Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 5.djvu/269

Rh of thirteen alternate red and white stripes of the present flag of the United States, with the crosses of St. George and St. Andrew emblazoned on the blue canton in place of the stars.

Many churches likewise bear the manly and exalted name of St. Andrew. Nearby my own New Hampshire home, there stands a little church, not far from the ragged headlands; and as the prayers of its worshippers ascend on high, the grand old ocean, that great wonder of the Creator, beats its ceaseless monotone as it laves the pebbly beach and thunders along the rocky coast. To this sacred edifice, recently erected, has been given the appropriate name of "St. Andrew's by the Sea."

At Madrid, in the Museo-del-Rey, are collected forty-five pictures by Murillo, the celebrated Spanish painter (1618-1682); one deserving special mention, is the Martyrdom of St. Andrew. It is described as "painted in small proportions, and is one of the best of the serial style; a silver tint, which seems showered down from heaven by the angels holding out the palm of immortality to St. Andrew, who is being crucified, pervades every object, softens the outlines, harmonizes the tints and gives the whole scene a cloudy and fantastic appearance, which is full of charms." In the collection of Mr. Miles at Leigh Court, is another painting by Murillo exhibiting St. Andrew suspended on a high cross, formed of the trunks of trees laid transversly. This is described as a work of great beauty and very effective. I would here remark that all authorities are not agreed concerning the form of the cross. One says it was an Olive tree and not a cross formed of plank. "The Martyrdom of St. Andrew" and the Saint preaching the Gospel, by Jaun-de-Roelas, are also mentioned as splendid productions of art. In the Hampton Court Palace, were deposited seven cartoons which were brought to England by King Charles the First from Brussels, in 1629, at the suggestion of Rubens, the distinguished Flemish painter. They were the composition of "Raphael the Divine," and prepared by that Prince of Painters, who is recognized as without a rival. He designed in the years 1513-16, twenty five scenes executed in colors, representing Gospel subjects, which were copied at Brussels, by being woven in tapestry fourteen to eighteen feet in length and twelve in height. Several are preserved at the Vatican at Rome, and in the European courts. Among the number formerly at Hampton Palace, but now exhibited at South Kensington Museum, is one reipresenting "Christ calling Peter and Andrew," but more generally known as "The Miraculous Draught of Fishes," in which the Saviour, Peter and Andrew are in one boat, and Zebedee and his sons James and John in another. They are the prominent and absorbing features of the sketch, which is particularly distinguished as having all of Raphael's characteristics of "simplicity, perspicuity, emphatic expression and clear developement of the story it illustrates." In Leonardo-de- Vinci's celebrated picture of the Lord's supper, which is painted upon the walls of the Refectory of the Dominican Convent at Milan, Italy, and was completed in 1492, the position of St. Andrew is next to Philip, who is near the end of the table earnestly looking at Jesus. Andrew is seated with his elbows resting upon the table.

In the ancient Greek types and in the old Mosaics, St. Andrew is represented as aged, with flowing white hair and beard, and is distinguished by the transversed cross. Since the fourteenth century, in the devotional pictures in which St. Andrew figures, he is represented as a very old man, his hair and beard silver white, long, loose and flowing; and in general the beard is divided. He leans upon his cross, and holds the Gospel in his right hand. "St. Andrew adoring his cross," by Andrea Sacchi, which is in the gallery of the Vatican at Rome, is remarkable "for its simplicity and fine expression." Guido painted in fresco in the Chapel of St. Andrea in the Church of St. Gregorio, at Rome, "St.