Although the exact date of the arrival of the two brothers in Basel is not known, there is evidence to show that they were busily at work there throughout the year 1515. Possibly it may have been their original intention to make a halt in that city of only some months’ duration; but they found it so profitable a field for their labours that they determined to remain there permanently. Basel, with its famous University, was at that time the home and refuge of many of the ablest thinkers and writers of the day, and it opened its gates freely to all whose advanced opinions made Germany and other parts of Europe undesirable as places of residence. Its many printing-presses were already celebrated, and the printers and publishers found constant employment both for learned scholars who edited for them new editions of the classics and the fathers of the Church, and for a large body of draughtsmen, designers, and wood-cutters who were engaged in illustrating their publications with portraits, pictures, title-pages, and innumerable initial letters and other ornaments. This well-paid and regular work which the city offered to all artists of ability was, no doubt, the real cause which induced the two brothers to become citizens of Basel. Among the earliest works produced there by Hans were two small heads of saints now in the Basel Gallery (Nos. 308, 309), apparently intended to represent the Virgin Mary and St. John the Evangelist. (Pl. 8).[96] The Virgin is wearing a crown, and her long straight hair falls upon her shoulders, as in the Rickenbach “Virgin and Child” of the previous year. The type of face, too, is the same as in that picture, and is seen again in the “Adam and Eve” picture of 1517. St. John is represented as a beardless young man with curly hair, and here again the head closely resembles that of the man in the “Adam and Eve.” Each has a large golden nimbus, which stands out against a plain pale-blue background. These small panels are pleasant in colour, and carefully painted, but otherwise afford few indications of the artist’s future greatness. They formed part of the Amerbach collection, and in the inventory are described as the young Holbein’s first works. (“Item einer heiligen iungen und iungfrawen köpflin mit patenen vf holz mit ölfarb klein H. Holbein erste arbeit.”) VOL. I., PLATE 8. [Illustration: THE VIRGIN MARY BASEL GALLERY ] [Illustration: ST. JOHN BASEL GALLERY ] [Sidenote: EARLY “PASSION” PICTURES IN BASEL]