against, Henry IV., but with no great zeal, and ultimately joined the victorious party. He was employed both by Henry and by Louis XIII. in negotiations about Piedmont and Savoy. In 1603 he became advocate-general of the parliament of Grenoble, and in 1630 was appointed its president. He died in 1636. Expilly was the author of a life of the Chevalier Bayard; of a volume of poems of no great merit; and of some other works.—J. T.
EYBLER, Joseph von, a musician, was born at Schwöchat, near Vienna, on the 8th of February, 1764, and died at Vienna in 1846. His father, who was schoolmaster and choirmaster in the village where Eybler was born, taught him the rudiments of music, and he profited so well by this simple instruction, that, when he was but six years old, his pianoforte playing attracted the notice of a wealthy lover of the art, named Seitzer, who took the boy under his special care. He was placed by this patron in the musical seminary of Vienna, who also obtained for him the advantage of lessons in composition from Albrechtsberger. Eybler worked diligently with this famous master from 1777 to 1779, and remained at the seminary until it was dissolved in 1782, pursuing at this institution his literary studies as well as the practice of his art. He then entered on a course of reading for the law, and his father made him an allowance from his own small income, to support him while preparing for this profession; but the burning of the choirmaster's house so crippled his means, that he was forced to leave his son to the resource of his talents, who therefore abandoned jurisprudence for music, in which he had already made such proficiency as to enable him to obtain a living by teaching. Eybler was now much assisted by the advice of Joseph Haydn, whose family was intimate with his own; and he made the friendship of Mozart, which remained unshaken until the great musician's death. In 1792 he was appointed choirmaster at the Carmelite church in Vienna, and soon afterwards obtained the same office at the Scotch convent. He was chosen in 1801 to be instructor of the imperial children. In 1804 he was appointed vice-kapellmeister to the emperor, and in this office he had frequent occasion for the production of his works. It was by the sovereign's invitation that he composed his oratorio "Die vier letzten Dine," which was first performed in 1810 at a féte given in the palace, when the composer received the marked compliments of his imperial patron, before a large assembly of nobility. He was raised to the office of kapellmeister in 1825, when the death of Salieri rendered its title and its emoluments vacant, Eybler having already discharged its functions for several years. In 1833, while conducting a performance of Mozart's Requiem in the imperial chapel, he was struck with apoplexy. This event closed his official career, for, though on his recovery he desired to resume his duties, the emperor apprehending that their cares might induce a recurrence of his fit, would not suffer him to do so, but provided him with a charming suite of rooms in the palace at Schönbrun, and settled an easy independence upon him, in the enjoyment of which he passed the remaining thirteen years of his life. The previous emperor, Francis, had conferred on Eybler a patent of nobility—whence the prefix "von" before his name; and this distinction, with the remembrance of the honourable post he had filled, not more than his artistic renown, drew universal respect towards him, when his great age prevented the further exercise of his long habitual activity. Eybler wrote very voluminously for the church, his works consisting of masses, psalms, hymns, and motets, besides two oratorios and a multitude of minor pieces; and his music, if not quickened by that spark of genius which insures immortality, is marked with the earnestness of purpose, and control of technical resources, which betoken the intelligence and cultivated powers of a master.—G. A. M.
