clearly
revealed than the technique that gives so much enduring delight to
artists the world over.

In the final decade of the painter's life Philip seems to have given
him no more than two sittings. Perhaps the artist's "Mars" and his
"Venus with the Mirror" gave offence in Madrid, where the nude was only
accepted if it was painted by some artist who had won his fame outside
the Iberian Peninsula. The whole trend of life in the court of Mariana
of Austria was opposed to the presentation of the nude in art. The two
late pictures of Philip, of which the one is in the Prado and the
second in our National Gallery, are quite the most finished of all his
studies of his royal master. The face, free from even a suggestion of
human interest or enthusiasm, has no emotion whatsoever save
disillusionment and sadness. The spectator gets a suggestion that life
has resolved itself into a long series of formal duties and formal
enjoyments, and that neither suffices to make it worth living. Duty to
the world at large and to the vast empire slipping from his grasp seems
to be all that holds Philip; and when we consider that he had lost his
first wife and her promising son, and of his children by his second
wife one or two were dead already; that dissipation and anxiety had
sapped his energies, and superstition had crabbed his intelligence; it
is not strange that the face should be as it is.

In 1658 Philip conferred upon Velazquez the knighthood of Santiago, and
money was deposited on his behalf by a friend who understood the
painter's financial straits to pay for the inquiries relating to his
genealogy. In spite of the king's wishes, the Council appointed to
inquire into the antecedents of the painter refused to admit him,
though Velazquez supplied many proofs that his blood was pure and his
origin honourable. At last, Philip applied to the Pope Alexander VII.
for a dispensation in the artist's favour, realising that the Vatican
was a Court whose jurisdiction was unlimited in its scope. The Pope
was complaisant: he could hardly be otherwise to Philip IV.; he sent a
brief that enabled Velazquez, after long delays, to obtain the much
coveted order. The story that Philip bestowed it upon Velazquez as a
reward for the picture "Las Meninas" is one of the pretty fables that
must be disregarded, and it seems likely that Philip only exerted
himself on his painter's behalf because he wished him to superintend
the arrangements for th