The Project Gutenberg eBook ofVan Eyck

The Project Gutenberg eBook ofVan EyckThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: Van EyckAuthor: J. Cyril M. WealeRelease date: January 7, 2013 [eBook #41798]Most recently updated: October 23, 2024Language: EnglishCredits: E-text prepared by sp1nd, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (http://archive.org)*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VAN EYCK ***

This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.

Title: Van EyckAuthor: J. Cyril M. WealeRelease date: January 7, 2013 [eBook #41798]Most recently updated: October 23, 2024Language: EnglishCredits: E-text prepared by sp1nd, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (http://archive.org)

Title: Van Eyck

Author: J. Cyril M. Weale

Release date: January 7, 2013 [eBook #41798]Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

Credits: E-text prepared by sp1nd, Charlie Howard, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by Internet Archive (http://archive.org)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VAN EYCK ***

The Project Gutenberg eBook, Van Eyck, by James Cyril M. Weale

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Book Cover

MASTERPIECESIN COLOUREDITED BYT. LEMAN HAREVAN EYCKHubert, 1365 (?)–1426John, 1385 (?)–1441

MASTERPIECESIN COLOUREDITED BYT. LEMAN HARE

VAN EYCKHubert, 1365 (?)–1426John, 1385 (?)–1441

Hubert, 1365 (?)–1426John, 1385 (?)–1441

Hubert, 1365 (?)–1426

John, 1385 (?)–1441

Others in Preparation.

PLATE I.—THE ADORATION OF THE LAMB(By Hubert van Eyck)The centre-piece of the Ghent Polyptych, in the Cathedral of that town. The panel was completed in or before 1426. See page28.

(By Hubert van Eyck)

The centre-piece of the Ghent Polyptych, in the Cathedral of that town. The panel was completed in or before 1426. See page28.

BY J. CYRIL M. WEALEILLUSTRATED WITH EIGHTREPRODUCTIONS IN COLOUR

IN SEMPITERNUM.

LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACKNEW YORK: FREDERICK A. STOKES CO.

TO MY MOTHER

IN TOKEN OF REVERENCE AND LOVE

John.Hubert.

THEadvent of the Van Eycks is the most important landmark in the history of painting in northern Europe. With them we open an entirely new chapter, for although the value of oil in various inferior processes of the art had been ascertained and availed of at an earlier period, it was entirely due to their longand painstaking experiments that its use was perfected as the vehicle of colouring matter in picture-painting. Unfortunately, time and its worst incidentals have obliterated the evidence which would have enabled us to follow the development of this new method, just as they have robbed us of all the earlier work of its original expounders, leaving us at the same time much too inconsiderable remains for a comprehensive survey of the school of which they were the finished product. It is a disconcerting experience to encounter primarily the lifework of two such eminent painters at a stage when they were already in the plenitude of their powers, and an experience that must always tax the ingenuity of the student and critic of their art. Particularly is this the case in respect of the elder brother, for the ascertained facts of Hubert's history are restricted to the last two years of his life (1425-26), while of the masterpieces he bequeathed to posterity only one can be said to be absolutely authenticated, though of others generally ascribed to him several may safely be accepted as genuine. John's career, on the other hand, can be traced back to 1424, but the chronology from that date to his death in 1441 is fairly ample, while he has left us a rich heritage of attested paintings to exemplify the varying aspects of his remarkable genius.

PLATE II.—CHOIR OF ANGELS(By Hubert van Eyck)The first dexter lateral panel in the upper zone of the interior of the Great Polyptych: now in the Royal Gallery, Berlin. Painted in or before 1426. See page31.

(By Hubert van Eyck)

The first dexter lateral panel in the upper zone of the interior of the Great Polyptych: now in the Royal Gallery, Berlin. Painted in or before 1426. See page31.

