ian columns, twisted and wreathed with vines, the overloaded
arches and elaborate entablatures are now often sadly out of place in
some old interior, and make one grieve the more over the loss of the
simpler or more appropriate reredos which came before them.

Dom Jorge d'Almeida held the see of Coimbra and the countship of
Arganil--for the bishops are always counts of

[Illustration: FIG. 73.

COIMBRA.

STA. CRUZ.

REREDOS IN CLOISTER.]

[Illustration: FIG. 74.

COIMBRA.

STALLS, STA. CRUZ.]

Arganil--from 1481 till 1543, when he died at the age of eighty-five;
during these sixty-two years he did much to beautify his church, and of
these additions the oldest is the reredos put up in 1508. This we learn
from a 'quitaca' or discharge granted in that year to 'Mestre Vlimer
framengo, ora estante nesta cidada, e seu Parceiro Joao Dipri,' that is,
to 'Master Vlimer a Fleming, now in this city, and to his partner John
of Ypres.'

The reredos stands well back in the central apse; it is divided into
five upright parts, of which that in the centre is twice as wide as any
of the others, while the outermost with the strips of panelling and
carving which come beyond them are canted, following the line of the
apse wall. Across these five upright divisions and in a straight line is
thrown a great flattened trefoil arch joined to the back with Gothic
vaulting. In the middle over the large division it is fringed with the
intersecting circles of curved branches, while from the top to the
blue-painted apse vault with its gilded ribs and stars a forest of
pinnacles, arches, twisting and intertwining branches and leaves rises
high above the bishop's arms and mitre and the two angels who uphold
them.

Below the arch the five parts are separated by pinnacle rising above
pinnacle. At the bottom under long canopies of extraordinary elaboration
are scenes in high relief. Above them in the middle the apostles watch
the Assumption of the Virgin; saints stand in the other divisions, one
in each, and over their heads are immense canopies rising across a
richly cusped background right up to the vaulting of the arch. Though
not so high, the canopy over the Virgin is far more intricate as it
forms a great curve made up of seven little cusped arches with
innumerable pinnacles and spires. (Fig. 75.)

Being the work of Flemings, the reredos is naturally full of that
exuberant Flemish detail which may be seen in a Belgian town-hall or in