The Master of the Amsterdam Cabinet has treated a wide range of subjects, his preference being for scenes of everyday life. His prints show appreciation of the beauties of landscape, his skill in the treatment of wide spaces is masterly, and there is a beauty and sweetness in the expression of his faces which makes him a worthy rival of Martin Schongauer himself. He has left us no purely ornamental designs, such as might serve in the decoration of vessels used in the church, and we may infer, from the character of his engravings, that he was a painter, who used the dry-point as a diversion, rather than a professional engraver, pursuing his craft as a means of livelihood. In power of composition he can hardly rank with Martin Schongauer, and in range of intellect he falls short of the heights reached by Albrecht Dürer; but his very limitations, perhaps, render him a more companionable personage, and his modernity makes an immediate appeal to us all. [Illustration: MASTER OF THE AMSTERDAM CABINET. ECSTASY OF ST. MARY MAGDALEN Size of the original engraving, 7⅝ × 5¼ inches In the Royal Print Room, Amsterdam] [Illustration: MASTER OF THE AMSTERDAM CABINET. CRUCIFIXION Size of the original engraving, 6 × 5¼ inches In the Royal Print Room, Amsterdam] The _Ecstasy of St. Mary Magdalen_ is one of his earliest plates and is a free translation of the same subject by the Master E. S. It would seem as though his dry-point was the immediate original of Dürer’s woodcut. The position of the Magdalen’s hands is the same in both compositions, but Dürer has added a landscape which, admirable though it be, detracts from the main interest of his print. The Master of the Amsterdam Cabinet, in a second rendering, herewith reproduced, has eliminated all superfluous or distracting details and imparted a surprising degree of grace and purity to the lovely design. Anything like a chronological arrangement of the master’s work would be difficult, but one may safely assume that this beautiful engraving belongs to the latest and most mature period of his art, to which period we also may assign the _Two Lovers_. As a rule, his least successful engravings are those dealing with religious themes. At times, however, as in the _Crucifixion_, he rises to heights of dramatic intensity, and Dürer may be indebted more than we realize to this rendering of the divine tragedy. _Aristotle and Phyllis_ and _Solomon’s Idolatry_ are satirical illustrations of the follies of sages in love. Both plates are illumined by a truly modern sense of humor, while the arrangement of the figures within the spaces to be filled is admirable.