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In Venice. 409 He was employed by the Senate to complete the work, left unfinished by Giovanni Bellini, in the Sala del gran Consiglio, Venice : this he did to the great approval of the authorities, and was rewarded with the office of La Sanseria — i. e. that of painter-in-chief to the Doges of Venice. In 1532 he went to Bologna at the invitation of Charles V., but did not (as has been commonly asserted) accompany that monarch to Spain. He was much patron- ized by the Duke Federigo Gonzaga, by Paul III. at Rome, and by other persons of note. The great Venetian colourist lived to the age of ninety- nine, and was in the full possession of all his faculties, when he was carried off by the plague, in 1576. He was buried in the church of S. Maria de' Frari, Venice. Titian's works combine the distinctive excellences of Giorgione and Correggio, with a lofty original character of their own. In colouring Titian stands pre-eminent; his rendering of flesh-tints has never been surpassed, and in his landscapes and groups his treatment of local colouring and chiaroscuro has seldom been equalled. He is con- sidered the finest portrait painter of any age ; his figures live on canvas ; they are real beings, whom we seem to know as we look into their calm and dignified faces, and they are as perfectly finished as the best works of the Dutch School. Aiming only at truth, Titian excelled all the other Italian painters in realistic imitation of nature ; and, although this very faithfulness precluded the develop- ment of ideal beauty, his works are all characterized by a calm nobility of figure and expression; his creations are as full of serene and conscious enjoyment of existence as those of Giorgione are of stern and active energy ; and in his long life of ninety-nine years he produced a series of