printed before 1500. During the last 
 decade of the fifteenth century, an incomparable series of woodcuts 
 for the illustration of books was being produced at Florence ; while 
 another, little inferior to it, was being cut simultaneously at Venice : 
 but it is not to the missals of this time that we must turn for the 
 most beautiful examples, nor even for a great number, of Venetian 
 woodcuts. 
 
 The beginning of the sixteenth century was marked by an event 
 of much importance in the history of Venetian missals, namely, the 
 publication of the first of that numerous series bearing the imprint 
 of Luc- Antonio Giunta. In 1497, and again in February and 
 October, 1498, Johannes Emericus de Spira had printed, ‘‘ impensis 
 Luce Antonii Juncte,” three several editions of the Roman missal. 
 It appears, however, that Giunta had established his own printing- 
 office at Venice before the close of the fifteenth century, for there is 
 an edition of the Constitutions of the Carmelites, which, according 
 to the colophon, was printed by him for that Order, in 1499. The 
 colophon adds that, the whole of the edition was duly delivered to 
 the monks, and that “ nulla bona vel mala charta aut minima littera 
 apud eundem impressorem vel alium secularem reman sit.” The 
 
714 
 
 VENETIAN MISSALS. 
 
 first missal, bearing tbe imprint of Luc- Antonio Giiunta, is dated 
 5th January, 1500. From this time, and before the year 1537, of 
 the one hundred and eight missals that were printed at Venice, no 
 fewer than forty-nine bear his imprint, either as publisher or printer. 
 After his death, which occurred about this time, the business of his 
 printing-office was continued by his heirs. “ Ces editeurs,” wrote the 
 Due de Fivoli, in his Bihliographie des Livres d figures Venitiens, 
 “dont le premier, Luc- Antonio Giunta, commenca en 1489 a im- 
 primer a Yenise des livres ornes de remarquables gravures au trait, — 
 ont publie, dans les annees posterieures a 1500, de tres nombreuses 
 editions d’ouvrages religieux, notamment des missels et des Dreviaires. 
 Les missels atteignent a un chiffre si eleve (plus d’une centaine), que 
 nous avons du les ecartez de cette etude ; nous n’en avons decrit 
 qu’une edition ; ils meritent ^ eux seuls un travail special ’’ ; and 
 although they form but a part of the subject of the present work, 
 they remain, nevertheless, for the bibliographer, the most important 
 part of his study in dealing with Venetian Missals. The value of 
 the Due de Rivoli’s contributions to this study may, in some measure, 
 be indicated by the fact that of the twenty-five Roman missals which 
 he described as printed or published by Luc-Antonio Giunta, between 
 the years 1500 and 1537, only seven are to be found in the collections 
 of the British Museum. 
 
 This series of editions was chiefly distinguished from those, which 
 had been published at Venice during the close of the previous 
 century, by the greater number and elaboration of their woodcuts 
 and other ornaments. In addition to the single full-page design of 
 the Crucifixion, a number of other cuts are commonly to be found 
 in them ; such as those of the Entry into Jerusalem, the Resurrection, 
 the Ascension, the Annunciation and the Assumption of the Virgin, 
 which occur in the little Roman missal printed by Giunta in octavo, 
 in 1501. Besides these larger cuts, a great number of smaller ones 
 are inserted in the text, after the fashion of the little miniatures, 
 which were used to ornament the illustrated manuscripts of such 
 service-books. Unlike the cuts executed in the previous century, 
 which for the most part were executed in outline, the cuts in this 
 little missal of Giunta’s printing are more freely handled, and are 
 shaded by a profusion of lines hatched in a single direction. They 
 are more rich in effect than the earlier cuts, but they are not always 
 more beautiful or more expressive. This peculiarity of the hatched 
 shading is very characteristic of the illustrations, which occur in the 
 Venetian missals during the first half of the sixteenth century, and 
 especially of those used by Giunta. On turning to another Roman 
 missal published by this printer in 1506, the admirable title-page of 
 which was reproduced in Mr. Pollard’s monograph on that subject, 
 we find many of the cuts which had appeared in the smaller missals 
 of 1501 repeated in this later volume ; the full-page illustrations 
 
VENETIAN MISSALS. 
 
