ightily stirs the aesthetic pulse. The
Prado has two dozen specimens, though two of them at least--a poor
replica of the Orgaz burial, and another--are known to be by El
Greco's son, Jorge Manuel Theotocopuli; of the numerous portraits and
other pictures dispersed by time and chance to the four quarters of
the globe, we have written earlier in this volume, when dealing with
the definitive work on this Greek by Senor Manuel B. Cossio. El Greco,
through sheer intensity of temperament and fierce sincerity, could
pluck out from men who had become, because of their apathy and
grotesque pride, mere vegetable growths, their very souls afire; or if
stained by crimes, these souls, he shot them up to God like green
meteors. To be sure they have eyes drunk with dreams, the pointed
skull of the mystic, and betray a plentiful lack of chin and often an
atrabilious nature. When old his saints resemble him, when young he
must have looked like his saints, Sebastian and Martin. With his
ardent faith he could have confuted the Gnostic or the Manichean
heresies in colourful allegory, but instead he sang fervid hosannahs
on his canvases to the greater glory of Christ and His saints. Perhaps
if he had lived in our times he might have painted heads of
fashionable courtesans or equivocal statesmen. But whether primitive
or modern, realist or symbolist, he would always have been a painter
of dramatic genius. He is the unicorn among artists.

VELASQUEZ IN THE PRADO

Fearful that your eye has lost its innocence after hearing so much of
the picture, you enter the tiny room at the museum on the Prado in
which is hung Las Meninas--The Maids of Honour, painted by Velasquez
in 1656. My experience was a typical one. I went hastily through the
larger Velasquez gallery in not only a challenging but an irritable
mood. The holy of holies I was enraged to find, seemingly, crowded.
There was the picture, but a big easel stood in the foreground
blotting out the left side; some selfish artist copying, some fellow
thrusting himself between us and the floating illusion of art. In
despair I looked into the mirror that reflects the picture. I
suspected trickery. Surely that little princess with her wilful,
_distrait_ expression, surely the kneeling maid, the dwarfs, the
sprawling dog, the painter Velasquez--with his wig--the heads of the
king and queen in the oblong mirror, the figure of Senor Nieto in the
doorway, the light framing his silhouette--sur