micircle, are three inscriptions, which again describe
the Trinity, as all-mighty, all-good, and all-bountiful. The two other
figures of this picture display equal majesty; both are reading holy
books and are turned towards the centre figure. The countenance of John
expresses ascetic seriousness, but in the Virgin's we find a serene
grace, and a purity of form, which approach very nearly to the happier
efforts of Italian art.

On the wing next to the Virgin stand eight angels singing before a
music-desk. They are represented as choristers in splendid vestments and
crowns. The brilliancy of the stuffs and precious stones is given with
the hand of a master, the music-desk is richly ornamented with Gothic
carved work and figures, and the countenances are full of expression and
life; but in the effort to imitate nature with the utmost truth, so as
even to enable us to distinguish with certainty the different voices of
the double quartet, the spirit of a holier influence has already passed
away. On the opposite wing, St. Cecilia sits at an organ, the keys of
which she touches with an expression of deep meditation: other angels
stand behind the organ with different stringed instruments. The
expression of these heads shows far more feeling, and is more gentle;
the execution of the stuffs and accessories is equally masterly. The two
extreme wings of the upper series, the subjects of which are Adam and
Eve, are now in the Museum at Brussels. The attempt to paint the nude
figure of the size of life, with the most careful attention to minute
detail, is eminently successful, with the exception of a certain degree
of hardness in the drawing. Eve holds in her right hand the forbidden
fruit. In the filling up, which the shape of the altar-piece made
necessary over these panels, there are small subjects in chiaroscuro:
over Adam, the sacrifice of Cain and Abel; over Eve, the death of
Abel--death, therefore, as the immediate consequence of original sin.

The arrangement of the lower middle picture, the worship of the Lamb, is
strictly symmetrical, as the mystic nature of the allegorical subject
demanded, but there is such beauty in the landscape, in the pure
atmosphere, in the bright green of the grass, in the masses of trees and
flowers, even in the single figures which stand out from the four great
groups, that we no longer perceive either hardness or severity in this
symmetry. The wing picture on the right, representing the holy pilg