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Exploring the Variety of Random
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pointed to with any certainty—the portrait-group of his wife and two
elder children. This, and the remaining wall-paintings in the Council
Chamber of the Town Hall, are the only works of importance of
which we have any record.
The portrait of his wife and his two elder
PORTRAIT OF HIS
WIFE AND children, Philip and Katherine, in the Basel Gallery
CHILDREN (No. 325) (Pl. 90),[783] was, no doubt, one of the
first things he undertook after his arrival. In any case, it was painted
in 1528 or 1529. It is in oils on four pieces of paper fastened
together, and at some subsequent time has been cut out round the
figures and mounted on a panel, thus spoiling the delicacy of the
outlines. The figures are life-size, and the wife, who is seated, facing
the spectator, is shown at almost three-quarters length. She wears a
dark green bodice without ornament, cut very low and straight
across the breast, and a dark-brown over-garment trimmed with a
thin band of fur. Her light brown hair is covered by a transparent veil
which comes low over her forehead, and a small brown cap on the
back of her head. On her left knee she supports a red-haired baby,
about eighteen months old, born during Holbein’s absence, dressed
in a cap and an undyed woollen garment, while her right hand rests
on the shoulder of a boy of about six or seven, with long fair hair,
wearing a dark blue-green dress above which the white collar of his
shirt is visible. The lad, who is shown in profile, is looking upwards
to the right, and presses against his mother’s knee. His head and
shoulders only are shown.
The picture is dated, but in the cutting out process it underwent
prior to its fastening upon the wood panel, which was done before
1586, as is to be gathered from the Amerbach inventory, the last
figure has been shorn away, and only “152” remains. It is almost
certain that this date was 1528 or 1529, probably the former, for
Holbein, once more united with his wife and family, would be likely
to give expression to his pleasure by painting their portraits. In the
greater energy of its conception and the vigour of its treatment it
more closely resembles the portraits painted in England than his
earlier Basel work.
Vol. I., Plate 90.
 HOLBEIN’S WIFE AND CHILDREN
1528-9
Basel Gallery

PORTRAIT OF HIS
There are other versions of this picture in
WIFE AND existence, among them a good late sixteenth-
CHILDREN century copy in the Lille Museum,[784] which has a
blue background. Like the Basel example, it is on paper pasted upon
wood, but it has not been cut out round the outlines, while on a
piece of paper added to the top of the panel there is an inscription in
gold, which runs—
“Die Liebe zu Gott heist Charitas,
Wer Liebe hatt der tragtt kein hass,”

thus turning it into a representation of Charity. A second[785]

