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Chap. VII. PIETRO PERUGINO. 243 The latest frescos of Perugino, in the monastery of S. Agnese at Perugia, and in the church of Fontignano (1522) have been sawed from the walls on which they originally stood. The latter, which ought to have been kept in Perugia, is in the Kensington Museum; and may be compared with the Madonna of the National Gallery to illustrate the difference between the art of Yannucci in his priiue and on the eve of his decease. The marked inferiority of the Virgin and saints at S. Agnese may be due to Eusebio da S. Giorgio. 1 At Fontignano, we observe, as it were, the flicker of an expiring flame, a heavy infant Christ, but a fine type of the Madonna; a black wiry outline, broken at intervals and taken up anew with an uncertain hand; a feeble imitation of nature in the extremities, and a painful ease in the mode of dabbing on the local tones; — an injured relic this, yet superior to the Adoration of Trevi. 2 I As the aged artist laboured at Fontignano, industrious and indefatigable to the close, a plague broke out in the Perugian districts, and ravaged the whole country. A disgraceful panic overspread the land. It tvas decreed that the ceremonies of religion should be omitted in 1 Fresco of the Virgin erect with her arms uplifted. Above her, two angels. Below, SS. Elisabeth of Portugal, and Elisabeth of Hun gary, and in niches at the sides, a good figure of S. Anthony the ab bot and S. Anthony of Padua, all but obliterated. The Virgin is ill outlined and unnatural in action. The figures are drawn with straight lines, and stand unstea dily on the plane of the picture. The drapery is without style. The execution reminds one of that of Eusebio di S. Giorgio, yet Mezza- notte (ub. sup. p. 163) states that the fresco was signed in the fringe of the Virgin’s mantle: “Petrus pinsit”, and that beneath, was the date 1522. The fresco sawed from the wall, is now in the Cappella della Consolazione where one sees, in tlio same style, a Virgin an<l Evangelist at the sides of a wood en cross, and two angels above (life size figures) plus, a S. Sebas tian of less stature, defective in form, though animated in action, a S. Roch, and the Eternal. 2 The figures in this fresco are above life size. The whole piece was transferred to canvass, and remained till 1862 for sale in the shop of Signor Angelo Morrettini at Perugia. The child lies in the centre of the foreground in front of the pent-liouse between the kneeling Virgin and S. Joseph. The shepherds kneel or stand to the right and left. Two angels, j now mere outlines, fly above. The j whole piece is much injured. A S. Roch and a S. Sebastian originally ! at the sides, are said to have been : sold to one Conte della Porta. 16*