 715 
 
 having the addition of borders in order to fill the increased dimen- 
 sions of the page. These cuts, which made a very pleasing decorative 
 appearance in the small edition, for which they were originally 
 designed, are seen to much disadvantage in the larger book ; the 
 type which accompanies them is less carefully composed, and both 
 they, and the other ornaments, are introduced with less relevancy to 
 the effect of the whole page. As time went on, such faults became 
 more common, and the preparation of new editions more perfunctory ; - 
 yet throughout the century these missals always retained a very 
 decorative appearance, on accounfi^of their black-letter type, a good 
 use of the red ink in the rubric, or some relic of a fine tradition of art 
 which lingered in their illustrations. Those cuts in the Venetian ser- 
 vice-books, remarks Dr. Lippmann, which appeared during the few 
 years immediately following 1500, were the best. “ Their artistic 
 quality, except in a few instances, decreased with the growth of the 
 century in a constantly augmenting ratio. But the issue of new impres- 
 sions, and of copies and imitations, from the old wood blocks, led to the 
 conservation of the old Venetian and Mantegnesque style of treat- 
 ment far into the sixteenth century. A great many of the woodcuts 
 in those Venetian liturgical books were produced, as is shown by 
 the Z. A. signature which frequently occurs, in the workshop of Zoan 
 Andrea. There is an occasional appearance among them of a fresher 
 style of execution ; but it soon dies out, nearly all bearing the stamp 
 of tame and monotonous mediocrity, and deserving to be considered 
 rather as commercial than artistic performances.” 
 
 Such, then, are the general characteristics, not only of the missals 
 published by Luc-Antonio Giunta, but of those issued by other 
 Venetian printers during 'the sixteenth century. In a few instances, 
 we come across a volume in which the cuts are of a singular and 
 uniform excellence, or of some especial interest. The most remark- 
 able example of the former kind is, perhaps, the little Homan missal, 
 in eights, printed by Bernardinus Stagninus, and bearing the date 
 30th July, 1506. Both the type and the cuts, as well as the com- 
 position and the press-work of the volume, are alike beautiful and 
 effective. Of the full-page illustrations, the Due de Rivoli repro- 
 duces no less than seven examples in the first portion of his work, 
 where they appear as the finest of their kind. In the original 
 volume, of which the British Museum possesses a most desirable 
 copy, they are yet more admirable when seen in contrast with the 
 rubricated type of text, and printed upon the thin, vellum-like paper 
 of the sixteenth century. In their treatment, these cuts* and espe- 
 cially such as the “ Procession of David with the Ark” and the “Christ 
 before Herod,” recall the engravings [of Andrea Mantegna : there 
 is the same treatment of the figures, attitudes and draperies, the 
 same hatched shading of short lines, worked in one direction ; in a 
 word, their whole manner is imitated from the prints of the Paduan 
 
716 
 
 VENETIAN MISSALS. 
 
 master. Several of these cuts bear the initials ta, which were 
 formerly thought to be those of Zoan Andrea ; but Dr. Lippmann 
 first pointed out, that they probably belonged to some artist named 
 Jacobus, citing at the same time several prints worked in a similar ^ 
 manner, by an engraver of that name. Of these, the most 
 important is the Triumph of Csesar, published at Venice, in twelve 
 sheets, in 1504. According to an inscription given by Bartsch, 
 which occurs on one of the sheets of this print, the engraver was 
 
 Jacobus Argentoratensis.” There is another woodcut in the style of 
 Mantegna, an allegorical subject, which bears the inscription “Istoria 
 Eomana,” and the signature OPYS lACOBI. In the opinion of 
 Dr. Lippmann, this print is also the work of “Jacobus,” the same 
 who engraved it from a drawing, if not by Mantegna himself, at 
 least by a very able disciple of his. That “Jacobus Argentoratensis ” 
 was not himself the draughtsman of these designs, but only the 
 engraver, seems to be shown by a third cut, which he engraved in a 
 wholly different manner, after a drawing by Beneditto Montagna. 
 
