But to turn now once more to the series of our master’s Holy Families and Sacred Conversations which began with La Zingarella, and was continued with the Virgin and Child with SS.  Ulfo and Brigida of Madrid.  The most popular of all those belonging to this still early time is the Virgin with the Cherries in the Vienna Gallery.  Here the painter is already completely himself.  He will go much farther in breadth if not in polish, in transparency, in forcefulness, if not in attractiveness of colour; but he is now, in sacred art at any rate, practically free from outside influences.  For the pensive girl-Madonna of Giorgione we now have the radiant young matron of Titian, joyous yet calm in her play with the infant Christ, while the Madonna of his master and friend was unrestful and full of tender foreboding even in seeming repose.  Pretty close on this must have followed the Madonna and Child with St. Stephen, St. Ambrose and St. Maurice, No 439 in the Louvre, in which the rich colour-harmonies strike a somewhat deeper note.  An atelier repetition of this fine original is No. 166 in the Vienna Gallery; the only material variation traceable in this last-named example being that in lieu of St. Ambrose, wearing a kind of biretta, we have St. Jerome bareheaded.

Very near in time and style to this particular series, with which it may safely be grouped, is the beautiful and finely preserved Holy Family in the Bridgewater Gallery, where it is still erroneously attributed to Palma Vecchio.  It is to be found in the same private apartment on the groundfloor of Bridgewater House, that contains the Three Ages.  Deep glowing richness of colour and smooth perfection without smallness of finish make this picture remarkable, notwithstanding its lack of any deeper significance.  Nor must there be forgotten in an enumeration of the early Holy Families, one of the loveliest of all, the Madonna and Child with the infant St. John and St. Anthony Abbot, which adorns the Venetian section of the Uffizi Gallery.  Here the relationship to Giorgione is more clearly shown than in any of these Holy Families of the first period, and in so far the painting, which cannot be placed very early among them, constitutes a partial exception in the series.  The Virgin is of a more refined and pensive type than in the Madonna with the Cherries of Vienna, or the Madonna with Saints, No. 439 in the Louvre, and the divine Bambino less robust in build and aspect.  The magnificent St. Anthony is quite Giorgionesque in the serenity tinged with sadness of his contemplative mood.

[Illustration:  From a photograph by Brauen-Clement & Cie.  Virgin and Child with Saints.]

Last of all in this particular group—­another work in respect of which Morelli has played the rescuer—­is the Madonna and Child with four Saints, No. 168 in the Dresden Gallery, a much-injured but eminently Titianesque work, which may be said to bring this particular series to within a couple of years or so of the Assunta—­that great landmark of the first period of maturity.  The type of the Madonna here is still very similar to that in the Madonna with the Cherries.