"EL GRECO" (Dominico Theotocopuli) (1545?-1614?) PORTRAIT OF A CARDINAL (ALSO KNOWN AS SAINT JEROME) Canvas, 37 1/2 inches by 43 1/4 inches

THERE are replicas of this picture in the National Gallery and the Prado, where it is called St. Paul. But the title is of small account. The picture is clearly the portrait of some dignitary of the church, or at least of the type of ecclesiastics of the day. The stubby hair and the long bear are approaching white, the face is greyed over, and silvery lights relieve the rose colored mantle. The head, in proportion to the body, is small but of extra length and narrowness, and the hands are extremely elongated. But by these exaggerations what expression of character is obtained! The head is at once that of a soldier, a scholar and an ascetic. The eyes have a cold, piercing directness; the long nose is indicative of relentless purpose and the mouth of iron rigidity and cruelty. One hand lies on the book with a gesture of refinement, almost of tenderness, while the thumb of the other is turned down with a decision that brooks no reasoning or opposition. In fine, the type is a strange mixture of intellectuality and bigotry; of elevation and narrowness, of gentleness and remorselessness. It might be that of an inquisitor, who condemns with no more hesitation than a surgeon, compelled by his diagnosis to use the knife.- Quoted from Caffin.

The picture was discovered, covered with grime, in a dark corner of the sacristy of the cathedral at Valladolid, Spain, where it had evidently hung undisturbed for centuries. M. Jules Cambon tried to buy it for the Louvre, but failed through the shrewdness of a Paris dealer, who also coveted it. From him it passed through various other hands until it reached New York.

105

H N