It has been a question among critics, whether the purse ought to be placed in the hand of Judas when present at the Last Supper, because it is usually understood as containing the thirty pieces of silver: but this is a mistake; and it leads to the mistake of representing him as hiding the purse, as if it contained the price of his treachery. Judas carries the purse openly, for he was the steward, or purse-bearer, of the party ‘he had the bag, and bare what was put therein’ (John xii. 6, xiii. 29): and as the money-bag is also the attribute of St. Matthew the tax-gatherer, we must take care not to confound him with the traitor and thief. This brings me to the consideration of the subject as treated by Albert Dürer. In the series of large woodcuts from the Passion of our Saviour (styled ‘_La grande Passion_’), the Cenacolo is an event, and not a mystery. John, as a beautiful youth, is leaning against our Saviour with downcast eyes; he does not look as if he had thrown himself down half asleep, but as if Christ had put his arm around him, and drawn and pressed him fondly towards him. On the right is Peter: the other apostles are not easily discriminated, but they have all that sort of _grandiose_ ugliness which is so full of character, and so particularly the characteristic of the artist: the apostle seated in front in a cowering attitude, holding the purse which he seems anxious to conceal, and looking up apprehensively, I suppose to be Judas. In the smaller set of woodcuts (‘_La petite Passion_’) I believe the apostle with the purse in the foreground to be St. Matthew; while the ugly, lank-haired personage behind Christ, who looks as if about to steal away, is probably intended for Judas: one of the apostles has laid hold of him, and seems to say, ‘Thou art the man!’ There is a third Cenacolo, by Albert Dürer, which plainly represents the Eucharist. The cup only is on the table, and Judas is omitted. In a Cenacolo by another old German, Judas is in the act of receiving the sop which Christ is putting into his mouth; and at the same time he is _hiding_ the purse:—a mistake, as I have already observed. * * * * * These examples must suffice to give some idea of the manner in which this subject was generally treated by the early German and Italian artists. But, whether presented before us as a dramatic scene expressing individual character, or as an historical event memorable in the life of Christ, or as a religious rite of awful and mysterious import—all the examples I have mentioned are in some respects deficient. We have the feeling, that, whatever may be the merit in sentiment, in intention, in detail, what has been attempted has _not_ been achieved. * * * * *