founded that new manner which his son carried to perfection. The features which we note in him are those of Wilhelm of Cologne, whose softness and well-rounded flesh-tints he contrived to imitate. The youngest Holbein copied his father. He had an uncle, also a painter, who was the feeblest of the three, and proves himself to be an artist of but limited genius. It is possible that painters existed in Augsburg before the time of the oldest Holbein ; but the noble character and the elegance which the latter gave to the Madonna, proves him to have studied Wilhelm of Cologne. In his composition and his groups, however, he was not unlike the later painter, Stephen. He exaggerated ornamentation, and was more red in colour than the painters of the Rhine. In the Gallery of Nuremberg may be seen a picture from his hand, signed "...S. HOLBAIN. 1." Another, in the Collection of the Moritz Kapelle, is dated 1499.2 A third, at Augsburg, represents the "Passion" on several small panels, and is dated 1496-99, and is signed "Hans Holbã." The feeble talent of his brother, the second Holbein, may be judged by a picture in the Augsburg Gallery, representing the history of Christ, and dated 1502.3 The rising talent of the son may be noted in the "Martyrdom of St. Sebastian," in the same gallery. When we see that it was painted by the artist at the age of seventeen, it appears to be a splendid proof of his precocious talent.

The painters of Westphalia were less known than those of Augsburg, and have left no name behind them; but

1 No. 184. Wood, Nuremberg Mus.

2 No. 126, Moritz Kapelle Catalogue.

3 Nos. 41, 42, 43, Augsburg Gallery Catalogue.

the oldest convents still preserve their traces in their halls and refectories. Amongst these, the monastery of Liesborn was the most remarkable for containing numerous early pictures, which Mr. Krüger purchased for his gallery at Minden. The painter's name, by general consent, is now the Master of Liesborn. He was a limpid, feeble, and unenergetic painter, immeasurably behind the Flemings in finish, and the artists of Cologne in firmness and vigour.1

The Swabian was another school, cotemporary with those of Wilhelm and Van Eyck, which left one painter only-Zeitbloom-to express its genius. Zeitbloom's pictures may be seen in Prussia. His "St. Peter" and "St. Anne," at Berlin, may be cited as examples,2 and will show that he kept the common level below Cologne and Belgium. The paintings of this master, in the Moritz Kapelle at Nuremberg, and those at Munich, prove him to have had, perhaps, a nobler mind and broader hand than his brethren of Westphalia; for his drapery was fine and flowing; but his paintings, like the rest, are unrelieved by chiaro-'scuro.

The influence of Flemish art is slight, however, in the School of Swabia, but impressed more strongly on that of Kalkar. In the sixteenth century, there arose a painter there whose name is taken from his native city, and who finished for his parish church an altar-piece of large dimensions. Kalkar's life was curious. His early style, exemplified by the altar-piece just mentioned, was founded

1 See the pictures of this master in our National Gallery, Nos. 254 to 261.

2 No. 561 A, Berlin Cat.; No. 561 B, ibid.

on the early school of Leyden, as expressed by Engelbrechtzen, but improved in some respects, and ennobled by a broader flow of lines-by a riper and more generous colour.

Kalkar went, somewhat later, into Italy, and proved himself a colourist. Vasari tells us that he painted subjects in the manner of Giorgione and Titian, and so like the style and handling of those masters that their pictures were frequently confounded. On this account, no doubt, the later efforts of this painter fail us; but his early style was imitated in the neighbouring town of Xanten, where curious traces of the study of the Flemings, and chiefly that of Memling, are found. "St. Anthony's Temptation," in the cathedral, may be mentioned as a proof how closely these semi-Flemish painters followed both the School of Bruges and that of Leyden. It is a curious point connected with this picture, that we find upon it the initials " A. W.," similar to those discovered on a panel once belonging to the Ader's Collection, and not unlike, in style, the "Adoration of the Magi” at the Pinakothek of Munich.1

The Flemish style of painting and composition, as impressed upon these lesser German schools at second-hand, and as much by the teaching of the later masters of Cologne as by that of the Flemings themselves, was directly stamped on Martin Schön, the pupil of Van der Weyden. The manner of Martin Schön may be judged in a panel now belonging to Mr. Baucousin, in Paris. The subject of this picture is a strange one-the "Burial of the

1 No. 45, Room 1, Munich Catalogue. Vide supra, pp. 279, 286.

Virgin;" but it serves to show how different is the impress made on men of talent by the master's teaching, from the vulgar stamp which marks the servile imitator. Van der Weyden's followers used his compositions, and debased his manner. Martin Schön improved it, gave it vigour, and laid the deep foundation of the later School of Nuremberg. The art of the Van Eycks leads up through Van der Weyden, and through Martin Schön, to Albert Dürer. It affected, through the School of Augsburg, the Noric painter Wohlgemuth.

The art of Belgium, which crept so slowly yet so surely into every part of Germany, invaded Spain-where legions of its painters, sculptors, architects, migrated to supplant or mingle with Italians. John Van Eyck had, doubtless, spread the desire of possessing pictures by his countrymen; but before his time, the early School of Florence had cast its roots and shed its flowers there. Gherardo di Jacopo Starnina, pupil of Antonio di Vinezia, and born at Florence in 1354, was the first to seek employment from the kings. of Spain. He enriched himself, and gained the favour of the Spanish court, and returned to Florence full of honours. But his pictures have since perished; and though the author of the book, entitled "Les Arts Italiens en Espagne," describes an altar-piece of his as still in the Escurial, no such work is found there now. The subject was the "Adoration of the Magi." Dello followed Starnina into Spain. He was a painter and a sculptor, and lived as late as 1455; but his pictures have been lost. He enriched himself at court, and returned to

1

1 Les Arts Italiens en Espagne, Rome, 1825.

Florence with a knighthood. But his stay in Italy was short. He quarrelled with the seigniory of his native city, returned to Spain, and died there. A single work of Dello is recorded in the book above referred to. It was signed "Dello Eques Florentinus," but cannot now be found. Another piece has perished also. It was a painted cloth, depicting the encounter of the Spaniards with the Moors at the battle of Higueruela. Having been found in Philip the Second's time, in the Tower of Segovia, it was copied by his order; and a fresco of it was produced by the Spanish painters, Fabricio and Granelio.' It may still be seen in the Hall of Battles at the Escurial; but it scarcely strikes us as a copy after Dello; it appears, indeed, to be the work of the later and baroque period of the seventeenth century.

Had we not historic proofs that Starnina and Dello were in Spain, it is scarcely credible how faint was their impression on the artists there; for Starnina was a glory of the School of Florence, and Dello no mean artist. But the only traces of Italian art now visible are to be found in the old cathedral of Salamanca, and in the chapel of St. Blas, in the cathedral of Toledo. The walls of the latter are covered internally with the frescoes of an ancient painter of the end of the fourteenth century. The chapel itself is one of the finest in the kingdom; and the subject which adorns it is the "Passion of our Saviour."

If Italian painters failed to leave distinct impressions, not so the Flemings; for they soon invaded and monopo

1 Quevedo, ut sup., p. 341.