r time mostly with her needle, wherewithal ... she can read
and write (Dutch); but as to French, Latin, or any other language, she
hath none. Nor yet she cannot sing nor play any instrument, for they take
it here in Germany for a rebuke, and an occasion of lightness that great
ladies should be learned or have any knowledge of music. Her wit is good,
and she will no doubt learn English soon when she puts her mind to it. I
could never hear that she is inclined to the good cheer of this country;
and marvel it were if she should, seeing that her brother ... doth so well
abstain from it. Your Grace's servant Hans Holbein hath taken the effigies
of my Lady Anne and the Lady Amelia, and hath expressed their images very
lively."[190]

Holbein was not usually a flattering painter to his sitters, and the
portrait he sent of Anne was that of a somewhat masculine and
large-featured, but handsome and intellectual young woman, with fine,
soft, contemplative brown eyes, thick lashes, and strong eyebrows. The
general appearance is dignified, though handicapped by the very unbecoming
Dutch dress of the period; and though there is nothing of the _petite_
sprightliness and soft rotundity that would be likely to attract a man of
Henry's characteristics, the Princess cannot have been ill-favoured.
Cromwell some months earlier had reported to Henry that Mont informed him
that "everybody praises the lady's beauty, both of face and body. One said
she excelled the Duchess (of Milan ?) as the golden sun did the silver
moon."[191] If the latter statement be near the truth, Anne, in her own
way, must have been quite good-looking. There was no delay or difficulty
in carrying through the arrangements for the marriage. The envoys from
Cleves and Saxony arrived in London in September, and saw Henry at
Windsor. They could offer no great dowry, for Cleves was poor; but they
would not be exacting about the appanage to be settled upon the Queen by
her husband, to whom they left the decision of the sum; and the other
covenants as to the eventual succession to her brother's duchy, in case of
his death without heirs, were to be the same as those under which her
elder sister married Hans Frederick.

This was the sort of spirit that pleased Henry in negotiators, and with
such he was always disposed to be liberal. He practically waived the
dowry, and only urged that the lady should come at once, before the winter
was too far advanced. When he suggested that she