It was in the nature of things that the monastic institutions, which in the early Middle Ages were exclusively the nurseries of learning and of the arts and crafts, should have infected these with the mystic spirit induced by the more or less contemplative life its inmates led. More especially must this have been so when we consider that their labours were wholly in the service of religion. As time went on, and monasticism progressed from the pursuit to the dissemination of knowledge, the pupils developed under its influence were naturally imbued with the same spirit, and so a tradition grew up and spread which held undisputed sway for a considerable period in the various centres where artists congregated and formed schools. In the earlier Rhenish school of Cöln this was the dominant note of its art, which it cherished andsustained in all its purity and simplicity to a later period than any of its offshoots and rivals; for as its teaching extended, more particularly northwards, we are conscious of a weakening of its traditions, of a gradual evolution from the spiritual idealism of its mystic brotherhood to the more humanistic realism that is the distinctive feature of Netherlandish art, from the utter sinking of personality to the frank assertion of individuality. Nor does this divergence necessarily bespeak a weakening of religious vitality: rather is it to be ascribed to a marked difference of temperament and race characteristics. Neither could this change have been as abrupt as might appear from the scant remains of the art of the period. It was a natural growth, the one inherent quality of all such developments, ever tending to the elaboration of a higher type, and eventually producing its finest exemplification in the person of Hubert van Eyck. In his younger brother, on the other hand, who almost belonged to another generation, we soon note a more striking falling away from the earlier ideals, and in the event analmost total emancipation from the canons of the mystic school, the explanation of which is probably to be sought in an equally marked difference of character and temperament in the two brothers: the one more poetic and imaginative, the other more objective and materialistic; the one drawing his inspiration from a humble and devout cultivation of art by the light of the sanctuary, the other from a devotion to art for art's sole sake, involving all the difference that divides the expression of beauty of thought and mere beauty of form, the spiritual and the intellectual: each nevertheless supreme in his own sphere, and wielding an influence and authority destined to leave their impress on all the after-work of the school.

The small rural town of Maaseyck, on the left bank of the Maas, in the old duchy of Limburg, was the home of the Van Eycksand the birthplace of the elect of their stock, Hubert's coming being traditionally associated with the year 1365, John's with 1385. In the absence of documentary evidence to the contrary, these data are acceptable as founded on reasonable conjecture. There is no record of their parentage, but we know of a third brother, named Lambert, and of a kinsman, one Henry van Eyck, whose exact relationship has not been established. As the early instinct of genius revealed the true bent of the elder lad's disposition, the outstanding advantages of a distinguished school of painting within hail almost of their doors naturally appealed to parents anxious to give effect to their son's aspirations; so to Maastricht they turned, where the boy was duly apprenticed to one or other of its recognised masters. Having served his articles and in due course been admitted to the rank of journeyman, the youthful artist, now free to qualify for his mastership, entered upon the most interesting period of his education, a period largely spent, according to the custom of the time, in foreigntravel; and it is with this stage of Hubert's career that criticism first finds legitimate occupation.

Futile as would be the attempt to trace a definite itinerary, it is allowable to conjecture that the mother school of Cöln would mark the first stage in the young artist's travels: in the centre-piece of the great polyptych we discover in the background architectural work distinctly reminiscent of that city, and detail unmistakably Rhenish in character, testifying to a close acquaintance with the district. Evidence of similar import, such as the cathedral in the Louvre picture and the city view with a faithful presentation of Old Saint Paul's as seen from the south in that of Baron Gustave Rothschild's collection, on the confident assumption that these are from the brush of Hubert, bespeak visits to France and England; while the landscape work in all his paintings betrays so intimate an acquaintance with central and southern European scenery as almost to compel us into the beaten tracks of the wandering artist-student of the time through Switzerlandand the south of France, to sunny Italy and erubescent Spain. The variety of his mountain scenery—undulating hills and snow-capped peaks, rugged crags and Alpine heights; the depth of his liquid skies and spacious firmaments, with their marvellous cloud and light effects, melodies in colour that breathe the warmth of a southern sun; and the extent of his botanical lore, embracing the olive and citron, the stone pine and cypress, the date-palm and palmetto, naturalised exotics of the Mediterranean slopes—all these and other particulars too numerous to list bear the hall-mark of knowledge garnered in the observant pursuit of local colouring.

For so much there is ample warrant, and within the limits of such guarded conclusions the critic incurs little danger from the many pitfalls that beset the by-paths of deductive reasoning. But seeing that the most of our knowledge of Hubert's life-work is arrived at by this method of inquiry, it is essential that every inference should at least stand the test of probability. To argue, for example, from the presentation ofa particular palm-tree a pilgrimage to the Holy Land is to offend the laws of proportion; to discern in the picture of the walled city of Jerusalem in "The Three Marys at the Sepulchre" work evidently "from a sketch made on the spot" would appear more justifiable, until one is reminded of the fact that the defences of the Holy City, pulled down in 1239, were not rebuilt until 1542; but surely it is speculation run riot, in the attempt to vindicate a preconceived theory, when the simple, unobtrusive artist is made, "after the adventurous manner of his time," to join a crusade and journey to Palestine, seeing that the last of these gallant enterprises had taken place full seventy years before he ever saw the light of day. Without, however, incurring the reproach of outraging probability, we may apportion the usual four years of Hubert's term of journeymanship between the countries already indicated, his wanderings likely enough terminating with the visit to England before his return to the Low Countries to settle down to his life's work as a master painter, his range of knowledge tremendouslyenlarged, his technique broadened and perfected in the various schools and workshops through which he had passed, his imagination fertilised, his creative powers strengthened, his faculty of utterance and expression developed—in short, fully equipped at all points to startle the world with the first-fruits of his as yet unrealised genius.

