In this document the name of the painter, “Holben,” is given; it is inserted between the lines, but is in the same hand and of the same date as the writing which surrounds it. The portion at the head of the memorandum between brackets is by another hand. It is interesting to note that not only is the name of the painter given but that in the seventeenth century Holbein’s work was considered, both by painters and amateurs, to be the finest picture then in France. There is in the Godefroy collection a second paper, a copy, dated 1654, of a memorandum drawn up by Camusat, in which there is further reference to the picture. It need not be quoted here, but it speaks of the figures as life-size, and concludes by saying that “the piece is esteemed the richest and best wrought that is to be found in France.”[81] Footnote 81: See Miss Hervey, _Holbein’s Ambassadors_, p. 18 _et seq._, where both documents are reproduced in facsimile. Thus the identity of Holbein’s sitters is irrefutably established, and the picture’s history can now be traced almost without a break. Dinteville, who had already been in England on a short mission in 1531, reached London at the beginning of February 1533, and was lodged in the royal palace of Bridewell, by the Thames. The exact date of George de Selve’s visit to him is not known, but it was between February and Easter in that year; he was back in France before the end of May. There appears to have been some secrecy in connection with the latter’s journey to England, for though he had the permission of Francis I, for some reason Montmorency, the Grand Master, was, if possible, to be kept in ignorance of it. In a letter, dated 23rd May, to his brother, the Bishop of Auxerre, Dinteville says: “Monsr. de Lavor m’a fait cest honneur que de me venir veoir, qui ne m’a esté petit plaisir. Il n’est point de besoing que Mr. le grant maistre en entende rien.”[82] Footnote 82: From a letter in the Dupuy Collection, Paris, Bibl. Nat., vol. 726, f. 46, quoted by Miss Hervey, p. 80. [Sidenote: JEAN DE DINTEVILLE AND HOLBEIN]