11.  Ippolito Andreasi.  Mary, seated, holds the Infant Christ between her knees; Elizabeth leans over the back of her chair; Joseph leans on his staff behind the Virgin; the little St. John and an angel present grapes, while four other angels are gathering and bringing them.  A branch of vine, loaded with grapes, is lying in the foreground.  Christ looks like a young Bacchus; and there is something mannered and fantastic in the execution. (Louvre, 38.) With this domestic scene is blended a strictly religious symbol, “I am the vine.”

12.  Murilio.  Mary is in the act of swaddling her Child (Luke ii, 7), while two angels, standing near him, solace the divine Infant with heavenly music. (Madrid Gal.)

13.  Rubens.  Mary, seated on the ground, holds the Child with a charming maternal expression, a little from her, gazing on him with rapturous earnestness, while he looks up with responsive tenderness in her face.  His right hand rests on a cross presented by St. John, who is presented by St. Elizabeth.  Wonderful for the intensely natural and domestic expression, and the beauty of the execution. (Florence, Pitti Pal.)

14.  D. Hopfer.  Within the porch of a building, Mary is seated on one side, reading intently.  St. Anna, on the other side, holds out her arms to the Child, who is sitting on the ground between them; an angel looks in at the open door behind. (Bartsch., viii. 483.)

15.  Rembrandt. (Le Menage du Menuisier.) A rustic interior.  Mary, seated in the centre, is suckling her Child.  St. Anna, a fat Flemish grandame, has been reading the volume of the Scriptures, and bends forward in order to remove the covering and look in the Infant’s face.  A cradle is near.  Joseph is seen at work in the background. (Louvre.)

16.  Le Brun. (The Benedicite.) Mary, the Child, and Joseph, are seated at a frugal repast.  Joseph is in the act of reverently saying grace, which gives to the picture the title by which it is known.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Louvre, Ecole Francaise 57.  There is a celebrated engraving by Edelinck.]

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It is distinctly related that Joseph brought up his foster-Son as a carpenter, and that Jesus exercised the craft of his reputed father.  In the Church pictures, we do not often meet with this touching and familiar aspect of the life of our Saviour.  But in the small decorative pictures painted for the rich ecclesiastics, and for private oratories, and in the cheap prints which were prepared for distribution among the people, and became especially popular during the religious reaction of the seventeenth century, we find this homely version of the subject perpetually, and often most pleasingly, exhibited.  The greatest and wisest Being who ever trod the earth was thus represented, in the eyes of the poor artificer, as ennobling and sanctifying labour and toil; and the quiet domestic duties and affections were here elevated,