 In certain cuts of the little missal printed by Bernardus Stagninus, it 
 is not improbable that we possess the conjoint work of the draughts- 
 man and engraver of the “ Istoria Bomana ” ; and that the initials 
 1 ^ are those of “ Jacobus Argentoratensis.” “ This question,” as 
 Dr. Lippmann puts it, “ is not indeed solved by the existence of 
 those signed works ; but it is, we may hope, drawn somewhat nearer 
 to solution.” There are some other cuts in Venetian books about 
 this time, which are designed and executed in a similar manner, and 
 which bear the same initials. The Due de Bivoli cites an instance 
 of this kind, which occurs in the Homan missal published by Luc- 
 Antonio Griunta, 22nd January, 1509: “Le graveur qui signe 
 
 I ft,” he writes, “ est peut-etre le plus habile que nous rencontrions 
 dans les missels venitiens. II grave, soit au trait simple (Ovide, 
 1497 ; Crucifixion du MissaJe Bomanum 8®, 1560, Heironimo Scoto), 
 soit dans la maniere ombree, comme les estampes du Missel Stag- 
 nino.” “ Ces vignettes, reeditees dans plusieurs autres ouvrages de 
 piete, furent copiees par di:^erents graveurs, dont nous allons parler, 
 et dont aucun ne possede ni la dexterite ni le savoir-faire de 
 I’original.” 
 
 Among the copyists of these designs in the little missal of Ber- 
 nardus Stagninus, is an engraver who signs himself VGO, on a 
 cut of the Annunciation, which occurs in a Boman missal bearing 
 the imprint of Jacobus Pencius de Leucho, and the date 16th Sep- 
 tember, 1512. This engraver was, in all probability, Ugo da Carpi, 
 who, according to Vasari, was “ilprimo inventore delle stampe di legno, 
 di tre pezzi, per mostare oltra il disegno, I’ombre, i mezi, ed i lumi 
 ancora ” : the art of printing woodcuts in chiaroscuro was already 
 known to the German masters. Hans Burgmair’s portrait of 
 “loannes Paungartner,” which is dated 1512, is printed in three 
 
J 
 
 r 
 
 i 
 
 VENETIAN MISSALS. 717 
 
 blocks, and Ugo da Carpi, probably, did not do more than to intro- 
 duce the method into Italy. We know that on the 24th July, 1516, 
 he obtained certain privileges from the Venetian Senate for the pro- 
 tection of his process, which he termed “modo nuovo di stampare 
 chiaro et scuro;” and it would seem that, previously to this time, he 
 worked in Venice as an engraver of book- illustrations, and that as 
 such he executed these blocks, which hear his name, for Jacobus 
 Pencius de Lencho. Of little artistic value in themselves, they are 
 chiefly interesting as the early work of the engraver who afterwards 
 produced such splendid prints as “ The Venus surrounded by the 
 Cupids ” in an oval, after Raphael, and the more celebrated cut 
 of “ Diogenes,’^ after Parmegiano. 
 
 The name of Zoan Andrea has been mentioned among those of 
 the illustrators of Venetian liturgical books. He is chiefly known 
 as the author of the largest woodcut, which the Italian Renaissance 
 produced, the bird’s-eye view of Venice, of which the original block 
 is preserved in the Museo Civico, in that city. Morelli has drawn 
 attention to the work of this master, in his studies of the Borghese 
 gallery ; and an essay entitled “ Zoan Andrea et ses homonymes,” 
 by the Hue de Rivoli and Charles Ephrussi, appeared in the 
 Gazette des Beaux- Arte for 1891. There are many points of criticism, 
 which are suggested by the works of this master and of his disci- 
 ples ; but both these and other questions of great interest, such as 
 the occurrence of the woodcuts by German masters in Venetian 
 missals, such as that of the Annunciation, which is reproduced 
 in the Hue de Rivoli’s work, from an edition of Giuntia’s printing, 
 I must here leave undiscussed. The presence of many German 
 printers in Venice — indeed, the whole influence, not only of German, 
 but also of Flemish artists over Venetian art — presents a series of 
 artistic problems, about which much has been written, although 
 more remains to be said. 
 
