88. How are we to know, then, that he speaks in vain? First, because among all his hearers you will not find one shrewd face. They are all either simple or stupid people: there is one nice woman in front of all, (else Holbein's representation had been caricature,) but she is not a shrewd one.
Secondly, by the light and shade. The church is not in extreme darkness—far from that; a gray twilight is over everything, but the sun is totally shut out of it;—not a ray comes in even at the window—that is darker than the walls, or vault.
Lastly, and chiefly, by the mocking expression of Death. Mocking, but not angry. The man has been preaching what he thought true. Death laughs at him, but is not indignant with him.
Death comes quietly: I am going to be preacher now; here is your own hour-glass, ready for me. You have spoken many words in your day. But "of the things which you have spoken, this is the sum,"—your death-warrant, signed and sealed. There's your text for to-day.
89. Of this other picture, the meaning is more plain, and far more beautiful. The husbandman is old and gaunt, and has passed his days, not in speaking, but pressing the iron into the ground. And the payment for his life's work is, that he is clothed in rags, and his feet are bare on the clods; and he has no hat—but the brim of a hat only, and his long, unkempt gray hair comes through. But all the air is full of warmth and of peace; and, beyond his village church, there is, at last, light indeed. His horses lag in the furrow, and his own limbs totter and fail: but one comes to help him. 'It is a long field,' says Death; 'but we'll get to the end of it to-day,—you and I.'
90. And now that we know the meaning, we are able to discuss the technical qualities farther.
Both of these engravings, you will find, are executed with blunt lines; but more than that, they are executed with quiet lines, entirely steady.
Now, here I have in my hand a lively woodcut of the present day—a good average type of the modern style of wood-cutting, which you will all recognize.[R]
The shade in this is drawn on the wood, (not cut, but drawn, observe,) at the rate of at least ten lines in a second: Holbein's, at the rate of about one line in three seconds.[S]
91. Now there are two different matters to be considered with respect to these two opposed methods of execution. The first, that the rapid work, though easy to the artist, is very difficult to the wood-cutter; so that it implies instantly a separation between the two crafts, and that your wood-cutter has ceased to be a draughtsman. I shall return to this point. I wish to insist on the other first; namely, the effect of the more deliberate method on the drawing itself.