conducted to his own dwelling the Mother to whom he was henceforth to be as a Son.  This beautiful subject, “John conducting the Virgin to his home,” was quite unknown, as far as I am aware, in the earlier schools of art, and appears first in the seventeenth century.  An eminent instance is a fine solemn group by Zurbaran. (Munich.) Christ was laid in the sepulchre by night, and here, in the gray dawn, John and the veiled Virgin are seen as returning from the entombment, and walking mournfully side by side.

* * * * *

We find the peculiar relation between the Mother of Christ and St. John, as her adopted son, expressed in a very tender and ideal manner, on one of the wings of an altar-piece, attributed to Taddeo Gaddi.  (Berlin Gal., No. 1081.) Mary and St. John stand in front; he holds one of her hands clasped in both his own, with a most reverent and affectionate expression.  Christ, standing between them, lays one hand on the shoulder of each; the sentiment of this group is altogether very unusual; and very remarkable.

HISTORICAL SUBJECTS

PART IV.

THE LIFE OF THE VIRGIN MARY FROM THE RESURRECTION OF OUR LORD TO THE ASSUMPTION.

1.  THE APPARITION OF CHRIST TO HIS MOTHER. 2.  THE ASCENSION. 3.  THE DESCENT OF THE HOLY GHOST. 4.  THE DEATH OF THE VIRGIN. 5.  THE ASSUMPTION AND CORONATION.

THE APPARITION OF CHRIST TO HIS MOTHER.

The enthusiastic and increasing veneration for the Madonna, the large place she filled in the religious teaching of the ecclesiastics and the religious sentiments of the people, are nowhere more apparent, nor more strikingly exhibited, than in the manner in which she was associated with the scenes which followed the Passion;—­the manner in which some incidents were suggested, and treated with a peculiar reference to her, and to her maternal feelings.  It is nowhere said that the Virgin Mother was one of the Marys who visited the tomb on the morning of the resurrection, and nowhere is she so represented.  But out of the human sympathy with that bereaved and longing heart, arose the beautiful legend of the interview between Christ and his Mother after he had risen from the dead.

There existed a very ancient tradition (it is mentioned by St. Ambrose in the fourth century, as being then generally accepted by Christians), that Christ, after his return from Hades, visited his Mother even before he appeared to Mary Magdalene in the garden.  It is not indeed so written in the Gospel; but what of that?  The reasoning which led to the conclusion was very simple.  He whose last earthly thought was for his Mother would not leave her without that consolation it was in his power to give; and what, as a son, it was his duty to do (for the humanity of Christ is never forgotten by those who most intensely believed in his divinity,) that, of course, he did do.