Among these designs for painted glass there is a considerable group in which the mercenary soldier or landsknecht of Holbein’s day forms the chief subject. These warriors are introduced as heraldic supporters of shields, and were intended, no doubt, for the use of burghers and nobles who had seen military service, while others were designed for the city authorities. The fact that in most cases the shields are left blank shows that Holbein produced them as stock patterns for the glass-painters, which could be adapted to the use of any customer who desired a military subject for his window. In these designs Holbein has made effective use of the picturesque and sumptuous dress and richly-decorated weapons these bold and reckless fighting-men affected. One of the earliest of them in point of date is in the Historical Museum of Berne.[311] It is, unfortunately, only the lower half of a design, of which the remaining portion is now lost. Only the legs, the lower part of the body, and the left hand, with which the landsknecht grasps his sword, are seen, together with part of the shaft of his lance. His right foot is hidden by a large shield containing the coat of arms of the city of Basel. The bases of the columns on either side very closely resemble those in the glass design of the “Prodigal Son,” which places the date at about 1520. The soldier is represented as standing on a platform above the river Rhine, and down below, seen between and on either side of his outstretched legs, is a distant landscape, drawn in a free and masterly manner, of exceptional interest on account of its elaborate detail. Across the rapidly-flowing river stretches a wide tressel bridge supported on wooden piers, which leads to an arched gateway in a high tower. Along the river bank, on either side of the bridge, are a number of houses, and behind them a town within steep fortified walls, with many buildings huddled together, and a church tower rising above the surrounding roofs. In the distance ranges of snow mountains close in the view. Trees and a high rock on the near side of the water fill the background on the left-hand side of the design. The view Holbein has thus shown is by no means an exact representation of Basel as seen from across the water, but is rather the simplified type of a Rhine town of his day. It is not improbable that the artist, in addition to the wall-paintings in the new Town Hall, also supplied designs for the windows in some of the rooms, in which case this fragment of a drawing, which contains the city coat of arms, may very possibly have formed a part of such decoration.[312]