 But I overlook the chief use of studying these ' illustrated books 
 of the Italian printers. We must beware how we tread this way of 
 mere bibliography ; lest, after all, we find it but a blind alley of 
 learning ! Of late years, much attention has been given in England 
 to the production of fine printed books ; their paper, their type, their 
 ornaments, and their press-work, have alike afforded occasion for 
 infinite care and thought. A great number of sumptuous volumes 
 has been the result of such an effort ; but are we able to say, speaking 
 in general, that these books possess those qualities of repose, and of 
 simple, effective, decoration, which distinguish the illustrated books 
 of Florence and Venice, during the great period of the printer’s art ? 
 Are not these and other fine qualities yet to be acquired by us, in 
 the productions of our press? And herein, perhaps, lies the chief 
 use of studying these books of the early Italian printers. 
 
 Herbert P. Horne. 
 
 1 
 
THE POSSIBILITY OF LIFE IN OTHER WORLDS. 
 
 Notwithstanding the wonderful advances in scientific methods 
 which have been efiected in recent years, a great problem still 
 remains unsolved. We are still as far as ever from having attained 
 any definite answer to the question as to whether life can exist on 
 any of the other worlds. Yast as has been the progress in know- 
 ledge since the days when Whewell and Brewster discussed the 
 question of possible inhabitants in other planets, a writer in the 
 present day finds the problem which they attempted still hopelessly 
 beyond his reach in so far as any determinate conclusions are 
 concerned. 
 
 But it seems worth while to take up the question afresh, inasmuch 
 as some of the old arguments have acquired increased significance 
 in consequence of later discoveries, while others -are now seen to 
 have lost something from the same cause. I propose, accordingly, 
 to set forth some account of the present state of the argument, and 
 to note whatever additional importance it may have acquired since 
 the days when the habitability of other worlds was discussed by 
 Brewster. 
 
 The standard argument in support of the belief that certain other 
 planets might be inhabited, was of this kind. It was noticed that 
 the sun lies at the centre of a system of bodies which revolve around 
 it, and that among these bodies the earth holds an intermediate 
 place. It is nearer to the central luminary than are some of the 
 other planets, while, on the other hand, it is more remote than others. 
 The warmth and light received by the earth from the sun would 
 therefore be greater than that reeeived by some planets, and less 
 than that received by others. If some of the planets are much larger 
 than the earth, then it must be remembered that other members of 
 the same system are smaller than our globe, and that some of them 
 are very much smaller. It was also pointed out that the earth in 
 another respect is, as it were, a fair average specimen of a planet. 
 Some of these bodies have moons revolving around them. It is quite 
 true that Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus are more richly endowed with 
 attendant globes than is the earth ; but then Mercury and Yenus 
 appear to be unprovided with any moons. It was thus seen that 
 in the matter of satellites, as well as in dimensions and in situation, 
 our globe is an intermediate one in the system. This conclusion was 
 confirmed by the subsequent discovery that Mars had a pair of 
 satellites and Neptune a single one. Indeed, the claims of the earth 
 to be a typical planet might be pushed still further. A notable cha- 
 racteristic of a planetary globe is its density, that is to say, its weight 
 
THE POSSIBILITY OF LIFE IH OTHER WORLDS. 
 
 719 
 
 in comparison with the weight of a globe of water of equal dimen- 
 sions. Here again our earth appears in the light of a fairly repre- 
 sentative object. It is much lighter, no doubt, bulk for hulk, than 
 some of the other planets. It is, on the other hand, much heavier 
 than others. 
 
 It is also noticeable in this connection, that our globe is sur- 
 rounded with a copious atmosphere, and this is an attribute which of 
 course stands in an obvious and specially important relation to the 
 question of the earth as an abode of life. Those who pondered on 
 the possibility of life on other worlds, could not fail to be struck by 
 the fact that some of those other worlds were also surrounded by 
 atmospheres. If these atmospheres, in certain cases, were excessively 
 dense and abundant, and in others greatly attenuated, this circum- 
 stance alone would tend once again to illustrate the intermediate 
 rank, so to speak, of our earth as a member of the planetary system. 
 
