Yale University Library

39002040726334

YALE UNIVEESITY LIBRAKY
0'Ae ^^^iHA^iu^^c/lecliiifi

FORlffED BY
James Abraham Hillhouse, B.A. 1749
James Hillhouse, B.A. 1773
James Ahraham Hillhouse, B.A. 1808
James Hillhouse, B.A. 1875
Memoved 1942 from tJie
Manor House iti Sachem's Wood
GIFT OF
GEORGE DUDLEY SEYMOUR

Zbc Hrt of tbe Dresden Gallery?

The c/lrt Galleries
gT Europe
With over five hundred (ull-page platei in duognvme
Complete in twelve volume* a< follows: —
By Mary Knight Potter
THE LOUVRE (PARIS)
THE VATICAN (ROME)
THE VENICE ACADEMY
By Julia de W. Jtddison
THE DRESDEN GALLERY
THE NATIONAL GALLERY (LONDON)
THE PITTI PALACE (FLORENCE)
By David C. Preyer
THE BERLIN GALLERIES
THE NETHERLAND GALLERIES
THE VIENNA GALLERIES
By C. S. Ricketts
THE PRADO (MADRID)
By Esther Singleton
THE BELGIAN GALLERIES
By F. J. Jtnsell and F. R. Fraprie
THE MUNICH GALLERIES
Issued by
THE ST. BOTOLPH SOCIETY
Boston, Mass.

RAPHAEL. — M\l>ONN\ 01 S\N SISTO (.V,v/,;.v--/5)

"CHE JRT GALLERIES
^^OF dURO'PE^^
THE DRESDEN
GALLERY
NOTES AND OBSERVATIONS UPON THE
OLD AND MODERN MASTERS AND
PAINTINGS IN THE ROYAL COLLECTION
By JULIA DE WOLF ADDISON
With Forty-eight Plates and Three Diagrams

THE ST. BOTOLPH SOCIETY
BOSTON !>?<] i>?o MDCCCCXI!

Copyright, igob
By L. C. Page & Company
(incorporated)
Entered at Stationers^ Hall, London
All rights reserved

COLONIAL PRESS
EUctrotypld and Prihttd ty C. H. Simonds &• Co.
Bost.m, U.S A.

preface

In looking through such parts of this study as I
prepared last summer in Dresden, I came upon this
note: In spite of the numerous copies and school
pieces in this gallery, the masterpieces are suffi
ciently important to render it one of the most inter
esting collections in the world. This is indeed true,
when we remember that Dresden enshrines the
greatest picture of Raphael, a gem of Van Eyck,
a celebrated Holbein, many examples of Rubens
and Rembrandt, Van Dyck's Man in Armour,
splendid specimens of the Venetians, with Titian's
Tribute Money, the finest row of Correggios in
Europe, and innumerable treasures of Flemish,
Dutch, and German art. Among the Spanish pic
tures, too, is one of the finest Murillos outside of
Spain. And even the pictures which must be classified
as " studio works," are in many cases most inter
esting selections. On the whole, I think one re
ceives as much pleasure from a tour of this gallery

vi preface
as from any other. One cannot claim that there
is no " padding; " of course there is the usual pro
portion of indiflferent work. But even such pic
tures seem to have their place, if we agree with
Philip III. of Spain. One of the Dukes in his suite
suggested to his Majesty that it would be well to
prohibit poor painters from launching their daubs
upon the world. " Bear with them," replied the
king, " for the sake of their laudable love for art,
and also because a bad picture pleases some people
as well as a good one." This is a little broader
stand than we should wish to recommend, but it
calls attention to the important fact that the spirit
of the time determines the standard of art, and it
is unfair to judge the best work of some men too
harshly, because the sentiment of their day, by
which they were guided, is different from the spirit
by which we determine the art standard of to-day.
To enjoy pictures it is necessary to develop enough
imagination to enable us to enter into the atmos
phere of the centuries in which they were produced.
Dresden has been called the Florence of Ger
many. With its art-loving princes, its coterie of
scholars and artists, its famed crafts and its noble
Academy and Art Gallery, it deserves the title as
well as any other Northern capital.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE
I. Early Italians ; Raphael and Correggio i
II. The Great Venetians . . . . 43
III. Later Italian Schools . . . .73
IV. Spanish Masters  100
V. Painters of the French and English
Schools  138
VI. Pastels and Miniatures, with Late Ger
man and Italian Pictures Hanging in
Adjoining Rooms  163
VII. Early Flemish, Dutch, and German Pic
tures: Durer and Holbein . . .191
VIII. Other Netherlandish and German Art
ists  225
IX. Rubens and Van Dyck .... 255
X. Rembrandt and Some of His Contempo
raries  286
XI. Dutch Painters  307
XII. Modern German Masters .... 362
Bibliography  445
Index  447

Xlst of irUustrattons

facing 4 9
• 34
. 46
• 54

Raphael. — Madonna di San Sisto (see page 18)
Frontispiece
Plan of the First Floor
Francesco Cossa. — Annunciation
Correggio. — Madonna of St. Francis
Titian. — Tribute Money
^ Giorgione. — Sleeping Venus
Tintoretto. — Six Women with Musical Instru
ments . . ...
Tintoretto. — The Rescue ....
Paolo Veronese. — Cuccina Family (Detail)
Guido Reni. — Venus and Cupid .
Caravaggio. — The Cheat ....
Salvator Rosa. — Portrait of Himself
Ribera. — St. Agnes 
Murillo. — Death of St. Clara (Detail)
Velasquez. — Portrait of an Elderly Man
Valdes Leal. — St. Basco of Portugal
Nicolas Poussin. — Pan and Syrinx
Claude Lorrain. — Acis and Galatea
Plan of the Ground Floor ....
Watteau. — A Garden Party
Rosalba Carriera. — Louis XV. (Pastel) .
LioTARD. — The Chocolate Girl

60
• 63
. 66
. 86
. 90
• 92
. 118
• 130
• 132
• 136
. 140
• 144
facing 146
• 152
. 168
. 180

X Xist of miustrationd PACI
Jan Van Eyck. — Central Panel of Triptych . 192
Albrecht Durer. — The Dresden Altar . . .211
Hans Holbein. — The Madonna of the Burgomas
ter Meyer  216
Hans Holbein. — Portrait of Morette 222
' Cssar van Everdingen. — Bacchus and Nymphs 237
Nicholas van Verendael. — Monkeys Regaling
Themselves .... .... 248
David Teniers. — Deliverance of St. Peter . 252
Rubens. — The Champion of Virtue .... 264
Rubens. — Diana with Her Nymphs Hunting . 275
Van Dyck. — Portrait of a Commander in Armour . 282
Rembrandt. — Rembrandt and Saskla. 286
Rembrandt. — Sacrifice of Manoah and His Wife 292
Vermeer of Delft. — A Girl and Her Lover . 302
Van der Werff. — Expulsion of Hagar 313
Vermeer of Delft. — Lady Reading a Letter . 321
RuYSDAEL. — The Monastery 327
Gerard Dou. — Portrait of the Artist in His Studio 338
Jan Steen. — The Marriage Feast at Cana . . 347
Adriaen van Ostade. — The Artist in His Studio 350
Gerard Ter Borch. — A Lady Washing Her Hands 356
Plan of the Second Floor facing 366
Theobald von Oer. — Giovanni Bellini's Visit to
THE Studio of Albrecht Durer .... 380
LuDwiG Knaus.— Behind the Scenes .
Munkacsy. — The Crucifixion
Franz Defregger. — Mountain SMrrHv
Puvis DE Chavannes. — Fisherman's Family
Karl Hoff. — The Son's Last Greeting .
Arnold Bocklin. — Spring's Delights .
Hermann Prell. — Judas Iscariot Bribed by the
Pharisees

386398 402408 414 434

440

tTbe
Ert of tbe Bresben (Bailee^

CHAPTER L
EARLY ITALIANS; RAPHAEL AND CORREGGIO
The origins of the German galleries are inter
esting to note. The Munich Gallery grew up from
a part of the old Bavarian Collection, absorbing the
Dusseldorf Gallery, which was added about a cen
tury ago. Flemish and Dutch pictures were then
purchased to complete the collection. The Berlin
Gallery was only brought into existence in the nine
teenth century, through the influence of the reign
ing Prussian Princes. Being founded at a time
when historic continuity was beginning to be appre
ciated, it was planned with a feeling for consecutive
order, and is famous for its systematic arrange
ment. But when the Dresden Gallery was founded, by
Elector Augustus (who was succeeded by August
the Strong, followed by Augustus III.), the idea of

2 xrbe art of tbe Dre0^en Caller?
an actual evolution in art had not been emphasized,
and the standard was, simply, to display the art
treasures without reference one to another. The
collection was started in 1560, by the Elector Au
gustus, when he set up an art gallery above his own
apartments in the Palace in Dresden. In 1694,
August the Strong intentionally founded the gal
lery. It was an unfortunate period in art and archi
tecture, taste being rococo, and historic continuity
of no account. The collection of early sixteenth-
century paintings, inherited by August the Strong,
was the nucleus of the Dresden Gallery. There was
no attempt made to secure earlier pictures at this
time. This prince bought pictures which appealed
to the taste of the eighteenth century, joyously
acquiring numerous examples of the art then chiefly
in vogue, Flemish and Dutch. Examples were ob
tained of Rubens, Jordaens, and Teniers, Dou,
Metsu, Ter Borch, and Wouwermans. while Italian
pictures by Giorgione, Albani, and Cima had been
acquired. More important was the progress of the Gallery
under Augustus III., who governed from 1733 to
1763. This king's minister, Graf von Briihl. di
rected the purchases, and the collection grew so that
it was necessary to move into larger quarters. Dur
ing the reign of August the Strong, two hundred
pictures had been purchased; Augustus III., though

Earls Utalians; IRapbael anb Correggio 3
not important for his deeds of statesmanship, was
full of artistic tastes, and the court was one of ex
travagant gorgeousness. The chief masterpieces of
the Golden Era of art which are in Dresden were
secured during this recklessly lavish period. Espe
cially devoted to the riper Italians, Augustus III.
added numerous examples of the florid post-Raph-
aelite period. Also he was the purchaser of the
world-famed collection of Francisco III., Duke of
Modena. Never before had so superb a collection
been seen north of the Alps. Titian's Tribute
Money, the four great Correggios, the enormous
paintings by Veronese, and celebrated pictures by
Andrea del Sarto, Carracci, Guido Reni, Dosso
Dossi, and Garofalo, as well as a Velasquez, a Hol
bein, and Rubens's St. Jerome, were among them.
This was rather the period for purchasers than
for producers ; art critics were despatched to all the
leading centres, and collecting became a royal
craze. Between 1741 and 1742 the Dresden Gal
lery added seven hundred and fifteen pictures to its
nimibers. Even painters found that there was more
profit in turning agent than in painting pictures
themselves. It was through one of these, the artist
Carlo Giovannini of Bologna, that negotiations
were made to purchase the Sistine Madonna of
Raphael from the monks at Piacenza. The Au-

4 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben ©aller?
gustan age in Saxony came to an end with the death
of Augustus III.
During the nineteenth century very judicious
management proved of great service to the Gallery,
for pictures were bought with a higher motive than
to please the taste of a single prince with exotic
ideals. Intelligent directors, Johann Anton Riedel,
C. F. Damiani, J. F. Matthai, and then the painters
Julius Schnorr and Julius Hiibner, guided the ex
penditures and practical matters, by means of their
tact and culture, at the same time educating the
taste of the public, while ever since 1848, mod
ern pictures have been purchased from time to time,
as well as examples of the Old Masters. During
the past ten years the gallery has kept specially
abreast of the times, under the directorship of the
celebrated Dr. Karl Woermann.
Pictures in Dresden are hung more with a view
to their size and breadth, or to their minuteness
and delicacy, than with an eye to consecutive pro
gression. Each picture is placed in such a position
and light as shall most enhance its peculiar worth.
The larger pictures, which may easily be seen at a
distance, are hung in the central halls, and effect
ively lighted from above; the smaller pictures are
placed in little rooms or cabinets, leading out of the
larger salons, and lighted from the side. This is
the most satisfactory system of hanging for the

L.
M. N. O. P.
0
R. S.
P. R.

17th Centur3' (Carracci).
Cupola. Tapestries.
Spanish and Italian School.
rillo).
Flemish and Spanish School
bens).
Dutch and Flemish School.
brandt).
Dutch and Flemish School.
Dutch and Flemish School.
German and Dutch School.
turies (Holbein)
Old German School. i6th Century (Cranach).
Dutch and German School. i6th to iSth Century
Dutch and German School. 17th and i8th Cen
turies.
Reserve room.s, chiefly weak Italian (closed).
Inspector's room (private).

17th Century (Mu-
17th Century (Ru-
7th Century (Rem-
17th Century.
17th Centuiy.
15 th and 1 6th Cen-

9.
10.
IJ.
12. 13.J4.J5.16.
17.
18-20. 2J.
44-46.47-5 J.

Italian School
Italian School
French School
Lorrain).
Dutch School.
Werff).
Dutch School.
Dutch School.
Dutch Schoo
Dutch School.
Dutch School.
Dutch School.
Dutch School.
Dutch School.
Dutch School.
Dutch School.
Flemish School
Old German and old
17th Centuries.
Italian and French Schools.
Various Schools.

17th Century.
17th Century (Poelenburgh).
17th Century.
17th Century (Ruysdael).
17th Century.
17th Century (Potter).
17th Century (Rembrandt).
I 7th Century (Dou).
17th Century (Ostade).
17th Century.
17th Century.
Flemish Schools. i6th and
17th Century.

Barls Utalians; IRapbael an6 Correggio s
casual spectator; for the student of art, of course,
it involves some travelling about, in order that one
may examine paintings in their proper sequence.
In preparing these observations I have thought it
best, so far as practicable, to consider all the
works of an artist together, and, as a rule, the cab
inets so supplement the halls, that it is possible to
do this without going far out of one's way. I have
retained the system of lettering and numbering for
the halls and cabinets as used in the Official Cata
logue ; this unity of plan makes it easier to use both
books without confusion.
In order to examine the pictures in appropriate
order, it is well to begin in the series of cabinets at
the extreme right, i, 2, 3, and 4, afterwards study
ing Hall D, proceeding thence by the precious little
room in the corner, A on the plan, — where hangs
but one picture, but that the greatest in the gallery,
— the Sistine Madonna of Raphael.
One of the surest ways of determining the attri
bution of a picture is a close observation of the
treatment of the hands and of the ears. The old
masters gave little thought to these details; it was
not until later that men realized that there was
character in hands, and even in ears. Therefore,
from giving these features little heed, they almost
invariably fell into some special way of painting
them, — all the hands painted by Botticelli, for

6 Zbc art of tbe 2)re85en (Bailers
instance, conform to one type, and the same may
be said of the ears. Now, a critic who is on the
lookout for such things, can say, almost confidently,
" Such and such a picture cannot be by Botticelli,
for the hands are those painted by Filippino Lippi,
or the ear is such an ear as only Mantegna painted,"
and by comparing hundreds of instances, and find
ing, as they do, that a given man will always paint
a given feature in a, certain way, they are able to
determine more accurately than ever before the
origin of various works.
Morelli considers that the picture which is usu
ally supposed to have been by Fra Angelico, is a
feeble example of Benozzo Gozzoli. It is the near
est we come to either of these early artists in the
Dresden Gallery, and should not be regarded as
representative of the Florentines of that period.
It is the Annunciation, and it hangs in the first cab
inet, among the primitive painters.
There is a very decorative painting in this cab
inet, No. 8, a Virgin and Child, probably a studio-
piece from the school of Botticelli. The rich blues
and green are very effective. The picture, if not an
original, is at any rate a characteristic bit of work
to have come from his studio, and is full of the
naive sweetness of his studies. The tender details
of the veil and robe-border are like the works of
an illuminator, and the book-cover, lying on the

lEnvVs trtalians; IRapbael and Correggio 7
table by the Virgin and Child, is finished as if by
a jeweller. The affectionate action of the child in
turning to his mother is human, and the two faces
are unusually beautiful, although St. John has an
underfed look, and is evidently the work of an infe
rior painter. Near by hangs a set of pictures as
cribed to Botticelli, representing scenes from the
life of St. Zenobius. The colouring is hard and
reddish, and the pictures very curious. In the first,
a boy is being run over in the street; the second
panel exhibits the mother of the boy taking him to
the Saint, that a miracle may be performed upon
him ; and in the third, St. Zenobius is restoring the
healed child to his mother. In the fourth panel the
death of the Saint is depicted. In the school piece,
No. 10, the face of the Virgin recalls the Madonna
in a tondo by BotticelU in the National Gallery of
London. There is a picture here ascribed to Lorenzo di
Credi, which, twenty years ago, was believed to be
by Leonardo da Vinci. Morelli considers it a Flem
ish copy of a picture by Verrocchio. The treatment
is certainly Northern, and the hard, uncompromis
ing surface of the flesh is not characteristic of
Credi, although the general appearance, at a first
glance, might lead one to suppose it an original.
The child is hideously flabby, with fat lying in folds
and rings, not at all like the flesh of a chubby child ;

8 Ube Hrt of tbe Dresden ©allers
in addition to which he is nearly cross-eyed. When
this picture was ascribed to Leonardo, a baleful
contagion seemed to spread among the European
galleries. Berlin instantly produced a forgotten
picture, and heralded it as a Leonardo, and Munich,
unwilling to be outdone, immediately discovered an
example of his work lurking unsuspected in its col
lection. Turn from this picture to another example
of Lorenzo di Credi, No. 15, and contrast it with
the clear, delicate work, like that of an illuminated
missal. The Virgin and Child in this picture are
flanked by St. John the Evangelist and St. Sebas
tian. The composition is formal and decorative, —
the two saints with their characteristic gestures, so
full of mannered grace, are beautiful figures as sup
porters for the Virgin and Child. The infant is
allowed the human interest of trying to reach for
ward to one of the saints.
The Virgin of the school of Filippino Lippi, with
her sweet, long eyes, is ver\' attractive.
A lovely, puce-pink tone pervades the portrait of
a boy by Pinturicchio, which may be seen on the
same wall with the Botticelli, in the first cabinet.
The face is full of that young immaturity which
might be seen in any boy of the streets to-day ; put
this charming little person into a newsboy's shabby
coat, cut his hair, and put a slouched round cap on
his head, and lo! the Bowery! or Whitechapel!

