But this discovery in technique is not his only claim to renown. His achievements as a painter were even greater than his skill as a craftsman. A high authority says that the beauty of the Virgin in the Adoration of the Lamb "places it in the rank of the Madonnas of Leonardo da Vinci and of Raphael." This genius of the Middle Ages and his younger brother have left Belgium in the famous triptych a lofty composition in which the marvelous technique that has wrought the colours together till the surface is like enamel is combined with beauty of landscape and skill in portraiture. In the inscription placed upon it we read: "Hubert van Eyck, than whom none greater has appeared, began the work, which Jan his brother, in art the second, brought to completion." Almost nothing is known of the life of Hubert van Eyck. He was born at Maaseyck about the year 1366, and lived at Bruges with his brother and their sister Margaret, who was also a painter. He was made a member of the painters' guild of Ghent in 1421, the year in which he left the service of the powerful lord afterward known as Philip the Good. Three years later, Jodocus Vydts, burgomaster of Ghent, and his wife Isabella gave him an order for an altar-piece to be placed in their mortuary chapel in the cathedral. His work was cut short by his death in 1426. It is impossible to tell how much was done by his hand and how much by his brother Jan, but there seems good reason to believe that Hubert painted the central panels in the upper row, and that Jan was the artist of the Adoration panel below these. Through some strange lack of appreciation in the custodians of this masterpiece, Brussels and Berlin were able to purchase the wings, so that those we saw at Ghent were only copies. Hubert van Eyck's body was laid in the chapel of the Vydts' in the cathedral of St. Bavon, near his masterpiece, but we are told that his severed right arm was placed in a reliquary in the cathedral itself. No doubt it was considered a sacred relic! His epitaph was carved on a shield, supported by a marble skeleton. The following free translation of this quaint old Flemish verse was made by William B. Scott:[6] [6] "Gems of Modern Belgian Art." "Whoe'er thou art who walkest overhead, Behold thyself in stone: for I yestreen, Was seemly and alert like thee: now dead, Nailed up and earthed, and for the last time green; The first spring greenness and the last decay Are hidden here forever from the day. I, Hubert van Eyck, whom all Bruges' folks hailed Worthy of lauds, am now with worms engrailed. My soul, with many pangs by God constrained, Fled in September, when the corn is wained, Just fourteen hundred years and twenty-six Since Lord Christ did invent the crucifix. Lovers of Art, pray for me that I gain God's grace, nor find I've painted, lived, in vain." [Illustration: "L'HOMME À L'OEUILLET."--VAN EYCK.]