So, back to Maaseyck and to Maastricht: to family rejoicings and the generous welcome of old friends, no light matter when ordered on the good old Netherlandish scale. Anxiety there, of course, and much curiosity here, as to how the promise of early talent would be justified by the ripening fruit. Nor could the issue have been long in doubt. The indispensable test triumphantly passed, the customary formalities duly complied with, and Hubert van Eyck took his place among the master painters of his time, soon to claim rank among the élite of them all. Of wife or children not a whisper, but in an age when civism spelt patriotism, and marriage was recognised as one of the prime moral obligations of a loyal citizen, it is inconceivable that a man of his sterling sense of duty should have done other than conform to the established practice. His home and workshop were from the outset probably cheered by the presence of his younger brother John, fired by the born artist's enthusiasm to follow in his senior's footsteps. This Maastricht studio no doubt also witnessed the inception of that long series of experiments, secretly shared in by the two brothers until carried to perfection, which gave to the world the new art of oil-painting, and so laid all the after ages under the deepest obligation to them.

PLATE III.—PORTRAIT OF "TYMOTHEOS"(By John van Eyck)A Presentation Portrait, probably from the Painter to his friend "Timothy," a Greek humanist whose Christian name only is known. The inscription at the foot reads: "Actum anno Domini 1432, 10 die Octobris, a Iohanne de Eyck." No. 290 in the National Gallery, London. See pages63,64.

(By John van Eyck)

A Presentation Portrait, probably from the Painter to his friend "Timothy," a Greek humanist whose Christian name only is known. The inscription at the foot reads: "Actum anno Domini 1432, 10 die Octobris, a Iohanne de Eyck." No. 290 in the National Gallery, London. See pages63,64.

John's apprenticeship ended, and he in turn started on his travels, Hubert would appear to have removed to Holland, where painters and miniaturists of the early years of the fifteenth century repeatedly exhibit marked traces of his influence; where also miniaturesin a Book of Hours, of date 1412 to 1417, to the order of Count William for the use of his only daughter, the fair and ill-starred Jacqueline, are judged to have been executed by him on the strength of the many points of resemblance they bear to the Great Polyptych. The commission of the latter work itself is now confidently attributed to the same prince. Observe the prominence given to the tower of Saint Martin's at Utrecht and the adjacent view of Cöln in the centre-piece, "The Adoration of the Lamb," and to St. Martin himself, the patron saint of Utrecht, in the panel of "The Knights of Christ," the banner in his grasp, moreover, charged with the arms of that town: the Count's territory was in the diocese of Utrecht and the ecclesiastical province of Cöln. So much depends on the origin of this commission in apportioning the respective share each of the brothers had in its execution that the further fact must not be overlooked that Ghent, for which the great work was completed, had no sort of connection with either Utrecht or Cöln, being in the diocese of Tournay andthe ecclesiastical province of Rheims, while the only saint in the altar-piece specially connected with Ghent who is characterised by an emblem—St. Livin, to wit—was also widely venerated in Zeeland. Finally, not to labour this aspect of the question unduly, the inscription on the frame attributes, not the picture's inception, but its completion, to Jodoc Vyt, the eventual donor—a form of words so singular as to admit of no other interpretation than the plain meaning the expression conveys.

