THE OAKEN CHEST OF YPRES
This chest of massive oak belongs to the office of archives at Ypres. It is perhaps the most curious and characteristic example of a kind familiar to antiquaries. In the middle panel, cut deep into the oak, St. George charges stoutly at the dragon, whose throat is stricken through with the lance. St. George’s head has a basnet, whose point ends in a socket with a feather stuck in it. This basnet has the camail and roundels over the ears. Over his hawberk the saint wears a short coat with long sleeves, wide and slittered at the edges. The saddle, with its great rolled guards for the legs, is noteworthy. The dragon is no writhing worm under the horse-hoofs, but a fearsome thing like to a mad bull-calf, a thing begotten of bull and serpent. Behind the monster stands Dame Cleodolinde, daintily lifting her skirt and no whit uneasy for the hurtling of horse and dragon. Behind her are the town walls, with towers and halls above them. Out of frilled clouds over St. George’s head a divine arm is thrust, in a loose sleeve, with two fingers blessing the lance-thrust. In the broad uprights at the chest-end a gentleman and a lady in full round sleeves stand between pillars. Above them are battlements, and above the battlements mullioned windows. ¶ The broad lock of this chest remains, a lock of most interesting form. The whole chest was once painted in colours, traces of which remain here and there. When the fashion of the dresses and arms have been reckoned over, and something allowed for craft tradition, the chest would seem to be of the early years of the fifteenth century, although it came to the famous exhibition of 1902 at Bruges most absurdly labelled and catalogued as of the thirteenth.