THE DUCHESS OF BERRY _Drawing in black and coloured chalks_ BASEL GALLERY ] After Holbein’s return to Switzerland from England in 1528 he painted Erasmus again. A number of versions of this third type exist, of which the finest are the small Greystoke portrait, which in 1909 passed into the collection of the late Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan, and the small roundel in the Basel Gallery. One of the versions, in the Parma Gallery, bears the date 1530. Erasmus had retired to Freiburg with Amerbach in 1528 in order to avoid the iconoclastic disturbances in Basel, and he must have given Holbein a sitting, most probably in that town, between 1528 and 1530. These later portraits closely follow the Longford Castle type as regards the pose and the position of the head, three-quarters face to the spectator’s left, and the details of the dress; but the sitter appears considerably older, and in every instance the background is a plain one. [Sidenote: THE GREYSTOKE PORTRAIT OF ERASMUS] The Greystoke picture[406] has every appearance of being a work from Holbein’s own brush. The masterly modelling, the fine and subtle draughtsmanship, the wonderful expression of the mouth and the still keen and brilliant eyes, are too good and too true to life to be the work of a mere copyist. The cheeks are more sunken and the face more heavily lined than in the portraits of 1523. The eyebrows are still dark, but the hair which straggles from below the black cap is white, and is drawn with all the minute care and delicacy with which Holbein always portrayed it in his portraits, and the stubble of a beard of a few days’ growth is also indicated with the touch of a master. The hands, resting on a narrow ledge in front of him, and half concealed by the deep fur cuffs of his gown, are not so good, and are much less expressive than was usual with Holbein. The picture is in a fine state of preservation, and the colour scheme is rich and harmonious, though the plain blue background has turned to a greenish hue in the course of time. Upon it, to the left of the head, is a small white label, with the inscription, “Erasmus Roterodamus,” which appears to be fastened to the wall with red wafers and a pin, like the label in the portrait of the Duchess of Milan. According to Sir Sidney Colvin,[407] both labels were probably the work of the same hand, and are of later date than the paintings. He suggests that the inscription on the “Erasmus” portrait was added to it when it was in the Arundel Collection. On the back of the panel is an interesting inscription, written, according to the same authority, in a hand of not later date than 1530-50. It runs as follows:— “Haunce Holbein me fecit Johanne[s] Noryce me dedit Edwardus Banyster me possidit.”