The Jesus Church at Setubal, built by Justa Rodrigues, Dom Manoel's nurse, has fifteen paintings in incongruous gilt frames and hung high up on the north wall of the church, which also have something of the same style.[10]
More interesting than these are two pictures in the sacristy of Santa Cruz at Coimbra, an 'Ecce Homo' and the 'Day of Pentecost.' It is the 'Pentecost' which is signed Velascus, and in it the Apostles in an inner room are seen through an arcade of three arches like a chapter-house entrance. Perhaps once part of the great reredos, this picture has suffered terribly from neglect; but it must once have been a fine work, and the way in which the Apostles in the inner room are separated by the arcade from the two spectators is particularly successful.
In Oporto there exists at least one good picture, 'The Fountain of Mercy,' now in the board-room of the Misericordia,[11] but painted to be the reredos of the chapel of São Thiago in the Sé where the brotherhood was founded by Dom Manoel in 1499. (Fig. 3.)
In the centre above, between St. John and the Virgin, stands a crucifix from which blood flows down to fill a white marble well.
Below, on one side there kneels Dom Manoel with his six sons--João, afterwards king; Luis, duke of Beja; Fernando, duke of Guarda; Affonso, afterwards archbishop of Lisbon, with his cardinal's hat; Henrique, later cardinal archbishop of Evora, and then king; and Duarte, duke of Guimarães and ancestor of the present ruling house of Braganza.
On the other side are Queen Dona Leonor,[12] granddaughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, Dom Manoel's third wife[13] and her two stepdaughters, Dona Isabel, the wife of Charles V. and mother of Philip II., who through her claimed and won the throne of Portugal when his uncle, the cardinal king, died in 1580, and Dona Beatriz, who married Charles III.. of Savoy.
The date of the picture is fixed as between 1518 when Dom Affonso, then aged nine, received his cardinal's hat, and 1521 when Dom Manoel died.[14]
Unfortunately the picture has been somewhat spoiled by restoration, but it is undoubtedly a very fine piece of work--especially the portraits below--and would be worthy of admiration anywhere, even in a country much richer in works of art.