Count William passed away on the 31st of May 1417, leaving an only child, Jacqueline, aged seventeen, by his wife, Margaret of Burgundy, who had predeceased him. Her uncle, John of Bavaria, Prince-Bishop of Liège, an unscrupulous ruffian who clearly paid small deference to women's rights, at once set himself to rob the unfortunate princess of her possessions. In September 1418 he marched out on Dordrecht, where he established his headquarters; Gorcum and other strongholds speedily succumbed to his arms, and after an interval, during which he married Elizabeth of Görlitz, Duchess of Luxemburgand widow of Anthony of Burgundy, Duke of Brabant and Limburg, he finally removed to Holland and installed himself at The Hague, free now to pursue his nefarious projects. For thirteen years the country resounded with the clash of arms and laboured in the rough and tumble of civil warfare: hence an atmosphere the least congenial to the cultivation and patronage of high art. The cities of Flanders and Brabant were the gainers by the exodus of craftsmen that presently set in. Of their number, sooner or later, was Hubert, who, prior to 1425 at any rate, had already settled at Ghent and acquired the freedom of that city. News of the unfinished polyptych remaining on his hands soon came to the ears of Jodoc Vyt, a wealthy burgher, who eagerly embraced the opportunity of striking the bargain by which he acquired all rights in the picture and so linked his name and personality for all time with this ineffable monument of the painter's art.

In the centre-piece, "The Adoration of the Lamb" (frontispiece), we discover the keynote to the scheme of the work, in the ApocalypticVision of St. John the source of its inspiration. The Lamb without spot, the blood from its breast pouring into a chalice, is stood on an altar, the white cloth over which bears on its superfrontal the text from the Vulgate, "Behold the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sins of the world," and on its stole-ends the legend, "Jesus, the Way, the Truth, and the Life." Worshipping angels gather around, some bearing instruments of the Passion, others swinging censers, their smoke laden with the prayers of the saints. In the foreground the Fountain of Life, flowing down through the ages along the gentle slope of flower-bejewelled sward, or dispensing its waters in vivifying jets from the gurgoyles beneath the feet and from the vases in the hands of the winged angel above its standard. To the four quarters groups of the elect: on the near right those of the Old Law and among the Gentiles who had lived in expectation of the Redeemer, the balancing group on the left typical of the New Law—prophets, doctors, philosophers, and princes in the former, the Apostles, popes, bishops, abbots, deacons,monks, and clerics among the latter. The corresponding groups back of the altar represent the army of martyrs whose blood is the seed of the Church, and the multitude of virgins. Over all, from the Holy Dove poised high over the altar, dart rays of light, emblematic of the Wisdom which had inspired their lives and of the fire of Love that had heartened their sacrifice. A carpet of flowers fills in all the open space fore of the altar, flowering shrubs and trees that of the mid-distance, while the entire background is an exquisite example of the realistic landscape-work that is an abiding charm of the Netherlandish school. The wonderful harmony of colour appeals at once to the senses; but more arresting, on nearer acquaintance, for its quality and felicity, is the wide range of portraiture that distinguishes the piece. From the two lateral panels in the dexter shutter the Knights of Christ and the Just Judges are pressing forward to the scene of the Vision, from the corresponding ones in the sinister shutter the Holy Hermits and the Holy Pilgrims: the former on spirited horses—an animal for whichthe painter evinces a special affection—the latter on foot. These panels are even more remarkable perhaps than the centre-piece for the diversity and multiplicity of the types portrayed, and for the wealth of landscape relieved by bird life lavished in their embellishment.

The "Adoration of the Lamb" is dominated in the upper zone by a triple panel, the centre framing the Almighty enthroned in majesty, whose is the kingdom, the power, and the glory—a supreme conception of the Eternal Father, unequalled for majestic stillness of face, intellectual power of brow, and depth and placidity of vision; on His right is the Mother of Christ, testifying to the full the lowliness of the handmaiden of the Lord, on His left St. John the Baptist, an earnest type, long of hair and rugged of beard, barefooted, and in a raiment of brown camel's hair girdled about the loins, intensifying the austerity of life ordained for him who was to prepare the way of the Lord and make straight His paths. In the "Choir of Angels" (Plate II.), which is the subject of the first lateral panel in the dexter shutter, wehave one of the choicest gems of the polyptych, and it affords us a measure of the distance the realistic tendencies of the painter had carried him from the traditions of the mystic school. Justified by the warrant of Scripture, he translates these spirit beings into purely human frames, but with a nerve system attuned to material sensations. In these angels there is no suggestion of trance-like ecstasy in contemplation of the Beatific Vision; they are angels materialised whose features reflect the strain of sustained effort and the underlying sense of pain which in man is inseparable from the sensing of intense joy. Evidently the master had fathomed the secrets of the human heart: the sense possibilities of the spirit world were without his ken, so he humanised his angels and evolved types understandable of the people, and at the same time one of the finest angel groups of all art. So inexpressibly realistic are his conceptions that to the poet-biographer Van Mander, at any rate, it was actually possible to discern "the different key in which the voice of each is pitched." But poets are privileged beings. Accompanying the Choir in their song of praise with organ, harp, and viol are the balancing group of angels in the corresponding compartment of the sinister shutter, types that, strangely enough, are in striking contrast to the former, their features moulded in placid contentment. The extreme panels of this zone are occupied by life-size presentations of our First Parents after the Fall, nude figures painted from the life, with absolute fidelity to nature and masterly conception of type: in a demi-lunette over the figure of Adam we see Cain and Abel making their offerings unto the Lord, and in that over Eve the slaying of Abel at the hands of his brother. There is a tradition extant that the altar-piece was originally furnished with a predella painted in distemper, a picture probably of Limbo or of Purgatory, but no trace of this remains.

