It is really two pictures, the Holy Family being on an upper floor, or rather shelf, of the manger and making the prettiest of groups, while below, among the animals, are the shepherds, real peasants, looking up in worship and rapture.

This is one of the most attractive of the series, not only as a painting but as a Biblical illustration.
In the corresponding corner at the other end of this wall is another of the many "Last Suppers" which Tintoretto devised.

It does not compare in brilliance with that in S.Giorgio Maggiore, but it must greatly have interested the painter as a composition, and nothing could be more unlike the formality of the Leonardo da Vinci convention, with the table set square to the spectators, than this curious disordered scramble in which several of the disciples have no chairs at all.

The attitudes are, however, convincing, Christ is a gracious figure, and the whole scene is very memorable and real.
The Tintorettos on the walls of the upper hall I find less interesting than those on the ceiling, which, however, present the usual physical difficulties to the student.

How Ruskin with his petulant impatience brought himself to analyse so minutely works the examination of which leads to such bodily discomfort, I cannot imagine.