example, though a work of no particular skill, is of interest because
it gives what was probably the background of the original work
before it was cut down, one of those architectural compositions with
pilasters and an ornamental frieze which Holbein so frequently used
as a setting for his earlier portraits, part of which forms a high-
backed seat in which the wife is placed. This copy, which belongs to
Herr E. Trümpy, of Glarus, shows some small differences, in the
boy’s hair, the folds of the draperies, &c., but it has suffered so much
that it is difficult to pass judgment upon it. It must have been
painted before the original work was cut down towards the end of
the sixteenth century. That the picture represents the painter’s wife
and children is certain, for it was in the possession of Amerbach,
whose son entered it in his inventory as “Holbeins fraw vnd zwei
kinder von im H. Holbein conterfehet vf papir mit olfarben, vf holtz
gezogen.”
This picture is painted with greater breadth and freedom than was
his custom. The delicacy of handling which marked almost all that he
did has given place to a more rapid but none the less truthful
execution. The baby is by no means a beautiful child, and the
mother’s plainness of countenance is almost repulsive at the first
glance. Her expression is one of deep dejection, her face careworn
and unhappy, and her eyes are rimmed with red, suggesting ill-
health or sorrow. The grouping is unconventional, and it may be that
the artist began to paint them just as he happened to see them,
without any elaborate posing or attempt to make a picture of them.
The wonderful truth with which he has realised them, however, the
fine rich colour, and the luminous painting of the flesh tones,
combine to make it one of his greatest works, in the study and
appreciation of which the want of physical beauty in the principal
sitter and the severe plainness of the costumes are overlooked and
forgotten. Though only six years later than the Solothurn Madonna
and the portrait at the Hague, Elsbeth Holbein has already lost all
appearance of youth, and the cares of life have left heavy traces
behind them. Her features are now not merely homely, but heavy
and uninteresting, while her figure is solid, ample, and ungraceful.
Yet it is still possible to recognise the likeness, no doubt somewhat
idealised in the earlier work, but here set down with remorseless
truth. The cause of this loss of youth and good looks, due, according
to some modern critics, to Holbein’s neglect and his infatuation for
Magdalena Offenburg, has been touched upon in an earlier chapter.
M. de Wyzewa, who is one of those who hold this theory, regards
this Basel family group as one of the few pictures in which Holbein
completely reveals his artistic soul. “I doubt,” he says,[786] “if there
exists in the world another painting comparable to this for subtle and
dolorous beauty of expression.” In its revelation of truth it is an act
of accusation against the painter himself, such as is not to be found
in any written account of him by his contemporaries, who, it is
suggested, influenced by his importance as an artist and by his
connection with big and influential people, did not think it wise to
speak the truth about him. It was Magdalena who was the chief
cause of this domestic misery, we are told. She was “l’odieuse rivale
qui l’a dépouillée de sa beauté et de son bonheur, et de toute sa
fortune par-dessus le marché, qui a réduit l’exquise jeune femme du
portrait de la Haye à devenir le fantôme navrant du portrait de Bâle;
voilà peut-être le grief qui aura pesé le plus cruellement sur le cœur
ulcéré d’Elisabeth Holbein! Et qui sait si ce remords-là ne s’est point
dressé au premier plan dans l’âme du peintre lui-même, lorsqu’en
1529 celui-ci a éprouvé le besoin de nous crier sa confession de mari
et de père, en même temps qu’il allait nous révéler la puissante,
l’émouvante grandeur de son génie d’artiste?”
The boy in the picture, who appears to be six or seven years old,
may well have been the model for the Infant Christ in the Solothurn
Madonna. The group has been painted with a speed and spontaneity
which is not usual in Holbein’s portraits, with their minute finish and
careful elaboration of details. This unwonted vigour of handling,
however, gives to it a freedom and a largeness which make it unique
among the varied manifestations of his genius. It has many of the
qualities of a brilliant sketch, in which both likeness and character
have been set down with direct and masterly power.

Vol. I., Plate 91.

 PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG WOMAN
Unfinished study in oils
Basel Gallery

A very remarkable portrait study of a young woman in the Basel

Gallery (No. 326) (Pl. 91),[787] which comes from the Faesch Cabinet,
bears a close resemblance to the Family Group, and is ascribed by
Dr. Ganz to the same year, 1528, to which it undoubtedly belongs.
The subject, evidently a woman of Holbein’s own class, is extremely
plain, with heavy features, and dark eyes and hair. She is
represented to the waist, turned slightly to the spectator’s left, her
long hands, with numerous rings, crossed in front of her. It is drawn
with the pencil, and coloured with oil colours thinly laid on and
mixed with white upon a red-toned ground. The background is a
plain, deep blue. It is unfinished, the turban-like cap, and the outer
bodice of the dress having the colour only slightly indicated. It is of
the utmost interest, as it affords evidence of Holbein’s methods of
working at this period, methods which he employed in painting his
wife and children, also done in oils on paper; and it is, in addition, a
wonderfully powerful study in portraiture, lifelike, vigorous, and
subtle.

RESUMES WORK IN
Little is known of Holbein’s work in Basel during
COUNCIL CHAMBER this period. No other portrait from his brush has
been so far discovered; but, happily for him, in
the summer of 1530 the Town Council found some employment for
him worthy of his great talents, work which occupied him for the
remainder of the year. They resolved to finish the internal decoration
of their Council Chamber, which Holbein had left incomplete some
years earlier, and he was naturally selected as the painter most fitted
to do it. For this work he received in all 72 florins, in four separate
payments between July 6 and November 18, 1530, a sufficiently
modest sum for five months’ work, which included at least two large
wall-paintings; but, nevertheless, better pay than he had gained for
his earlier frescoes in the same room, for the original arrangement
was that he should decorate the whole chamber for the sum of 120
gulden, and for that sum he had covered all but the “back wall” with
large pictures.
The new subjects, which may have been selected in 1521, when
the work was first begun, were “Rehoboam rebuking the Elders of
Israel,” and “The Meeting of Samuel and Saul.” A third subject,
“Hezekiah ordering the Idols to be broken in pieces,” was probably
only one of the single figures which were placed between the larger
compositions. Unlike the earlier wall-paintings, of which the subjects
were taken from classical antiquity, the ones upon which Holbein
was now occupied were drawn from the Old Testament, and were
selected for the purpose of setting forth the evil effects of bad
government and the punishment which follows the obstinacy of
rulers who oppose their will to the will of God. The “Hezekiah”[788]
was chosen, no doubt, as an apt illustration of the wisdom of
obeying the commands of God in the sweeping away of all false idols
and images, as exemplified in the iconoclastic outbreaks in Basel
itself in the previous year, the painting of which Holbein must have
undertaken with mixed feelings.

