fear from the rivalry of any foreigner at that time settled in London, and still less from the numerous English painters, who were of little importance and of mediocre abilities. Native talent, indeed, was at a very low ebb. The influence of the Italian revival of learning made itself felt in this country at an earlier date than that of the renaissance of the arts. No school of English painting was in existence capable of taking advantage of such influence, and of basing a new native art upon it. The English painters, indeed, were hardly painters at all in the modern sense. Many of them were mere house-painters and decorators; tradesmen occupied in various more or less artistic ways, but rarely, if ever, in the painting of pictures or portraits. They were painters of heraldic devices and shields, of banners and armour, of walls, ceilings, and ships, which can be definitely assigned to any one of them; even such third-rate productions as those preserved at Hampton Court, like “The Battle of Spurs,” or “The Field of the Cloth of Gold,” for generations attributed to Holbein, were probably not from the hand of an Englishman, but the work of foreigners. At the time of Holbein’s arrival in London, in the winter of 1526-1527, the leading English artist was John Browne, who was serjeant-painter to the King, an office he held for more than twenty years. He was appointed to the post on the 20th December 1511, in the third year of Henry’s reign, with an allowance of twopence a day out of the issues of the lordship of Whitley, in Surrey, and four ells of cloth at Christmas, annually, of the value of 6_s._ 8_d._ an ell, from the keeper of the great wardrobe, for his livery.[531] [Sidenote: JOHN BROWNE, SERJEANT-PAINTER] On the 24th September 1511 he received the balance of his bill for painting the streamers, banners, flags, and staves belonging to the King’s ship, _The Mary and John_, amounting to £16, 14_s._ 8_d._, and on the 17th December in the same year, £142, 4_s._ 6_d._ for painting and staining banners for _The Mary Rose_ and _The Peter Pounde Garnarde_ (Pomegranate).[532] Browne occasionally employed the services of Vincent Volpe, an Italian, for this banner-painting, and also from time to time supplied the materials for the royal revels. Thus, for the jousts on the 1st June 1512, “2,100 of party gold” for surcoats was bought from him for £2, 6_s._, and in the following year he received 10_d._ for the hire of sails “to shadow the percloos for the pageant.”[533] In June 1513 he received £4, 8_s._ 8_d._ from the royal purse for painting “divers of the Pope’s arms in divers colours,” and on the 10th April in the following year he rendered an account for work done on the King’s royal ship, the _Great Harry_ or _Henry Grace à Dieu_, which included the supply of flags, banners, and streamers, two of them with crosses of St. George, and painting sixty staves in the King’s colours in oil at 6_d._ apiece.[534]