on among the burghers
of Nuremberg. The religious excitement then prevailing throughout
Europe, on the eve of the Reformation, increased the demand for his
engravings of the Virgin, the saints, and the great Passion series.

In 1508 Duerer finished the painting of "The Martyrdom of the Ten
Thousand Christians," to which he professed to have given all his time
for a year. It was ordered by Frederick of Saxony, the patron of Lucas
Cranach, who had seen the master's woodcut of the same subject, and
desired it reproduced in an oil-painting. It is a painful and
unpleasant scene, full of brutality and horror; and the picture is
devoid of unity, though conspicuous for clear and brilliant coloring.
Duerer and Pirkheimer stand in the middle of the foreground.

On the completion of this work the master wrote to Heller, "No one
shall persuade me to work according to what I am paid." He then began
Heller's altar-piece, under unnecessary exhortation "to paint his
picture well," and made a great number of careful studies for the new
composition. When fairly under way, he demanded 200 florins for his
work instead of the 130 florins of the contract-price, which drew an
angry answer from the frugal merchant, with accusations of dishonesty.
The artist rejoined sharply, dwelling upon the great cost of the
colors and the length of the task, yet offering to carry out his
contract in order to save his good faith. Throughout the next year
Heller stimulated the painter to hasten his work, until Duerer became
angry, and threw up the commission. He was soon induced to resume it,
and completed the picture in the summer of 1509, upon which the
delighted merchant paid him gladly, and sent handsome presents to his
wife and brother. Duerer wrote to Heller, "It will last fresh and clean
for five hundred years, for it is not done as ordinary paintings
are.... But no one shall ever again persuade me to undertake a
painting with so much work in it. Herr Jorg Tauss offered himself to
pay me 400 florins for a Virgin in a landscape, but I declined
positively, for I should become a beggar by this means. Henceforward I
will stick to my engraving; and, if I had done so before, I should be
richer by a thousand florins than I am to-day."

The picture which caused so much argument and toil was "The Coronation
of the Virgin," which was set up over the bronze monument of the
Heller family in the Dominican Church at Frankfort. Its exquisite
delicacy of execution