Marco.

Taking for granted that, because Angelico could paint such beautiful pictures he could do everything else equally well, he asked him to become the Archbishop of Florence, one of the most important church offices within the gift of the Pope. How we admire the good brother when he responded, with the simplicity which was so marked a characteristic of him, "I can paint pictures but I cannot rule men." And further, how we delight in him as he recommends another brother of his order, Fra Antonio. That his judgement in this matter was equal to his generosity is proved by the fact that Antonio became the wisest archbishop Florence had ever had.

The successor of Pope Eugenius, Nicholas V., also extended his friendship and protection to the painter. Here in Rome he lived for the last ten years of his life. His work here was largely confined to the chapel of Nicholas V., in the Vatican, which he decorated with scenes from the lives of St. Lawrence and St. Stephen. For years this chapel was closed to the public and the key lost, so that when it was re-opened it seemed as if a new set of works belonging to Fra Angelico had been discovered.

FLIGHT INTO EGYPT

When the heat of summer came on in Rome, the painter from the hills of the Arno wilted under the depressing influence and he longed for his native heights. An opportunity for release from the stagnant weather of Rome during the months of June, July and August came from an unexpected quarter. It was the time of the building of the great Italian cathedrals. Every large community seemed bent on excelling its neighbor in the splendor of the church it erected. Florence reared her Duomo, the Santa Maria del Fiore, Siena built her fine cathedral, striped black and yellow like a tiger.

Orvieto, near by, had witnessed a wonderful miracle, and in remembrance of it her citizens determined to build a cathedral that should be more beautiful than any other in Italy. So much in earnest were the people of Orvieto in undertaking this work, that they gave their holidays to drawing materials for it from the hills near by. In eight years, an incredibly short time in the building of a mediaeval cathedral, it was sufficiently finished for holding religious services. It was three hundred years, however, before the people had made it the wrought jewel that it stands to-day.

In the delicacy and elaborateness of its ornament it is the most splendid church in Italy. A hundred and fifty skilled sculptors worked their best on the carving. Nearly a hundred workers in mosaic put together cunningly the bits of glass and precious stones which make its rich and vari-colored mosaic. Almost as many master painters added their work to the precious structure. The facade is like some grand screen, with its exquisite bas-relief, its glistening and intricate mosaic and its delicate pinnacles, every one crowned with a statue.

Such a beautiful and substantial structure was a fine crown for this ancient town, rising almost like a rock-cube from the barren ravines below. It was to help adorn this wonderful church that the building council urged Fra Angelico to quit Rome each year through the sickly summer. All arrangements were completed and our artist once more breathed the hill air to which he was born.

On one of the walls he planned to represent "The Last Judgment" a subject which he had previously painted. He never proceeded further than to the completion of the figure of the judging Christ. This fragment is the strongest piece of work Angelico ever did. It is probable that the mighty Angelo studied this figure before painting his own "Last Judgment." The critic who compares the two Christs must, it seems to me, ever decide in favor of the one made by the Angelical painter. The combination of strength and compassion in Angelico's is far more to our notions of the gentle Christ, sitting as Judge of all the world. If Angelico had finished the work at Orvieto, it would doubtless have been much like the one we may study to-day in the Academy in Florence. Let us consider that for a moment.

PARADISE. (DETAIL OF LAST JUDGMENT)

It was a strange subject for one with so mild and loving a nature to undertake, but we must remember that it was the favorite theme of the age, so that all sorts of painters tried their hands at it. Here Christ sits enthroned, encircled by angels, while below him, divided by a long line of unopened graves, are the blessed and the condemned. In depicting the former our angel painter was perfectly at home. What a joyous host they are as they tread the flowery meadows and appear in the searching rays of heaven's own light! One group, a monk embraced by an angel, is reproduced in this sketch.

Even if for a time Angelico was able to summon the power by which he could portray an avenging and yet pitying Christ, he lost that power when he tried to image forth the agony of the condemned, the wickedness of Satan. So the picture stands, half in the glory of fine and characteristic execution and half in the darkness of inadequate workmanship.

Just why Angelico never went back to Orvieto we do not know. It is probable that the infirmities of age were pressing upon him. Perhaps, too, he was reserving his surplus strength for a last visit to his beloved Florence. Hither we know he came, in the last years of his life, and painted for the Church of the Annunciation a little cupboard to hold the gold and silver vessels used about the altar. It was a delicate task not wholly unlike the miniature work with which, in his early years, he had adorned the parchments of his monastery.

FACADE OF ORVIETO CATHEDRAL

Thirty-five panels were filled with scenes from the life of our Lord. The series is done in the spirit of a man who knows the Scriptures and medieval legend to a point, and all the time there shines through the painted figures the saintliness, the mystic, far-away thoughts of the artist. It was a beautiful work to give to his home city in the evening of his quiet life.

The work completed, he wended his way back to Rome where he died, in 1455, or, as a contemporary historian says, "Envious death broke his pencil and his beautiful soul winged its way among the angels to make Paradise more joyous." He was buried in the Church of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva where he had lived since his first coming to Rome. His tomb is simple enough, enriched merely with the quaint figure of a Dominican monk, with his hands crossed, and wearing the dress of his order. At the feet of the stone monk is this epitaph, composed by Nicholas V., Angelico's friend and patron—