FRANCESCO COSSA.  ANNUNCIATION

iBavl^ Vtaltans; IRapbael anb Correggio 9
There is an Annunciation here by the most im
portant Ferrarese master, next to Cosimo Tura;
this is Francesco Cossa, who lived in the latter
half of the fifteenth century. In a decorated hall
of florid Renaissance style, Mary and the Angel
are seen; very ornate — very much out of keeping
with the simple story. The details of the picture
are quite suggestive of Crivelli's conceits, but the
colour and texture are harder and colder. A snail
crawling on the ground may be symbolic of domes
tic peace, but is more probably a miniature freak of
decorative zeal. Morelli scorns the idea that Cossa
was influenced by van der Weyden; and yet, in
the work of this artist, and also in that of Cosimo
Tura, there are certain hard, German qualities in
the expression of the faces, which give some ex
cuse for this theory, which has been expressed.
Cossa suffered a keen disappointment when, after
he had, as he supposed, risen to the rank of a great
master, his name appeared in the records of the
artists decorating the Schifanoia Palace as only
one of the workmen, on the same level as the
others. There is here a sweet little Virgin and Child by
Giacomo Francia, a son and pupil of Francesco.
The Child holds a little bird in his hand, and the
young Baptist leans over the shoulder of the mother
in an eflFort to see it.

lo XEbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
A dashing, rich picture, called " A Loving
Couple," by some unknown Venetian painter, has a
surface of enamel finish, and is enough like some
of Giorgione's work to have been given to him for
awhile, but is no longer attributed with confidence
to any special artist.
The Presentation of the Virgin, by Cima da
Conegliano, is a naive and interesting composition,
prefiguring, as it does, the great Titian's Presenta
tion in Venice. A literal transcript of the passage
in Josephus is here made, " Between the wall which
separated the men from the women and the great
porch of the Temple, were fifteen steps." Here
we have the fifteen steps, with the High Priest
standing at the top, and the wall is seen as de
scribed. The great porch — a sort of open Re
naissance loggia, with the tower of the Palazzo
Vecchio at one corner — occupies the left side of
the picture. The Virgin, a tiny child, in contadina
costume, carrying a lighted candle, ascends the
steps with reverence. As a concession to the East
ern setting, the bystanders are represented in tur
bans, and there are some curious interpretations of
palmetto-trees, splaying forth into stiff, umbrella
tops. It is particularly interesting to note that the
old woman sitting on the lower step, with a basket
of eggs, is almost exactly the figure as painted by
Titian, with the same profile and head-(Jress. A

iBavVs irtalians; IRapbael anb Correggio "
boy with a cage of birds to sell sits with his arms
akimbo, watching the little maiden's progress, with
some amusement.
There is a pleasant, bright picture by Ludovico
Mazzolini, of the Presentation of Christ in the
Temple. The church dignitaries liked Mazzolini's
work, as it was brilliantly coloured, and had a popu
lar appeal, so that he was often employed to paint
religious scenes.
Ercole Roberti, who lived in the time of Tura
and Cossa, is well represented by two interesting
pictures, very decorative in colour and skilful in
grouping. Christ on the way to Golgotha is the
subject of one, while the other shows the Betrayal
and the arrest of Jesus. This pair of panels hang
on the same wall in the first cabinet. There is also
a copy near them of Roberti's picture in the Na
tional Gallery, the Gathering of Manna in the
Wilderness. These paintings were acquired in
1750. Here, too, is a charming Holy Family, by Man
tegna, the handling of which has almost the force
of a modern work. It has a glorious low tone, and
a mellow quality, partly owing to the fact that it
is painted in extremely transparent medium on a
very rough, twilled canvas, — the paint is very thin,
and the texture, therefore, of the whole is unusual
in works of its period. Regarding its composition,

" XEbe art of tbe S>resben aalleri?
too, it is graceful and unaffected. The picture was
bought from Sir Charles Eastlake.
As we proceed into the next cabinet, we find a
picture by Polidoro Veneziano (or Lanzanij, who
is better represented here than in any other gallery.
A Venetian nobleman is seen in the act of present
ing his daughter to St. Joseph, that she may be
dedicated to the Virgin Mary. It might have been
painted by Veronese himself. There is an effective
portrait of a lady in mourning, which was ascribed
to Pordenone, but later criticism has denied its au
thenticity. The clear, pure tones of Cima da Conegliano
show up with that brilliant translucency which some
people admire so extravagantly in the full-length
figure of the Saviour in the act of blessing. The
fact that two men in the background are holding
the bridle of an ass, suggests that it may have been
the author's intention to portray the Lord as he
was about to start on the Entry into Jerusalem.
In Cabinet 3, Franciabigio, the companion of
Andrea del Sarto, is seen in an important picture;
Uriah is taking the fatal letter, w hile David gloat
ingly gazes down from the house-tops at Bathsheba,
who is bathing recklessly in the foreground. She
is surrounded by her maidens, one of whom carries
a ewer, with the initials of the artist inscribed

BarlB Italians ; IRapbael anb Correggio 13
upon it. The bath itself is decorated with, the arms
of the Medici.
The familiar picture, known as Correggio's
Magdalen, hangs here. In the first place she is too
virginally fresh and youthful-looking. This repent
ant Magdalen may be a copy of some lost original
by Correggio. The blue colour is much more like
that used by van der Werff, and it may well have
been executed by a Flemish artist of that school.
It was brought from Modena in 1746. This picture
has been inexplicably popular; there is scarcely a
child who has not seen some engraving or photo
graph of it. When Velasquez saw it, on one of his
Italian journeys, it was owned by the Princes
d'Este, and was carried with them on all their
travels, and kept under lock and key, in a frame of
silver set with precious stones.
Morelli records an amusing conversation, too
long to quote in full, which he had with a German
lady and her father, while standing before this
Magdalen, which was then still attributed to Cor
reggio, They talked for a time upon the subject
of art critics and their iconoclastic tendencies, and
then the lady asked Morelli if he did not consider
the Magdalen the most beautiful and valuable pic
ture in Dresden. Morelli had already told them
that he was an art student, and they had no idea
of his importance in the field of art. When he

14 Ube Hrt of tbe 2>resben (Bailer?
stated deliberately that he did not believe the pic
ture to be a Correggio at all, but a seventeenth-cen
tury Flemish work, they drew back in horror. The
lady remarked, " Really this is too bad I But per
haps you are only joking?" Morelli assured her
that he was quite in earnest, and pointed out the
various defects of the picture: the crude ultra
marine blue, which was very like that used by van
der Werff ; the affected long fingers ; the laboured,
oversmooth treatment of the foreground, and the
coquettish lack of naivete in the general design ; he
asked her to compare the trees with those in van
der Werff 's pictures, Nos. 1817 and 181 8, in the
same gallery. She turned from him in self-suffi
cient scorn, " You will never convince me," she
declared. " You have evidently never read the writ
ings of Raphael Mengs; he was a great art critic,
and he studied Correggio profoundly, and entered
thoroughly into his mode of thought and feeling.
In his eyes this picture was the finest of all the mas
ter's works, and, moreover, our great poet, Schlegel,
wrote one of his most charming sonnets in praise
of this Magdalen." At this juncture the lady's
father had the tact to suggest that she should recite
this sonnet. She spared Morelli the doubtful joy
of listening to her rendering of it, saying, " To
preach to deaf ears is useless." Then she proceeded,
tartly, " Criticism is like fire, destroying all it comes

Earl? irtalians ; IRapbael anb Correggio is
in contact with. A short time ago the critics at
tacked our beautiful Madonna by Holbein, and now
they have the audacity to disparage Correggio's
world-renowned Magdalen. Such proceedings may
be tolerated in Russia, where Nihilism is rampant,
but in Germany, fortunately, we have so many ad
mirable connoisseurs and students of art that such
pernicious and revolutionary attempts will soon be
stamped out. Let us go." And they Swept out of
the gallery.
Mr. Frank Preston Stearns disputes earnestly
Morelli's dictum upon Correggio's Magdalen. To
him the picture is absolutely convincing and char
acteristic, as it certainly would seem to many who
have not applied to it the most severe tests of scien
tific criticism. He, with Raphael Mengs, still
believes it to be the finest of Correggio's works.
Mr. G. B. Rose expresses well the attitude of the
artistic world toward the Magdalen of Correggio.
" It is a lovely little jewel taken from Correggio's
crown," he says ; " A jewel that never belonged
there, but which he had worn so long that we regret
to see it go."
The subject of the panel, No. 80, by Ubertini,
is rather an interesting one. Four sons of a king,
so runs the story in the Gesta Romariorum, fell to
quarrelling for the crown of their father, at his
death. At length they agreed to abide by the de-

i6 ube Hrt of tbe 2)re8ben (Bailer?
cision of an arbitrator, who decreed that they should
take the dead body of the king, and suspend it from
a tree, and then shoot arrows at it; and he who shot
it through the heart should inherit the kingdom.
The first arrow wounded the hand; the second
pierced the cheek, and the third entered the heart
of the corpse. Therefore the third son considered
it certain that he should succeed to the kingdom.
But the youngest wept and refused to aim an
arrow at his father's body; whereupon every one
agreed that he was the only one fit to rule, and the
others were banished.
Girolamo da Carpi is believed to have painted
the picture, 144, hitherto ascribed to Dossi. It is
a Judith holding the head of Holofemes. The in
fluence of Parmeggianino may be traced in the
work. Ippolito Scarsella, who formed his style partly
on Veronese, is the author of the interesting Holy
Family in the Carpenter's Shop, where St. Joseph
is working with a saw exactly like the one now in
use in modern Germany.
Bartolommeo Veneto's half-length composition,
the Daughter of Herodias with the head of John
the Baptist on a charger, is full of rich red and
green of a deep hue. This picture had long been
ascribed to Leonardo. The jewels which the woman
wears are attractive; a ruby is bound upon her

Ban? irtalians; IRapbael anb Correggio 17
brow, while the neck of her dress is bordered by
precious stones. She has the same strange crinkled-
wiry hair which frequently occurs in the paintings
of Veneto. There is a portrait in Frankfort which
is a good example of this peculiarity.
There is a superb portrait here which must strike
all who see it as extremely vital. It is by Morando,
or Cavazzola, of Verona. He was a pupil of Do-
menico Morone, and was surely quite the equal of
his master on this occasion. The portrait is of a
man attired in velvet and fur, with scintillating
cuffs of yellow and black metallic material of most
lustrous effect. The subject is said to have been
a member of a patrician family of Verona in the
days when Morando was working. The artist lived
from i486 to 1522. The face is that of a beardless
elderly man; he wears a dark slouch cap.
In order to see the earliest examples of Sienese
art which Dresden possesses (and they are hardly
worth the trip), one must go down-stairs and quite
along to the end of the corridor on the right as
one descends; there, in the forty-third cabinet, may
be seen the few unworthy examples of this great
school. There are some other interesting early Ital
ians, however.
A lovely bit, having the soft, moth-wing quali
ties of a fresco, is the decorative Virgin in a
Garden, adoring her child, by Ambrogio Bevilacqua.

i8 Ubc Hrt of tbe ©resben (Bailer?
This artist is the only distinctly Milanese painter
in the gallery ; he worked at the end of the fifteenth
century. The curious, delicately finished row of
trees should be noticed, and also the mediaeval
scrolls held by angels.
No. 21, a Madonna, by a follower of Rafaello
de Capponi, has certain glowing, transparent greens
in it which are worth noticing.
Of course, the Mecca of all visitors to the Dres
den gallery is the small room in the farther corner
where Raphael's Sistine Madonna is enshrined
alone. To many travellers this picture is a syno
nym for the gallery, and they hardly notice the
numerous excellent masterpieces which intervene.
It is our purpose to examine these other works, and
try to do away with the popular impression that one
visits the Dresden collection almost entirely to see
this one great painting. I remember, I was stand
ing in one of the smaller cabinets, one day, lost in
admiration of a delicate Vermeer of Delft, when
I heard a party of Americans approaching. Two
learned-looking young ladies with eye-glasses were
calling the wayward attention of their mother to
the excellences of the Dutch school. But, al
though the good woman had evidently provided
that her children should benefit by the higher cul
ture, she had little use for it herself. " .-Vin't we
'most got to that Sistine Madonna ? " she almost

Earl? "fftalians ; IRapbael anb Correggio 19
wailed. As the tired figure passed by, and as the
trio moved out of sight, I registered an earnest
hope that the poor weary soul would find refresh
ment in gazing into the wonderful eyes of the
child in Mary's arms. And perhaps the most im
portant element in the greatness of that picture is
its absolutely universal appeal. Be a man a critic
or an ignoramus; be he professor or untutored
peasant, there is a message for him. The Infinite
has been brought as nearly into human presentment
in those two faces as is possible in the realm of
graphic art.
The general plan of the picture is in no way re
markable. The green curtains, which are probably
introduced to suggest a sudden breaking of the
heavenly vision upon the veiled eyes of earth, are
stagey and unnecessary. It is claimed that the two
little cherubs were an a^fterthought, and that the
lines of the clouds over which they were painted
can be traced through their surface.
The Sistine Madonna is the apotheosis of mother
hood. The white effulgence which surrounds the
figures is suitable to this altar of wondering divine
innocence. The charm does not lie in the colour,
but in the expression. The deepest and truest
spiritual insight is here exhibited, and Raphael has
made the nearest approach to painting the soul that
has ever been achieved.

20 XCbe Hrt of tbe 2)resben (Bailer?
When one considers his age, it seems almost in
credible that a young man should have had suffi
cient knowledge of both worlds to paint such a
flawless epitome of the Christian religion as the
faces of this mother and her child. But, though
Raphael's life did not measure itself by scores of
years, there is a truer scale of measurement — the
gauging of life by emotion, by study, and by nat
ural intellect. By this standard, Raphael's life was
as long as eternal things. What had been the men
tal history of the youth? Had he been taken up
with watching money come and go, or had he spent
his time in social frivoHties? No; work — the
truest of all experiences — had been his portion ;
not drudgery of work, tiring body and soul with its
monotony, but buoyant, interesting, vital work,
which filled his longings, and satisfied his ambitions,
and made him independent of companionship or
environment ; work in which his mind and his tech
nical skill were daily engaged, and in which he re
joiced with the strength and enthusiasm of an
unspoiled vigour. The characters which he had
constant need to study during these early years
were the sacred men of Scripture; the family
of Our Lord; the subjects which he had been
obliged to consider, and to consider deeply and
seriously, before he could have painted them, were
such as the Crucifixion, the Resurrection of Christ,

Barl? "fftalians; IRapbael anb Correggio 21
the- Virgin as a loving mother, as a sorrowing
mourner, and as a saint transfigured. He had
to conceive the spiritual forms of the hierarchies
of heaven, to render visible to an unlettered people
the forms of angels and archangels, and to portray
all manifestations of human and divine love. In
his early days he painted that exquisite little Vision
of a Young Knight, in London, with the two paths
of life typified by the two women of opposite types;
an allegory which showed that he was consciously
turning to the right, and conscientiously trying to
follow the uplifting vision of a virtuous progress.
St. George, the warrior against evil - — St. Michael
destroying the demon of sloth, greed, and lust :
these were the personages to whom his attention
was necessarily turned, and his unconscious mental
development was quickened by the thoughts with
which it was fed.
Imagine the excitement of the youth, when,
hardly twenty years old, he went to Florence, — the
Mecca of aesthetic dreams in his- day, — armed
with a letter from the sister of the Duke of Urbino,
to the Gonfalonier, Pietro Soderini ! " He who
presents this letter to you," wrote Johanna, " is
Raphael, a painter of Urbino, endowed with great
talent in art. He has decided to pass some time at
Florence, in order to improve himself. ... As his
father, who was dear to me, was full of good qual-

22 Zbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
ities, so the son is a modest young man of distin
guished manners, and thus I bear him affection on
every account, and wish that he should attain per
fection. This is why I recommend him as earnestly
as possible to your Highness, with an entreaty that
it may please you, for the love of me, to show him
help and protection on every opportunity. . . .
From her who commends herself to you, and is
willing to render any good offices in return,
Johanna Feltra de Rovere."
Then came the great days in Rome, when another
mightier than he was by, to give him encourage
ment and new ambitions, — Michelangelo. In those
days he planned and carried out deep studies on
great, burning questions. He must have had defi
nite theories about the ancient philosophies before
he could have designed and executed the School of
Athens; he must have heard and weighed the big
oted strivings and self-righteous bickerings of
ecclesiastics before he could have painted the Dis
pute of the Sacrament; he must have steeped his
mind in the fascinating Greek classics and entered
into the idyllic atmosphere of Myth before he could
have created the loveliest conception of Parnassus
which has ever been evolved.
Of course, it was not possible that all this should
be the exclusive mental food of a virile young man
with such universal perceptions. He must have had

fiarl? fltalians ; IRapbael anb Correggio 23
many recreations and relaxations from this intellec
tual discipline, as many of his lighter classical sub
jects would denote, and the list of his Madonnas
is here and there interrupted with portraits of his
mistress; but the main tendency, the life that counts
for something when the physical life comes to an
end, was upright, far-seeing, deeply spiritual, and
comprehending. To such a man it was possible,
even at an early age, as years are counted, to give
to the world the most perfect exposition of the soul
that has ever breathed from a canvas.
Raphael knew the hardships of the life of the
worker — not only the bright, glad enthusiasm wa?
for him; as he says himself in writing to Francia,
" entreating his indulgent excuse " for having so
long delayed in sending him a picture which he had
promised : " Excuse me, therefore, you who know
from frequent experience what it is to live deprived
of one's liberty, and at the command of patrons,
who, when they need you not, lay you aside."
There are thoughtful art historians who consider
that Raphael died at the right moment, — that so
full a flowering at so early a period was leading
surely toward a premature dissolution of his pow
ers, which would have been a greater aesthetic
calamity than his early death.
The Sistine Madonna was painted in 1515, at
the order of the Benedictine monks of San Sisto,

24 trbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
at Piacenza. It has been thought strange that these
poor monks were able to secure this masterpiece
originally. It is quite probable that the Cardinal
of San Sisto, who was in Bologna in 15 14, may
have arranged with the friars for this painting, for
Piacenza is not far from Bologna, and it is con-
jecturable that some of the monks may have gone
to solicit this favour from the cardinal. The
Elector of Saxony bought the Sistine Madonna for
eleven thousand sequins, in 1753, the monks not
realizing the absolute pricelessness of their treasure.
He brought it to his palace in Dresden. When they
tried to place it on the palace wall to best advan
tage, they discovered that the only part of the room
where the light was favourable, was in the spot
where the throne stood. The Elector immediately
ordered the displacement of the throne, that the
place of honour might be secured for the pic
ture. The faces in the Madonna di San Sisto must
have been painted quickly and with great spon
taneity; they suggest the vital inspiration of pass
ing thought and emotion. There is something of
the eternal about the picture. It seems as if those
wonderful eyes must have always looked into the
souls of men, — that they existed always, and that
they will never cease to exist. There is classic
vigour in the child in Mary's arms. He is not sim-

jearl? Ttallans; IRapbael anb Correggio 25
ply a pretty infant, appealing to our sympathies,
and calling to strength to minister to his weakness ;
he is already a ruler of men, and a masterful power
making for righteousness. Mr. F. P. Stearns says :
" I have gazed at the Sistine Madonna day after
day, until I discovered that her eyes were painted
in such a manner that in cloudy weather they are
scarcely visible." This is one way of accounting
for the marvellous evanescence and transitoriness
of the expression. While the figures of St. Sixtus
and St. Barbara do not enhance the value of the
composition in this case, one must admit the ex
quisite beauty of the upturned face of the old man,
and the technical success of the draperies and acces
sories. In Room B we find Antonello da Messina's St.
Sebastian. It is rather hard in finish, but it has
an adorable background of blue-green, which
makes up for many deficiencies. The figure of the
saint is so large, and the figures of other personages
in the picture so unduly small, considering the
slight amount of distance which is indicated, that
I could quite understand the little child whom I saw
looking at it, when she remarked, " There's Gulli
ver ! " The figure of a sleeping guard is comically
foreshortened. The little background figures are
spirited and the details excellent. It was painted
between 1480 and 1490. Antonello is inadequate

26 ube Hrt of tbe Sresben (Bailer?
to express deep emotion. The setting is more at
tractive than the main figure. St. Sebastian's face
is not very expressive. The mouth is open, yet
without the effect either of speaking or of la
menting. Cosimo Tura's St. Sebastian was attributed orig
inally to Cossa, and afterward to Costa; but it is
now recognized as being a fine example of Tura's
work. Like all this artist's figures, the Saint is pain
fully mannered in his attitude.
A very richly coloured example of Garofalo may
be seen here : it portrays a Bacchic procession, Sile-
nus riding on a lion, while Ariadne sits by Bacchus
in his triumphal car, drawn by leopards, and ele
phants follow in stately progress. It is a large and
important picture, but is not entirely original with
Garofalo. Vasari tells us that it was painted when
Garofalo was old, and was taken from one of
Raphael's drawings.
The long-favoured people of Parmeg^anino ap
pear here in the Madonna della Rosa, so called be
cause the Virgin is receiving a rose from the Divine
Infant. This picture has an interesting history. It
was probably painted by order of Pietro Aretino,
one of the greatest libertines of his time, and in
tended for a Venus and Cupid ; later, when Parme-
gianino decided to give it to Pope Clement VII., he
altered it, according to his biographer Affo, into

Barl? Italians ; IRapbael anb Correggio 27
a Madonna and Child ! There is also an attractive
copy here of the Cupid by Parmegianino, in
Vienna, in which he is seen whittling out a bow
from a branch of wood. This picture has hardly
any colour, except the soft greenish wings, and is
very lovely.
Calvaert has made an excellent study of ecstasy
as he comprehends it, in his picture of St. Francis
and St. Dominic standing in highly dramatic
trances upon beholding the Virgin and Child in
the clouds. St. Dominic is provided with his book
and lily, which he never seems too busy to omit.
In Room C there are various copies from
Raphael by fairly good artists; while such pictures
do not add much to the value of the collection, it is
well to have reproductions of famous works which
would not othferwise be seen. It is not our purpose,
however, to devote time to copyists' productions in
this volume. There are no original works of
Michelangelo in Dresden; there is a copy of his
brutal Leda, painted pretty well by Rubens, and
also a few inconsiderable copies here and there
among the cabinets. Sebastiano del Piombo's
C3irist bearing the Cross hangs in Madrid; there
is a copy of it here by a Flemish artist. It was
acquired through an English dealer, in 1874, at a
period when pedigrees were not so carefully exam
ined as they are now.

