neither murmuring nor resisting!
And while he stood admiring, Messer Gesu had ascended sufficiently
high, and turning on the ladder opened His kingly arms, and extended
His hands to those who were waiting to nail them."[46]

[Illustration: THE VIRGIN ENTHRONED AMIDST SAINTS.]

Lastly in the room which Cosimo de' Medici had prepared for his own
use in the convent and where he often talked with the Prior Fra
Antonino, Fra Angelico painted an "Adoration of the Magi." As Pope
Eugene IV. slept in this room when he came to Florence in 1442 to
assist at the consecration of the church, it is probable that this
Adoration allusive to the Epiphany, at which time the consecration
took place, was painted at that epoch.

The fresco, rich in figures and beauty, is executed with real
mastery. The personages of the royal cortege vary in type and
character, in expression and sentiment, showing the great pains our
artist had taken in the painting of this important work, which now,
unhappily restored and injured, only allows us to guess at the
wonderful beauty with which it was once filled.

We see his own hand more completely in the fresco in the corridor
representing the Virgin enthroned, with the child seated on her knee
and several saints at the sides. On the right are St. Paul, St. Thomas
Aquinas, St. Laurence, and St. Peter Martyr; on the left St. Mark, St.
Cosmo and St. Damian, and St. Dominic, holding an open book where it
is written: _Caritatem habete; humilitatem servate; paupertatem
voluntariam possidete. Maledictionem Dei et meam imprecor possessiones
inducenti in meo Ordine_.

This painting, one of the most perfect in the convent, is one of
Angelico's best, and shows what a high degree of ability he had
reached. The gentle head of the Virgin bends down to look at her Son
with the golden curls, whose face with sparkling eyes breathes an
infantile grace. The execution is accurate, the figures well designed,
full of character, nobility and life; the delicacy of tone, just
balance of composition and freshness of colouring, are mingled with
the most profound sentiment and intimate knowledge of truth.

Rio thinks this fresco was done while Fra Angelico was in Tuscany
after 1450; his adieu, as it were, to his brethren; a last legacy to
that devout household with whom he had shared joys and sorrows, and
from which he was about to be separated. There is nothing to refute
this; but it appears to us that he who had painted the gre