Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/37

Rh structure of the outward frame. The form of the head has especially undergone a change; for in the people of antiquity, the forehead and upper portion of the head was low, in particular amongst the Romans, with whom the head has a square build, broad rather than high. Amongst the modern cultivated nations, the arch of the skull is considerably higher, so likewise the forehead; the opening of the eye is also larger, and the whole countenance has a more beautiful rounding, and lovelier proportions, especially amongst the women. And must it not be so? A higher spirituality has taken up its abode in the human race; must it not, therefore, form for itself a dwelling in harmony therewith? The ideal has descended into reality, and has elevated it to a resemblance with itself.

Of the pictures in the Galleria di Firenze, I particularly remember two, by one of the Dutch masters—Honthorst—the pleasure of which increased with me the more I studied them. They both represent the birth of Christ; they show the mother and the child, surrounded by persons who appear to be of the lower class. But how natural these figures! and what life in the countenances! Mary is here, no Raphaelesque virgin, of almost supernatural, bloodless, beauty; she is a young, lovable, earthly woman, who, still pale from the suffering of child-birth, contemplates her heavenly child with tearful, devout joy; and the bystanders, both young and old, who press forward also to gaze upon it, half-curious, half in admiration, and joyful presentiments, how they smile, how they rejoice with sincere näiveté, which seems to enter into