Strona 312 z 490

He had a special passion, also, for ecclesiastical vestments, as

indeed he had for everything connected with the service of the

Church. In the long cedar chests that lined the west gallery of

his house, he had stored away many rare and beautiful specimens

of what is really the raiment of the Bride of Christ, who must

wear purple and jewels and fine linen that she may hide the

pallid macerated body that is worn by the suffering that she

seeks for and wounded by self-inflicted pain. He possessed a

gorgeous cope of crimson silk and gold-thread damask, figured

with a repeating pattern of golden pomegranates set in

six-petalled formal blossoms, beyond which on either side was the

pine-apple device wrought in seed-pearls. The orphreys were

divided into panels representing scenes from the life of the

Virgin, and the coronation of the Virgin was figured in coloured

silks upon the hood. This was Italian work of the fifteenth

century.