Sometimes in Fuchs’ figures a wonderfully decorative spirit is shown, as in the case of the Earth-nut Pea (Text-fig. 87) which fills the rectangular space almost in the manner of an “all-over” wall-paper pattern. It must not be forgotten, when discussing wood-cuts, that the artist, who drew upon the block for the engraver, was working under peculiar conditions. It was impossible for him to be unmindful of the boundaries of the block, when these took the form, as it were, of miniature precipices under his hand. These boundaries marked out the exact limit of space which the figure could occupy. It is not surprising, under these circumstances, that the artist who drew upon the block should often seem to have been obsessed by its rectangularity, and should have accommodated his drawing to its form in a way that was unnecessary and far from realistic, though sometimes very decorative. This is exemplified in the figure of the Earth-nut Pea, to which we have just referred and also in Text-figs. 41, 44, 62, 92, 95, 101, etc. The writer has been told by an artist accustomed, in former years, to draw upon the wood for the engraver, that to avoid a rectangular effect required a distinct effort of will. At the present day, when photographic methods of reproduction are almost exclusively used, the artist is no longer oppressively conscious of the exact outline of the space which his figure will occupy. [Illustration: Text-fig. 87. “Apios” = _Lathyrus tuberosus_ L., Earth-nut Pea [Fuchs, De historia stirpium, 1542]. _Reduced._] [Illustration: Text-fig. 88. “Arum” = _Arum maculatum_ L., Wild Arum [Fuchs, De historia stirpium, 1542]. _Reduced._] The figures here reproduced show how great a variety of subjects were successfully dealt with in Fuchs’ work. The Cabbage (Text-fig. 30) is realised in a way that brings home to us the intrinsic beauty of this somewhat prosaic subject. In the Wild Arum (Text-fig. 88) the fruit and a dissection of the inflorescence are represented, so that, botanically, the drawing reaches a high level. Fuchs’ wood-cuts are nearly all original, but that of the White Waterlily appears to have been founded upon Brunfels’ figure. We have so far spoken, for the sake of brevity, as if Fuchs actually executed the figures himself. This, however, was not the case. He employed two draughtsmen, Heinrich Füllmaurer, who drew the plants from nature, and Albrecht Meyer, who copied the drawings on to the wood, and also an engraver, Veit Růdolf Speckle, who actually cut the blocks. Fuchs evidently delighted to honour his colleagues, for at the end of the book there are portraits of all three at work (Text-fig. 89). The artist is drawing a plant with a brush fixed in a quill.