The Dance of Death,

103

Foppens 7 has mentioned an Antony Silvius, a schoolmasterat Antwerp, in 1565, and several other members of thisfamily. Two belonging to it were engravers, and anothera writing master.

Whether the artist in question was a Sallaerts 01 aSilvius, it is certain that Plantin, the celebrated printer,employed him to decorate several of his volumes, and itis to be regretted that an unsuccessful search has beenmade for him in Plantin's account-books, that were notlong since preserved, with many articles belonging tohim, in his house at Antwerp. His mark also appearsin several books printed in England during the reign ofElizabeth, and particularly on a beautiful set of initialletters, some of which contain the story of Cupid andPsyche, from the supposed designs by Raphael, and othersubjects from Ovid's Metamorphoses : these have been

counterfeited, and perhaps in England. The initial Q,

in this alphabet, with the subject of Leda and the swan,was inadvertently prefixed to the sacred name at thebeginning of St. Paul's Epistle to the Hebrews in theBishop's Bible, printed by Rd. Jugge in 1572, and in oneof his Common Prayer-books. An elegant portrait of

Edward VI. with the mark A~* is likewise on Jugge's

edition of the New Testament, 1552, 4to.; and there isreason to believe that Jugge employed this artist, as thesame monogram appears on a cut of his device of thepelican.

VI. In the German volume, the title of which is alreadygiven in the first article of the engravings from the Baslepainting, 8 there are twenty-nine subjects belonging to thepresent work; the rest relating to the Basle dance, excepttwo or three that are not in either of them. These havefallen into the hands of a modern bookseller, but therecan be no doubt that there were other editions which con-tained the whole set. The most of them have the letters

G. S. w ^ n tne g ravm g tool, and one has the date 1576.

The name of this artist is unknown ; but M. Bartsch hai7 Biblioth. Belgica, L 92. 8 See p. 34.