Ruskin has described this portrait for us in words so eloquent and so glowing (Cornhill Magazine, March, 1860) that no excuse is needed for quoting a sentence or two here: “Every accessory is perfect with a fine perfection: the carnations in the glass vase by his side; the ball of gold, chased with blue enamel, suspended on the wall; the books, the steelyard, the papers on the table, the seal-ring with its quartered bearings—all intensely there, and there in beauty of which no one could have dreamed that even flowers or gold were capable, far less parchment or steel. But every change of shade is felt, every rich and rubied line of petal followed, every subdued gleam in the soft blue of the enamel and bending of the gold touched with a hand whose patience of regard creates rather than paints. The jewel itself was not so precious as the rays of enduring light which form it, beneath that errorless hand. The man himself what he was—not more; but to all conceivable proof of sight, in all aspect of life or thought—not less. He sits alone in his accustomed room, his common work laid out before him; he is conscious of no presence, assumes no dignity, bears no sudden or superficial look of care or interest, lives only as he lived—but for ever. It is inexhaustible. Every detail of it wins, retains, rewards the attention with a continually increasing sense of wonderfulness. It is also wholly true. So far as it reaches, it contains the absolute facts of colour, form, and character, rendered with an unaccusable faithfulness.”
According to Dr. Woltmann, Gisze belonged to a family residing in the neighbourhood of Basle, and even to-day, in the small adjacent town of Liestall, the name, in the form of Gysin, is to be seen over many houses. Even on the picture it is spelt in more ways than one. Miss Hervey considers it to be a variation of the surname Gueiss, one of the most distinguished in the annals of the Steelyard, and well known in Cologne. Georg Gisze was deputy Alderman of the Steelyard in 1533.
Shortly after the death of Queen Jane Seymour, in October, 1537, the Privy Council began to urge the King to marry again. The lady chosen was Christina, niece of the Emperor Charles V., daughter of the King of Denmark, and the young widow of Francesco Maria Sforza, last Duke of Milan, whom she married in 1534, when she was only eleven. He died in the following year, and in 1538 she was residing in Brussels at the Court of her aunt, the Regent of the Netherlands. Holbein, as “a man very excellent in taking phisanymies,” was sent over to paint her portrait, and arrived there on March 10, accompanied by Sir Philip Hobby. A long letter to Cromwell from John Hutton, English Envoy to Flanders, gives us full details of this expedition. The lady’s portrait had just been painted by some local artist, and despatched to Cromwell, on the eve of Holbein’s arrival. When Hutton, however, saw the likeness which the latter produced in the space of three hours, which he considered “very perffight,” he sent a messenger in haste to stay the delivery of the other, telling Cromwell that it was but “sloberid” in comparison. Holbein probably made one of his usual black-and-white crayon studies touched with colour, and from this, after his return to London, painted the full-length portrait belonging to the Duke of Norfolk, which he has lent so generously for a number of years to the National Gallery.
Christina stands, almost the size of life, facing the spectator, dressed in “mourning aparel after the manner of Italy”—a black satin gown, and over it a long black cloak lined with yellow sable. A black hood covers her hair and part of her forehead, and a ruby ring is her only ornament. You cannot call her very beautiful, but her expression is fascinating in the highest degree. It is painted with the utmost simplicity and directness, and yet is stamped with real grandeur of style in every delicate stroke of the brush. Her slender form (“She is of taller stature than either of us,” wrote the Ambassadors Wriothesley and Vaughan) is admirably rendered, and Holbein, in the spirit of a true artist, has chosen to depict her in all the severity of her widow’s weeds, rather than in the bravery of the Brussels court lady, thus giving an added effect to her sweet childish countenance, which is modelled in the most masterly fashion. Her dark eyes, from under fair eyebrows, seem to admit one to her most secret thoughts, and the red lips are full of expression. The flesh tints are unusually transparent, and a faint rosy glow of health just flushes her cheeks. “She is not so white as the late Queen,” says Hutton, “but she hath a singular good countenance, and when she chanceth to smile there appeareth two pits in her cheeks and one in her chin, the which becomith her excellently well. She is higher than the Regent, a goodly personage of body and competent of beauty, of favour excellent, soft of speech, and very gentle in countenance.” It is an exquisite portrait, and one of the most precious in the country.
For some reason, probably the Papal excommunication of Henry, the Emperor suddenly became hostile to this alliance, and the negotiations were broken off. She herself seems to have been not unwilling to become an English Queen. Sir Thomas Wyatt reported that she was somewhat flighty, but Hutton, on the other hand, mentions “her honest countenance, and the few words she wisely spoke.” The popular tradition runs that she sent a respectfully sarcastic refusal to Henry, saying that “she had but one head; if she had two, one of them should be at His Majesty’s service.” She married Francis, Duke of Lorraine and Bar, in 1541.
One of the best of Holbein’s portraits of English commoners is that of Robert Cheseman in the Hague Gallery, which was formerly in the royal collections of England. With his usual directness and faultless mastery of handling, he has given us here another example of exact portraiture, illuminated by a deep insight into
