***" •

________

8 4

The Dance of Death.

publishers of the designs, with whom he was intimatelyconnected, for the commendatory verses.

The booksellers Frellon of Lyons, by some means withwhich we are not now acquainted, or indeed ever likely tobe, became possessed of the copyright to these designs forthe Old Testament. It is very clear that they had previouslybeen in possession of those for the Dance of Death, and,finding the first four of them equally adapted to a Bible,they accordingly, and for the purpose of saving expense,made use of them in this Bible, though with differentdescriptions, having, in all probability, employed the sameengraver on wood as in the Dance of Death, a task towhich he had already demonstrated himself to be fullycompetent. Now, if the Frellons had regarded Holbeinas the designer of the " Simulachres et historiees faces dela Mort," would they not rather have introduced intothat work the complimentary lines of Borbonius on somepainting by Holbein of a Dance of Death, and whichwill be hereafter more particularly adverted to, insteadof inserting the very interesting and decisive dedicationthat has so emphatically referred to the then deceasedpainter of the above admirable composition 1

Nor is it by any means a matter of certainty thatHolbein was the designer of all the wood engravingsbelonging to the Bible in question. Whoever may takethe pains to examine these biblical subjects with a strictand critical eye, will not only discover a very greatdifference in the style and drawing of them, but likewisea striking resemblance, in that respect, of several of themto those in the Dance of Death, as well as in the mannerof engraving. The rest are in a bolder and broader style,in a careless but effective manner, corresponding altogetherwith such designs as are well ascertained to be Holbein's,and of which* it would be impossible to produce a singleone, that in point of delicacy of outline, or composition,accords with those in the Dance ; l and the judgment of

1 The few engravings by or after Holbein that have his name or itsinitials are to be found in his early frontispieces or vignettes to booksprinted at Basle. In 1548, two delicate wood-cuts, with his name, occurin Crammer's Catechism. In the title-page to " a lytle treatise after