But to return to the tomb of Archbishop Ernst. The artist has adopted that late Gothic style which was apt to lead to so much that was weak, trivial and ineffective. But there is here nothing that is excessive or disproportionate. Even in the case of the canopy above the head of the reclining Bishop, if we concede the permissibility of its presence at all, we must also confess that there is an artistic reason for its existence in the fact that it furnishes the top which one feels to be required for the monument. As to the recumbent form itself, it is, in the strength of its treatment and the individuality of its portraiture, conceived after the realistic manner of the day. But Vischer has not been betrayed into any excess in this direction. Only it is evident that the influence of that striving after the impressions of life as the artist sees it, which has been called Realism, and which yet leaves room for so much that is ideal, has been working strongly within him. The broad, heavy folds of drapery falling straight or almost straight down the bodies of the Bishop and the Apostles speak also to the same conclusion. For statuettes of the Twelve Apostles, ranged on either side of the tomb, stand on pedestals, enriched with deep foliage, and beneath beautiful canopies, intricately wrought in the Gothic style. They are the forerunners of those superb figures on the Sebaldusgrab, but their pose is very monotonous, and in their undersize they recall the works of Adam Krafft, which reflect the short and dumpy type of the contemporary Nuremberger. A tendency to exaggerate the size of the head may be noticed. Possibly it is the result of the artist’s endeavour to express the individuality of the Apostles he represented. But this defect is reproduced in the Angel set at the head of the Archbishop. A noticeable figure on this tomb is the St. Maurice at the head of it corresponding to the St. Stephen at the foot. This is a veritable Nuremberg type, and reminds us of the statuette of the same Saint now preserved in the Court of Krafft’s House (No. 7 Theresienstrasse) at Nuremberg. It is a fountain-figure, and was originally gilded. Doubt has been cast on the authorship of this piece, but cannot be seriously entertained after a comparison with the St. Maurice at Magdeburg. (Ill. 5.) [Illustration: STEIN PHOTO.] [KRAFFT HOUSE, NÜRNBERG 5. ST. MAURICE] The tomb throughout is wrought richly and with the minutest care. On the base Peter Vischer seizes the opportunity of indulging his humour and luxuriant imagination. He has added fantastic dogs and beasts of various kinds, in the same spirit, perhaps, as that in which Dürer used to adorn and complete his engravings and even to crowd the vacant spaces of his compositions with the _Traumwerk_ with which his mind and memory were stored. And in this respect also the Magdeburg tomb foreshadows the Sebaldusgrab.