EYCK, Hubert van, Jan van, Lambert van, and their sister Margaret van, the founders of the Flemish school of painting, and the first to adopt the use of the so-called oil-colours were, it is supposed, originally from Eyck or Maeseyck in Limburg, and established themselves at Bruges, a circumstance that led many of their biographers to consider them as natives of that town—
Hubert Van Eyck was the eldest. He was born in 1366, and learned painting, according to some, from his father, or, according to others, from Meister Wilhelm of Cologne, or from Meister Stephen, the pupil of the latter. However this may be, Hubert, in his turn, became the instructor of his sister Margaret, and of his brother Jan; with their assistance he carried out almost all his works, and perfected the invention that was to create a new era in the art of painting. Now-a-days, there are but very few productions known as entirely or certainly his. Some writers mention a picture of "Our Lady," in the possession of an archduke of Austria, living about 1590. But of this work no traces are now to be found. There is a triptyc at Ghent; an "Adoration of the Magi," at Bruges; and a "Nursing Virgin," at Antwerp, which are attributed to him, but great doubts are entertained regarding their authenticity. What is received as almost beyond dispute is, that the upper part of the so-called "Adoration of the Lamb," which the brothers Hubert and Jan painted at Ghent in the church of St. John, for the chapel of the Vyd family, may fairly be considered as entirely by the hand of the eldest. It is the general belief, that of all the artists of the period Hubert possessed the greatest information on linear and aërial perspective. His portrait is introduced in the above-named "Adoration of the Lamb." He died at Ghent, September 18, 1426, and was buried in the vault belonging to the Vyd family. Hubert became a member of the brotherhood of Our Lady of Ghent in 1422.
Jan Van Eyck, the second brother—and through the report of Vasari, who calls him John of Bruges—the most celebrated of the family, was born about 1390-95, and was accordingly nearly thirty years younger than Hubert. There is no picture by John of an earlier date than 1420. Marcus van Vaernewyck, in his History of Belgium, says he died young; and it has been recently discovered that the statement of Vasari that John died in 1441, is correct. He died at Bruges in July of that year, and from the nature of the fees—twelve francs—paid at his funeral, which was of the humblest class, he seems to have died in poor circumstances. He was buried first in the churchyard of St. Donatus, but his body was removed to the interior of the church, March 21st, 1442, through the exertions of his brother Lambert. It is the name Van Eyck which led to the suggestion that this family was native of the small village of Limburg, now called Alden-Eyck. As the name existed in Ghent, and the family was settled in Bruges, it is more than probable that Flanders was the native country of these painters. John bought the lease of a house in Bruges in 1430, and this house was still occupied by his widow in 1443. The family continued to reside at Bruges after the death of Hubert. John van Eyck is supposed to be the "Master John," the Flemish painter, who accompanied the mission sent by the Duke Philip the Good to Portugal in 1428, to solicit the princess Isabella in marriage, which returned with the princess to Bruges, January 8, 1430. This date sufficiently corresponds with the above purchase of a house in Bruges. John van Eyck is commonly reported as the inventor of oil-painting, entirely through the representation of Vasari. The facts show that the inventor must have been Hubert van Eyck. The whole of the upper part of the "Adoration of the Lamb," at St. Bavon's, Ghent, was painted by Hubert. He was, therefore, complete master of the method; and at the date that Van Mander fixes for the discovery, 1410, John was but a boy. This famous altarpiece, a copy of which was exhibited at Manchester in 1857, was painted for Judocus Vyd, and was completed by John in 1432, six years after the death of Hubert. It was fixed up in the chapel on the 6th of May of that year. In the inscription on it, nearly the whole merit is given to Hubert:—
" Pictor Hubertus e Eyck, major quo nemo repertus,
Incepit; pondusque Johannes arte secundus
Frater perfecit, Judoci Vyd prece fretus
Vers V seXta MaI Vos CoLLoCat aCta tUerI:"
The last line being what is called a chronogram, and fixing the date. This picture is now dispersed; the two centre parts only remain in their original place. The National Gallery possesses a picture by John painted in this year, 1432, a portrait of admirable execution; and the very remarkable picture of a "Flemish Lady and Gentleman," which, from the inscription, "Johannes de Eyck fuit hic," appears to represent the painter and his wife, was painted only two years afterwards, 1434. This picture is as fine an example of the master as exists. It exhibits a perfect understanding of objective truth of representation, including a thorough appreciation of perspective. The gallery possesses another portrait of the year 1433. No other collection possesses three signed Van Eycks. As regards the method of the Van Eycks, it was not oil-painting, but was a mixture of oils with resins, and this is what Vasari describes it to be; still the common designation, oil-painting, is sufficient to distinguish it
