The Dance of Death.

8 7

letters 0* this alphabet, but had not perceived on them

either the name of Lutzenberger, or the mark jfJV ; 3 but

M. de Mechel has not said that the mark was on the proofsheet, or on the letters themselves, but only the name of

Lutzenberger, adding that the \\ A on the cut of the

Duchess will throw some light on the matter, and thatHolbein, although this monogram has been usuallyascribed to him, never expressed his name by it, but

used for that purpose an JJ joined to a JJ ; in which

latter assertion M. de Mechel was by no means correct.

On another alphabet of a Dance of Peasants, in thepossession of the writer of these pages, and undoubtedly bythe same artists, M. de Mechel, to whom it was shownwhen in England, has written in pencil the following

memorandum : " H^ grave par Hans (John) Lutzenberger,

graveur en patrons a Basle, vivant la au commencement dui6me siecle;" but he has inadvertently transferred theremark to the wrong alphabet, though both were un-doubtedly the work of the same artist, as well as a thirdalphabet, equally beautiful, of groups of children.

The late Pietro Zani, whose intimate experience inwhatever relates to the art of engraving, together withthe vast number of prints that had passed under hisobservation, must entitle his opinions to the highest con-sideration, has stated, in more places than one in his" Enciclopedia Metodica," that Holbein had no concernwith the cuts of the Lyons Dance of Death, the engravingof which he decidedly ascribes to Hans Lutzenberger;and, without any reference to the inscription on the proofof one of the alphabets in the library at Basle before-mentioned, which he had probably neither seen nor heardof, mentions the copy of one of the alphabets which hehad seen at Dresden, and at once consigns it to Lutzen-berger. He promises to resume the subject at large in

2 Brulliot, Diet, de monogrammes, &c. Munich, 1817, 4J 0. p. 418,where the letter from De Mechel is given.