1045, Room XI; or indeed
the general run of the gold embroidery of the period as shown in our
gallery. {147}
So with the jewels; there are examples of jewels in most of the
pictures named above, none of them, perhaps, very first-rate, but all
of them painted with more care and serious aim than the eighteen-
penny trinket which serves S. Nicholas for a brooch. The jewels in
the mitre are rather better than this, but much depends upon the kind
of day on which the picture is seen; on a clear bright day they, and
indeed every part of the picture, look much worse than on a dull one
because the badness can be more clearly seen. As for the mitre
itself, it is made of the same hard unyielding material as the
portico behind the saint, whatever this may be, presumably wood.
Observe also the crozier which S. Nicholas is holding; observe the
cheap streak of high light exactly the same thickness all the way and
only broken in one place; so with the folds in the draperies; all is
monotonous, unobservant, unimaginative--the work of a feeble man
whose pains will never extend much beyond those necessary to make him
pass as stronger than he is; especially the folds in the white linen
over S. Nicholas's throat, and about his girdle--weaker drapery can
hardly be than this, unless, perhaps, that from under which S.
Nicholas's hands come. There is not only no art here to conceal, but
there is not even pains to conceal the want of art.
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