hand; and the smaller portrait of Francis I, also at Hampton Court, is either by, or a copy after, the same painter. These circumstances would point to a possible French origin, and lend some colour to the ascription of the portrait either to “Sotto” Cleef, who worked in France before coming to England, or to Jean Clouet—more probably the latter, who may very well have been in attendance on Francis I at the Field of the Cloth of Gold.”[235] It is difficult, however, to follow these writers in their conclusion that the portrait of Eleonora, almost certainly by the elder Clouet, and the portrait of Henry VIII are by the same hand, while the fact that in all the earlier portraits of the King he is shown with long hair, cut straight across the forehead, and no beard, makes it still more difficult to accept the date as that of the meeting of the two monarchs in France, unless much stronger evidence as to its French origin be forthcoming. It is not safe to go farther than to ascribe it to a Franco-Flemish origin. It should be noted in passing that a small point in favour of those who see in it a work by an Italian hand lies in the scroll or cartellino, a feature not often met with in French or English portraits of that time. Footnote 234: Stow’s _Annales_. Footnote 235: _Burlington Fine Arts Club Exhibition Catalogue_, p.bv 81. [Sidenote: “HENRY VIII WITH A SCROLL”] On the back of the panel is branded Charles I’s cypher, and there is also a slip of paper on which is inscribed in contemporary handwriting, “Changed with my Lord Arundel, 1624.” In Charles’ catalogue, compiled in 1639, it is entered as “King Henry VIII when he was young, with a white scroll of parchment in his hand; the picture being to the shoulders; half a figure so big as the life, in a carved gilded frame. Length 4 ft. 0. A Whitehall piece, said to be done by Jennet or Sotto Cleve.” It is possibly the picture in the Commonwealth inventory—“King Henry y^e 8^{th} by Gennett,” which was “sold to M^{r.} Baggeley y^e 23^{rd} Oct. 1651 for £25.” It may also be the “Table with the picture of King Henry VIII, then being young,” in Edward VI’s catalogue. An early and interesting copy of this picture, on canvas, 28¾ in. × 22¼ in., is in the possession of the Merchant Taylors’ Company, which was in the Tudor Exhibition, 1890 (No. 120), and the Burlington Club Exhibition, 1909 (No. 24). In the catalogue of the former exhibition it was attributed to Paris Bordone. It was presented to the Company in 1616 by Mr. John Vernon. There is a third version of the picture in the Marquis of Exeter’s collection at Burleigh House, in which the same Latin verse is inscribed on the scroll. Dr. Waagen says that “it is very carefully painted in a brownish tone.”[236] Footnote 236: Waagen, _Treasures of Art_, &c., iii. p. 407.