Vol. I., Plate 92.

 “KING REHOBOAM REBUKING THE ELDERS”
Three fragments of the wall-painting formerly in the Basel Town Hall
 1530
Basel Gallery

Vol. I., Plate 93.

REHOBOAM REBUKING THE ELDERS OF ISRAEL

Study for the wall-painting in the Basel Town Hall, 1530
Basel Gallery

Two fine preliminary designs for the “Rehoboam” and the “Samuel
and Saul” form part of the Amerbach Collection, drawings which may
have been made as early as 1521. Among the few fragments of the
original wall-paintings preserved in the Basel Gallery, there are two
showing the head and the raised hand with pointing little finger of
Rehoboam (No. 328) (Pl. 92 (3)),[789] the head being drawn in
profile, whereas in the study it is full face, indicating a change in the
design when carried out on the wall. In the centre of the
composition, as shown in the drawing (Pl. 93),[790] King Rehoboam,
seated upon a lofty throne beneath a rich canopy backed by a
curtain decorated with a fleur-de-lys device, bends forward, his left
hand stretched before him in vehement action, with little finger
extended towards the group of Israelitish elders standing below him,
some of whom turn away in despair. With his right hand he points to
a scourge held by an attendant on the left. The moment depicted is
when he cries out in a rage: “My little finger shall be thicker than my
father’s loins; my father hath chastised you with whips, but I will
chastise you with scorpions.” Behind the throne, within the rails
enclosing a large vaulted chamber in the Renaissance style, are a
number of figures, on the one side the older councillors who had
served his father, Solomon, whose advice he neglected, and on the
other the younger courtiers whose bad counsel he followed. On the
right of the composition is a glimpse of a hilly landscape, with the
Crowning of Jeroboam by the revolted tribes in the middle distance.
The drawing is washed in Indian ink, with touches of colour in the
sky, in the circular openings at the back of the hall, in the landscape,
the faces of the figures, and the rails and the floor. The story is told
very simply and clearly, but with considerable dramatic force, such
as would make an instant appeal to those for whom the lesson it
contained was intended. The figures are rather short and stumpy, a
fault to be noticed in many of Holbein’s earlier designs for books,
wall-paintings, and painted glass; but the composition is a dignified
one, and the large painting based upon it must have been a noble
work. As stated above, the fragments of the original painting which
have been preserved show that Holbein deviated from the sketch in
essential points. The head of Rehoboam, which is a masterpiece of
strong expression, is seen in sharp profile. There are also in the
same Gallery two fragments containing groups of heads of the
Israelite Messengers (No. 329) (Pl. 92 (1 and 2)).[791] Traces of gold
are still visible on these remains of the original work, showing that
Holbein made use of gilding in wall-paintings as well as in portraits.

