32

Tfie Dance of Death.

A. O. C.

Sebastiano Doppenstenio, Casparo Clugio Coss."Ronaventura a Bruno, Jacobo Rudio Tribb. PI.Hunc mortales chorum fabulse, temporis injuria vitiatumLucas Gebhart, Iodoc. Pfister. Georgius SporlinusHujus loci ^Ediles.Integritati suse restituendum curavereUt qui vocalis picturae divina monita securius audiuntMutae saltern poeseos miserab. spectaculoAd seriam philosophiam excitentur.

OPATEA02 MAKPOT BIOTAPXHN OPAMAKAPIOT.

cio id lxiix.

In the year 1616 a further reparation took place, aridsome alterations in the design are said to have been thenmade. The above inscription, with an addition only ofthe names of the then existing magistrates of the city, wascontinued. A short time before, Matthew Merian the elder,a celebrated topographical draughtsman, had fortunatelycopied the older painting, of which he is supposed to havefirst published engravings in 1621, with all the inscriptionsunder the respective characters that were then remaining,but these could not possibly be the same in many respectsthat existed before the Reformation, and which are entirelylost. A proof of this may be gathered from the lines ofthe Pope's answer to Death, whom he is thus made toapostrophise : " Shall it be said that I, a God upon earth,a successor of St. Peter, a powerful prince, and a learneddoctor, shall endure thy insolent summons, or that, inobedience to thy decree, I should be compelled to ascertainwhether the keys which I now possess will open for methe gate? of Paradise 1 " None of the inscriptions relatingto the Pope in other ancient paintings before the Refor-mation approach in the least to language of this kind.

Merian speaks of a tradition that in the original paintingthe portrait of Pope Felix V. was introduced, as well asthose of the Emperor Sigismund and Duke Albert II., allof whom were present at the council; but admitting thisto have been the fact, their respective features would scarcelyremain after the subsequent alterations and repairs thattook place.

That intelligent traveller, Mons. Blainville, saw thispainting in January, 1707. He states that as it had been