a clasp, and falling down in ample
folds over the feet. Behind, as high as the head, is a hanging of green
tapestry which is ornamented with a golden pelican--a symbol of the
Redeemer. Behind the head the ground is gold, and on it in a semicircle
are three inscriptions describing the Trinity as almighty, all-good, and
all-bountiful. The figures of S. John and of the Virgin display equal
majesty; both are reading holy books, as they turn towards the centre
figure. The countenance of S. John expresses ascetic seriousness, but in
that of the Virgin we find a serene grace and a purity of form which
approach very nearly to the happier effects of Italian art.

The arrangement of the lower central picture, the worship of the Lamb,
is strictly symmetrical, as the mystic nature of the allegorical subject
might seem to

[Illustration: PLATE XXI.--JAN VAN EYCK

JAN ARNOLFINI AND HIS WIFE

_National Gallery, London_]

have demanded; but there is such beauty in the landscape, in the pure
atmosphere, in the bright green of the grass, in the masses of trees and
flowers--even in single figures which stand out from the four principal
groups--that we no longer perceive either hardness or severity in this
symmetry.

The landscape of this composition and that part of it containing the
patriarchs and prophets are generally supposed to have been completed by
JAN VAN EYCK (_c._ 1385-1441), whose name till within a comparatively
recent period had almost obscured that of Hubert. For although there is
little doubt that the elder brother was the first to develop the new
method of painting, yet the fame of it did not extend beyond Belgium and
across the Alps until after the death of Hubert, when the celebrity it
so speedily acquired throughout Europe was transferred to Jan Van Eyck.
Within fifteen years after his death, 1455, Jan was commemorated in
Italy as the greatest painter of the century, while the name of Hubert
was not even mentioned. It was Jan van Eyck to whom Antonello da Messina
is said by Vasari to have resorted in Bruges in order to learn the new
style of painting; he alone also is mentioned in Vasari's first edition
of 1550, Hubert not until the second edition in 1568, and then only
incidentally.

Fortunately there are in existence various authentic pictures by Jan Van
Eyck in which his original powers are more easily recognised than in the
part he took in the execution of the great altar-piece at Ghent, in
which he doubtle