PLATE IV.—PORTRAIT OF THE PAINTER'S FATHER-IN-LAW(By John van Eyck)The subject of this painting has only within recent months been identified as the father of Margaret van Eyck, with whose portrait, reproduced in Plate VII., it should be compared. The framework bears along the upper border the Painter's simple motto "Als ich can," and at the foot "Iohannes de Eyck me fecit anno 1433, 21 Octobris." No. 222 in the National Gallery, London. See page66.

(By John van Eyck)

The subject of this painting has only within recent months been identified as the father of Margaret van Eyck, with whose portrait, reproduced in Plate VII., it should be compared. The framework bears along the upper border the Painter's simple motto "Als ich can," and at the foot "Iohannes de Eyck me fecit anno 1433, 21 Octobris." No. 222 in the National Gallery, London. See page66.

The closed shutters display, filling in the full width of the middle zone, the scene of the Annunciation. The Ethyrean Sibyl and the Cumaean Sibyl occupy the demi-lunettes above the middle portion of the Virgin's chamber, thelunettes above the lateral divisions showing half-length figures of the Prophets Zacharias and Micheas. Of the four compartments of the lower zone the inner ones contain statues in grisaille of St. John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist, the outer ones figures in the attitude of prayer, eminently life-like, of the donor, Jodoc Vyt, and his wife, Elizabeth Borluut. Jodoc was the second son of Sir Nicholas Vyt, Receiver of Flanders,—a wealthy citizen who owned the lordships of Pamele and Leedberghe, besides several mansions in Ghent, of which city he was burgomaster in 1433-34, after filling various minor municipal offices: by no means a handsome type, though manifestly a capable and kindly burgher, well-set, with a somewhat low forehead, small grey eyes, and a large mouth with broad under-lip; neither do the short-cropped hair and growing baldness or the three warts on upper-lip, nose, and forehead make for attractiveness. In respect of looks his wife is the better favoured, striking the beholder as an indulgent lady, with much of the homely dignity and serenity of the finer type of Flemish matron.

The Great Polyptych had not yet reached completion when, on the 18th of September 1426 Hubert van Eyck passed away after a painful illness. How much of the work remained to be accomplished none can tell with any hope of approach to certainty. A whole volume would not suffice for a critical examination of the mass of contending theories that for the best part of a century has been squandered in the endeavour to allocate to the two brothers their respective shares in the execution of the picture. Remember that it had already been some ten years in the making, and that, although it did not receive its final touches from the brush of John van Eyck until 1432, nearly six years after his brother's death, this period of John's life, as we shall presently discover, was too fully occupied in the service of Duke Philip of Burgundy to have allowed of his spending any considerable proportion of it in the task of completion. Remembering also that John's art had been closely modelled on that of his brother, that none better comprehended his ideals or was more intimately acquainted with the workingout of his conceptions, mindful, moreover, of the deep veneration in which he held his master's genius, we must suppose that he realised the obligation of conscientiously adhering to the art and technique of the picture as he found it, any obtruding originality in violation of which would have amounted almost to sacrilege: all this further enhances the difficulty of differentiating between the work of the two painters. Indeed, if so minded, the reader is probably as well equipped as the writer to solve the puzzle.

