It is almost needless to advert to M. Nieuhoff Piccard's mistake in asserting that Holbein made the engravings which he copied; but it would have been of some importance if, instead of his pious ejaculations, he had described all the subjects that Holbein painted on the walls of the galleries at Whitehall. He must have used some edition of the wood-cuts posterior to that of 1545, which did not contain the subjects of the German soldier, the fool, and the blind man, all of which he has introduced. It is possible, however, that he has given us all the subjects that were then remaining, the rest having become decayed or obliterated from dampness and neglect, and even those which then existed would soon afterwards perish when the remains of the old palace were removed. His copies are by no means faithful, and seem to be rather the production of an amateur than of a regular artist. For his greater convenience, he appears to have preferred using the wood engravings instead of the paintings; and it is greatly to be regretted that we have no better or further account of them, especially of the time at which they were executed. The lives of Holbein that we possess are uniformly defective in chronological arrangement. There seems to be a doubt whether the Earl of Arundel recommended him to visit England; but certain it is that in the year 1526 he came to London with a letter of that date addressed by Erasmus to Sir Thomas More, accompanied with his portrait, with which More was so well satisfied that he retained him at his house at Chelsea upwards of two years, until Henry VIII. from admiration of his works, appointed him his painter, with apartments at Whitehall. In 1529 he visited Basle, but returned to England in 1530. In 1535 he drew the portrait of his friend Nicholas Bourbon or Borbonius at London, probably the before-mentioned crayon drawing at Buckingham House, or some duplicate of it. In 1538 he painted the portrait of Sir Richard Southwell, a privy counsellor to Henry VIII. which was afterwards in the gallery of the Grand Duke of Tuscany.[128] About this time the magistrates of the city of Basle settled an annuity on him, but conditionally that he should return in two years to his native place and family, with which terms he certainly did not comply, preferring to remain in England. In the last-mentioned year he was sent by the king into Burgundy to paint the portrait of the Duchess of Milan, and in 1539 to Germany to paint that of Anne of Cleves. In some household accounts of Henry VIII. there are payments to him in 1538, 1539, 1540, and 1541, on account of his salary, which appears to have been thirty pounds per annum.[129] From this time little more is recorded of him till 1553, when he painted Queen Mary's portrait, and shortly afterwards died of the plague in London in 1554.