28 tCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
Mythology and martyrology are the chief sources
from which painters of the Renaissance derived
their subjects. We turn to Pan teaching Olympus
to play the Flute, by Giulio Romano. The con
trasting flesh-tints make the young Olympus look
quite ill.
In Giulio Romano's selection of subject — the
bath of the infant Saviour — the artist probably
intended to suggest a foregleam of the idea of
Christ's baptism. There is a certain intimate charm
in the human way in which the family has gathered
to watch this little daily process.
Among the early Florentines, Piero di Cosimo,
that tender but eccentric painter, is represented by
an interesting picture formerly ascribed to Luca
Signorelli — it hangs in the large hall, D, and is
numbered 20. On a strange central rock two angels
are seated, singing out of a book ; below, the Holy
Family is seen, the Infant in a pose which is not
very childlike, and rather theatrical. The face of
the mother is pretty, and there are two delicious
little glimpses of flat landscape in the background
on either side of the rock, which add a charm to
the whole. There is a good deal of conventional
grace about the lines, and the finish is clear and
glossy, — in fact it is hard, like enamel. The pic
ture is composed in a circle.
A very glowing painting is that by Francia, of

Earl? Utalians ; IRapbael anb Correggio 29
the Baptism of Christ. The tones" are like those in
some of Perugino's tenderest studies. The figures,
although, of course, posed deliberately, as are all
figures of this school and period, are of excep
tional grace. A curious fact is noticeable, — it may
have been intentional; the feet of Christ are abso
lutely on the surface of the water, as if he were
standing on glass. The artist may have had some
principle in mind, — he may have intended to con
vey the idea that the sacred person of Our Lord
should be independent of such earthly forces as
the power of gravitation, otherwise it would seem
that Francia would have indicated the natural play
of the water about the ankles of Christ.
The pictures by Andrea del Sarto in this collec
tion are disappointing. The most interesting is the
Abraham about to offer up Isaac, a large picture of
excellent composition, in which the colouring is
soft and good, with the exception of a hard scarlet
in the scarf. The figure of the boy is graceful, and
Abraham rather grandiloquent. Isaac's face has
the characteristic square-mouthed, snarling expres
sion, so usual in del Sarto's work. Andrea's mono
gram on the stone in the foreground is hardly
needed when this face is examined. It is equal to
a signature in itself.
The Betrothal of St. Catherine, by Andrea del
Sarto, is painfully strong in colour, almost raw.

30 Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
The effect and finish of this picture is woolly, and
the legs of the children are positively elephantine.
It is a genuine work, however, but not at all pleas
ing. Restorers may be responsible for the unfa
vourable impression which it makes.
Dosso Dossi and Garofalo are especially well
represented in Dresden. Girolamo da Carpi is also
to be seen to advantage. Dosso's four small pic
tures were all probably originally in one room at
the Palace of Ferrara. Probably there is no gallery
out of Italy where he can be studied to so much
advantage. Although the four large canvases in
the salon D, on the plan, are partly to be attributed
to the work of his pupils, the design and the colour
scheme are undoubtedly Dossi' s, and they are won
derfully rich and decorative as a set of pictures.
The St. George is almost copied from Raphael's
in St. Petersburg, but it is altered in parts, and is
larger than the original. This picture and the one
near by, the Archangel Michael warring against
Satan, were originally attributed to Penni, but have
now been assigned to Dosso Dossi. The colouring
in Justice with the Scales, and in Peace with the
Torch and Horn of Plenty, is especially warm.
There is also a picture of the Four Fathers of the
Church with St. Bernardine of Siena, the Corona
tion of the Virgin appearing in the clouds above.
That is, it is called often the Coronation, but it is

£arl? Italians; IRapbael anb Correggio 31
more likely that it is a representation of the Pre
destination of Mary, a legend which assumed that
the Virgin was predestined before her birth to be
the mother of Christ. If the design is examined
with this in view, it will be noticed that the Father,
with a triangular halo, holds a wand over the head
of the Virgin, who is about to descend to earth.
There is no crown, in spite of the name usually as
signed to the picture. The Church Fathers appear
greatly at variance concerning this revelation —
they certainly are excusable. Each is meditating
in a characteristic way, upon the mystery. St.
Gregory sits thinking, with pen and tablet ready;
Ambrose and Augustine are also waiting for inspi
ration. To St. Jerome only is vouchsafed the vision :
he looks up in rapture and awe, at the appearance
of God and the Virgin, in the clouds. This picture
should be compared with No. 155, which hangs in
the third cabinet. At first one would say that there
was no occasion for such a comparison, for one is
a large religious composition and the other is a
portrait of an elderly gentleman; but look at the
hands. They are identical in both pictures, and
have led the critics to believe that this portrait,
which has long been called the Physician of Cor
reggio, is really the work of Dosso Dossi.
In the figure of St. Michael, Dosso Dossi recalls
both the pictures by Raphael and Guido Reni of

32 Ube Hrt of tbe 2>resben (Bailer?
this subject; the figure of his archangel is superb,
and the grim form at his feet is a sort of bat-
winged Neptune, with his trident raised in self-
defence. The foreshortening of St. Michael is
rather sudden, but the glow of rich colour covers
a multitude of minor sins, if they exist.
There is a Diana bending above the Sleeping En
dymion, hanging near the large picture, which used
to be considered a Dossi, but is now believed to be
the work of Garofalo, though the gfenuineness is
uncertain. Of the school of Dossi also is the picture of
nearly the same size, called One of the Hours with
the Four Steeds of Apollo. It has some character
istics of Garofalo — it may easily have been exe
cuted by the same hand as the Endymion, for it has
many points in common.
In the forty-second cabinet is a school piece of
Dossi, No. 131, a young woman taking a siesta,
surrounded by fantastic dream sprites. This pic
ture is not interesting except for its marvellous blue
and green draperies.
Garofalo's Minerva and Neptune, dated 15 12, is
an example of a good period of this master. It
hangs on the same wall with the chief Dosso
Dossis. Amonc: tlie works attributed to Garofalo
is a good example of his decline, in No. 134, in
which St. Peter, St. Bernard of Clain-aux, and St.

Earl? Italians ; IRapbael anb Correggio 33
George are seen with the Virgin in the sky above.
The picture was transferred from panel to canvas
in 1838. It was painted for the Carthusians of
Ferrara, in 1530, and therefore some are inclined
to consider the saint in the foreground to be St.
Bruno, the patron of the order, rather than St. Ber
nard. In another good Garofalo, Venus is seen
visiting Mars, begging for his chariot, she having
been wounded in the battle of Troy. Mars is a
well-appointed sixteenth-century knight in armour,
who would cause " Homeric laughter ! "
A pretty composition is the Virgin giving the
infant Saviour to St. Cecilia, who kneels at the
side, with various musical instruments scattered on
the ground. It rnay be a school work, but came
from Modena in 1746, among the valuable paint
ings which had belonged to Prince Ignatio Cesare.
St. Bernardine of Siena and St. Anthony of Padua
are seen behind St. Cecilia, while a magnificent fig
ure of St. Geminianus is seated, at the other side,
in cope and mitre. St. Geminianus was the patron
of Modena, and was regarded as having saved the
Cathedral from being destroyed by a flood, after
his death. His attribute in art is a model of a
church. Mythological subjects by Garofalo are not very
common; one, the Neptune and Minerva, just al-

34 Ube Hrt of tbe 2)re8ben (Bailer?
luded to, shows traces of the influence of Costa,
and is dated 15 12.
In No. 142, Opportunity, the object was to por
tray the rapid flight of Opportunity, and the fact
that when it passes. Repentance is found to be com
ing after. It is painted by Girolamo da Carpi, who
was a pupil of Garofalo.
As we stand and look upon that significant line
of Correggio's pictures hanging in this hall, it
seems as if we had a mental history of Correggio
before us. The first — the lovely Madonna of St.
Francis — was painted when Corr^gio was only
twenty, and it has the restraint and timidity of the
spring, — the beginning, — yet with all its promise,
too. Some pious souls have objected to the Ma
donna as having too much coquetry in her expres
sion, and perhaps if one were looking for trouble,
one might admit that her benediction and smile
must be extremely gratifying to the remarkably
handsome young monk. — if his ecstasy and fresh
beauty were removed, and the figure of an old,
thin, weather-beaten saint substituted, I have no
doubt that the critics would never have noticed that
Mary's regard was too tender.
The Madonna of St. Francis was painted in
1 5 14, for the Franciscans of the town of Correggio.
When the Duke of Modena took it away in 1638,
the citizens arose in revolt, and a genuine riot en-

CORREGGIO.  MADONNA OF ST. FRANCIS

Barl? irtalians ; IRapbael anb Correggio 3S
sued. All the early influences — of Costa, Man
tegna, and Leonardo — may be traced in it; sug
gestions of Francia and of Perugino may also be
found. The soaring cherubs in this picture look
as if they might have hooks in their backs, and be
swung on threads, and they give the sensation
of going round and round after each other. This
was long supposed to be the master's earliest paint
ing, but nearly a dozen early works were really
executed before it. Youth and enthusiasm, pagan
love for pure beauty for its own sake, — these
qualities pervade the lovely picture of the Madonna
of St. Francis. It is more formal in its arrange
ment than the riper picture, the Madonna of St.
Roch, which shows more of the spirit of noon, —
of summer, — of maturity.
There is less piquancy in the face of the Virgin
in the Madonna with St. Roch and St. Sebastian.
There is less of that arch quality which reminds us
of Leonardo. The Madonna- is more placid, and
more maternal. Every one else in the composition
seems to be working hard. It lacks repose. It has
lost the youthful timidity and reserve, and is full
of action, — not as restful as the earlier painting.
St. Sebastian is writing in mixed ecstasies of pain
and joy ; St. Roch is sleeping heavily in an uncom
fortable pose, suggestive of nightmare, and St.
Geminianus, who has presented his architectural

36 Xtbe Hrt of tbe Bresben (Bailer?
model to the heavenly group, is turning round to
the spectator, pointing upward with one hand and
downward with the other, as if he were making
a speech, and calling the attention of the onlooker
to the Celestial Vision. Angels balance themselves
in most precarious attitudes, and one tiny cherub
is riding astride on a small cloud with all the zest
of a little boy " playing horse." The colour, too,
is rampant and active ; the central light is red, grad
ing into a yellow sky above and a yellow robe
below, making the tones in the other earlier picture
look very cool by contrast.
In the Nativity, or Holy Xight. we have the
evening glow, — still, dark, and brooding; Cor
reggio was an old man when he painted this. The
lines are clearer than in the other pictures. It has
the restraint of age instead of the timidity of youth.
The light streaming outward, from the sweet, hu
man little baby lying on the straw, is diffused in a
balmy effulgence on the salient points of the com
position, leaving the rest in mystery and shadow.
Woltmann and Woermann say of the Holy Night:
" The types, with the exception of the \'irgin, are
commonplace; the composition lacks grace and
charm; marvellous effect is produced solely by the
treatment of the light, which proceeds from the
person of the sacred Infant, and illumines the by
standers, while the distant landscape is lighted bv

Barl? Italians ; IRapbael anb Correggio 37
dawn." The picture was executed in 1530, for the
Chapel of St. Prospero in Reggio, The Madonna
is a young mother tending her baby ; the shepherds
and Joseph are simple country people; there is
nothing hierarchic even about the angels. Nothing
of the formalism of the early piety of art remains.
Vasari particularly admires the angels, and ob
serves that they hardly seem to have been painted,
but rather " showered down from heaven." The
expression on the face of the maid who looks up
at the shepherd has been objected to, on the ground
bf portraying a " feeble rapture ; " and the angels
in the sky above have been accused of appear
ing to suffer from aerial cramp. The real study of
the picture is in its lighting. The effulgence is not
intended to be exactly like any known light. It
merges into the distant dawn, and the line of de-
markation is skilfully handled. There is a bit of
the handwriting of Correggio relating to the pic
ture of the Nativity. While at work upon it, he
received his payment in instalments. One of these
partial payments amounted to " forty pounds of
ancient currency," and on the receipt for this sum,
signed in 1522, these words are written: "I, An
tonio Lieto of Correggio, declare that I received
the sum mentioned on the day and in the year
aforesaid, in token of which I have written this
with my own hand."

3* Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
It is almost a pity that such a harmonious se
quence of dawn, noon, and evening, as are typified
by these three pictures, the Madonna of St. Francis,
the Madonna of St. Sebastian, and the Holy Night,
should be intruded upon by the florid and extrava
gant Madonna of St. George, which is the last
altar-piece by the master, and is overblown and
mannered. Here we have a decided decadence ; St.
George, as a Roman soldier, strident and confident,
places his hand on his hip, and looks over his shoul
der to see — ¦ what? To inquire if people are notic
ing the Madonna and Child, or to see who is looking
at him? The attitude can be interpreted either
way. The sense of reverence is quite subordinate.
St. John the Baptist is a fat and well-liking young
faun, who must have found great plenty of locusts
and wild honey in his desert. The colour is soft
and glowing, and the technique admirable. But the
Greek pagan predominates over the (Christian at
every point. Of the Cupid-like cherubs who oc
cupy the foreground, — certainly among the most
vital and charming of Correegio's creations, —
Guido Reni inquired, some years after seeing them,
if they were still there? " For," he added, " they
were so lifelike that it seems as if they must have
grown up by this time ! "
Correggio was not a simple, self-made boy of
humble origin, as has been thought by some; there

Earl? irtaltans; IRapbael anb Correggio 39
is evidence that he was a protege of the wife of the
Lord of Correggfio, the cultivated Veronica Gam-
bara. In this way the boy had the best artistic
training possible to one of his ingenuous tempera
ment, surrounded by the refined delights of a small
court, in one of the most select little coteries of the
Renaissance. Correggio's life was uneventful, and he lived in
a town instead of a city. He was not in the midst
of turmoil and quarrels, he did not live where jeal
ous artists were constantly making life hard for
him, and where the unrestrained passions of the
day were wreaked all about him ; his buoyant nature
could expand with a pleasant optimism, and he had
little to disturb the refined pastoral tendencies of
his nature.
There are many apocryphal stories about Cor
reggio and his witty sayings: they are not to
be regarded as gospel truth, but it is amusing to
hear that when the Church dignitaries at Parma,
where he did much of his most remarkable work,
objected to the amount charged for his incompa
rable frescoes, Correggio replied, proudly, " Turn
your cupola upside down, and fill it with gold, and
even then it will not contain the true value of the
pictures ! " Correggio spent many years in Parma.
" Putti " — those amalgamations of cherub-
child-and-Cupid — are especially in Correggio's

40 tCbe Hrt of tbe H)resben (Bailer?
line; he may be considered responsible for the pre
dominance of this form in the Renaissance. Putti
are almost a trade-mark of the period. No artist
could resist introducing them.
Correggio never painted a portrait, even of him
self. His creations were mental, and had only the
life of his brimming imagination. He was a real
and natural pagan. There was no conscious ef
fort at classic Renaissance about him ; he was bom
with the free Greek spirit, and his life, passed
largely in small towns where he was brought little
in touch with the pedantic dilettantism of his times,
fostered this light-hearted tendency. His works
are lyrical, not epic, nor vast, nor dramatic, nor ter
rible in any way. He was nearer to Sappho than
to Homer.
Correggio was unique in his power to hypnotize
us with a smile or a sentimental, langnishing pose.
In his followers these qualities become mere weak,
intentional simpering, and in Carlo Dolci, Sassofer-
rato, and others, we recognize the difference be
tween the true myth and the planned fairv-tale.
In literature there are few figures who stand in the
same relation to their art that he did to painting.
Shelley and Keats are among these, and they were
equally unfortunate in their followers.
It is interesting to compare Corre^o's St. Fran
cis with the Baptism of Christ by Francia. It is

Earl? Utalians ; IRapbael anb Correggio 4i
evident that some of the same spirit is in both. It
has been pointed out by Berenson that the eyes are
strikingly alike in both pictures, and the colour
scheme is similar.
It is believed that Correggio's first teacher was
Bianchi, whom he left in 1508, going to Bologna,
where he stayed and may have studied with Francia
and Costa. It is likely, too, that he went to Mantua
with Costa in the following year, where he could
have had ample opportunity for the study of Man
tegna and Dossi. His occasional similarity to Lotto
may be accounted for by a visit to Venice. There
is also a strange likeness to Raphael in Correggio's
St. Catherine; she is much like the same saint with
her wheel in the National Gallery in London. The
St. John, too, is a good deal like the St. John in the
Madonna da Foligno in Rome. Both of these pic
tures by Raphael were somewhat influenced by his
teacher, Timoteo Viti, and Correggio may easily
have come under the same spell through other fol
lowers of Viti, although he could not have learnt
of Raphael. Morelli believes him to have been in
fluenced by Lotto; this Berenson denies.
Correggio was but forty when he died, in 1535.
A remarkable testimony to the fact that he was not
fully appreciated during his lifetime, is the circum
stance that he was buried under a simple wooden
slab, inscribed, " Antonius de AUegris, Pictor; " not

42 ^be Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
for a century after his death was this replaced by
a stone. The world in which Correggio moved and had
what might be called almost an astral existence,
was the world of imagination. Dominated by a
soft, voluptuous love for light and delicate forms,
it was his ability to paint realistic pictures of these
unreal phantoms which made him a unique magi
cian. His art, as Symonds has said, excels in
" artless grace and melodious tenderness." It is
exotic; it should not be judged by those standards
by which other productions are tested.

CHAPTER II.