PLATE V.—JOHN ARNOLFINI AND JOAN CENANI, HIS WIFE(By John van Eyck)An incomparable example of the Master's varied gifts, and a valuable study of contemporary dress and domestic furniture. Joan Cenani is presumed to have been a younger sister of Margaret van Eyck, with whose portrait, reproduced inPlate VII., it should be compared. The carved frame of the mirror on the far wall enshrines ten small medallions, exquisite miniatures representing the Agony in the Garden, the Betrayal and St. Peter's Assault on Malchus, Christ led before Pilate, the Scourging at the Pillar, the Carrying of the Cross, Calvary, the Deposition, the Entombment, the Descent into Limbo, and the Resurrection. On the wall above the mirror we read the precise statement, "Iohannes de eyck fuit hic 1434." No. 186 in the National Gallery, London. See page67.

(By John van Eyck)

An incomparable example of the Master's varied gifts, and a valuable study of contemporary dress and domestic furniture. Joan Cenani is presumed to have been a younger sister of Margaret van Eyck, with whose portrait, reproduced inPlate VII., it should be compared. The carved frame of the mirror on the far wall enshrines ten small medallions, exquisite miniatures representing the Agony in the Garden, the Betrayal and St. Peter's Assault on Malchus, Christ led before Pilate, the Scourging at the Pillar, the Carrying of the Cross, Calvary, the Deposition, the Entombment, the Descent into Limbo, and the Resurrection. On the wall above the mirror we read the precise statement, "Iohannes de eyck fuit hic 1434." No. 186 in the National Gallery, London. See page67.

Hubert van Eyck was laid to rest in the crypt of the chapel for which he had painted his masterpiece, but in 1533, when chapel and crypt had to make way for a new aisle, his remains were transferred to the churchyard, all except the bone of the right fore-arm, which was suspended in an iron casket in the porch of the Cathedral. The brass plate bearing the well-known epitaph was at the same time placed in the transept, only to become the spoil of the Calvinist Iconoclasts in 1578, when already the casket had somehow or other long since disappeared. But what of the painter's fame, to whose workshop laymen of the highest distinction had felt it a privilege to be admitted, about whose easel journeymen painters had flocked, and whom the leading contemporary artists of the Netherlands had been proud to call master? During his lifetime, and for a considerable period after his death, his was a dominating influence in the Art of the North, and Van Mander has it on record that whenever the polyptych was freely exposed to the public gaze crowds flocked to it from morning till night "like flies and bees in summer round a basket of figs and grapes." But in the stress and turmoil of succeeding generations his memory gradually faded away; his work, uncared for, lost hold on the imagination; even his great masterwork narrowly escaped destruction. Even so it did not escape dismemberment, or profanation at the hands of the "restorer." Saved from the fury of the Iconoclasts in 1566, and subsequently rescued from the Calvinist leaders who contemplated its offer to Queen Elizabeth in acknowledgment of her subsidies, it eventually became the spoil of the French Republicans;but after the battle of Waterloo restitution was effected, and the main portion of the altar-piece, all that remains of it in Ghent, was reinstated in its present position. The Adam and Eve panels, which in 1781 had offended the unsuspected modesty of Joseph II., and in consequence been deferentially removed, were ultimately ceded to the Belgian Government, and now rest in the Royal Gallery at Brussels; while the other six shutter panels, which had been safeguarded through the French occupation, were shamelessly sold to a dealer in 1816 by the Vicar-General and churchwardens—in the absence, it is right to say, of the Bishop—for a paltry 3000 florins, subsequently changing hands for 100,000 francs, and eventually becoming the property of the Prussian Government for four times that amount.

During the five years that followed the death of William IV., Count of Holland and Zeeland,the usurping John of Bavaria had so far succeeded in asserting his power as to be able to permit his interest to wander to the lighter occupations of life, the while the niece he had dispossessed was supplementing the tale of her political woes with all the domestic misery attendant upon a succession of unhappy marriages. Thus in 1422 we find John van Eyck attached to the Count's household as painter and "varlet de chambre," and, as we gather from the prince's household accounts, engaged in the decoration of the palace at The Hague from the 24th of October in that year till the 11th of September 1424. Another member of the household at the time was his kinsman, Henry van Eyck, the record of whose faithful services won him in February 1425 the post of master of the hunt to Jacqueline's second husband, John IV., Duke of Brabant. John of Bavaria died on the 25th of January 1425, and, as might have been expected, civil war immediately broke out. The situation proving uncongenial, the whilom court painter lost no time in taking the road to Flanders, where Philip III.,Duke of Burgundy, was lording it as the most munificent patron of the arts and sciences and of letters. With a keen eye for available talent, this princely despot at once enlisted him in his service. No doubt he had become acquainted with the Van Eycks during his residence at Ghent in the days of his heir-apparentship and before the younger artist's removal to The Hague; probably the portrait of Michelle of France, the Duke's first wife (who died in July 1422), copies of which exist, was painted by John: at any rate we have Philip's own words for the fact that it was personal knowledge of John's skill that determined his appointment on the 19th of May 1425 as painter and "varlet de chambre," with "all the honours, privileges, rights, profits, and emoluments" attaching to the office; moreover, with characteristic prudence, he secured a first lien on his services by awarding him a retaining fee—call it salary or call it pension—equivalent to £5, 11s. 1-1/3d. in contemporary English currency, or anything from ten to twelve times that sum at the present day.

