It is with more interest than one turns to the work of another artist of this transition period, Luis de Morales. For although he experimented with various motives, his adoption of them seems to have been prompted by his search for the expression of a personally sincere religious fervor. Almost nothing is recorded of his life, beyond the few facts that he was a native of Badajoz, on the frontier of Portugal, and died there in 1586; that, except for a visit to Madrid at the invitation of Philip II he seems to have spent his life in the quiet retirement of his native city, and notwithstanding the estimation in which his pictures were held, reached an old age of poverty. For it is related that the king passing through Badajoz, sent for the artist. The latter, when as a young man he had been summoned to Court, appeared in so sumptuous an attire, that the King remonstrated with him, but was appeased by Morales’ explanation that he donned it in honor of his Majesty. Now, however, he appeared in a condition of extreme destitution. To Philip’s remark: “Morales, you are very old,” the artist replied, “Yes, your Majesty, and very poor.” The king on the spot awarded him a pension of two hundred ducats. “For your dinner,” he said, to which Morales replied, “And for supper, Sire?” The King, so the story goes, accepted the jest and added another hundred ducats a year to the pension. This episode took place in 1581 and it is supposed that Morales at the time of his death, five years later, had reached the age of seventy-seven years.