What most astonishes a person examining this work is the amazing variety and minuteness of the patterns, and the perfect smoothness and evenness of the curves, as if they had been traced by compasses or some other fine instruments; though they were all drawn by the unaided hand. The scribes usually made the capital letters very large, so as sometimes to fill almost an entire page; and on these they exerted their utmost skill. They painted the open spaces of the letters and ornaments in brilliant colours: and in this art--an art usually designated ‘Illumination’--the old Irish scribes also excelled. Several manuscript-books, ornamented in this manner, have been preserved, of which it will be sufficient to mention one here--The Book of Kells, now in Trinity College, Dublin, though there are several others almost equally beautiful. It is a copy of the Four Gospels in Latin, written on vellum in the seventh or eighth century. Miss Margaret Stokes, of Dublin, a skilled artist and a great judge of such matters, who has carefully examined this book, thus speaks of it:--“No effort hitherto made to transcribe any one page of this book has the perfection of execution and rich harmony of colour which belongs to this wonderful book. It is no exaggeration to say that, as with the microscopic works of nature, the stronger the magnifying power brought to bear upon it, the more is this perfection seen. No single false interlacement or uneven curve in the spirals, no faint trace of a trembling hand or wandering thought can be detected. This is the very passion of labour and devotion, and thus did the Irish scribe work to glorify his book.” Professor Westwood, of Oxford--an English gentleman--who examined the best specimens of penwork all over Europe, speaks even more strongly. “The Book of Kells,” he says, “is the most astonishing book of the Four Gospels which exists in the world. How men could have had eyes and tools to work out the designs, I am sure I, with all the skill and knowledge in such kind of work which I have been exercising for the last fifty years, cannot conceive. I know pretty well all the libraries in Europe where such books as this occur, but there is no such book in any of them. There is nothing like it in all the books which were written for Charlemagne and his successors.”