A Sottobosco with Mushrooms, Butterflies, a Dragonfly, a Snake and a Lizard

A dark forest floor with a central stand of mushrooms — a large pale gray-capped mushroom rising at center, with a smaller reddish-brown cap tucked beside it and a toppled mushroom lying on its side at its base. Three butterflies hover around the scene: a pale cream butterfly at upper right, another at middle left, and a red admiral with its distinctive black, white, and orange patterning resting on the smaller mushroom cap. A tiny blue-and-red dragonfly floats at left. A green lizard with a curled tail stretches across the moss at the base of the composition, and a dark snake emerges from the shadows at the lower left corner, its small head lifted. Two delicate pink cyclamen flowers grow at center. The moss is rendered in textured gold and green — Marseus is known to have pressed real moss directly into his wet paint.