PETER VISCHER 
use the trade mark of the House, and on more 
than one occasion signed in his father's name as 
the lawful successor to the business. There is, 
for instance, a letter extant which is nominally 
written by Peter Vischer, but in reality by Hans 
in the deceased craftsman’s name, for it is dated 
January 25th, 1529, whereas Peter Vischer died 
on the sixth of that month. In that letter Hans 
begs the Duke Heinrich von Mecklenburg to send 
for a monument which had already been lying a 
whole year in the foundry, and for which payment 
is demanded. This reference fixes the date of the 
purely heraldic tomb-plate which commemorates 
the Duchess Helene von Mecklenburg. (Ill. 27.) 
An example of Hans’ use of the Vischer mark 
is to be found in the tomb of Bishop Sigismund 
of Lindenau, in the Cathedral at Merseburg, whilst 
a tablet with a high relief of a Madonna in the 
Parish Church at Aschaffenburg bears an inscrip- 
tion to the effect that Johannes Vischer of Nurem- 
berg made it in 1530. The former of these two 
monuments consists of a lifeless prelate kneeling 
before a weak and effeminate figure on the cross. 
It dates from the year 1544, and is a work of no 
importance except as an example of the extremely 
rapid deterioration exhibited by German art after 
the days of Diirer and the great Vischers. Hans 
was not an original artist of any talent, but merely 
a painstaking craftsman. Where he had the taste 
and designs of his father and brother to guide him 
he turned out some admirable work, as for ex- 
122