Intarsia and Inlaid Wood-work.
instance of a more elaborate method. These splendid panels, which go all round the choir, contain each a three-quarter-length figure of a saint. Lanzi deservedly praises them as the largest and most perfect figures of tarsia which he had seen. They date from 1486, and were executed by an Istrian artist, Bartolommeo da Pola, perhaps from the designs of Borgognone. The method by which their highly pictorial effect is produced is a mixed one, the shading being partly inlaid with woods of different colours, and partly obtained by scorching the wood with fire or hot sand in the manner generally in use for marqueterie at the present day. The inexhaustible patience as well as the fertility of resource displayed by Messer Bartolommeo is astonishing. Where the saw-cut did not give him a strong enough line he has inlaid a firm line of black wood, the high