 The argument then ran in this wise, Regarding our earth as a 
 globe which constitutes a member of the solar system, it can hardly 
 be said to possess very extreme attributes. It does not appear to be 
 marked out in any specially distinctive manner which would qualify 
 it rather than certain of the other globes for becoming suitable 
 abodes for life. The qualities which the earth possesses are, gene- 
 rally speaking, conferred upon it in degrees intermediate to those 
 in which other globes of the system are endowed with similar quali- 
 ties. As the earth was inhabited, it would seem only reasonable to 
 assume that in this respect also it was not exceptional, and that in 
 all probability the other globes, some of them, or many of them, 
 were also fitted for the abode of life, suitably adapted to the condi- 
 tions which each globe had to offer. 
 
 Such was in outline the famous argument which was presented 
 half a century ago, in support of the conclusion that in all proba- 
 bility certain other planets besides our earth contained organic 
 life. It is worth while to see how far the present state of our 
 knowledge affects the validity of this argument. That it does so 
 cannot be questioned. I believe, on the whole, the argument has 
 been strengthened by modern research, though it must be admitted, 
 that in some respects its efficiency has been impaired. 
 
 We can indeed, in these present days, bring forward a striking 
 point of relationship between the earth and the other planets, as 
 to which the earlier writers had no information. Had they been 
 aware of it they would certainly have regarded it as greatly 
 strengthening the contention that it was reasonable to presume 
 that the planets must be inhabited. But in those days, philo- 
 sophers had little notion that so astonishing a fact would ever be 
 demonstrated as that the material constituents of the earth were in 
 a great measure identical with the materials constituting the sun. 
 
720 
 
 THE POSSIBILITY OP LIFE IN OTHER WORLDS. 
 
 They did not know that the elementary bodies in the earth were 
 substantially the same as the elementary bodies which make up the 
 mass of the great luminary. It is, no doubt, quite true that we are 
 not as yet able [,to affirm, with any absolute certainty, that the 
 materials from which the planets, such as Venus or Mars, have been 
 built, are actually the same kind of materials as those which make 
 up the earth. Our knowledge indeed stops short of this point. 
 We can pronounce on the substantial identity of the solar materials 
 with the terrestrial materials, because in the former case the bodies 
 are so greatly heated that they are in the gaseous state. Spectro- 
 scopic methods are therefore available for determining their identity 
 with the glowing vapours of the same substances as we have them 
 on the earth. But the planets are not incandescent. Our spectro- 
 scopes may indeed, to some slight extent, inform us as to the consti- 
 tuents of the planetary atmospheres, but the actual solid portions of 
 the planets cannot be analysed by any means at our disposal. There 
 is, however, no reason to think that the elements of which the 
 planets are composed, differ considerably from the elements of which 
 the earth is made. For most astronomers now admit that the sun 
 and the planets have had a common origin from some primitive 
 nebula, and as we verify this theory by showing that the earth and 
 the sun are substantially of the same constituents, it seems impos- 
 sible to doubt that the substances which form the earth are 
 largely, if not wholly, the same as the substances out of which the 
 planetary globes have been fashioned. A striking confirmation of 
 this doctrine of material uniformity is presented by certain of the 
 comets which belong to the solar system. It is quite true that such 
 objects have, so far as physical condition goes, no resemblance tc 
 planets, it is however sufficiently remarkable that comets appear tc 
 be composed of materials resembling those of which our earth has 
 been made. For these bodies happen to be, in part at least, of such 
 a gaseous nature that we are enabled to submit them to spectroscopic 
 analysis. They have thus been proved to contain some of the most 
 important terrestrial elements. 
 
 It is therefore plain that the ancient argument in support of the 
 notion that some of the planets might be tenanted with life, can be 
 considerably reinforced by modern discoveries. For it may now be 
 regarded as practically certain that various elements known on this 
 earth are present in the planetary bodies. We thus see that the 
 components necessary for the physical frame-work of living creatures, 
 may, in all probability, be as abundantly provided upon some of 
 the other planets as it is on the earth. 
 
 In this connection it is instructive to bear in mind what is known 
 as to the distribution of those particular elements in space which 
 appear to be most characteristically associated with the manifestation 
 
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