Note 120 — BOOK I. (continued 2)

Forty of these I find cited, and I am informed of some others not yet edited. The Ab. Zani (p. 142) assures us "that the genuine impressions which are now acknowledged to be from the hand of Mantegna, do not amount to twenty; and nearly all of them are executed with few figures." Such an assertion appears no less singular to me than to others on whose judgment I could rely, whom I have consulted. How can we admit its accuracy, when confronted with the account of Mantegna's fellow citizen and contemporary Scardeone, who collected his works, and who expressly declares, as cited by the Ab. Zani, "that Mantegna engraved Roman triumphs, Bacchanalian festivals, and marine deities: also the descent of Christ from the cross, and the burial," engravings exhibiting a variety of figures, and in number more than a dozen. After this enumeration the historian adds, "et alia permulta," and many others. To confute this excellent testimony, the Ab. Zani refers only to the words of the same Scardeone, who thus continues: "Those plates are possessed by few, and held in the highest esteem; nine of them, however, belong to me, all of them different." This writer therefore, in spite of his expression "et alia permulta," confesses that he had only nine specimens from the hand of his fellow citizen. Yes, I reply, he confesses his scanty portion, but admits the superior number that exists in various cabinets, and what reason have we for believing the first assertion and not the second? For my part, I give credit to the historian; and if any one doubt, from a diversity of style between the plates, that there is any exaggeration in his statement, I should not hence conclude that they are from different hands, but executed by the same hand, the works of the artist's early life being inferior to his last. For what artist ever devoted himself to a new branch, and did not contrive to cultivate and improve it? It is sufficient that the taste be not wholly opposite.