Among the statues in the cathedral that are ascribed to Cano, and are certainly his work, we may place first the Purissima, which is kept in the sacristy. It is a small and very beautiful statuette which has the qualities that belong to Cano’s paintings. Even more interesting is the group of the Virgin and Child, with Santa Ana, also in the cathedral, where it is hidden in the gloom of a dark side-chapel. Quite unknown, this beautiful statue is almost certainly Cano’s work; it has all the qualities that belong to his art. The Virgin, who is seated on the knee of Santa Ana, holds the Child Jesus. The figures are half life-size; the three faces and the hands are of exquisite delicacy. The Virgin resembles the Purissima in her sweetness. What a dainty fairness is here; with what exquisite taste the veil and the robe are arranged! The polychrome, too, is very beautiful, and fortunately it has not been restored. The Virgin wears a white tulle turban, which is black striped and gold fringed; her robe is light red, damasked in gold, and partly covered by a drapery of indigo blue, which is fastened with gold clasps at the shoulders and waist. Santa Ana’s robe is black, gold embroidered, while her cloak is a deeper shade of the same red-brown as the Virgin’s tunic. In these two statues we see Cano’s power in expressing tender human emotions. It is the quality that marks his works--both his painting and his carvings--among the Spanish masters. His art never touches the passionate Conceptions of Ribera or Zurbaran in painting, or of Hernandez in sculpture: it is on a lower level than the ecstatic emotion of Murillo or the beautiful carvings of Montañés. Cano is mild and touching; he neither excites nor thrills us. His Virgin is the happy earthly Mother who takes sweet pleasure in her Child, not the Mater Dolorosa, suffering for the sorrows of her Divine Son. She has the fairness which he gives to all women. It was this understanding, so uncommon in Spanish art, whose object was “to persuade men to piety and to incline them to God,” of the joy of life with its human relationships, that was Cano’s special gift. He changed the dramatically serious religious compositions common to his country into scenes that speak charmingly of tender joyousness born of earthly love. To him alone, it would seem, it was given to find joy, and not sorrow, in the divine drama from which the Spanish artists drew their inspiration.