“THE MEETING OF
The wall-painting of “Samuel and Saul” was the
SAMUEL AND SAUL” largest of all the decorations in the Council
Chamber, and that it was painted side by side
with the “Rehoboam” on the only wall in the room unbroken by door
or window is evident from the fact that in the sketches the same
dividing column appears in both. It was probably about 7 or 8 feet
high by 16 or 17 feet long, and if the same proportion was preserved
in both designs, the “Rehoboam” must have been about 13 feet
long. The moment chosen for representation is the return of Saul
from his conquest of the Amalekites, and his meeting with the
Prophet Samuel. Instead of obeying the command of God, and
destroying men, women, children, and flocks, he has spared them,
and carried them and much spoil away with him. Samuel has come
forth in anger, and Saul, perceiving him, has dismounted, and
advances to meet him bent in reverence. The prophet heaps
reproaches upon him. “Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt
offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Because
thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, He hath also rejected thee
from being king.” The right half of the composition is crowded with
foot-soldiers and horsemen, wearing Roman helmets, among whom
the conquered King Agag is borne captive. In the distance are seen
the captured herds and flocks, and the burning villages on the
hillsides. The composition is a finely-balanced one, and the noble,
menacing figure of the Prophet is well contrasted with the cringing
figure of the King, conscious, now that the flush of victory is
passing, that he has failed to fulfil the sacred commands. The army
behind him is most effectively grouped, and the soldiers’ lances,
seen darkly against the sky, produce much the same effect of
grandeur and of numbers as in Velazquez’s great picture. In the left
upper corner is a long white tablet—no doubt in the finished painting
it was shown hanging from the painted framework surrounding the
picture—on which the Latin text, quoted by Tonjola, was inscribed.
The sketch (No. 347) (Pl. 94)[792] has been slightly washed with
colour, blue in the sky, the stream in the middle distance, the trees,
and the hills, and brown over the landscape, which combines with
the blue to produce green in the trees and hillsides, while the flames
from the burning villages are bright red. The figures are drawn in
brown and shaded with a wash of cool grey. It is not possible from
this, however, to gain much idea of the actual colouring of the wall-
painting, but, from the darting flames and the volumes of heavy
smoke rolling across the sky and blotting out a part of the
landscape, it is possible that the general effect attempted was one of
strong contrasts of chiaroscuro, such as are to be seen in the Basel
Passion picture. Still, the sketch, small as it is, affords ample
evidence of the greatness of Holbein’s power of design in large
compositions crowded with figures, and emphasizes the seriousness
of the loss suffered through the destruction of the whole of his wall-
paintings and larger decorative works.

Vol. I., Plate 94.

SAMUEL AND SAUL

Study for the wall-painting in the Basel Town Hall
Pen drawing in brown touched with water-colour
Basel Gallery

Beyond the Town Hall frescoes, little remains to show in what

manner he was employed during the remainder of his stay in Basel.
There is a fine design for a dagger-sheath, richly decorated with
Renaissance ornament, in the Basel Gallery, dated 1529 (Pl. 45 (1),
Vol. ii.);[793] but this is the only work of the kind that can be given
definitely to this period, though possibly some of the other designs
for dagger-sheaths and bands of ornament in the Basel Gallery,
described in a later chapter,[794] were made during these years. He
also produced a number of designs for woodcuts, among them a
series of illustrations for the Cosmography and several astronomical
works by Sebastian Münster of Munich, published by Heinrich Petri.
Münster was in Basel in the autumn of 1529, and it is possible, so
Dr. Ganz suggests,[795] that his fellow-townsman, Niklaus Kratzer,
whose portrait Holbein had so recently painted, drew his attention to
the artist’s skill in the delineation of scientific and mathematical
instruments, such as Münster required for the illustration of his
books. In this way, no doubt, the author and the artist came into
personal contact. Holbein drew for him a number of fine designs,
such as figures representing the signs of the Zodiac, drawings of
sun-dials, and a variety of mathematical and astronomical
instruments, and a great astronomical table, first published in 1534,
but starting from the year 1530, with ornamental accessories and
representations of the four seasons, a work of great beauty.[796]
He also painted a new portrait of Erasmus, most probably in
Freiburg, for the portrait at Parma, which is one of the best of
various almost contemporary copies, is dated 1530. The small
circular picture in the Basel Gallery is very possibly the original study
painted directly from the sitter. These portraits and the roundel of
Melanchthon in the Provinzial Museum at Hanover, which is probably
of the same period, have been described in a previous chapter.[797]

