These considerations have convinced me that the designer
of the chapels at Saas is none other than Tabachetti himself, who,
as has been now conclusively shown, was a native of Dinant, in
Belgium.
The Saas chronicler, indeed, avers that the chapels were not built
till 1709--a statement apparently corroborated by a date now visible
on one chapel; but we must remember that the chronicler did not
write until a century or so later than 1709, and though indeed, his
statement may have been taken from the lost earlier manuscript of
1738, we know nothing about this either one way or the other. The
writer may have gone by the still existing 1709 on the Ascension
chapel, whereas this date may in fact have referred to a
restoration, and not to an original construction. There is nothing,
as I have said, in the choice of the chapel on which the date
appears, to suggest that it was intended to govern the others. I
have explained that the work is isolated and exotic. It is by one
in whom Flemish and Italian influences are alike equally
predominant; by one who was saturated with Tabachetti's Varallo
work, and who can improve upon it, but over whom the other Varallo
sculptors have no power.
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