THE origin of the mediæval romance of the Croſs is hard to diſcover. It was very popular. It occurs in a good number of authors, and is depicted in a good many churches in ſtained glaſs. I may perhaps be allowed here to repeat what I have ſaid in my article on the Legend of the Croſs, in “Myths of the Middle Ages:”— “In the churches of the city of Troyes alone it appears in the windows of four: S. Martin-ès-Vignes, S. Pantaléon, S. Madeleine, and S. Nizier. It is freſcoed along the walls of the choir of S. Croce at Florence, by the hand of Agnolo Gaddi. Pietro della Franceſca alſo dedicated his pencil to the hiſtory of the Croſs in a ſeries of freſcoes in the chapel of the Bacci, in the church of S. Franceſco at Arezzo. It occurs as a predella painting among the ſpecimens of early art at the Accademia delle Belle Arti at Venice, and is the ſubject of a picture by Beham, in the Munich Gallery. The Legend is told in full in the ‘Vita Chriſti,’ printed at Troyes in 1517; in the ‘Legenda Aurea’ of Jacques de Voragine; in a French MS. of the thirteenth century, in the Britiſh Muſeum. Gervaſe of Tilbury relates a portion of it in his ‘Otia Imperalia,’ quoting Peter Comeſtor; it appears in the ‘Speculum Hiſtoriale’ of Gottfried of Viterbo, in the ‘Chronicon Engelhuſii,’ and elſewhere.” In the very curious Creation window of S. Neot’s Church, Cornwall, Seth is repreſented putting three pips of the Tree of Life into the mouth and noſtrils of dead Adam, as he buries him. Of the popularity of the ſtory of the Croſs there can be no doubt, but its origin is involved in obſcurity. It is generally poſſible to track moſt of the religious and popular folk tales and romances of the Middle Ages to their origin, which is frequently Oriental, but it is not eaſy to do ſo with the Legend of the Croſs. It would rather ſeem that it was made up by ſome romancer out of all kinds of pre-exiſting material, with no other object than to write a religious novel for pious readers, to diſplace the ſenſuous novels which were much in vogue. We know that this was largely done after the third century, and a number of martyr legends, ſuch as thoſe of S. Apollinaris Syncletica, SS. Cyprian and Juſtina, the ſtory of Duke Procopius, S. Euphroſyne, SS. Zoſimus and Mary, SS. Theophanes and Panſemne, and many others were compoſed with this object. The earlieſt of all is undoubtedly the Clementine Recognitions, which dates from a remotely early period, and carries us into the heart of Petrine Chriſtianity, and in which many a covert attack is made on S. Paul and his teaching. On the other hand, we know that an Asiatic prieſt, as Tertullian tells us, wrote a romance on “Paul and Thecla, out of love to Paul.” S. Jerome ſays that a Pauline zealot, when convicted before his biſhop of having written the romance, tried to exculpate himſelf by ſaying that he had done it out of admiration for S. Paul, but the Biſhop would not accept the excuſe, and deprived him. Unfortunately this romance has not come down to us, though we have another on S. Paul and his relations to Thecla, who is ſaid to have accompanied him on his apoſtolic rambles, diſguiſed in male attire. The Greek romance literature was not wholeſome reading for Chriſtians. Some of the writers of theſe tales became Chriſtian biſhops, and probably devoted their facile...