Lastly in the room which Cosimo de' Medici had prepared for his own use in the convent and where he often talked with the Prior Fra Antonino, Fra Angelico painted an "Adoration of the Magi." As Pope Eugene IV. slept in this room when he came to Florence in 1442 to assist at the consecration of the church, it is probable that this Adoration allusive to the Epiphany, at which time the consecration took place, was painted at that epoch. The fresco, rich in figures and beauty, is executed with real mastery. The personages of the royal cortege vary in type and character, in expression and sentiment, showing the great pains our artist had taken in the painting of this important work, which now, unhappily restored and injured, only allows us to guess at the wonderful beauty with which it was once filled. We see his own hand more completely in the fresco in the corridor representing the Virgin enthroned, with the child seated on her knee and several saints at the sides. On the right are St. Paul, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Laurence, and St. Peter Martyr; on the left St. Mark, St. Cosmo and St. Damian, and St. Dominic, holding an open book where it is written: _Caritatem habete; humilitatem servate; paupertatem voluntariam possidete. Maledictionem Dei et meam imprecor possessiones inducenti in meo Ordine_. This painting, one of the most perfect in the convent, is one of Angelico's best, and shows what a high degree of ability he had reached. The gentle head of the Virgin bends down to look at her Son with the golden curls, whose face with sparkling eyes breathes an infantile grace. The execution is accurate, the figures well designed, full of character, nobility and life; the delicacy of tone, just balance of composition and freshness of colouring, are mingled with the most profound sentiment and intimate knowledge of truth. Rio thinks this fresco was done while Fra Angelico was in Tuscany after 1450; his adieu, as it were, to his brethren; a last legacy to that devout household with whom he had shared joys and sorrows, and from which he was about to be separated. There is nothing to refute this; but it appears to us that he who had painted the great Crucifixion of the chapter-house might well have done at the same time this fresco. It is a compendium of all his technical qualities and feeling, and demonstrates how little by little he succeeded, while still preserving his own spirit, in reaching the real in art, and giving it life in a manner all his own. But in comparing the pictures of the chapel of Pope Nicholas V. in Rome, with this fresco, we cannot avoid noticing in those a greater freedom of composition and grouping of the figures, a greater majesty of design, a truth and depth of observation, not recognisable in any of his earlier works, nor even in the large Crucifixion, which is justly considered one of the pious monk's best works. [Illustration] IN THE GALLERY OF ANCIENT AND MODERN ART.