On the east wall above the mantel-piece is the central group. Lodovico and his wife, clad in rich brocaded robes, are seated in a garden surrounded by their children, and dwarfs in the act of receiving a messenger, who hands the Marquis a letter. Neither Lodovico nor any of his family seem to have been remarkable for personal beauty, and Mantegna has not made any attempt to embellish them. He paints them exactly as they were, in the stiff costumes of the day. Barbara wears the same veiled horn-shaped head-dress as in Andrea’s portrait-engraving in the British Museum; the children and courtiers are in short jackets and tight-fitting caps. Nothing is omitted that could complete the picture, which is like a page torn out of the court life of those times; a favourite greyhound lies asleep under Lodovico’s chair, and several dwarfs positively repulsive in their ugliness are introduced. They formed, we know, an important part of the household, since the Marquis kept a particular race, bred at Mantua, and reserved a whole wing of his palace, with staircases, halls, and bedrooms adapted to their stature, for their exclusive use. Beyond the fine figure of the courtier on the right, evidently the painter’s own portrait, we have another compartment where the Marquis stands at the head of the stairs welcoming his guests, or, as Selvatico suggests, opening his arms to his son Federico, who had been in disgrace for refusing to consent to a marriage which Lodovico had arranged for him. This subject is much damaged, but on the entrance-wall is another group, the best preserved of the three, in which the Marquis meets his younger son, the boy-cardinal Francesco, on his return from Rome. The composition is stiff and the dresses awkward, but nothing can surpass the life-like character of the heads, whether we fix our eyes on the baby-faces and demure air of the children who advance to welcome their brother, or on the vigorous profiles of Lodovico and his courtiers. A tame lion crouches at the feet of the Marquis, and a view of hills and classical temples, intended to represent Rome, fills in the background. On the opposite side of the doorway the servants and pages in attendance are introduced holding their master’s horse, and several dogs in leash, all admirably drawn; while above the door itself a charming group of seven winged boys, in every possible attitude, support a tablet with the following inscription:— Ill Lodovico II. M.M. Principi optimo ac Fide invictissimo Et Ill Barbaræ eius Conjugi Mulierum Glor Incomparabili Suus Andreas Mantinia Patavus opus hoc tenue Ad eorum Decus absolvit. Ann. MCCCCLXXIIII.