THE GREAT VENETIANS

With the Renaissance there developed a reali
zation of the importance of details in pictures. Art
ists began to see that if their paintings were to have
verisimilitude, the usual accessories of a scene must
appear in the picture. Not that these details were
to be conspicuous, but it was found that if they
were omitted their absence was felt. Nature had
not been painted as it really was : during the early
centuries it was formally arranged into rural scenic
effects; but the study of nature in the modern
sense, where a landscape is practically a portrait
of a place, had not developed. When I say portrait,
I mean to use the word with the same distinction
that we make between a photograph and a portrait
of a person. I mean a scene treated with an appre
hension of its characteristics, and a demonstration
of the atmosphere and sentiment of the scene — not
simply a transcript of the number of trees to be
seen, or the height of certain hills. It takes just as
much interpretation and comprehension to paint a
43

44 Zbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
true portrait of a place as it does to paint a true
likeness of a person.
Until Titian's day landscape art had been very
slight; during the Middle Ages it was positively
unsafe for citizens to wander outside of town walls,
and therefore the artists and their patrons knew
little of the actual communion with nature which
made the country estates and gardens of the Renais
sance so attractive. Landscape had been employed
as background where subjects demanded it, but had
not flourished as an art.
The works of Jacopo de' Barbari are to be seen
in the second cabinet, in the half-figures of two
saints, Catherine and Barbara ; also in the first cab
inet, the Saviour in the act of blessing. No. 57,
has now been assigned to the same artist, as well as
No. 59 A, which hangs in the farthest cabinet on the
ground floor, and which represents Galatea riding
on a dolphin. The reasons for deciding upon the
authorship of these pictures are various ; critics see
certain unmistakable signs of the style of Jacopo
in all of them. Among other individual marks
may be noted the extreme roundness of the heads,
the bluntness of the thumbs, the prominence of the
upper eyelids, and the fact that the lips are apart.
An intensely blue spot demands attention in the
second cabinet; it is a tenderly finished .\doration
of the Infant Christ by Girolamo da Santa Croce,

^be (Breat IDenetians 45
a painter who lived in Venice between 15 19 and
1549- Titian's Madonna and Saints hangs in Hall D,
although most of the other works of Titian are in
the next apartment. Both the Madonna and Child
are most lovely, and the painting of the whites in
the draperies of the Virgin and the Magdalen, who
stands in an attitude of classic grace opposite her,
is thoroughly characteristic of Titian's finest early
work. The dark shadowy head of St. Paul, outlined
sharply against the lucid sky, is to be noted as
a superb foil for the stately beauty of the Magdalen.
The Baptist is a rugged figure at the left, with
magnificent biceps and forearm, and his heavy
brown hand clasping the delicate arm of the infant
Saviour is another instance of clever juxtaposition
of opposed types. It was painted early, in the same
period as the Assumption of the Virgin in Venice,
between 15 14 and 1520. The picture was executed
rapidly, painted in a thin medium over a ground
of white gesso. It has been thought that the types
of St. John and St. Paul are more like Sebastian del
Piombo than Titian. It was originally in the Casa
Grimani in Venice.
Titian's religion was not a practical personal
aspiration; he had no idea of suggesting the inti
mate communings of a soul with its creator; his
conception of religion was a magnificent pageant

46 XTbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
and ritual, and as such he has treated it. Paolo
Veronese has done this even more; he has carried
it to a more spectacular extreme, and his pictures
are simply scenes of Venetian gorgeousness.
The most precious Titian here is the Tribute
Money, one of the master's noblest works, painted
in the manner derived from early Flemish study.
It hangs in the second cabinet. The signature,
" Ticianus F.," is to be seen on the open collar of
the Pharisee who is trying to entrap Jesus by ask
ing him if it be lawful to pay tribute unto Caesar.
Our Lord is portrayed at the moment when, point
ing to the coin, he asks, " Whose image and super
scription hath it?" The wonderfully maintained
contrast between the two men, — Christ, noble,
serene, yet powerful and masculine, and the wrin
kled, sly face opposed to his, — the dark clutching
hand of the Pharisee and the slender hand full of
nerve and action, which is near it, — the fine red
robe touching the coarse shirt of the \Tilgarian, —
all these denote a keen apprehension of the actual
scene, and yet there is no lack of devotional feeling.
The picture hung for many years in the palace of
the Duke of Ferrara, but there is no actual record
that it was ordered originally by him. It is a curi
ous coincidence, however, that on the coins of this
Duke were inscribed the words, " Render unto
Caesar the things that are Caesar's and unto Ciod

TITIAN. — TRIBUTE MONEY

Ubc Great Venetians 47
the things that are God's." The hands in this pic
ture have so much expressive action that they almost
supply the place of words.
In 165^ Scanelli wrote a gossipy set of memoirs
called " Microcosmo." He there tells of certain
(Germans who visited Titian's studio in Venice, and
went away wagging their heads, maintaining that
there was but one real artist, who knew how to
finish a picture: Albrecht Diirer. Titian was
rather annoyed at their bigotry bred of ignorance,
exclaiming that, had he thought that extreme finish
were the end and aim of art, he could have pursued
it equally well in that direction. Partly to prove
that he could do this, and that, in spite of the fact
that he preferred a broader style, he was able to
demonstrate that " the subtlest detail might be
compassed without sacrifice of breadth," he painted
this picture of Christ and the Tribute Money. He
had the satisfaction, too, of hearing the ambassador
of Charles V., at the court of Ferrara, wonder that
any one should be able to rival Diirer thus on his
own ground!
Titian was highly prized in Spain. Once, when
there was a fire raging in the Pardo, Philip III.
cried, " Is the Antiope of Titian saved ? " And,
upon being reassured, observed, that other pictures
could be replaced by others equally good, but that
a Titian was priceless.

48 Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
Venice was the first Italian city to realize the
value which portraits would have for future gen
erations, and the Venetians made it a point to haVe
their great men — rulers, statesmen, and benefac
tors — painted by the best artists. Portraits of the
Doges were all ranged about the Great Hall of
Council in the Ducal Palace. Then it began to be
fashionable to paint heroes and beauties as saints,
and to introduce likenesses of prominent citizens
into altar-pieces. The first Italian idea of por
traiture was sculptural ; busts were made as like
nesses, but the colour was lacking, and they were
not really satisfactory. Then Donatello thought of
tinting these portrait busts according to nature, but
the effect was uncanny, and by degrees the painters
realized that portraiture was in their line rather
than in that of the sculptors, and the great insti
tution of modern art — the painted portrait — came
and remained.
No more enchanting series of portraits hangs in
any gallery than those of Titian in this hall, E, at
Dresden. The progress of colouring, from one to
the other, is beautiful and satisfying. Lavinia as
a bride, in soft and glowing white. Lavinia as a
matron, in deep rich green : with the portrait of
a lady in a strange strawberry pink gown coming
between them, and at one side, the portrait of a
young giri with a vase, all in peachy gray, — it

Ube (Breat IDenetians 49
would be impossible to plan a more delicious colour
scheme than this part of the wall.
The girl with the fan is entirely the work of the
master himself. Flag-fans were only carried by
brides, so we know that this represents Lavinia
just after her marriage, the portrait having been
painted upon Titian's return from Rome. The
little pearls twisted in the hair are charmingly con
trived, and the soft texture of the pearl necklace
contrasts exquisitely with Lavinia's fair skin. The
opposing textures of damask and gauze, too, are
painted with great realism. The portrait came
among the heirlooms of the d'Estes, from Modena.
Here the pretty Lavinia is quite suggestive of her
later portrait in Berlin, where she appears bearing
aloft a dish of fruit in her sturdy arms. The same
stalwart short-waisted appearance is in both the like
nesses, also. In the more mature portrait, the lines
of the figure are similar — the outlines are farther
apart, but the curves are on the same plan !
No. 171 portrays the same daughter of Titian as
a matron. In this case she carries a feather fan, sig
nifying a noble lady of Venice. Charles V. having
created Titian a count, she would have been entitled
to carry such a fan.
Near by hangs a Holy Family, of which the
authenticity is questioned, but which has charm.
Morelli pronounces it genuine, one of Titian's more

so Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
mature works, but restored. Where the luminous
green shines so lustrously the effect is that of the
colour being laid upon gold. The family of the
Donor, a man, woman, and boy, appear in this pic
ture, which rather lacks aerial perspective, espe
cially in the cloudy sky in the background, which
obtrudes itself unduly, and might be intended for
snow-clad mountains. The painting is rather flat,
and there is no blending of the edges such as
Titian's work usually shows. It is possible that it
is by another hand, but the facial types of the Holy
Family are like those of Titian. The others, being
portraits, have fewer distinguishing marks.
There is a very good copy of Venus and the Lute
Player from Madrid. It has been supposed a por
trait of the Princess of Eboli, and the lute-player
to represent Philip II., but it is more likely that
it is a Venetian noble and his mistress. The rest
of the copies, which are numerous, are unimportant,
though doubtless interesting to those who can never
see the originals.
Titian had no idea of exploiting human anatomy.
He liked a just and sufficient veil of flesh, and super
imposed it over the bony structure of his person
ages with lavish intention. Neither did he care to
vie with Michelangelo in contorting the muscles as
far and as curiously as was consistent with life;
he understood the value of repose, and generally

Ube (Breat Venetians 51'
preferred to portray more tranquil positions of the
human frame.
Titian's Man with a Palm is an interesting por
trait ; one wonders whom it represents. It was orig
inally inscribed as a portrait of Pietro Aretino, but
the inscription was discovered to be a forgery, and
it was already evident from the lack of likeness that
it certainly was not intended for Aretino. Painted
out, but traceable, in the background, there is the
faint line of a nimbus about the head. What a
curious adjunct to a portrait! One feels inclined
to suggest that it may have been Titian's attempt
at a saint, with the palm of martyrdom, especially
as there are some small knives on the window-sill,
which might be considered as attributes! This is
idle conjecture, however. This picture is now
signed, as was discovered when the false signature
was removed, " MDLXI. . . . Titianus Pictor et
.Sqttes CcEsaris." It was painted when Titian was
eighty-four years of age.
If one wishes to learn what kind of a life Titian
lived, it is only necessary to look through some con
temporary documents and one finds a letter written
by Priscianese, who in 1540 was visiting Venice,
to a friend in Rome. He relates how he was invited
to a garden-party at Titian's home, and the descrip
tion is so charming that it would be a pity not to
quote it : " Before the tables were set out," he

52 trbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
writes, " we spent the time in looking at the lively
figures in the excellent pictures of which the house
was full, and in discussing the real beauty and
charm of the garden, with singular pleasure and ad
miration expressed by all of us. It is situated in the
extreme part of Venice, upon the sea, and from it
one sees the pretty little island of Murano and other
beautiful places. This part of the sea, as soon as
the sun went down, swarmed with gondolas adorned
with beautiful women, and resounded with the
varied harmony and music of voices and instruments
which till midnight accompanied our delightful
supper. . . . Besides the most delicate viands and
precious wines, there were all those pleasures and
amusements that are suited to the season, the guests,
and the feast."
When Titian was ninety-nine years old and near
his death, he visited the monks of the Frari, and
spoke to them in words such as these : " The moun
tains of Cadore are dear to me : the rushing waters
of the Pieve are dear to me : and the murmur of the
wind in the pine-trees in my far-away home. But
bury me not there. Promise to bury me here, in
the city where I have done my life's work, bury me
in this church, where first I was successful, and I
will live on that promise long enough to paint you
yet another Christ — the Christ of pity! It shall
be nearer to the real Christ than any I have yet

trbe (Breat Venetians 53
painted, for I am the nearer to him myself ! " Titian
did not live to finish his picture, but the monks re
membered their promise, and when he died, of the
plague, he was buried as he had requested, in the
Frari. One of the most famous and beautiful Giorgiones
in the world may be seen in Dresden; the Venus
Sleeping, in a Rich Landscape. It was originally
supposed to be a Titian, and seems to be from the
same model as his Bella. This lovely being is very
mortal — she is not a goddess. Dresden was once
supposed to be rich in Giorgiones. Jacob saluting
Rachel, by Palma Vecchio (No. 192 in the large
room D), used to be ascribed to him, and No. 210,
the Adoration of the Shepherds, by Bonifazio
Veronese, was also given to him. This is in the
second cabinet. The picture of a man embracing
a girl. No. 221, in the first cabinet, is now brought
in question, and is not given definitely to any
painter, but there is some reason to think that it
may be Domenico Mancini. It is somewhat remi
niscent of his work. This picture was formerly re
garded as a Giorgione, as was also the portrait of
Pietro Aretino, of uncertain authorship, which
hangs in the second cabinet. No. 186, in the forty-
first cabinet, used to be catalogued as a Giorgione,
but it is more likely a copy or school piece. The
only absolutely attested Giorgione in Dresden, then.

54 Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
is the beautiful Sleeping Venus, which occupies an
important place in the large salon K.
This picture, it is true, was probably finished by
Titian, but it is the same painting referred to by
Ridolfi, hanging in his day in the Casa Marcella in
Rome, and Morelli has established its authenticity
by various tests, so that it is now accepted by all
the leading critics, although it was bought for a
Titian. Ridolfi alludes to it thus : " An exquisite
nude figure of Venus sleeping is in the Casa Mar
cella, and at her feet is Cupid holding a little bird,
which (Cupid) was finished by Titian." At first
sight one might suppose this could not be the picture
in question, as there is no Cupid ! But it was stated
by Doctor Hiibner that when this picture came to
Dresden, the little Cupid at the feet of Venus was
so much damaged that it was painted out. In the
course of time the canvas was even ascribed to Sas-
soferato, on what ground it would be difficult to
imagine. Titian's Venus in the Uffizi is almost ex
actly the same figure, but as I have attempted to
show in my volume on " Classic Myths in Art," the
head of Eleanora Gonzaga was probably substituted
in the case of the Titian, which may have been in
other respects a copy of the picture in Dresden.
In 1746 the beautiful large canvas by Catena was
brought from Modena. It was erroneously given
to Andrea del Sarto, and represents the Virgin sit-

Ube (Breat IDenetians ss
ting on the knee of St. Anne, holding in her turn
the infant Saviour. Joseph is seen working by
them, and domestic animals are introduced. This
denotes a great departure from earlier ideals, when
it was not considered fitting to show the earthly
mother of Mary, the divine element alone being
recognized in those days. The painting is beauti
fully clear, but is rather hard. In a letter from
Marcantonio Michel, written in Rome in 1520, he
sounds a warning note : " On Good Friday, at three
at night, the most delightful and excellent painter
Raphael of Urbino passed away, to the great sor
row of us all. . . . It is said that Michelangelo is
ill at Florence. Therefore bid our Catena beware,
for the turn to die of the excellent painters has
come." Such a passage in a contemporary letter
proves that Catena was held in high esteem by the
people of his own time.
Palma Vecchio did not escape the fate of most
of the painters of his time, in having his various
" manners " classified. Of his " first " manner there
are no examples to be seen in this collection, but in
his "second" and "third" — (known as his
"blonde" manner), there are specimens. The Re
clining Venus and the Virgin and Child, No. 191,
are both in the blonde period, which was his latest.
The Venus Reposing is probably a portrait of a
contemporary Venetian beauty, and a beauty she

s6 Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
certainly was. The picture is exquisite, but the
head strictly that of a fashionable woman of the
period. Palma's Three Sisters, a rather provokingly
smug array of lazy-looking women, are chiefly
charming for their colouring, warm russets being a
delightful offset for the soft greens and blues. The
" Anonimo " alludes to this painting: " The picture
of three women to the waist, painted from life, was
the work of Palma." It is badly restored; the
features of the sister on the right are so painted over
as to have quite changed their original expression.
Palma Vecchio's Virgin and (Thild with Saints
— the Baptist and St. Catherine — is a study in
half-lengths, very Venetian in character. The pic
ture might be intended as a study in childhood,
young womanhood, young manhood, and maternal
love. The central interest of Palma's picture of Jacob
Saluting Rachel, is the fact of the lover's kiss. Al
though there is a good deal of rural accessory in the
way of herdsmen, inquiring dogs, and pugnacious
rams butting each other in the background, one's
eyes are held captive by the spectacle of the delight
of the fond young people, who meet and embrace.
The picture was once considered a Gioi^one, and
has some of his qualities.
Lotto was probably bom in 1480, and lived to be

Ubc (Breat IDenetians 57
seventy-six, dying in 1556. He was born in Venice,
and died in Loreto, although his life was passed in
various other places. He is believed to have been a
pupil of Alvise Vivarini. When he was feeling the
weight of ill health (he completely lost his voice in
1550), he went to Loreto and gave himself into the
keeping of the canons of the Holy House there,
making a deed of transfer of all his property to this
institution, " being tired of wandering, and wishing
to end his days in that holy place." During his life
he arranged that he was to have rooms, clothing,
and a servant, and the liberal sum of a florin a
month, " to do what he pleased with," while he was
to benefit by the prayers of the brothers, who were
thus to regard him as a benefactor. So, in the peace
ful seclusion of this quiet retreat, he continued paint
ing, and passed a comfortable and protected period
of two years, after he had finished battling with the
world: quite a contribution to the history of An
nuities! A very sensible way to close one's career
after there have been inroads upon the vitality which
render daily responsibilities of undue magnitude.
That Lorenzo Lotto was high in favour among
the artists of his day is proved by a letter from that
arch rogue, Pietro Aretino. Pietro, of whom I
have given an account in the " Art of the Pitti
Palace," approaches the subject in his soft suave
way, — " Oh, Lotto, as goodness good, and as tal-

58 Ubc Hrt Of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
ent talented, Titian . . . greets and embraces you
by the token of the letter which I received from
him, two days ago. He says that it would double
the pleasure that he takes in the emperor's satis
faction with the pictures he is now painting, if he
had your eye and your judgment to approve him.
And indeed, the painter is not mistaken, for your
judgment has been formed by age, by nature, and by
art . . . envy is not in your breast."
The rendering of Lotto — the actual handling
of the paint, is quite prophetic of the modem men.
Berenson finds something in common between his
methods and those of Manet.
Lotto's Madonna and Child with the Baptist
hangs in the first cabinet. The Madonna is clad in
blue and lilac, and through the open window in the
background is seen a delicate landscape, such as the
artists of this period loved. The infant is leaning
over to kiss his little cousin, and the action is thor
oughly human and tender. No sentiment of medi
aeval formalism or ritual is seen here. The embrace
between the children does not occur in art before
1518. The picture is quite reminiscent of Alvise.
When Lotto painted a picture, he charged so much
for each figfure introduced, showing that he under
stood the importance of each bit of human charac
terization, rather than the ability to cover so many
feet of canvas. No. 194b is a picture catalogued

Ube ©reat IDenetians 59
as " in the style of Lotto's later period," and is
probably not by the master at all. It represents the
martyrdom of St. Sebastian and is almost like a
tinted drawing.
Paris Bordone is represented in various parts
of the gallery. In both the large halls D and E may
be seen some of his works. In one hangs a picture
of Apollo listening with much disgust to Marsyas,
playing on his flute, and in the other a delightfully
decorative Diana, who holds her dogs in leash, while
a n)miph presents to the virgin goddess the head
of a stag just slain. There are rich blues in the sky,
and in the skirt of Diana. The painting is rendered
with a strong dark outline. In all may be detected
the curious treatment of the hair — in little tight
ringlets — it is quite eccentric. The textile qualities
are good. Paris Bordone worked with Titian, and,
indeed, is regarded as the most celebrated of his
pupils. In many tones and touches he recalls the
master. Bonifazio the Elder and Bonifazio the Younger
are both to be seen in the same room. Cabinet 2, so
that one may easily compare their methods. The
pictures have been variously attributed at different
times to Giorgione, and to Palma, and the general
effect would often account for this error ; but com
parison of certain details will prove that the later
critics are right. For instance, the hand as painted

