s painting, and fell into great poverty. In 1581 the king saw
Morales at Badajoz, in a very different dress from that he had worn at
court. The king said: "Morales, you are very old." "Yes, sire, and very
poor," replied the painter. The king then commanded that he should have
two hundred ducats a year from the crown rents with which to buy his
dinners. Morales hearing this, exclaimed, "And for supper, sire?" This
pleased Philip, and he added one hundred ducats to the pension. The street
in Badajoz on which Morales lived bears his name.

Nearly all his pictures were of religious subjects, and on this account he
was called "the divine." He avoided ghastly, painful pictures, and was one
of the most spiritual of the artists of Spain. Very few of his pictures
are seen out of Spain, and they are rare even there. His masterpiece is
"Christ Crowned with Thorns," in the Queen of Spain's Gallery at Madrid.
In the Louvre is his "Christ Bearing the Cross." At the sale of the Soult
collection his "Way to Calvary" sold for nine hundred and eighty pounds
sterling.

ALONSO SANCHEZ COELLO (about 1515-1590) was the first great portrait
painter of Spain. He was painter-in-ordinary to Philip II., and that
monarch was so fond of him that in his letters he called him "my beloved
son." At Madrid the king had a key to a private entrance to the apartments
of Coello, so that he could surprise the painter in his studio, and at
times even entered the family rooms of the artist. Coello never abused the
confidence of Philip, and was a favorite of the court as well as of the
monarch. Among his friends were the Popes Gregory XIII. and Sixtus V., the
Cardinal Alexander Farnese, and the Dukes of Florence and Savoy. Many
noble and even royal persons were accustomed to visit him and accept his
hospitality. He was obliged to live in style becoming his position, and
yet when he died he left a fortune of fifty-five thousand ducats. He had
lived in Lisbon, and Philip sometimes called him his "Portuguese Titian."

Very few of his portraits remain; they are graceful in pose and fine in
color. He knew how to represent the repose and refinement of "gentle blood
and delicate nurture." Many of his works were burned in the Prado. His
"Marriage of St. Catherine" is in the Gallery of Madrid. A "St. Sebastian"
painted for the Church of St. Jerome, at Madrid, is considered his
masterpiece. Lope de Vega wrote Coello's epitaph, and called his pictures

"Eternal sc