The little saint stands by in an attitude of prayer, and all about are comely courtiers of the king.

In the distance are delightful palaces in the Carpaccio style of architecture, cool marble spaces, and crowded windows and stairs.

The steps of the raised temple in which the saint and the basilisk perform have a beautiful intarsia of foliage similar to that on the Giants' Staircase at the Doges' Palace.
So much for the ingredients of this bewitching picture; but as to what it is all about I have no knowledge, for I have looked in vain among books for any information.

I find a S.Tryphonius, but only as a grown man; not a word of his tender years and his grotesque attendant.

How amusing it would be to forget the halo and set the picture as a theme among a class of fanciful fantastic writers, to fit it with an appropriate fairy story! For of course it is as absolute a fairy tale illustration as the dragon pictures on the other wall.
It is now well to ask the way to S.Francesco della Vigna, where we shall find S.Jerome and his lion again.