6o ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
by the older and younger Bonifazio is not like that
rendered by their master, Palma ; both of them draw
a fleshier hand than Palma, who usually depicts a
thin angular hand.
In Bonifazio Veronese's Virgin and Child with
St. Catherine, St. Peter, and St. Anthony, there is
delicious tone. Other works by Bonifazio have been
noted in a previous chapter.
Polidoro Lanzani's picture of a nobleman bring
ing his child to the Virgin might easily be taken for
a painting by Paolo Veronese; Polidoro was a pupil
of Titian.
There are several examples, but rather unim
portant ones, of the work of Jacopo da Ponte, called
Bassano, at Dresden ; also many school pieces from
his studio. They are to be seen here and there in
different parts of the gallery, and deal chiefly with
Old Testament subjects. The more important
Leandro Bassano, known as Da Ponte, is repre
sented by two portraits of the Doge Pasquale Ci-
cogna and his wife Laura Morosini.
Not especially striking is Andrea Schiavone's
Dead Christ supported by two men and an angel.
Jacopo Robusti, the marvellous Tintoretto, has
several pictures to testify to his genius in this col
lection. The hall E has the earliest example — Six
Women with Musical Instruments. This is a gen
uine Tintoretto, but his early style is much harder

ttbe (Breat Venetians 6i
than it became later. The colouring is golden, and
the picture attractive. The long, slender, graceful
figures are in charming contrast to most of the nudes
of the period. One nymph is playing upon a little
organ, which is operated by a companion who sits
on the other side, and pulls two cords with both
hands. This is an unfamiliar form of bellows work,
but would undoubtedly produce the same result as
pedals. Strictly speaking, these lovely women are
not playing upon their instruments, but are tuning
them preparatory to performing in unison. They
are comparing their musical notes, and apparently
waiting for " cues " to begin.
With the exception of those in Vienna, the finest
Tintorettos north of the Alps are in Dresden. A
portrait of a lady in mourning hangs here, which
used to be considered a Titian. A very lovely opal
escent example hangs in this hall, — it represents
the allegory of the persecution of the Woman by
the Dragon, " A woman clothed with the sun, and
the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown
of stars," according to the description in Revelation
xii. The woman is seen at the upper part of the
composition, on the left ; " and there appeared an
other wonder in heaven, and behold a great red
dragon, having seven heads, and. ten horns, and
seven crowns upon his heads." This monster is
seen wallowing in the lower depths, — on the right

62 tlbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
side is the illustration of another verse : " and there
was war in heaven, Michael and his angels fought
against the dragon, and the dragon fought and his
angels. And prevailed not ; neither was their place
found any more in heaven. And the great dragon
was cast out." Tintoretto presents the " angels of
Satan " in the same spirit as his famous " tempter "
in the Scuolo di san Rocco in Venice, with a wild.
voluptuous beauty, really offering a temptation to
mortals instead of being the repulsive reptile forms
which were portrayed by the northern nations, and
which we shall have opportunity to consider when
we deal with those schools in art. This picture is
a strong example of Tintoretto, and characteristic
in every way.
Tintoretto's Parnassus is a restless, uncomfort
able, vague place — just the proper environment
for a certain school of poets whose uncertainty
of ideal makes them waver and sway in their dic
tion, much like these floating Muses, who hover at
all sorts of indeterminate angles, and suggest a
form of poetry that should have no special coher
ence but should express through " lilt " and eu
phony alone a sort of hypnotic rhythm. The Par
nassus is probably not entirely by Tintoretto's own
hand, — the finish is closer than usual with him,
and the faces of the women conform too strictly to
one type, which does not happen to be Tintoretto's

Ube (Breat IDenetians 63
type. In this picture one sees evidence of the kind
of study in perspective which delighted Tintoretto:
he used to make little clay models, and then suspend
them from beams in the ceiling, so that he might see
them from below as if they were flying through the
air. Near by hangs a charming painting, genuine also,
showing a knight in armour rescuing two ladies
from a tower. He stands below, in a boat, which is
ridiculously inadequate to its load, not to mention
the addition of two fair nude ladies. This boat
looks as if a man in armour alone would be sufficient
to swamp it. It has a sort of gondola prow at
either end. A boy sits at the stern, and neither he
nor the knight seem to regard it as at all peculiar
that the ladies are descending from their captivity
without any clothes. They are all unembarrassed
and graceful, and the composition charming. The
tones are cool.
The double portrait of an old and young man by
Tintoretto, No. 270, is interesting. Tintoretto's
Holy Family, with the Patron worshipping, is a
very rich canvas. The Madonna is severely clad,
not as Tintoretto and the Venetians of his day
usually painted her; but St. Catherine, who stands
by, is crowned and jewelled and is a fine foil to the
almost Byzantine simplicity of the Virgin. Another
Tintoretto, now considered only a studio piece, is

64 Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
the Woman taken in Adultery standing before
Christ. Tintoretto's charm as a man is summed up by
Ridolfi perhaps better than he realized when he
wrote the description : " he was of a kind and ami
able disposition, for painting does not cause men to
become peculiar, as some people think, but it rather
makes them accomplished and quick-witted. He
was accustomed to converse with his friends in a
most obliging manner, and many bright sayings and
kind deeds are recorded of him; and he could say
witty things in an amiable manner, without the
least appearance of jesting."
There is a splendid Domenico Tintoretto here, —
the work of the talented son of the great Venetian.
He employs a dark outline, and emphasizes it in
tentionally. Four saints look up from the earth to
the vision of the Virgin and (Thild which occurs in
the heavens above. The canvas is an enormous
one, and the whole, a creditable woric of the pupil
of his father.
With regard to the work of Paolo Veronese,
Dresden is in advance of either Venice or Paris;
the four best examples in the world to be seen to
gether are in this hall. The IMadonna of the Cuccina
Family stands out as the finest of these, as we look
at them. .Vfter this, tlie Adoration of the Kings
and the Marriage at Cana appeal to us as splendid

XLbc (Breat IDenetians 65
in colour and rich in decorative design. There
never was a painter of stuffs so satisfactory as
Paolo ; the mere upholstery, — the " millinery " as
some people irreverently term it, is a joy to the eye,
and at first the subject is a secondary consideration.
The Cuccina Family was one of the wealthiest in
Venice in the sixteenth century, coming originally
from Bergamo. Francis I., Duke of Modena,
bought this and the other two large pictures, the
Adoration and the Marriage at Cana, from the Cuc
cina family, who owned all three of them, in 1645.
This picture is a good instance of Veronese's ability
to plan a system of balance in his compositions, ar
ranging his values in radiating points of interest,
which all shall eventually lead toward the central
object. In this instance, the lights, starting from
the figure clad in white in the midst, make a curved
line, carried out by means of the faces which occur
at different heights, down through the little boy
leaning against the column, from his hand on to the
clear bit of sky, which connects the line with the
arm and shoulder of the Baptist, and thence leads
up to the Virgin and Child. On the other side a
similar line may be detected, having the same species
of festooned grace, but it is a shorter series of lights,
and the sweep of all the interest makes toward the
holy child at the end, while the family, with the
stately matron in the centre, is still the real subject

66 ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
of the composition. The attractive little Cuccinas
in their striped suits, which to modern eyes are so
suggestive of little convicts, are engaged in natural
occupations of childhood. One is climbing against
the porphyry column, and the other is playing with
a dog. They are quite indifferent to the fact that
Faith, Hope, and Charity are leading them to the
great throne of God : to them, as simple little human
beings, this allegory only means that their home is
happy : they do not yet realize why this is so.
Veronese is more than a decorator — he is a great
composer of pageants and splendid glowing scenes.
While all critics cannot go to the extent of claiming
that Veronese is a religious painter, Mr. Kenyon
Cox does consider him capable of rendering scenes
of religious import. Veronese is often considered
trivial ; his dogs and cats, monkeys and parrots, are
sometimes felt to be intrusions in an important
scene; but perhaps after all he is only in advance of
his times : in our age of realistic art and literature,
we ought not to complain of this comprehensiveness.
In his own day, however, this tendency got him into
trouble. The Inquisition summoned him, on July
8. 1573, and accused him of introducing profane
figures, dogs, etc., into certain religious pictures.
The examiners ordered Paolo to remove a dc^ at
once, and to substitute the Magdalen. The Inquisi
tors had not much sense of humour : Paolo must

PAOLO VERONESE.  CUCCINA FAMILY (dETAIL)

Ube (Breat IDenetians 67
have been amused at this suggestion! However it
was settled, the dog was never painted out, nor was
the Magdalen added.
The interest of the Marriage at Cana centres in
the graceful standing figure of a man who holds his
wine-glass up to the light, — a fine specimen of
Venetian glass it is too! — evidently exclaiming,
" Thou hast kept the good wine until now ! " The
face of Christ, watching this man intently, is full
of strength, but it lacks beauty. The two old men
at the end of the table watch the pouring out of the
wine, and are more non-committal. A young man
standing behind one of them is drinking eagerly ; he
is neither suspicious nor astonished, but enjoys the
novel addition to the feast without question as to
its origin. As if in defiance of the Inquisition and
their violent attack, Veronese here introduces a girl
caressing a dog in one corner, and a boy playing
with a cat almost in the centre of the canvas!
George Eliot did not at all admire the heads in the
Marriage at Cana, considering them' unattractive
though well executed. We all agree in this, I am
sure, regarding the stout guest who is tuming to
look around at the men who are testing the wine;
in fact there is a sexless ugliness about this whole
figure which has led some writers to regard it as
a man and others as a woman; the head of Christ,
however, is fine, with its earnest expression, watch-

68 xtbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
ing eagerly to see the effect of the miracle on the
bystanders. Veronese knew well how to obtain the necessary
effect of a shallow plane in large wall pictures, by
using light in a generous way, letting it flood the
whole, much as footlights do on the stage, and keep
ing the foregrounds of his compositions well-filled,
so that little depth of background is necessary to
enhance the scene.
The draperies which Paolo Veronese paints are
not rampant ; they are not portrayed as if they were
in a swirling wind, as is so often the case with the
textiles of the other great Venetians, and also of
Rubens. He keeps to a steady value of colour, not
allowing his shadows to be heavy, with striking
points of light, like Rembrandt.
Veronese's treatment of textiles is about the best
in the world. Rubens is too exuberant in these de
tails, as in most things; the draperies of Veronese
are so exquisite, so restrained, and yet withal so
sufficient, that one does not realize his supreme
cleverness in handling them unless one knows by
experience the difficulties of such painting.
In most of the other works attributed to Veronese
in this gallery the hand of a pupil may be traced
here and there. But they are all very beautiful
pictures, and well worth studying. The figures in
the Christ Bearing the Cross are nobly planned, in

TTbe 6reat IDenetians 69
their relation to the whole composition; a very
difficult proposition, with the uncompromising lines
of the great wooden cross in the middle of the pic
ture. One must go back to Hall D, in order to ex
amine the charming finding of Moses, in which the
most seductively graceful court ladies are seen mas
querading as Egyptians. There is absolutely noth
ing to suggest the Nile in any detail of the compo
sition. Even the little negro slaves who are caring
for the pets in the left comer are more like imported
pages in a European court. The figfure of the
woman at the left, who is bending her enchanting
head toward Pharaoh's daughter, is one of the most
exquisite in Venetian art. The model who posed
for this may have been the same who occurs as Leda
in Hall C, an alert, fascinating type of woman, —
not simply languishing, but with ideas of her own ;
a fit mate for Jupiter. The background of Vero
nese's Finding of Moses, is one of his most beauti
ful studies of landscape, suggestive of his early
home on the Adige. Nearly all Italian artists loved
to paint the picturesque country of their childhood's
recollection. In this picture, as in the Marriage at
Cana (and, of course, in the Cuccina family), the
likenesses of several celebrated Venetians occur.
The Supper at Emmaus is very likely only a
studio work, but is soft and mellow. The clear
green looks as if the paint were glazed over gold or

7° Ubc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
yellow-white. Veronese has again introduced the
little girl playing with a dog on the floor, and in
this case she is thoroughly out of place, — a little
smirking courtier stuck as an impertinence among
a lot of dignified sturdy peasants.
Susannah bathing by a tiny spigot in the fountain
wall, which sends out a jet of water toward her foot,
is rather an original rendering of the appearance of
the scene. A little modem soap-dish, with a cake
of soap on end in it, stands near by. The Elders
must have had keen imaginations to pierce with
their eyes the thick mantle which falls over Susannah
on the side where they stand. Given the outdoor
conditions, a less ostentatious bath it would be diffi
cult to take. The lady has on a chemise and a cloak,
held by a girdle. The old gentlemen must have
been singularly prurient, or unused to ladies in
decollete. Among the works of the school of A^eronese is
to be seen in the third cabinet a delightfully infantile
and attractive little child with a rattle. The treat
ment is hard, but the subject very appealing.
Italian art, before it died, had time, through the
Spanish invasion of Venice, to influence that great
Spanish school which, through \'elasquez, and Goya,
has done so much to form modern ideals. The suc
cession may be traced through Venice to Spain,
through Velasquez to genuine realism, — not neces-

^be (Breat IDenetians 71
sarily the selecting of repulsive objects to paint, but
plain truth of colour and form.
Theotocopuli, that very cosmopolitan artist who is
sometimes recognized as a Greek and sometimes a
Spaniard, is a little of each of these, but as his work
is classed with the Italians in the Dresden catalogue,
we must assume that his Greek parentage, which
gave him his pseudonym El Greco, and his long
residence in Spain, where he was recognized as a
Spaniard, are to be discounted, and that the empha
sis must be laid upon the fact that he was a pupil of
Titian. The picture which we have here by El
Greco represents (Thrist Healing the Blind Man.
The composition is full of action, and although the
figure of Our Lord is not in the centre, but quite
at the left, the eye naturally sees the group of inter
est at once, as the balancing group of disciples on
the right is on a different plane, being farther back.
Theotocopuli painted sometimes well and sometimes
badly; he greatly baffled the categorical tendencies
of critics, who like to apportion a painter's career
into his " first, second, and third manners." In
this sense, El Greco had " no manners." He would
paint a fine picture and an execrable one in the same
year, probably governed by moods, which rendered
him incapable of portraying uncongenial scenes with
success, or subjects to which he felt no personal
impulse. Theophile Gautier, after analyzing the

72 Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
style of El Greco, sums it up by the trenchant
phrase, " In all this there appears a depraved energy,
a misappropriated power, which betrays both the
great painter and the folly of genius." Theotocopuli
died at Toledo, in 1625 ; his friend, Luis de Gon-
gora, wrote a fantastic sonnet in his memory, lines
of which may be translated as follows :
" Stranger! beneath this polished porphyry stone,
Locked from the world, the sweetest pencil lies
That e'er could witch thee with resplendent dyes
O'er breathing wood or living canvas thrown.

Here lies The Greek ; to nature all his art
Leaving, to all, his lore; to Iris hues;
To Phcebus lights ; to Morpheus shadows deep ;
Let his great urn thy tear-drops, as they start,
Despite its hardness, drink. . . ."

CHAPTER III.
LATER ITALIAN SCHOOLS
The Dresden Gallery is especially rich in the
Italian schools of the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries. The collection having been made largely
by wealthy princes of Saxony, it was easy for the
founders of the gallery to buy good examples of
the work of the Italians of their times. Indeed, in
most cases, the masterpieces of the leading artists
of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries may be
seen in Dresden. Often one has been prejudiced
against certain artists because one has had to judge
of them by inferior works ; but in Dresden one sees
the best productions of these painters. It is only
fair to such artists, especially those of the seven
teenth century, to reserve judgment until the Dres
den gallery has been examined.
In the Hall F, and in its surrounding cabinets,
we deal chiefly with the Eclectics ; those painters of
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in Italy
who quarried from all the perfections of the earlier
schools, and flattered themselves that they repro-
73

74 TLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
duced them in their works; whereas really, be
cause they were going to art for their inspiration
instead of to nature, they rapidly declined, and be
came of little importance in the world of construct
ive genius.
It has often been remarked that genius begins
where rules end ; but it is a poor plan to cut loose
from rules until we are convinced that we have the
requisite genius to continue creative work.
Fuseli called Academic mediocrity " the cipher
of art," and this it was that the Eclectics attained.
As one glances casually about in this salon, one is
conscious of great uniformity of excellence, but lit
tle overpowering originaHty. The Eclectics were
copyists, and therefore were not expressing their
own individuality. " Line upon line, here a little
and there a little," they had consciously adopted
features from all the existing schools, and lacked
vitality of personal effort and discovery. They
were compilers, and as such, can hardly be recog
nized as a school. Jean Frangois Millet said : " De
cadence set in when people began to believe that art
was the supreme end ; when such and such a painter
was taken as model and aim, without remembering
that he had fixed his eyes upon infinity."
We may here observe numerous examples of the
works of the Carracci. Ludovico, the veritable
founder of the Eclectic school, was a pupil of Pros-

Xater Utalian Scbools 7S
pero Fontana (one of the Decadents, and the au
thor of the Holy Family with St. Cecilia, in the
forty-second cabinet, No. 115). A picture of the
Repose on the Flight into Egypt is here attributed
to Ludovico on rather questionable grounds. The
picture came, in 1742, from the Carignan collection
in Paris. A curious conceit is introduced; one of
the angels who minister to the Virgin presents her
with a basket of needlework. Occasionally, in
paintings of the Virgin, a basket of sewing mate
rials is introduced, as a symbol of industry and
domesticity; sometimes also a pitcher of water and
a dish of fruit signify temperance.
Ludovico Carracci had two nephews, Annibale
and Agostino, and he instructed them in his own
ideas; they finally formed an academy in which
they propagated their doctrines, exhorting their
followers to adopt the good features of all the
schools. They were admonished to draw as nearly
as possible like Michelangelo; to study grace from
Correggio, colour from Titian and the other Vene
tians ; in short, to compile the characteristics of all
the leading artists, and try to turn out better!
Nature, the one thing needful, they overlooked.
In his Genius of Fame, No. 306, Annibale cer
tainly did not confine himself to the Venetian sen
timent for colour; it is a pink and blue confection,
— a kind of colossal Valentine. The colours are

76 ^be Hrt of tbe Dresben ©aller?
cold and chalky. Although the clouds are intended
to be fleecy, they are deliberately shaded with black
paint, and the effect is anything but light.
Among others of Annibale Carracci's paintings
is a large Madonna Enthroned with Saints, which is
hard and mannered. It lacks celestial glow. St.
Francis is seen kissing the foot of the Virgin ; the
Baptist stands by, and St. Matthew is writing in
a book. This is one of the few instances in art in
which St. Matthew appears as a balancing figure
to that of St. John. He is not a patron Saint of
any special place or subject. The picture has a land
scape background. No. 305, the large St. Roch
distributing alms, is a fine composition and an inter
esting picture.
But the gem of Carracci's work in- Dresden is
the delightful Lute Player, in the fourth cabinet.
It is rich and dark, and beautifully handled. This
proves that Annibale was a consummate portrait
painter. His superb portraits are near!.- ahvays
surprises to people who have only thought of him
in connection with religious art, when he was
merely copying other artists. When he turned his
attention to portraying a human face, which must
perforce be studied from the original, and not from
some admired type made popular by another painter,
he is at his best, and shows himself reallv great.
There is a head of Christ, hanging also in the

Xater Italian Scbools 77
fourth cabinet, by Annibale Carracci, which has an
unusually soft glow. Some of the school pieces
are good, but most of them are hardly worth special
attention. Agostino Carracci defined the principles of his
school in a sonnet, of which the following is a free
translation :
" Let him who wishes to be a good painter," ad
vises Agostino, " acquire the design of Rome, Ve
netian action, and Venetian management of shade,
the dignified colour of Lombardy (meaning da
Vinci), the terrible manner of Michelangelo, Ti
tian's truth and nature; the sovereign purity of
Correggio's style, and the just symmetry of
Raphael, the decorum and well-grounded study of
a Tibaldi, the invention of the learned Primaticcio,
a little of Parmegianino' s grace; but without so
much study and weary labour, let him apply himself
to imitate the works which our Niccolo dell' Abate
left us here."
Thus it will be seen that while the Eclectics
aimed only at borrowing from others, their aims
were not even always high, and their models quite
unworthy of imitation. No wonder it was a short
lived school!
Among the best of the Eclectics was Domen-
ichino, but he can only be seen in one example
here, — Charity, or Love, as a mother, reclining,

78 XTbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
surrounded by three children. Domenichino was a
kindly and entertaining companion, full of quaint
humour. His biographer, Passeri, recounts charm
ing anecdotes about him, as he saw him while he
was himself engaged in fresco work at the chapel
of Frascati, for Cardinal Aldobrandini, with whom
Domenichino was then staying. " He would draw
caricatures of us all," says Passeri, " and the in
habitants of the villa; and when he succeeded to
his perfect satisfaction, he was wont to indulge in
immoderate fits of laughter. We who were in the
adjoining room, would run in to know his reason,
and then he showed us his spirited sketches. He
drew a caricature of me with a guitar ; and one of
the Guarda Roba, — who was lame of the gout, —
and one of the Sub-Guarda Roba, — a most ridicu
lous figure. To prevent our being oflfended, he car
icatured himself."
Guercino may be well studied in Dresden from
numerous examples. All the large pictures, how
ever, are rather sharp. His Semiramis Informed
by a Messenger of the Insurrection of Babylon is
hard and yellow in tone, and has certainly not
much verisimilitude; all the personages are quite
Italian in type and costume. Semiramis is sup
posed to be sitting at her toilette when she receives
this bit of news, but it would seem a little incoher
ent to put on her crown before doing up her hair !

