Michael Angelo gives us a most majestic Virgin standing on the steps of a prie-Dieu, and turning with hands upraised towards the angel, who appears to have entered by the open door; his figure is most clumsy and material, and his attitude unmeaning and ungraceful. It is, I think, the only instance in which Michael Angelo has given wings to an angelic being: for here they could not be dispensed with. In a beautiful Annunciation by Johan Van Eyck (Munich Gal., Cabinet iii. 35), the Virgin kneels at a desk with a book before her. She has long fair hair, and a noble intellectual brow. Gabriel, holding his sceptre, stands in the door-way. The Dove enters by the lattice. A bed is in the background, and in front a pot of lilies. In another Annunciation by Van Eyck, painted on the Ghent altar-piece, we have the mystic, not the historical, representation, and a very beautiful effect is produced by clothing both the angel and Mary in robes of pure white. (Berlin Gal., 520, 521.) In an engraving after Rembrandt, the Virgin kneels by a fountain, and the angel kneels on the opposite side. This seems to express the legendary scene. These few observations on the general arrangement of the theme, whether mystical or historical, will, I hope, assist the observer in discriminating for himself. I must not venture further, for we have a wide range of subjects before us. THE VISITATION. _Ital._ La Visitazione di Maria. _Fr._ La Visitation de la Vierge _Ger._ Die Heimsuchung Mariä. July 2. After the Annunciation of the angel, the Scripture goes on to relate how "Mary arose and went up into the hill country with haste, to the house of her cousin Elizabeth, and saluted her." This meeting of the two kinswomen is the subject styled in art the "Visitation," and sometimes the "Salutation of Elizabeth." It is of considerable importance, in a series of the life of the Virgin, as an event; and also, when taken separately in its religious significance, as being the first recognition of the character of the Messiah. "Whence is this to me," exclaims Elizabeth, "that the mother of my Lord should come to me?" (Luke i. 43); and as she spoke this through the influence of the Holy Spirit, and not through knowledge, she is considered in the light of a prophetess.