Having made good his position, John's firstmove apparently was in the interest of his kinsman, for whom he secured the position of falconer in the ducal household. As we have no further concern with this member of the Van Eyck family, it may be said that in 1436 he was employed by the Duke on a secret mission of some importance, that on the occasion of his marriage in 1444 to the daughter of the master-falconer Philip made him a present of 100l., and that in 1461 he became baillie of the town and territory of Termonde, continuing in that office, with the additional distinctions of councillor and chamberlain to the Duke, besides a knighthood, until his death in November 1466.

The new court painter was something more than a master of his art: a man evidently of sterling qualities of mind and heart, of wide accomplishments and business capacity—in every waypersona grataat the most brilliant court of the age. Not many months after his appointment he removed to Lille by order and at the expense of the Duke, by whom also was paid the rent of the house he occupied there from 1426 to 1428, from midsummer to midsummer.Of his professional work at this period nothing is known. The chroniclers in the Duke's service did not concern themselves with such minor matters. As De Comines himself boasted, they wrote "not for the amusement of brutes and people of low degree, but for princes and other persons of quality," little bethinking themselves what store the after ages would have set by their gossip had it busied itself with the doings, for example, of court painters. In other respects, however, we are better served, and in the early part of 1426 we find John van Eyck commissioned, after the pious custom of the time, to undertake a pilgrimage in the interest of the ducal health, and in August of the same year despatched on some distant foreign mission. His return was saddened by tidings of the death of his brother Hubert, who had passed away in his absence. Further tokens of the ducal favour in 1427 took the form of presents of 20l.and 100l.respectively.

Duke Philip's matrimonial ventures hitherto had not been crowned with success. Neitherhis first wife, Michelle of France, nor Bonne of Artois, whom he wedded and lost within the ten months (she died in September 1425), had provided him with an heir. Anxious to secure the succession in the direct line, towards the middle of 1427 he despatched ambassadors to the court of Alphonsus V., King of Aragon, to obtain for him the hand of Isabella, eldest daughter of James II., Count of Urgel, and John van Eyck was attached to the mission. Arriving at Barcelona in July, only to find that the earthquakes in Catalonia had driven the Court to escape by sea to Valencia, the embassy followed in the royal track and reached this city early in August, in time for the floral games and bull-fight with which the Jurats honoured the King. The mission led to nothing, not even to a portrait of the princess, who in September 1428 was married to Peter, Duke of Coimbra, third son of John I., King of Portugal; but it is interesting to find Alphonsus V. in later years acquiring paintings by Van Eyck for his collection. The return journey included a short halt at Tournay, where the magistratesvery appropriately paid Van Eyck the compliment of a wine of honour on the 18th of October, St. Luke's Day, the local guild, moreover—Robert Campin, Roger de la Pasture, and James Daret doubtless distinguished among its members—being favoured with his company in the celebration of the feast of its patron saint. A like wine of honour was presented to the ambassadors on the 20th.

An illuminating dispute between the Duke, the Receiver of Flanders, and John van Eyck helped to relieve the tedium of life in the intervals of employment on foreign missions at this stage of the painter's career. Philip's munificence was largely tempered by prudent frugality in the ordering of his household, and in the process of curtailing his domestic expenses in 1426 he published an edict bearing date December 14 regulating its constitution and the wages of its members. By some inadvertence John's name was omitted from the new roll, and the Receiver of Flanders summarily stopped payment of his salary. An ineffectual protest was lodged, complaints followed reinforced by threats, to such good purpose that eventually, though not until after many months' persistent badgering, the aggrieved party emerged with flying colours from the triangular duel, securing letters patent under date March 3, 1428, confirming his appointment and commanding the payment of all arrears.

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