The name of Holbein has been so strongly interwoven with the Dance of Death that the latter is seldom mentioned without bringing to recollection that extraordinary artist. It would be a great waste of time and words to dwell specifically on the numerous errors of such writers as Papillon, Fournier, and several others, who have inadvertently connected Holbein with the Macaber Dance, or to correct those of travellers who have spoken of the subject as it appeared in any shape in the city of Basle. The opinions of those who have either supposed or stated that Holbein even retouched or repaired the old painting at Basle, are entitled to no credit whatever, unaccompanied as they are by necessary proofs. The names of the artists who were employed on that painting have been already adverted to, and are sufficiently detailed in the volumes of Merian and Peignot; and it is therefore unnecessary to repeat them. Evidence, but of a very slight and unsatisfactory nature, has been adduced that Holbein painted some kind of a Death's Dance on the walls of a house at Basle. Whether this was only a copy of the old Macaber subject, or some other of his own invention, cannot now be ascertained. Bishop Burnet, in his letters from Switzerland,[91] states that "there is a _Dance_ which he painted on the walls of a house where he used to drink; yet so worn out that very little is now to be seen, except _shapes and postures_, but these shew the exquisiteness of the hand." It is much to be regretted that this painting was not in a state to have enabled the bishop to have been more particular in his description. He then mentions the older Dance, which he places "along the side of the convent of the Augustinians (meaning the Dominicans), now the French church, so worn out some time ago that they ordered the best painter they had to lay new colour on it, but this is so ill done, that one had rather see the dark shadow of Holbein's pencil than this coarse work." Here he speaks obscurely, and adopts the error that Holbein had some hand in it.