Knights of the Art | Page 8

and the round O of Giotto has become a proverb to this day in Tuscany.
`Round as the O of Giotto, d' ye see; Which means as well done as a thing can be.'
Later on, when Giotto was at Naples, he was painting in the palace chapel one very hot day, when the king came in to watch him at his work. It really was almost too hot to move, and yet Giotto painted away busily.
`Giotto,' said the king, `if I were in thy place I would give up painting for a while and take my rest, now that it is so hot.'
`And, indeed, so I would most certainly do,' answered Giotto, `if I were in your place, your Majesty.'
It was these quick answers and his merry smile that charmed every one, and made the painter a favourite with rich and poor alike.
There are a great many stories told of him, and they all show what a sunny-tempered, kindly man he was.
It is said that one day he was standing in one of the narrow streets of Florence talking very earnestly to a friend, when a pig came running down the road in a great hurry. It did not stop to look where it was going, but ran right between the painter's legs and knocked him flat on his back, putting an end to his learned talk.
Giotto scrambled to his feet with a rueful smile, and shook his finger at the pig which was fast disappearing in the distance.
`Ah, well!' he said, `I suppose thou hadst as much right to the road as I had. Besides, how many gold pieces I have earned by the help of thy bristles, and never have I given any of thy family even a drop of soup in payment.'
Another time he went riding with a very learned lawyer into the country to look after his property. For when Bondone died, he left all his fields and his farm to his painter son. Very soon a storm came on, and the rain poured down as if it never meant to stop.
`Let us seek shelter in this farmhouse and borrow a cloak,' suggested Giotto.
So they went in and borrowed two old cloaks from the farmer, and wrapped themselves up from head to foot. Then they mounted their horses and rode back together to Florence.
Presently the lawyer turned to look at Giotto, and immediately burst into a loud laugh. The rain was running from the painter's cap, he was splashed with mud, and the old cloak made him look like a very forlorn beggar.
`Dost think if any one met thee now, they would believe that thou art the best painter in the world?' laughed the lawyer.
Giotto's eyes twinkled as he looked at the funny figure riding beside him, for the lawyer was very small, and had a crooked back, and rolled up in the old cloak he looked like a bundle of rags.
`Yes!' he answered quickly, `any one would certainly believe I was a great painter, if he could but first persuade himself that thou dost know thy A B C.'
In all these stories we catch glimpses of the good- natured kindly painter, with his love of jokes, and his own ready answers, and all the time we must remember that he was filling the world with beauty, which it still treasures to-day, helping to sow the seeds of that great tree of Art which was to blossom so gloriously in later years.
And when he had finished his earthly work it was in his own cathedral, `St. Mary of the Flowers,' that they laid him to rest, while the people mourned him as a good friend as well as a great painter. There he lies in the shadow of his lily tower, whose slender grace and delicate-tinted marbles keep his memory ever fresh in his beautiful city of Florence.
FRA ANGELICO
Nearly a hundred years had passed by since Giotto lived and worked in Florence, and in the same hilly country where he used to tend his sheep another great painter was born.
Many other artists had come and gone, and had added their golden links of beauty to the chain of Art which bound these years together. Some day you will learn to know all their names and what they did. But now we will only single out, here and there, a few of those names which are perhaps greater than the rest. Just as on a clear night, when we look up into the starlit sky, it would bewilder us to try and remember all the stars, so we learn first to know those that are most easily recognised--the Plough, or the Great Bear, as they shine with a clear steady light against the background of a thousand lesser stars.
The name by which this second great painter is known