rollary, "but cakes are very nice." She is not to have any cakes, just
now, but as soon as she has done thanking the lady for her beautiful
nosegay, she is to have a couple of nice new-laid eggs, that are being
brought her by another lady. Valsesian women immediately after their
confinement always have eggs beaten up with wine and sugar, and one can
tell a Valsesian Birth of the Virgin from a Venetian or a Florentine by
the presence of the eggs. I learned this from an eminent Valsesian
professor of medicine, who told me that, though not according to received
rules, the eggs never seemed to do any harm. Here they are evidently to
be beaten up, for there is neither spoon nor egg-cup, and we cannot
suppose that they were hard-boiled. On the other hand, in the Middle
Ages Italians never used egg-cups and spoons for boiled eggs. The
mediaeval boiled egg was always eaten by dipping bread into the yolk.

Behind the lady who is bringing in the eggs is the under-under-nurse who
is at the fire warming a towel. In the foreground we have the regulation
midwife holding the regulation baby (who, by the way, was an
astonishingly fine child for only five minutes old). Then comes the
under-nurse--a good buxom creature, who, as usual, is feeling the water
in the bath to see that it is of the right temperature. Next to her is
the head-nurse, who is arranging the cradle. Behind the head-nurse is
the under-under-nurse's drudge, who is just going out upon some errands.
Lastly--for by this time we have got all round the chapel--we arrive at
the Virgin's grandmother's-body-guard, a stately, responsible-looking
lady, standing in waiting upon her mistress. I put it to the reader--is
it conceivable that St. Joachim should have been allowed in such a room
at such a time, or that he should have had the courage to avail himself
of the permission, even though it had been extended to him? At any rate,
is it conceivable that he should have been allowed to sit on St. Anne's
right hand, laying down the law with a "Marry, come up here," and a
"Marry, go-down there," and a couple of such unabashed collars as the old
lady has put on for the occasion?

Moreover (for I may as well demolish this mischievous confusion between
St. Joachim and his mother-in-law once and for all), the merest tyro in
hagiology knows that St. Joachim was not at home when the Virgin was
born. He had been hustled out of the temple for having no children, and
had fled deso