Xater Utalian Scbools 79
So, however, Guercino has chosen to represent the
fair Assyrian queen.
An early St. Francis with an angel, who is com
forting him with the strains of a violin, is ecstatic
and dramatic.
Diana with a greyhound, a pretty half-length
picture of a good-looking Jewess, also lacks classic
feeling. The draperies are very graceful, how
ever, and as a study of a breezy young huntress
it is attractive.
The Birth of Adonis from the Myrrh-tree is
here to be seen, also by Guercino. The startled in
fant emerges from the trunk, and is tenderly taken
in hand by the nymphs. The composition is pretty,
and the large canvas well-filled with graceful lines
of draperies.
A curious picture, called Painting and Drawing,
represents a young woman occupied in painting a
sleeping Cupid, pausing to glance over her shoulder
at a gray-bearded man who is holding a sketch.
Guercino seems to gloat over scenes of carnage
and weeping in this hall! Here we see Silvio, the
hero of the Faithful Shepherd (II Pastor Fido, by
Guarini), deploring the wound which he has unwit
tingly inflicted upon his beloved Dorinda. The
scene is treated gingerly; Dorinda is supported by
a faithful herdsman, who raises a corner of her
garment, exposing a small wound which looks like

8o fCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
a skilful operation for appendicitis. Silvio, in a
strictly " stage attitude," falls on one knee, and,
with his bow and arrow in one hand, while the
other holds his hunting-shirt open in a restrained
and operatic manner, begs her forgiveness.
If one turns, one sees another picture nearly op
posite this one, also by Guercino ; a bolder and much
more bloody rendering is this, of Venus bending
over the body of Adonis, both her hands uplifted
and all ten fingers spread out incontinently. Adonis
is a good deal gashed and spattered; his wound
looks like another and unsuccessful operation, only
it is on the wrong side for the appendix! Cupid
is seen leading away the offending boar by the ear !
Here again is Cephalus despairing over the body
of his too faithful Procris. Lamentations seem to
be in order, and it is a relief to turn to the enamel
like, peaceful mediocrity of the Lot and his Daugli-
ters, No. 368. The three survivors are partaking
of light refreshments, their backs discreetly tumed
upon the landscape, in the midst of which Lot's
wife is seen in her new saline form.
Guercino can only be seen to adx-antage in his
four studies for the Evangelists. We must step
into the fifth cabinet, and there we are repaid by
these powerful heads. St. Matthew, with his angel
holding the book in which he is writing, is a ven
erable apostle. The white hair and beard are

Xater iFtalian Scbools si
painted in the most beaut ful way, and the head is
extremely noble.
St. Mark is busy sharpening his pen; the tenta-
tiveness of his attitude being emphasized by his
tuming so that only his profile is seen. The face
is of Jewish cast and is decidedly handsome. His
attribute, the lion, appears in the form of a little
statuette standing on a shelf. The hands of St.
Mark are extremely well painted. Few artists have
improved upon the eclectics in their ability to draw
and paint, technically speaking.
St. Luke is sitting before a picture, the comer
of the stretcher, with the tacked edge of the can
vas, showing at the left, in a state of exultation,
with his palette on his thumb, evidently lost in rap
ture over the portrait of the Virgin which he has
painted. His head and face are very beautiful, and
the lights are managed in a particularly artistic
way. One wishes that the artist had omitted the
little heraldic placque hanging on the wall, con
taining a bas-rehef of a resting bull. It is sym
bolism carried to a reductio ad absurdam.
There are two pictures in this gallery represent
ing Joseph and Potiphar's wife. The subject has
been treated often, but in most cases the lady has
been designed on a rather magnificent scale, and
our sympathies go out to the youth only because
he is struggling in the toils of such an amazon.

82 ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
But the interesting item about both of these pic
tures is that Potiphar's wife is shown as a sweet-
looking young woman, and our sympathy for Jo
seph takes on an entirely new form. One of these
pictures is by Simone Cantarini, and is well painted.
The action is restrained and dignified. There is a
tender pleading in the girl's face, which causes us
to respect Joseph for the consistent stand which he
is taking. The figures are in fine relief, too, and
the colours rich, laid in firm, large masses; green,
blue, and yellow, fearlessly and successfully applied,
as few would have dared to attempt.
The other view of the same subject is more emo
tional ; it is to be seen in the fourth cabinet, and is
octagonal in form. It displays Joseph, subjected
to a great strain, certainly; its painter. Carlo Ci-
gnani, has drawn him with both hands upraised in
protest, while the mischievous siren has him firmly
round the waist, with both arms, heartlessly laugh
ing at his conscientious efforts to free himself.
She is exceedingly pretty, and we are really quite
glad that we know how the story ends, so to speak,
or our suspense would be positively painful.
Albani's Galatea is exquisite in colour, but in no
other quality is it remarkable; while scintillating
with a delicious golden glow, it betrays as little in
tellectual power as could well be employed in the
construction of a picture.

Xater Utalian Scbools 83
Albani is represented here by several other con
fections, quite characteristically lacking in thought,
in the fourth cabinet. In the wreath of dancing
cherubs around a statuary group of Cupids, he has
drawn a pretty set of playful children. Why he
should have felt obliged to drag in the scene of the
Abduction of Proserpine in the background, with
Ceres hanging on to the back of the car, and being
very literally " dragged in," it is impossible to ex
plain. Two cloud medallions on the painfully blue
sky, display, on one side, Venus and Cupid, and on
the other, an amoretti orchestra in full blast. The
picture is delicately painted on copper; the little
dancing loves carry with them the emblems of
Pluto, which they are supposed to have acquired
while his attention was otherwise engaged.
The Woman taken in Adultery, painted by Bar
tolommeo Biscaino, is mellow in tone, and there is
fine handling in the head of the old man at the left.
The Penitent Magdalen, by Franceschini, is a weak
affair, suggestive of a repentance based on physical
collapse and formal discipline. There is a certain
dash about Domenico Feti's David with the head of
Goliath, inclining to the style of the Naturalists.
There are two canvases of Bernardo Strozzi
which are very good ; Rebecca with Abraham's serv
ant at the Well is rich and effective. Rebecca
looks as if she were a charming operatic heroine of

84 JLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
the seventeenth century, and the servant is dressed
according to the styles of the same period, while
the stoutish gentleman in the background, with the
well-waxed moustache, might be the leading tenor
waiting for his cue; but if one overlooks these little
eccentricities of local colour, and the anachronisms
in setting, the picture is very charming. David
with Goliath's head is also good. David is an
" old friend," surely, but with a " new face," in
asmuch as he sports a moustache. In B, there is
a well-coloured picture, also by Strozzi, of a lady
playing upon a bass viol. The face is extremely
beautiful. In Procaccini's Holy Family with Angels Bring
ing Fruit, the pigments have been so conscien
tiously chosen that there is not a crack or a dis
colouration, which is rather unusual among these
later men. Procaccini died in 1626.
Varotari, who formed his style on principles of
Titian, did better work in his Judith with the Head
of Holofemes than was accomplished by most art
ists who copied painters instead of nature. There
is a rich use of deep pink in the striped garment
which she wears. Varotari may be seen to advan
tage, also, in the Study of a Female Head, No. 526,
in the fifth cabinet. It is a face of great beauty,
full of expression, and the treatment is most ef
fective.

Xater Utalian Scbools 85
There is a lovely Venus Bathing, by Antonio
Trivia, a pupil of Guercino, who died in 1699 in
Munich. A satyr and Cupid are in attendance. It
is almost as soft as a Correggio.
Lavinia Fontana was one of the decadent paint
ers, — one of the few women of that time who
practised tlie arts. She lived from 1552 and 1602.
She was daughter and pupil of Prospero Fontana,
who founded a school in the late sixteenth century.
The father is here seen in No. 115, a Holy Family
with St. Cecilia; while Lavinia's Holy Family with
Elizabeth and John is very original in composition.
In the sixty- fourth cabinet is a striking series
of pictures representing the Seven Sacraments.
They are painted by Giuseppe Maria Crespi, and
are very bold and effective. The handling is ex
tremely clever, and broad, crisp, and modern in
feeling. The paint is heavy, and the lights loaded
thickly. The fluttering robes of the priests contrast
charmingly with the brown habits of the friars.
These pictures should be examined attentively.
Among the decorative spots in this hall, E, is
the Judgment of Paris, by Pietro Liberi, — fluffy,
soft, and pink, — a dainty canvas for its size !
Liberi was a follower of Varotari. This shows
how art " bred in " in the seventeenth century !
There are few collections in which Guido Reni
is as well represented as in Dresden. There are

86 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
hardly any of his usual mawkish traits to be seen
in his pictures here, and almost all of the works are
his best productions. In the large hall, first, is his
Reclining Venus, with Cupid. This picture is fa
miliar to all lovers of this artist, but can never fail
to be positively enchanting to look at, whether for
the first time or not. There is a certain airy deli
cacy throughout that is almost like the substance of
a dream. The sweet, slender girl and the polite,
smiling Cupid are among the loveliest of fanta
sies. The atmosphere is unusually soft, and the
tones so golden and peachy, leading into tender
greens and a strange, dull puce-colour, that one feels
that any criticism is unfair except such as shall
recognize it either as a jewel or as a vision.
A gentleman of Bologna once asked Guido Reni
where he got his lovely models, whom he assuredly
kept to himself, for no other artist knew who they
might be! Guido replied, in a mysterious tone,
" Do you come to my studio, signor, and I will
show you my beautiful model." So the nobleman
tiptoed up to the studio in a high flutter of expec
tation. Imagine his chagrin when Guido called his
colour-grinder. " a great greasy fellow, with a brutal
look like the devil," and posed him, seated, looking
up through the skylight. Guido then took a pencil
and rapidly sketched a beautiful Magdalen in the
same position. "Dear Count," he said, gravely,

GUIDO RENI.  VENUS AND CUPID

Xater lltalian Scbools 87
turning to his visitor, " say to your ' other artists '
that a beautiful idea must be in the imagination,
and in that case any model will serve,"
Guido Reni's half-length figure of St. Jerome
is splendid, — much freer than his work generally
is in handling.
In the precious cabinet. No. 4, are no less
than three studies of the head of Christ crowned
with thorns. The best is the smaller oval, of the
upturned head only. No. 323. Next in excellence
is No. 329, No. 330 being less satisfactory than the
others. The expression of human suffering domi
nated by uplifting zeal and faith is most beautifully
portrayed in the first of these heads.
Less pleasing, but exquisitely modelled, is the
Little Bacchus Drinking, also by Guido, with its
"pure, bright, decided manipulation," to which at
tention has been called. In Guido's Apparition of
Christ to His Mother, an angel bears the standard
of victory, and Adam and Eve are seen behind the
Saviour. Here also is a Magdalen, — one of the many re
pentant cave-dwellers in this gallery, — by Fran
cesco Gessi, a pupil of Guido Reni. It is a trivial
affair. The Mater Dolorosa of Solimena is rather better
work than some of this school. There is a replica
of it in America, in the possession of the writer.

88 trbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
The excellent and spirited Satyr and Girl with a
Basket of Fruit, which is now pronounced to be by
Rubens, is largely the work of the master's own
hand; it was formerly catalogued as a Jordaens.
It is almost the same as one in Vienna, and is ar
bitrarily hung in this place.
In the fifth cabinet. Carlo Dolci's St. Cecilia really
deserves her popularity. The picture is lovely, if
it does seem a little insipid to lovers of another
school of art. The Daughter of Herodias, too, is
a good example of Dolci's " far niente ! " The
lady is somewhat encumbered with Italian superflu
ity of dressy clothes for anything very active in the
way of a dance, besides which she is heavy and sad
looking — but one must not expect thought on
such trifling matters from Carlo Dolci !
Carlo Dolci's Saviour Blessing the Bread and
Wine may have a religious appeal for some
natures; if so, I would not wish to interfere with
any good that it may accomplish. As a work of
art, it has high finish, like a varnished tempera, and
is richly coloured. The table-cloth obtrudes itself
too strongly into the composition.
Carlo Dolci made a solemn vow never to paint
any but religious subjects: as it were, dedicating
his pencil to the Virgin. His Madonnas, however,
were frequently portraits of Madelina Baldinucci.
He was of a melancholy turn and seems to have

Xater Utalian Scbools 89
had a strangely active conscience. While the guests
were assembled, on the day of his own wedding, it
is said that the bridegroom was missing ; and, upon
his being sought, he was discovered prostrate be
fore a crucifix in the Church of the Annunziata.
The Eclectics were opposed by another school,
origfinating in the Neapolitan district ; these painters
were known as the Naturalists, and were headed
by the dashing Michelangelo Amerighi, or Cara
vaggio, who, born in 1569, was a successful artist
of the wild and tempestuous school which saw only
the stem side of " nature," and depicted her chiefly
in storm and stress. Human nature was seen by
him in the same way. We have here two of Cara-
vaggio's best pictures; the first is the Christ and
St. Sebastian, which is a splendid study in light and
shade. The Cheat, which is. to be seen in replica in the
Sciarra Palace in Rome, and elsewhere, is one of the
most popular works of the whole Naturalist school.
The human nature here depicted is depressing. Two
youths, so far sunk in vileness as to combine to
ruin an innocent boy, are playing cards with him:
or rather, one handles the cards, while the older
fellow, standing behind the unsuspecting victim, is
holding up fingers by way of a signal to his con
federate. The types are well chosen for their pur
pose, and are finely studied. The poor little dupe.

9° Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
a youth with a sweet expression, and ignorant of the
ways of villainy, is poring over his cards, while the
boy opposite, who, by the way, has one card retained
in his other hand, lifts his mean-spirited, sordid
eyes to observe the signal given by the man in the
shadow, whose sinister eyes are all that show
above his cloak, as he raises two fingers in mystic
information. It is well for the victim that he does
not turn and discover the treachery, — it is better
for him to lose his money than his life, as would
probably follow, if he were to become a menace to
their secrecy. The man in the background has a
dagger ready for any such emergency. The tones
of the picture are deep and rich, in accordance with
the gruesome subject.
The Venus bending over the body of Adonis,
by Alessandro Turchi, known as I'Orbetto, is a
much more natural goddess than that of Guercino,
and better painted. Another picture by I'Orbetto,
David with the head of Goliath, is a fine, spirited
work, and has been restored to the master, after
doubt having been thrown on its authenticity. The
face of the youth is very beautiful. The attitude,
too, is original and full of vigour. When one is
in the forty-third cabinet, the Stoning of Stephen
should be noted, also by Alessandro Turchi. It is
extremely interestinpf.
Carlo Maratti's Virgin bending over the Infant

H <
aS
um
XH

Xater Vtallan Scbools 91
in a Manger, is in Room B. It is a painting which,
though it lacks strength, is so charming an arrange
ment of chiaroscuro, and so exquisite a study of
infancy, that it deserves special notice. The faces
of the Virgin, Child, and cherubs, are all fore
shortened at extreme angles, and there can be
no doubt about the effect being very skilfully
managed. Francesco Furini could paint exquisite heads,
and had a natural comprehension of grace, which,
though sometimes overdone, is always present in
his works. There is a sweet, cool-toned little St.
Cecilia here, with a gash in her neck. Furini died
in 1649. ^6 was a follower of Matteo Roselli.
In the forty-fifth cabinet a quaint pair of pictures
may be seen, by Castiglione, a Genoese of the
seventeenth century. They display, respectively,
the Animals going into Noah's Ark, and the Re
turn of Jacob. Their technique is most curious.
They are painted in strange little long dabs, almost
like stitches in thick wool. The animals selected to
accompany Noah, on this occasion, are goats, rab
bits, cats, guinea-pigs, and other domestic crea
tures. The bam-yard fowls are introduced, but
Castiglione is discreet in not attempting to portray
the fiercer beasts, with whom he had no personal
acquaintance. There is no elephant, no phcenix,
and no rhinoceros. It is really only a plain farm-

92 Zbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
yard scene, to which a more important name has
been tacked, to make it seem a more significant
work. The amusing portrait supposed to be Salvator
Rosa, by himself, appears to me to be genuine,
although the authenticity is questioned. Salvator
is generally classed among the Naturalists of
Naples, but a review of his early career will prove
that he is actually the product of no school, though
his affiliations were with these painters in later life.
He was original, and almost self-taught. This
portrait represents him with an ape on his shoulder.
When Salvator Rosa was bom, the one thing upon
which his parents were decided, was, that he should
no^ be a painter. Both his father and mother were
members of a family of indigent artists, and they
decided that he should be brought up in the Church.
They named him Salvator, because, as an Italian
divine says, " Never has it been known that (jod
permitted the devil to torture in hell a man who
bore his name." It is to be hoped that Salvator
did not break this interesting record.
His whole childhood was one of protest against
the calling that had been chosen for him; his one
aim, that of freedom. From the time when, as a
baby in swaddling bands, he was hung up behind
the door to be out of the way (as is still the fate
of some ambitious Italian babies when their

SALVATOR ROSA.  PORTRAIT OF HIMSELF

Xater Utalian Scbools 93
mothers are busy), he asserted himself, and longed
to stalk abroad; this he did just as soon as it was
possible for him to venture forth upon his own legs,
and then he was known as the imp of the neigh
bourhood. When he was old enough to be taught, he was
subjected to the discipline of a monastic training,
— he was punished for making charcoal sketches
on the sacred spandrels in the cloisters. He was
obliged to abandon the jaunty Italian costume of
the period for the hampering cowl; but all was
under protest, and his behaviour was so obstreper
ous that the pious brothers, quite unable to manage
him, sent him forth in disgrace, in their own self-
defence. Thus, instead of bringing peace and bless
ing upon his injudicious parents, who had persist
ently pushed him in the wrong direction, he re
turned home under the ban of a prodigal son, and,
this situation proving highly distasteful to his rest
less spirit, he allied himself with the profession
which was the special abhorrence of his father and
mother, and turned to Nature for his guidance in
art. He became a painter by profession, and wan
dered off into the picturesque country which was
so near him, in search of inspiration and subjects
for pictures.
As might have been foreseen, the headstrong
youth, travelling about unprotected, fell a prey to

94 ^be Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
brigands. Whether these terrible men held him
because his artistic ability proved to be a source
of income to them, or whether he himself found
their society congenial, at any rate, Salvator Rosa
took up a residence with the banditti of the Abruzzi
for some time. These bandits were not highway
robbers in the usual sense, but rather a band of
outlaws who held a considerable position in the
mountains. His life among these wild votaries
of Nature helped him to form his style, and to store
his memory and imagination for life with the ter
rible and magnificent ideals for which he afterward
stood. As in our own day, a follower of any of the
arts is honoured less for perfection than for orig
inality, so the fame of Salvator rested on his pic
tures, full of the august elemental passions, and the
weird desolation of the forces of Nature, causing
an entirely new sensation among the connoisseurs
who had been buying Carracci's saints and Guido's
Magdalens. To cause a new sensation is the key-note to suc
cess in any art. Salvator Rosa did not base his
manner on any that had gone before; it was the
ebullition of a free spirit expressing its own per
sonal interpretation of nature both animate and in
animate. The melancholy of the wildemess; the
dominance of the hurricane; the dark mystery of
forests; these were the subjects which he chose

Xater IFtalian Scbools 95
to portray, and he was the first man at that time
to begin his artistic career with that aim.
But, although fortune finally smiled upon this
original painter, there were many years \vhen his
labours were unpaid, and he hardly knew where
to turn for support. He made the journey to
Rome chiefly on foot; the expenses of a life in
that city were so much more exacting than those
of the life to which he had been accustomed, that
it proved almost impossible for him to live there
at first. He has left us an interesting manuscript :
it is a burlesque cantata, setting forth his condition,
from which it will be amusing to make a few ex
tracts. " Yet from my first-drawn sigh, through life,
I've waged with Fate eternal strife ;
Have toiled without reward or gain,
And wooed the arts — but wooed in vain.
For while to Hope I fondly trust,
I scarce can earn my daily crust.

