There is very little doubt, however, that several of these are genuine Van der Weydens--the 'Seven Sacraments' at Antwerp, for example, and the 'Pièta' of the Brussels Gallery; but at the same time, when pictures are unsigned and there is no documentary evidence as to their authorship, it is well-nigh impossible to arrive at absolute certainty. Sometimes a pupil is able to so exactly acquire his master's manner that the greatest experts are thereby deceived. It was so in the case of the famous Sforza picture, formerly in the Zambeccari Collection at Bologna, and now in the Brussels Gallery (No. 31). This beautiful picture--a 'Calvary,' with portraits of Francesco Sforza, his wife Bianca Visconti and their young son Galeazzo--was attributed by some experts to Memling, and it was thus ascribed in the official catalogue of the Brussels Gallery. There were others, no less competent, who were convinced that it was Roger's work; it dated, no doubt, they said, from the time of his sojourn in Italy. Mr. Weale, however, was quite sure that neither of these artists had painted it, and, thanks to his recent research, we now know the true story of the picture. The critics who said that it was in Van der Weyden's style were quite right, but it was not painted by the master himself, but by his pupil, Zanetto Bugatto, of Milan. The Duchess of Milan, it seems, had seen some of Roger's pictures, and was so charmed by them that she requested him to paint her portrait. He, for some reason or other, being unable at the time to leave home, was compelled to decline the commission, and the Duchess sent the young Milanese painter, Zanetto Bugatto, to Brussels in order that he might study with Roger, and thus acquire his style. This was in the year 1460. Bugatto remained in Brussels three years, and on his return to his native town he painted the picture in question. There is a tradition, which does not seem to be well founded, that Roger van der Weyden was at one time the pupil of John van Eyck. If this were so, he was certainly not much influenced by his master's manner of painting. John delighted in serene immobility, Roger in tragic action. His tall, wan, emaciated figures always live and feel; and though he could, when he would, depict tranquillity, and his portraits are as calm and collected as any of those which were painted by John van Eyck, unlike Van Eyck's, they are almost always ascetic-looking, and very often sad. He seems to have been unable to appreciate the beauty of health and gladness. Guicciardini says that Memling was Roger's pupil, but there is no documentary evidence to show that such was the case. We know next to nothing of the first days of the great Bruges painter, but his earlier pictures distinctly recall the pictures of Van der Weyden; and if he were not his pupil, he must have certainly studied his work.