the others are hiding their faces from the dreadful struggle. The rest are gazing on it with awestruck looks, hardly daring to hope that Hercules will be victorious. Browning's poem, which was published in the same year[1] in which Lord Leighton's painting appeared, contains at the end a description of the picture, which you will be glad to read here. "There lies Alkestis dead, beneath the sun, She longed to look her last upon, beside The sea, which somehow tempts the life in us To come trip over its white waste of waves, And try escape from earth, and fleet as free. Behind the body, I suppose there bends Old Pheres in his hoary impotence; And women-wailers in a corner crouch * * * * * Close, each to other, agonising all, As fastened, in fear's rhythmic sympathy, To two contending opposite. There strains The might o' the hero 'gainst his more than match, --Death, dreadful not in thew and bone, but like The envenomed substance that exudes some dew Whereby the merely honest flesh and blood Will fester up and run to ruin straight, Ere they can close with, clasp and overcome The poisonous impalpability That simulates a form beneath the flow Of those grey garments." Now, of course, the story of Admetus and Alcestis is a fable, but for all that it is not worthless as some fables are. Though the god Apollo never existed, and never lived among men as a servant, yet the old tale reminds us of Him who was truly the Son of God; who came to this world and lived a human life like our own--a life of lowly service; who did this not because of any crime He had committed, since He was perfectly holy; and not because any one forced Him to do it, but of His own free and loving choice. And further, the story shows us how sorrow and death came to these old Greeks, and awakened in their hearts great dreams and longings. These desires seemed vain enough then, because there was no one who could fulfil them. But they were the very desires which Jesus Christ came to fulfil in due time. The Greeks thought of a love which was strong enough to make one lay down one's life for a friend, and they put that idea into the sacrifice of Alcestis. They thought, too, of a power which was strong enough to conquer Death, and to bring lost ones back to life, and they put that idea into the victory of Hercules. In Jesus Christ you actually find both such a love and such a power. He laid down His life for His friends--yes, and for His enemies. He loved us, and gave Himself for us. And, though He died, yet He conquered Death. He rose again in victory and glory. He gives eternal life to all His disciples. He has abolished death, and has brought life and immortality to light. Must not this picture, and this old-world story, make us think reverently and lovingly of Him, and of the verse which tells how He came _that through death He might bring to nought him that had the power of death_?