REPAINTING OF
There is only one other record to show that he
RHINE GATE CLOCK received any further employment from the civic
authorities after the completion of the Town Hall
paintings. On October 7, 1531, he was paid “17 pfund 10 schilling,”
or fourteen gulden, for repainting the two clocks on the Rhine Gate
(“von beden Uren am Rinthor zemalen”).[798] This commission was
for renovating the two faces of the old clock, which was decorated
with the grotesque figure of the “Lallenkönig,” with distorted
countenance stretching out his tongue towards Little Basel. This
undertaking seems very paltry after the big decorative works upon
which he had been occupied twelve months earlier, but was
apparently all that the authorities had to give. It is an exaggeration,
however, to speak of it, as some writers do, as contemptible work
for an artist of his standing. Mrs. Fortescue says of it: “As soon as
Holbein got his pay for this disgraceful commission—a pay he was
now much too hard pressed to refuse—he quietly slipped away from
Basel without taking the Council into his confidence.”[799] To Holbein,
who by no means regarded himself as a portrait-painter only, but to
whom all decorative work, however large or however small, was
equally an occasion for giving of the best that was in him, the
ornamentation of a clock face would in no ways appear to be work in
any way disgraceful or beneath him; nor is there the slightest
evidence to show that he ran away from Basel like a thief in the
night. Throughout his life, indeed, his methods were orderly, and
such as became a citizen and guildsman of his adopted town. He
must, nevertheless, have suffered many anxieties, for times were
unpropitious in Basel, and offered few opportunities for the
remunerative practice of the fine arts.
Both in 1529 and 1530 great scarcity prevailed. The religious
excitement, too, grew in strength, and the Protestant persecutions
became as severe as the papal ones which had preceded them.
Holbein himself fell under suspicion. On June 18, 1530, just when he
was beginning to work on the Town Hall frescoes, he was called
upon, together with a number of other citizens, to justify himself for
not having taken part in the Communion instituted in the Basel
churches after the abolition of the Catholic ritual in 1529. He gave as
an answer that he demanded, before approaching the Lord’s Table,
that the signification of the holy mystery should be better explained
to him. It appears that the information given to him was sufficient to
satisfy his conscience, as he did not persist in his refusal. His friend,
Bonifacius Amerbach, was more obdurate, and so had the ban
passed upon him.
In 1531 open war broke out between the different cantons,
through stress of religious differences. This was possibly the last
straw in Holbein’s case. Work growing daily more difficult to obtain,
his thoughts would naturally turn to the happier fields for his genius
which England afforded, and he determined to return there. The
exact date of his departure is unknown, but it must have been
towards the end of 1531 or in the early spring of 1532; perhaps the
latter date is the more probable of the two, as the journey, in the
way in which he would be forced to make it, would be an
unpleasant, if not a difficult, one in winter.[800]
 POSTSCRIPT TO CHAPTER XIV

A Newly Discovered Portrait of an Unknown English Lady

HE discovery of a new portrait by Holbein must always be

a matter of the highest interest to students of the
master’s art, and when the panel so discovered is one in
practically faultless condition and of exceptional
attraction, its importance as an addition to the list of the
painter’s works cannot be easily exaggerated. It is pleasant,
therefore, to have to record the fact that such a portrait was brought
to light for the first time during the present year (1913). The portrait
in question formed part of a collection of pictures and engravings
removed from Rotherwas House, near Hereford, the seat of the
Bodenham family, early in the year, the greater number of which
were sold by auction in London last February. The Holbein picture,
however, was first heard of at a sale at Messrs. Puttick and
Simpson’s rooms in Leicester Square on April 8th. It was in a very
dirty state, and its beauty was almost entirely obscured by a thick
coat of dark varnish, with which it had been covered some two
centuries or more ago. It had also two slight abrasions above and
below the right eye. Across the left sleeve was painted in white, in
late eighteenth-century lettering, the inscription “Margaret Tudor,
Queen of Scotland.” This attribution, however, was changed by the
compilers of the sale catalogue to “Mary, Queen of Scots,” and it was
described as by an unknown artist of the early English School. The
bidding for this picture started at £10, and it was finally acquired for
340 guineas by Mr. Ayerst H. Buttery.
 Upon careful cleaning the false inscription at once came away, and
after the removal of the varnish the picture was found to be, as
already stated, in a practically faultless condition—except for the two
small abrasions—and in the original state in which it was left by the
artist, thanks, no doubt, to the varnishing process it had undergone.
It is unsigned, and has no inscription giving the name and age of the
sitter, but in spite of this it is difficult to doubt its authorship. Holbein
was the only painter then in England who possessed so fine a
technique. It has been carefully examined by several leading
authorities on the painter, among them Dr. Friedländer, of the Kaiser
Friedrich Museum, Berlin, and all are agreed that it is a splendid
example of Holbein. A detailed description of it, with several
suggestions toward the solution of the identity of the sitter, was first
published by Mr. Maurice W. Brockwell, in the Morning Post of June
28, 1913.

