Among such masters in their various arts the youthful Holbein moved, and it must have been from personal intercourse with them that he gained his first knowledge of design, and how it should be rightfully applied to the service of the several decorative arts, and how best modified to suit the nature of the materials used in each particular handicraft; and that he made the most of his opportunities is proved by the fact that when, a few years later, he started upon an independent career in Basel, the first works he produced show him to have been even at that early age an almost complete master of decorative design. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER III FIRST YEARS IN SWITZERLAND Departure of Hans and Ambrosius from Basel—The “Virgin and Child” of 1514—The painted Table at Zürich—Their arrival in Basel—Heads of the Virgin and St. John—The “Cross-Bearing” at Karlsruhe—The five scenes from “Christ’s Passion” at Basel—Work for the Basel printers—Holbein’s first title-page—The marginal drawings to Erasmus’ “Praise of Folly”—The share of Ambrosius in these illustrations—The legend of the painter’s intemperance—The Schoolmaster’s Sign-Board—Double portrait of Jakob Meyer and his wife—The “Adam and Eve.” THE fortunes of the Holbein family, never very brilliant, having become still more precarious, if existing records are to be believed, the two sons, now approaching manhood, resolved to seek employment farther afield. Possibly in 1513, but more probably in the spring of 1514, they turned their backs on Augsburg and set out for Switzerland. Whether Basel was their objective from the beginning or whether they arrived there more or less by chance, in the course of their wander-year, and finding work plentiful, resolved to make it their headquarters, there is no actual proof to show; but their uncle, Sigmund, had been settled in Switzerland for some years,[92] and had established himself in good practice in Berne, and this fact may have had something to do with the resolve of the younger Holbeins to turn their faces in that direction. The discovery of a little picture of the “Virgin and Child,” dated 1514, in a small village near Constance, which is attributed to Hans, affords some evidence that their departure from Augsburg took place in that year; that they had reached Basel some time in the spring or early summer of 1515 is proved by the existence of more than one authentic work by the younger brother bearing that date. Not long afterwards the father himself left Augsburg for Isenheim, near Gebweiler, in Alsace, at no great distance from Basel, and, so far as is known, never returned to his native city, so that the old home was finally broken up. [Sidenote: THE “VIRGIN AND CHILD” OF 1514]