While as I saunter through the court
I grow the jesting page's sport.
For threadbare coats meet no respect,
And challenge only cold neglect
In Summer when the dog-star glows,
I'm dressed as though the Tiber froze :
For this you'll guess the ready reason —
I've but one suit for every season !

96 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
Yet when my frozen spirits play,
And Fancy lends a genial ray,
My pencil in its wanton sport.
Brings the well-freighted bark to port!
Bestows fair sites on whom I please,
Raises rich leafy woods with ease :
But, of such varied wealth the maker,
I work, and starve, without an acre I
For, take it on Salvator's word,
Of the rich, noble, vulgar herd,
Few estimate, and few require
The painter's zeal, the poet's fire.
The surest road to recompense
Is to conceal superior sense."
Later in life prosperity awaited him, and his
works became fashionable, and he was able to drive
with his wife and child in his own carriage; all
of which things connote success. But if Salvator
painted his own portrait, of which there is some
doubt, in this amusing study in Dresden, he evi
dently retained his cynical ideas.
When Salvator Rosa was aging, and could not
exercise, he would express his cravings for free
open-air life and solitude, exclaiming, " How I hate
the sight of every spot that is inhabited ! " His
illness was an especially trying one to his tempera
ment. It was accompanied by great suffering from
cold. He wrote to a friend at that time : " I have
suffered two months of agony even with the ab-

Xater Italian Scbools 97
stemious regimen of chicken broth! My feet are
two lumps of ice, in spite of the woollen hose
which I have imported from Venice. There is not
a fissure in my house that I am not daily employed
in diligently stopping up: and yet with all this I
cannot get warm." To our ears, his trials explain
themselves ! A man trying to live on an exclusive
diet of chicken broth, in a house with such cracks
that they had to be stuffed every day, elicits our
sympathy! No wonder the poor fellow could not
get warm!
Luca Giordano, who was named Fa Presto, on
account of his rapid execution, may be seen in all
sorts of rampant and theatrical display in Dresden.
A few of his works are interesting; in an early
picture, a study of St. Jerome, No. 481 in H, the
lights are very striking; and the Virgin and Child,
No. 489, is really extremely clever. The technical
treatment is original. The canvas, which is ex
tremely rough, is first coated with a kind of shellac
or vamish, and the paint then applied, very thin,
so that it lies only on the salient points. The touch
is broad, and the whole most effective. The colour
is in this way diluted with a soft brownish haze.
There are also good brown tones in the portrait of
Fa Presto himself, No. 494, which may, however,
have been rendered by a pupil.
Here is another repentant Magdalen in her cave.

98 Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
by Cagnacci. A curious incident is treated in a
picture by Mattia Preti (446), representing the In
credulity of Thomas; the Lord is himself guid
ing the hand of Thomas into the wound in his
side. Notice, in Cabinet forty-eight, what good lights
there are on the face of a portrait by Fra Vittore
Ghislandi, No. 547; but the picture is a copy of
a portrait of himself by Rembrandt, so the credit
is not due to the Italian.
Here is a large canvas dealing with the subject
of the Three Kings before Herod. It is painted by
Conca. There is much flourish and some scram
bling in this crowded scene; it is not especially
attractive. The black King stands before Herod,
holding out his hand as if he were inviting the
King to act as palmist! Conca was famous for
certain pictures painted in the Bernardine monas
tery of Valdeiglesias, and several other series of
paintings elsewhere. There is some likelihood that
he studied in Florence, for there is a Florentine
feeling visible in most of his work. The Christ
on the Cross between The Virgin and St. John is
attributed to him by some critics, although it is
catalogued still as uncertain. It may be seen in
the forty-third cabinet.
Down-stairs is a series of smaller rooms, num
bered thirty-nine to forty-three, and here may be

Xater Utalian Scbools 99
seen some more of the late Italians. It seems best,
however, to treat of these at the same time with
the Pastels and Miniatures, which are also on the
ground floor.

CHAPTER IV.

SPANISH MASTERS

The early Spanish idea of art is clearly indicated
in a sentiment expressed by the ecclesiastics of
Seville when the Cathedral was rebuilt in 1401.
" Let us build a Church," said they, " which shall
cause us to be taken for madmen by those who
come after us." Such an ambition was destined
to express itself, and it soon spread to other cities
and in other branches of the arts besides architec
ture. Curious stories are told of the miraculous in
spiration of artists. When actual visions of celes
tial beings did not vouchsafe to descend and sit for
them, as was frequently understood to happen,
other means of revelation were employed. There is
an instance of a sculptor, who, desirous of carving
an image of the Virgin, fell asleep in discourage
ment at the inadequacy of his own sketches. He
was roused from his slumbers by a voice, saying:
" Awake and rise : and out of that log of wood
blazing on the hearth, shape the thought within
100

Spanisb noasters loi
thee, and thou shalt obtain the desired image."
Much elated, the artist extinguished the brand,
and out of it he hewed what has been designated
" a miracle of art " — a figure of the Virgin which
gave great satisfaction to the royal personage who
had ordered it. It certainly fulfilled the prophecy
regarding a " tree stock " which " shall be for a
man to burn . . . and of the residue thereof he
maketh himself a god ! "
Spanish art is distinguished for its severity and
its decency: an intended if misguided religious
veneration, and absolute success in technical
achievement. Superstitious unquestioning faith in
the physical miracle led to the belief in legendary
anecdotes of a most fantastic nature. It was told,
and firmly believed, that a painter had been struck
blind for venturing to attempt to " restore " a sacred
picture which had been executed by St. Luke. Dur
ing the plague at Malaga, in 1649, ^ figure of
Christ at the Column suddenly proved to be mirac
ulous, curing people of their diseases all through
the week, and sweating every Friday! This was
taken as an omen that the artist who had wrought
the image would soon be taken to heaven; and
sure enough, the poor stone-mason who had carved
it succumbed to the plague in eight days !
Two significant legends show how important it
is that an artist, if he intends to portray the devil,

I02 zbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
should balance his energies by also painting the
Virgin to counteract the baleful influence.
The first of these stories relates to a young friar,
well meaning, but easily led. He had often painted
the Virgin, and rendered her as a perfect queen
of beauty; in fact, his pictures were almost what
one might call " flattered " likenesses. At the same
time, he was in the habit of making most grotesque
and uncomplimentary portraits of the devil, rack
ing his ingenuity to devise new features of hideous-
ness and terror to introduce. The devil, highly dis
pleased at these liberties, decided to catch the un
wary friar, and, knowing his special weaknesses,
he made himself into the shape of a pretty young
woman, and visited the artist, with proposals of
ardent devotion. The young friar, rather frail in
this line, readily acceded to the persuasions of the
fair one, who, however, demanded a very high
price for her favours, — no less than the jewelled
reliquaries in the convent treasury. The young
man, overcome by the charms of his enchantress,
was rash enough to give her what she asked for.
As they passed through the cloisters canning the
treasures, the mean-spirited devil reassumed his
own form, and began calling, " Thie\'es ! Thieves ! "
This outcry collected a number of the monks about
the deluded friar, and there seemed no doubt that
he was caught stealing the convent plate! So by

Spanisb /Masters 103
way of arresting him, the brothers tied him to a
pillar in the cloister, to await his sentence, and then
they retired until morning should dawn. When
the poor young friar was left alone, the devil had
a most satisfactory revenge upon him, twitting him
with his disappointment in love, and pointing out
how completely the brethren had him in their power.
" You'd best call on one whom you have treated
better than you have me, if you want help now! "
sneered Satan. This was a happy suggestion. In
stantly the monk called upon the Virgin, whom he
had so frequently painted with so much admiration
and love, to rescue him. With charitable prompt
itude, the Virgin appeared before him, and, with
out stopping to analyze whether, after all, he did
not deserve just about what he was getting, she
loosed his bonds, and helped him to tie the devil
up in his place. Then with triumph she conducted
him to the treasury, where the stolen reliquaries
were restored to their proper positions. In the
morning the young friar appeared at Matins as if
nothing had happened, and when the monks found
the sacred vessels in the treasury again, they be
lieved his account of the interference of a higher
power; they did not venture to veto so celestial
a favour, and he was allowed to go free.
The second narrative is even more dramatic; it
is told, by Lope de Vega. The hero of this story

104 Ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
was not a monk, but a secular painter. He loved
to depict these two opposing types — the Virgin
and the devil — just as the friar had done. In re
taliation, the fiend arranged that the painter should
fall in love with the wife of a soldier, and elope
with her. While this plan was being carried out,
and when the guilty pair had progressed as far as
the market-place, the evil one started all the bells
in the city to ringing, and then, in the g^ise of a
mortal, he " grinned like a dog and ran about the
city," spreading the news. The eloping parties
were thrown into prison (in separate dungeons, of
course), and the indignant husband visited his faith
less wife, and cut off her hair prior to her inevitable
execution on the day following. The painter, ad
dressing a petition to Our Lady, met with instant
success. In recognition of his life of devotion to
her image, she at once freed both of the lovers,
and restored them to their respective homes. When
the soldier awoke in the morning and saw his wife,
with her full complement of hair again growing on
her head, he was overcome with amazement. The
lady, with ready tact, appeared surprised at his
questions, and remarked that the strange things of
which he accused her had not really occurred during
the night, but must have been a dream. He could
not quite believe this : he went out and asked his
friends, who all testified to having witnessed the

Spanisb /Masters 105
scene. But when they found the painter also com
fortably installed in his home, quietly painting a
likeness of his deliverer, he also upheld the state
ment of the clever lady with whom he had so nearly
run away. " It was undoubtedly a dream : if more
than one had dreamed it, that was a coincidence,
surely, but strange things often happened ! " So
the ancient story ends : " Thus was the devil once
more foiled, and thus the citizens who had been
roused by the bells, the pursuers who had captured
the truants, the turnkey who had barred the prison
ers, the husband who had clipped the tresses, and
the gossips who had told the tale were made to
believe by the merits of Our Lady that they had
dreamed a strange, vivid, and unanimous dream ! "
The questions of justice and ethics do not enter at
all into these annals. Faith did everything, and
works were entirely discounted in Spain in those
days. Owing to the strictly devotional character of his
subjects, Luis de Morales was called the Divine
Morales. His picture of Christ, about to be led
away, with a rope around his neck, and his face
expressive of suffering, is a characteristic example
of this artist's manner. Luis de Morales was bom
in Badajos early in the sixteenth century; he
founded a school, his life being otherwise unevent
ful. There are not very exact records about him ; it

io6 ubc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
is probable that he studied in Toledo or Valladolid,
and certainly worked a great deal in Estramadura.
In 1564 he went to Court in order to paint some
pictures for the Convent which was founded in
connection with the Escorial. In after-life, when
he was old and poor, the King, noticing his condi
tion, gave him a purse of money, saying : " For
dinner. Morales." Morales, with ready wit, asked,
" And for supper. Sire ? " by which exercise of
alertness he secured a larger amount. The chron
icler Palomino commends " the discreet wit of the
vassal in profiting by the occasion, and speaking
at the right time, which is a g^eat felicity." The
town of Badajos, where he was bom and where he
died, did honour to his memory so far as it was
able, in naming a street after Morales. Morales
is considered the earliest artist of the Spanish school
who employed the means so common in Italian art
of fusing into his pictures poetical and ideal ele
ments, instead of being content with realism and
narrative. He painted always on panel, and the
picture in Dresden is no exception to the rule, being
on wood, and therefore not of large measurements.
His finish is delicate, and the example is interesting
historically, if it is not a picture calculated to attract
or please the eye. Some critics see in his work
certain qualities which suggest Correggio.
Pacheco, the prudish Commissioner of the Inqui-

Spanisb /iDasters 107
sition (of whom an account is given in my " Art
of the National Gallery "), finds fault with Morales
that he dared to depart from custom, in depicting
the Ecce Homo without a reed in the hand of
Christ, and often without the crown of thorns.
Any such liberty caused Pacheco genuine discom
fort, so entirely was his freedom of thought quelled
by the consciousness of the dignity of his posi
tion! Juan de las Roelas was the scion of a noble
Spanish house; he may have been the son of the
Admiral de las Roelas. Born about 1559, he re
ceived a college education in Seville, and was a
painter in good standing in 16 16, when he was
recommended as Court painter to Philip III., being
vouched for as " son of an old servant of the
crown," and " A virtuous man and a good painter."
Although he did not receive this post, the applica
tion is testimony to his excellence. He was an
ecclesiastic, and lived an uneventful life, chiefly in
Madrid and Seville, until his death in 1625. His
work was censured by Pacheco, because in one in
stance he introduced a table with eatables into a
picture of the Education of the Virgin, which was
a materialistic touch too irreverent for the soaring
mind of Pacheco; and again, because in a Nativity,
the Infant Saviour was represented with no clothes.
Pacheco indignantly calls attention, not without a

io8 ;rbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
show of justice, to the fact that no mother would so
imperil the life of a new baby in the depths of
Winter! This painter was known colloquially as
" El Clerigo Roelas " and also as " El Licenciado."
His picture here is an allegorical rendering of the
subject of the Immaculate Conception.
Pedro Orrente, born in Murcia in the late six
teenth century, was the author of the picture, Jacob
and Rachel at the Well ; he was usually recognized
as a cattle and sheep painter, and figure studies are
not in his most characteristic vein.
The assignment of Spanish pictures of this period
is really difficult ; only highly cultivated and observ
ing critics dare to pronounce with certainty concern
ing them. As a partial explanation of this difficulty,
I quote from a description of the condition of a
Spanish art gallery in 1841, as it was seen by Mme.
Hahn-Hahn on a visit to the Seville Museum. " It
is wretched," writes this lady, " to see how these
invaluable jewels are preserved! Unframed, un-
cleaned, . . . unprotected . . . they lean against
the walls, or stand unprotected in the passages
where they are copied. Every dauber may mark his
squares upon them, to facilitate his drawng . . .
the threads have in certain cases, begun to leave
their impression on the picture. . . . Nothing would
be easier than to smuggle out . . . small pictures!
A painter comes, copies them, does not stand upon

Spanisb /l>asters 109
a few dollars more or less, — takes off the originals
and leaves copies behind in their places — (they
are high up and badly lighted) the pictures are gone
for ever ! This sort of proceeding is not impossible
here ... it cannot, of course, be done without cor
ruption and connivance on the part of the official
guardian : and after all, one has hardly courage to
lament it ! The pictures are in fact saved ; they are
protected and duly valued; whilst to me it is com
pletely a matter of indifference whether a custode
on account of this sort of sin suffer a little more
or a little less in Purgatory!" (It sounds very
much as if Mme. Hahn-Hahn had herself secured
some treasures in Spain!)
Kugler tells an anecdote of a picture dealer in
London who was advertising a painting by Zuccaro.
Upon being asked if it were a genuine example, the
dealer replied, " Yes, Zuccaro or Velasquez." Upon
hearing surprise expressed at this strange alterna
tive, he added, " The fact is, the picture came from
Spain, and Zuccaro is not a Spanish master; that
is the only reason for calling it a Velasquez."
It was only through war and stress that Spanish
art was heralded abroad. During the War of In
dependence in Spain, many paintings were taken to
France; British dealers came and offered money,
and acquired many of the rarest treasures in the
days of Moore and Wellesley. The French and

"o XTbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
English, with cultivated taste and excellent judg
ment, collected some of the best pictures in Spain.
For the same reason, Spanish paintings were not
known in Europe at large; Spagpioletto, who
worked at Naples, was almost the only Spaniard
who was known out of his own country. This is
one thing which renders the school more individual
and interesting than most of the other schools,
though its origins were later, and it has not the
splendid historical succession of Italy.
Spanish art is essentially a native art, developing
from ideals of Spain's own painters. There were
few travelling artists, either Flemish, Italian, or
German, who visited Spain to help to introduce new
outside influences. Titian, in the days of Charles
v., was one of the few with whose works, outside
their own, they were familiar. In Italy, the Flemish
artists were constantly coming, and in Germany
and Holland, the Italians frequently made visits.
The rage for relics was, of course, ravenous
among people who so firmly believed in the miracu
lous. A lady in waiting of Queen Isabella took a
mean advantage of her privilege, when she was
allowed to kiss the foot of the body of St. Isadore
de Labrador. She deliberately bit off a toe, intend
ing to carry it home to perform private miracles
for her ; but she was " mysteriously detained " in
the church, and unable to move or go home until

Spanisb /iDasters m
she had relinquished her prize ! There are those of
us who are blasphemous enough to feel that this
" miraculous detention " might be accounted for on
purely natural and sordid grounds !
The Spaniards were great realists. One painter
was commissioned to paint a picture of an eagle
which had been caught by the King's fowlers ; the
painting was so realistic that the original attacked
it, and tore it to pieces with beak and talons! The
bird was kept in captivity ever after, and a chron
icler says he often saw him, alluding to " his grave
and composed manner of gazing, which showed no
little grandeur and authority.", Quite descriptive
of the usual manner of eagles in captivity.
It is hardly likely that the figure of St. Matthew,
No. 680, is by Francesco Herrera the Elder; the
work is mediocre, and is hardly worthy of this inter
esting painter. Herrera was born in 1576, and was
the teacher of Velasquez. He was exceptionally
free in his style, making his drawings with char
coal, and working in a broad, bold manner. There
is a tradition that when he was without an assistant,
he employed the housemaid to lay on the large
values of colour, he afterwards shaping and arrang
ing them. This theory would render the authen
ticity of the present picture more plausible! Her
rera was also a worker in bronze. Led astray by
the very obvious opportunity which this afforded,

