There is no doubt that during the summer of 1526, in spite of his reputation as a painter, he found it increasingly difficult to gain a living, and that, in consequence, he made up his mind to seek his fortunes in some other country, and finally decided to visit England. In those early days of the Reformation in Switzerland, when the ecclesiastical disputes were assuming so acute a form, and risings of the peasants and other violent disturbances were growing common, there was very little opportunity for artists to find remunerative employment, and Holbein suffered with the rest. The town authorities had no time for considering such important public works as the completion of the Town Hall decorations, and all that they could find for him to do was an ill-paid job or two at long intervals, such as the one already mentioned,[525] which in happier times would have been hardly worth his attention. Basel, indeed, no longer offered a means of livelihood to a painter with a wife, a stepson, and two children of his own to keep. Throughout this year, too, the plague was raging in the city, and this may have proved the last straw which definitely turned his thoughts in the direction of England. Numerous legends have grown up around this journey of his, which for the most part have no foundation in fact. The commonest, first voiced by Van Mander, is to the effect that the Earl of Arundel, when passing through Basel on his way home from Italy some years previously, was so delighted with Holbein’s work that he urged him to try his fortunes in England. Later on, when Holbein had taken his advice, he was asked by Sir Thomas More, who it was who had suggested this course to him. Holbein replied that he had forgotten the nobleman’s name, but, taking up a piece of charcoal, he rapidly sketched a face, which the Chancellor instantly recognised. Another version gives the Earl of Surrey as Holbein’s adviser; but the tale is a pure legend, and has been told of more than one painter.