_Adam and Eve_ is followed by a group of prints which, though interesting in treatment and charming in subject, such as the _Nativity_, _Apollo and Diana_, and the first four plates of the _Small Passion_, reveal nothing new in Dürer’s development as an artist or a man. In the year 1510, however, is made his first experiment in dry-point. Of the very small plate of _St. Veronica with the Sudarium_ two impressions only have come down to us, neither of them showing much burr. The _Man of Sorrows_, dated 1512, likewise must have been very delicately scratched upon the copper, all existing impressions being pale and delicate in tone. Whether Dürer’s desire was to produce engravings which should entail less labor and be more quickly executed than was possible by the slower and more laborious method of the burin, or whether, as seems much more likely, he was influenced by an acquaintanceship with the dry-point work of the Master of the Amsterdam Cabinet, cannot be asserted with any degree of assurance. Dürer’s third dry-point, the _St. Jerome by the Willow Tree_ (like the _Man of Sorrows_ dated 1512), is treated in so much bolder and more painter-like a manner, is so rich in burr and so satisfying as a composition, that one can hardly account for such remarkable development unaided by any outside influence or stimulation. The British Museum’s impression of the first state, before the monogram,--the richest impression known--yields nothing in color effect even to Rembrandt. Thausing is inclined to think that Rembrandt must have been inspired by this plate to himself take up the dry-point--an interesting speculation and one which would do honor to both of these great masters. [Illustration: ALBRECHT DÜRER. ST. JEROME BY THE WILLOW TREE (First State) Size of the original dry-point 8⅛ × 7 inches In the British Museum] [Illustration: ALBRECHT DÜRER. HOLY FAMILY Size of the original dry-point, 8¼ × 7¼ inches] The _Holy Family_, though without monogram and undated, belongs so unmistakably, from internal evidence, to this period, that we may safely assign it to the year 1512. The background and landscape to the left are indicated in outline only. Did Dürer intend to carry the plate further? We can never know. It is his fourth and, unfortunately, his last dry-point. There is a beauty in _St. Jerome by the Willow Tree_ and in this Holy Family which leads us to read in these two masterpieces certain Italian influences. There is the largeness of conception of the Venetian School, and both _St. Jerome_ and _St. Joseph_ show strong traces of such a master as Giovanni Bellini.