The large initial E shows a sacred scene, and is of English late thirteenth century work, in a private collection. The harmony is studiously correct, and the original, which is slightly larger, glows with color. It is rather more than four inches square. The figures are firmly outlined, as are their draperies. The gold is leaf, the architectural portion being left very flat, but the nimbus and the border are burnished. It has been found impossible to reproduce exactly the pattern of the ground in chromo-lithography, but as it may readily be done by hand, a description taken direct from the original will be acceptable to the pupil. The blue ground within the letter is dark: on it is ruled a square cross-bar of deep olive lines of great fineness. Intersecting them, and so to speak keeping them down, is a net-work of very fine nearly white lines, the points of intersection being marked by minute circles. Within the little spaces thus divided are minute circles of vermilion. The outer groundwork is of olive diapered with a deeper shade of the same color. The ground outside the letter is pink divided into squares by brown lines, each square having a little red circle in it. The edges of the draperies are marked by minute white lines, and there is less shading than in the reproduction. Altogether this letter represents the best work of the period, and is an admirable example of the painstaking care by which alone great effects are produced. Even a genius, such as was the artist who produced this little picture, must condescend to take infinite trouble if he would obtain an adequate reward. [Illustration: HERALDIC POPINJAY.] [Illustration: PLATE I.--INITIALS BY ENGLISH ILLUMINATORS, 12TH AND 13TH CENTURIES.] [Illustration: LETTERS FROM AN ALPHABET OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. (The remainder of the alphabet is shown in colors in Plate II.)] DESCRIPTION OF PLATE II.