is particularly to be noticed in the heavy-lidded, slightly-protruding eyes, much more pronounced in the later picture, while the general shape of the head and form of the features are alike in both. The likeness, however, is not so striking as to make it absolutely certain that in the Hague picture we have a portrait of Holbein’s bride. The work is without inscription. She is represented seated, with her crossed hands resting upon her white apron. Her hair is completely covered by a white gauze veil which is carried under the chin, and her gown, edged and lined with fur, is open at the front, showing the plain white, high-necked bodice below. Whether by Holbein or not—and it is difficult to see who else could have painted it—this picture has great charm. A recent writer[241] speaks of this picture as leaving a vivid and permanent impression on the spectator, by reason of the luminous freshness of its colour, the delicate perfume of its purity, and the exquisite, limpid sweetness which exhales from it as from a white rose under a blue sky in spring-time. In the Louvre there is a silver-point drawing, touched with Indian ink and red crayon, of the head and shoulders of a young woman (Pl. 38),[242] which bears considerable likeness both to the Solothurn Madonna and to the portrait of 1528-9. She is represented almost full face, with eyes cast down, and her straight hair falling in two large plaits down her back. She wears a necklace with a pendant circular medallion with the Cross of St. Anthony, and across the border of her bodice, which is cut low and straight, runs the device “ALS.IN.ERN.ALS.IN ...” (“In All Honour”).[243] The same heavily-lidded eyes, prominent nose, well-chiselled mouth with its full lips, double chin, and slope of the shoulders, occur both in this drawing and in the Solothurn altar-piece, and are even more strongly marked in the later portrait-group, though in this earlier study the features as yet bear few traces of the trials and experiences of life, but still retain much of their youthful bloom and freshness, and gain a certain beauty from the happy smile which lights them up. VOL. I., PLATE 38. [Illustration: HEAD OF A YOUNG WOMAN (Probably Holbein’s wife) Study for the Solothurn “Madonna” _Silver-point drawing, touched with red_ LOUVRE, PARIS ] [Sidenote: THE “SOLOTHURN MADONNA”]