Vol. I., Plate 95.

 PORTRAIT OF AN UNKNOWN ENGLISH LADY
(Formerly in the possession of the Bodenham family, Rotherwas Hall,
 Hereford)
Reproduced by kind permission of Mr. Ayerst H. Buttery

It is on panel, 31 inches high by 23½ inches wide (Pl. 95). The

lady is shown full face, and almost three-quarters length, holding
with both hands a very small open prayer-book or breviary, which is
attached to a ribbon round her waist by a plain chain. The dress is of
deep maroon satin, with the upper part of the bodice of black velvet.
The latter is open at the throat, the points of the collar being turned
back, showing the white lining. This style of collar occurs very rarely
in Holbein’s pictures, and is to be seen in only two others of his
finished portraits of ladies—those of Catherine Howard and Lady
Butts. In these two, however, the “revers” are quite plain, whereas in
Mr. Buttery’s picture they are richly embroidered in black with a floral
design, suggesting carnations, conventionally treated, while round
the edge runs a narrow border with a row of conventionalised
flowers of a somewhat similar pattern, which occurs again on the
white ruffs at her wrists. Her long and thin arms are encased in
tightly fitting sleeves, terminating in the then fashionable “hanging”
or “over” sleeves, partly of black velvet, which are exceptionally full
and heavy, with slashings filled in with white silk embroidered in
black with a design suggesting acorns arranged in groups of four.
The skirt, or petticoat, of which little can be seen, shows an
elaborate floral pattern. The lady wears no rings, but has a plain
gold chain wound twice round her neck. The collar of the bodice is
fastened together by a small brooch or pin set with a dark “table”
stone, from which is suspended a circular medallion or pendant of
gold and enamel, with the figure of a lady in a red dress, seated in a
high-backed chair, and playing a lute or viol. Above this figure is a
scroll with the legend, “Praise the Lord for evermore.” The whole is
enclosed within a border of scroll-work, with a grotesque head in
white enamel on either side, green leaves at the bottom and a red
rose at the top. The head-dress is of the curved shape introduced
from Paris, and not the more customary angular English hood. It has
two bands of elaborately wrought goldsmith’s work, and is filled in
with cerise-red satin, which makes a very beautiful colour contrast
with the plain blue-green background, against which the head is so
effectively placed. The arrangement of the fair hair, such of it as can
be seen, is both unusual and attractive, being parted in the centre,
while on either side bands, of slightly lighter colour than the rest,
are brought forward over the ears, which are completely hidden.
Individual golden hairs are indicated against the dark background,
and both hair and head-dress have been rendered with all Holbein’s
minute and loving care and dexterity of draughtsmanship.
The face is a most expressive one. Both the mouth and the grey,
contemplative eyes are full of character, suggested in the most
subtle manner and with unerring brushwork. The modelling of the
flesh is of extraordinary delicacy. The lady, whoever she may be,
though not perhaps strictly beautiful has considerable pretensions to
good looks, and her whole personality, indeed, is one of great
charm. The colour-scheme, too, is one of exceptional attraction. The
contrast between the sombre-coloured garments with glinting lights
upon them, and the pale and pearl-like face, standing out against
the blue-green of the background, is most harmonious, and the
band of red in the head-dress adds to and sets off the delicate
blondness of her features. Another point to be noted is the skill with
which the slight ripples in the plainly-cut bodice and upper sleeves
have been indicated, as well as the little inequalities and furrows in
the satin of the head-dress, where the material has slightly puckered
at the edge by which it is fastened to the ornamental bands. The
portrait, indeed, is one of the most beautiful and attractive ever
produced by the painter.
Little or nothing is known of the history of this picture, and at
present the identity of the sitter has not been established. The
ancient family of Bodenham was settled at Rotherwas long before
Henry VIII came to the throne. It was the recent death of Mr.
Charles Bodenham, the last direct descendant of this family, which
brought about the sale of the estate together with the family
mansion and the whole of its contents. “The entire property,” says
Mr. Brockwell, “seems to have been first purchased by a firm at a