"2 trbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
he once became a coiner of false money. He was
brought before the King, Philip IV., who pardoned
him, saying : " What need of gold and silver has
a man with your talents? You are free; but be
careful not to get into such a scrape again! " Her
rera was such a stern and violent-tempered man that
his pupils not infrequently fled from him. Ve
lasquez is said to have been one of these truants;
when Herrera went to Madrid in 1650, he found
his errant pupil at the height of his glory ! Herrera
died in Madrid in 1656.
The old Spanish proverb says, " Where there are
mares, there will be colts." Ribera and Juan de
Ribalta were both " colts " in this sense, — pupils
and followers of the older Ribalta, Francisco, who
was a leading artist of the school of Valencia. We
have none of his work here, but his son Juan is
represented, and also Ribera, the noted Spagnoletto.
Juan de Ribalta, to whom the picture. No. 695,
the Mass of St. Gregory, is attributed, was the son
of Francisco de Ribalta, and was born in Valencia
in 1597. He was a most precocious child, painting
large important pictures when he was only eighteen,
an altar-piece of the Cmcifixion, now in the Valen
cia Museum, testifying to this fact, by the signa
ture, " Johannes Ribalta pingebat et invenit 18
setates suce anno 161 5." He worked with great
rapidity, as is often the case with painters whose

spanisb /©asters 113
fathers have been artists, the early training cuUi-
vating great technical facility in many cases. He
died very young, only living until 1628. An inter
esting old picture in Oxford, which was captured
on a Spanish sailing-vessel (probably destined for
some port where this painting was to have been con
veyed by order, being an altar-piece), is now as
signed to Ribalta. It passed as a Titian at one time,
and has been attributed by critics to other hands at
various times.
The very typically Spanish picture of St. Francis
and St. Bernard supporting St. Gonzalo is by Vin-
cente Carducho, who, though born in Florence,
painted most of his life in Madrid, and was recog
nized as a master of that school. In a burst of
glory above in the heavens the Christ-child is seen,
flanked by seraphs and a multitude of he^ivenly
beings. St. Gonzalo stands, his lips parted and a
beatific expression of joy on his upturned face, hold
ing in his hands the model of a building. St. Fran
cis and St. Bernard raise their hands in amazement
at the vision, and the whole composition is put
together very well. Carducho was also a writer on
art, — his " Dialogos de la Pintura " are most inter
esting, though rather curious than instructive at the
present time. There are eight conversations, sup
posed to take place between a master and his pupil,
" in a retired spot on the banks of the murmuring

"4 Ubc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
Manzanares." Carducho relates many anecdotes of
painters, introducing St. Luke as casually as Ra
phael or Michelangelo ! He tells of one picture so
affecting in its loveliness that in looking upon it
" hearts became eyes, and eyes tears ! " Carducho
died in 1638. In Lope de Vega's tributary sonnet
on the occasion, there are the lines :
" Pens scarce had dared thy glory to proclaim,
No brush achieved to paint thee but thine own."
Lope de Vega seems to have eulogized all the
artists of his day in similar terms!
Joseph de Ribera was bom in Jativa in 1588. He
is usually known as Lo Spagnoletto, and is often
recognized as a master of the Neapolitan school,
because he lived in Naples and founded a school
there; but, as will be seen, he was a Spaniard by
birth. Naples has even claimed the distinction of
having produced him, but the baptismal register
proves that he was born in Jativa on January 12th,
and that his parents were Luis Ribera and Marga
rita Gil. He was educated in Valencia, and became
a pupil of Francisco Ribalta. His appearance in
Italy is not easily accounted for, but during his
youth he was in Rome, and, being seen by a philan
thropic Cardinal to be almost destitute, he was taken
by the kind cleric and lodged in his palace. Ribera,

Spanisb /iDasterd us
however, discovered that luxury was bad for him,
— he was less easily inspired to work when sur
rounded by all these comforts, so he left the Car
dinal, and lived simply among some other young
struggling artists, among whom he obtained the
pseudonym, Lo Spagnoletto. Being a brawler by
nature, he got into trouble in Rome, and fled to
Naples, where, with Caravaggio and others, he
formed a nucleus for a school of extravagant real
ists in art. Ribera was a small man, — hence his
diminutive nickname, — but full of force and fire.
When he found conversation lag in company, he
would throw a verbal bomb in the form of a state
ment that he had found the Philosopher's stone.
This being the great quest of the day, among dilet
tanti, they would crowd about him, and ask him
to show it to them. He would invite them to his
studio, with promises of enlightenment. When they
arrived, in all excitement, on the following morn
ing, Ribera sent his servant out with a picture;
they waited; in a short while the servant returned
with a package of gold. "That is the secret of
gold making," Ribera would say, " I do it by paint
ing, you by serving his Majesty; attending to
business is the secret of the truest alchemy ! "
Spagnoletto's style is dashing, and he is often
horrible in his choice of subject. The flaying of
St. Bartholomew was his first, picture, which caused

"6 XCbe Hrt Of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
a great stir on account of its painful realism; other
martrydoms were his delight. Byron has remarked
how —
"... Spagnoletto tainted
His brush with all the blood of all the sainted ! "
One of Ribera's daughters eloped under very dis
graceful circumstances. She was a pretty g^rl, and
had often served him as a model. Indeed, the nuns
of Sta. Isabel had the head of a Madonna by Ribera
painted over after this scandal had taken place, lest
in the face of the Virgin any one might trace an
unfortunate likeness to the frail Maria Rosa !
The rest of Ribera's works here are all strictly
pleasing in subject. A beautiful Diogenes with his
lantern (No. 682 in Room J) is supposed to be a
portrait of himself. The fact that Diogenes is so
passive, while it was Ribera's custom to emphasize
any possible action in rendering a subject, confirms
the judgment of those who have pronounced this
work a portrait. In handling it is magnificent:
the shadows are strong and virile. Of course, as
a study of the Greek, it is absurd ; there is no sug
gestion of any classic sentiment.
St. Peter delivered from Prison by the Angel is
a beautiful study of an old man. The face and
hands are splendidly treated, and the whirling angel
in the air is flying in a delightfully buoyant manner.

Spanisb /ibasters 117
We are fortunately spared Ribera's most savage
mood in the Dresden collection. The martyrdom
of St. Lawrence, similar to that in the Vatican, is
the only hint of horror which confronts us. And
St. Lawrence is so exquisite in his graceful ecstasy
of abnegation, that there is little heed paid to the
roaring fire to which he is being conducted. As a
study of flesh and chiaroscuro it is admirable.
St. Francis on his bed of thorns is hardly a com
fortable suggestion, but the picture is mild com
pared to most of his portrayals of human suffering.
Both of these pictures are painted in thick impasto,
and are strenuous in action and feeling.
But the loveliest Ribera in Dresden is the justly
celebrated St. Agnes. As one enters the hall one's
eyes are drawn toward the simple and restrained
figure, so unaffected in design, so straightforward
in its gradations of all tones of white and brown.
The saint kneels in a rather awkward attitude, but
her expression is very exalted. The angel who is
bringing a sheet to cover her is illuminated by the
light which emanates from the halo which is
breathed about her. The artist has proved in this
picture that he could be poetic, delicate, and appre
ciative of all virginal loveliness and grace. The
picture was thought to represent St. Mary of Egypt,
and also has been considered as a Magdalen. But
it is now recognized as a St. Agnes. The shading

ii8 u be Hrt of tbe Dresben 6aller?
of light and dark whites to gold, and finally into
the umber darkness at the left of the figure, could
not be more masterly if planned by a modern
" problem painter." The composition is quite free
from accessories. It is particularly striking in its
simplicity and unadorned qualities, so rare in the
art of its period. It is one of the few great pic
tures with only one interest. In many, the eye can
pick out various separate bits of equal importance,
practically each a picture in itself. Here is remark
able unity and limit of subject. A wonderful ex
pression is concentrated in the eyes. One sees them
first and last ; the reverent upturned face claims all
the attention of the observer. Ribera died in Naples
in 1656.
There is but one picture by Francesco Zurbaran
in Dresden. He was one of the best artists of the
early seventeenth century in Spain. Bom in the
country, his father had designed him for the plough,
but when a marked talent for art asserted itself, he
very wisely sent the boy to Seville to study with
Juan de Roelas. He painted many monastic sub
jects, being employed by the Carthusians on several
occasions. While for a short time he painted at
the Court of Philip IV., the monarch did him the
honour to clap him on the back and congratulate
him upon being a " painter of kings and a king of
painters." Probably this was Philip's little stock

RIBERA.  ST. AGNES

• Spanisb /iDasters 119
pleasantry by means of which he usually won the
personal affection of artists who appeared at Court.
For no matter how sovereign a personage a man
may be, — no matter how absolute may be his power
over the very lives of his subjects, — he is seldom
without that human trait of longing to be loved for
himself; which proves how much stronger love is
than temporal power, when even Kings will strive
for it, and queens will jeopardize crown and state
for it !
Zurbaran's picture here is a characteristic one,
as to subject, although the finish of it is rather more
polished than some of his more striking figures,
notably the Praying Monk in London. St. Bona-
ventura is seen kneeling before the Papal Crown,
offering prayers that he may be inspired to assist the
Cardinals, as he has been requested by them, in
naming the next Pope. The picture was originally
believed to represent St. Francis refusing the Papal
Tiara, but this latter interpretation has been put
upon it by the scholars who are the best judges.
The figure of the Apostle Paul, by Alonso Cano,
is good in tone; the robes are of rich reds and
greens. Cano was born in Granada in 1601, and
painted for the first half of the seventeenth century.
He was the last of the Spanish votaries to all three
of the arts, practising painting, sculpture, and archi
tecture. His life was eventful, and is worth re-

I20 Tlbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
hearsing briefly. One day he returned to his home
to find his wife lying dead on her bed, her body
having received fifteen stabs. Her hands were
gripped full of human hair. A servant having dis
appeared from the house on that day, the murder
was charged upon him. But later investigations
revealed that Cano himself was carrying on an
intrigue, which would have made the death of his
wife timely and acceptable, and suspicion tumed
abruptly upon him. Alarmed, he fled to a monas
tery, and, after spending a due season in painting
saints and leading a religious life as it was popu
larly understood, he returned to his home. Here,
however, the law was still vigilant, and he was
seized and put to the torture to make him confess.
As he did not do so, he was acquitted and released.
But his friend Velasquez believed in his guilt, al
though public opinion was satisfied by the test of
the rack and screws. So, without any special oppro
brium resting upon him, Alonso Cano resumed
work, took priest's orders, and became a Canon in
the Cathedral of Granada. Here he employed his
talents to the adornment of the sanctuary, and
proved himself a valued member of the staff. While
he was working on some pictures in Malaga, at one
time, a flood descended upon the city, and while the
clergy were all collected in the Cathedral praying
for the inundation to abate, the waters rose around

spanisb /iDasters 121
them to an alarming extent. The Bishop was so
frightened that he sought refuge in the great organ ;
when Alonso Cano asked him why he did so, he
replied, " It is better to be crushed to death in a
dignified great machine than to be drowned like
a rat!" "Ah, for my part," replied Cano, with
a shrug, " if we are to perish like eggs, I think it
matters little whether we are poached or boiled ! "
The flood subsided, however, leaving the Bishop
safe in the organ !
Cano seems to have been of a generous disposi
tion, and no one ever appealed to him in vain for
alms. If he was beset by a beggar, and his purse
chanced to be empty, he would instantly sit down
and make a rapid drawing, which, signed by his
name, was readily marketable. This he would give
to the beggar to sell. But his magnanimity was
extended exclusively to the Gentiles ! Where a Jew
was concerned, he was relentless. If he saw one in
the street, he would cross over rather than pass near
him. If his clothes brushed against a Jew, he would
discard them at once. His servant discovered this
weakness, and gained many a good garment by
calling his master's attention to the fact that a Jew
had rubbed against him, — had he not noticed it?
Once, when he found a Jew pedlar in his house,
he not only sent the housekeeper away as a quaran
tine precaution, since she had been talking with

122 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
the offender, but he had that part of the floor where
the Jew had stood repaved, and he burnt the shoes
with which he had himself kicked him out!
When Cano came to die, a crucifix was placed in
his hand. He threw it impatiently away, — it was
not carved to suit his aesthetic taste, — and he de
manded a plain wooden cross, upon which he could
imagine such a figure as would be worthy. He
then died, according to the chronicle, " in a manner
highly exemplary and edifying to those about him."
This was in 1667. He was a strangely inconsistent
character — charitable to the point of Quixotism to
Christians, hard-hearted and unforgiving to Jews;
hot-tempered and quarrelsome with his fellow art
ists, but friendly and sweet to his pupils; possibly
a murderer, yet tender to those in trouble.
Cano was a methodical worker. Blessed with
more than one artistic resource, he was able to rest
himself from one kind of work, by tuming to
another, and so, without weariness, employed all
his time to advantage. One day, when tired of
painting, he tumed to his mallet and chisel for re
laxation. A friend remarking that this was surely
a queer way to rest, Cano replied, " Blockhead !
Don't you see that to create form and relief on a
flat surface is a greater labour than to fashion one
shape into another ? " This may be taken as Cano's

Spanisb flDasters 123
answer to the perennial question as to whether
sculpture or painting were the higher art.
On one occasion an Auditor of the Chancery of
Granada ordered a figure of St. Anthony to be
carved by Cano. This august personage, when he
was told that Cano wished a hundred doubloons for
the statue, remarked, " You have worked but
twenty-five days; that is at the rate of four doub
loons a day." " Pardon me, your lordship," re
plied Cano, " I have spent fifty years in learning
how to execute it in twenty-five days." " That is
all very well," replied the Auditor (Palomino tells
us that an auditor of Granada was " venerated like
a deity upon the earth"), "but I have spent my
patrimony and my youth in studying at the Uni
versity, and in a higher profession, and yet I am
only able to make a doubloon a day." " A higher
profession!" cried Cano. "The idea of such a
comparison ! A King can make a Judge out of the
dust of the earth, but God alone can make an
Alonso Cano ! " He dashed the figure to the
ground as he spoke, and the Auditor rapidly van
ished, and there was never more argument upon that
subject. The bust of a black-haired warrior with a scarf
of red is by Pedro de Moya, a Spaniard who lived
in the first half of the seventeenth century. He
was born in Granada and died there, though his

124 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
life was that of a soldier. He managed to combine
the two professions of foot-soldier and painter,
and made great use of his opportunity for studying
art in the Low Countries. When he was not in
active service, he was copying pictures in churches.
Finally, however, his admiration for Van Dyck
became so all-absorbing, that he obtained his dis
charge from the army, and went to study with Van
Dyck in London. De Moya was too late, however,
to profit much by his instruction, for Van Dyck
died only six months after the Spaniard's arrival in
England. Moya then retired to Spain, where his
foreign knowledge had some perceptible influence
upon Murillo, who was then painting in Seville.
Velasquez and Murillo not only dominated Spain
at the end of the seventeenth century, but they also
dominated the whole world of art. They were the
two supreme masters of their time. Rubens had
died in 1640; the Carracci had passed away; Van
Dyck lived only until 1641, and Guido Reni died
in 1642; Rembrandt was the only painter of first
importance alive later than 1650, and he died within
twenty years of that time. So the field was vacant
with the exception of the " little masters " of Hol
land and Salvator Rosa in Naples.
Sir David Wilkie, in a comparison between Ve
lasquez and Murillo, remarks that " while Velasquez
has displayed the philosophy of art, Murillo has

Spanisb /IDasters 125
concealed it." In other words, Velasquez is a great
realist, who does not attempt to conceal or to im
pose ; Murillo, on the contrary, delights in depicting
the impossible, the fanciful, the spiritual, if you
like. Wilkie says he is " without vulgar imitation."
He pronounces Velasquez unrivalled " in painting
an intelligent portrait," but considers him inferior
to Murillo where he attempts simple, natural, or
sacred subjects.
In Murillo's work, ardour and impulsiveness pre
dominate over quiet force and power ; in Velasquez,
strength and reserve are more in evidence than
eager enthusiasm. While I do not hold with
Lucien Solvay that Murillo's work is so " pleasant "
that it " verges on insipidity," it must be admitted
that he has not the virility in the tout ensemble of
his art that is in the pictures of the greater Span
iard. It is a well-known story how Murillo spent his
early days in painting pictures for the great market,
the Feria, which was held every Thursday, and is
still held, in the long market-place in Seville. It is
interesting to imagine the young artist at his stall,
advertising his wares like any common huckster;
standing among gipsies and muleteers, fish sellers
and junk dealers, holding up for sale a St. Chris
topher, which he can change to order, by a deft
stroke of his bmsh, into a St. Anthony, if preferred;

126 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
or a Madonna, which can be converted into a Mag
dalen or a St. Margaret with a few skilful sweeps!
After some years of foreign travel and study,
Murillo returned to Seville, and founded the cele
brated Academy there. The rules governing this
body in its beginnings are unique and instructive,
showing a high state of idealism among the painters
of Spain. There were two Presidents, Murillo and
Herrera; they had very definite duties to perform,
and it was no sinecure to hold this office. They
were responsible for maintaining order, for impos
ing and collecting fines, for settling disputes, and
for deciding upon the worthiness of candidates who
wished to enter the Academy. A monthly subscrip
tion from each of the regular twenty members paid
for the models, heating, and candles ; students were
admitted for very small sums — they were encour
aged to come there to study. One of the rules for
admission was that the student must prove himself
orthodox' by a confession of faith : " Praised be
the most Holy Sacrament and the pure Conception
of Our Lady." Conversation was not allowed un
less pertaining to the work in hand. There was
a fine for talking upon outside subjects, and upon
profanity and vulgarity in manners. This was a
naive and rather refreshing standard for an art
school !
Murillo was fortunate in having attracted the

Spanisb Masters 127
attention and respect of an eccentric but wealthy
patron of the arts, — the philanthropist, Mafiora.
This worthy was a famous character in the Seville
of his time; his conversion was of a sudden
nature. Not an especially religious man originally,
he was highly incensed upon a certain occasion,
when some hams which had been sent him were
detained outside the gates for duties. He went
forth in his wrath, intending to make a great pro
test and to upset things generally. While on his
way to vent his spleen on the officials in charge,
the narrative says that " the Lord poured a great
light upon his mind." In other words, he thought
better of his intention to make a fuss. By this mys
terious revelation, whatever it may have been, the
whole course of his life was changed. As he was
a moral and temperate man already, it did not in
volve much outward reform in his life, but he was
resolved to devote himself ever after to good works,
and to mortify the flesh so far as he could. As
his only approach to a vice was a love for chocolate,
he immediately renounced that beverage, and never
touched it again! (When the good man was buried,
an allusion to this laudable abstinence was men
tioned on his coffin-lid!) At any rate, his virtues
took practical shape, and he gave generously to all
charitable institutions, and, among other good
works, he employed Murillo to paint eleven pic-

128 ube Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
tures for the adornment of a great hospital which
he endowed. Some of these works are the master's
most famous paintings.
There is a legend that Murillo once painted a
Madonna on a linen napkin ; the circumstances were
as follows. Murillo wished to leave some token of
regard with the faculty cook at the Convent where
he had resided for some time as lay brother, to
whom it is quite conjecturable that the artist might
be indebted for slight favours which a cook alone
could confer! Having used up all his canvas, he
looked about to see what he could employ as a
ground. The cook extended a napkin to him, say
ing, "Here, paint on this!" The picture, known
as the Madonna of the Napkin, adomed the altar
at the Capuchin church.
Murillo had a high regard for the genius of
other artists, being himself free from petty jealous
ies. Campafia's Descent from the Cross hung in
his own parish church. He used to sit and gaze at
it by the hour, explaining, " I am waiting until
those men have brought the body of Our Blessed
Lord down the ladder." By his own request, his
body was laid beneath this picture after his death.
He died in 1682. He was buried where he had
desired, but during the wars, the French destroyed
the church, and no stone or mark was left. Some
years later, excavations were made in the rubbish,

Spanisb /Ibasters 139
and a vault with bones in it was discovered, but as
there was no means of identifying the remains of
Murillo, it was closed again just as it was. His
bones are probably among those found at that
time. Murillo had married a wealthy and aristocratic
woman, and his home was always a centre of social
and artistic gatherings. His lovely daughter was
frequently painted as his type of the Virgin Mary.
He departed somewhat from the rules laid down
by Pacheco regarding the treatment of his favourite
subject, which he has painted so often, — the Im
maculate Conception. Pacheco was as didactic as
the Byzantine Manual, which guided the early
mediaeval artists of Italy. " In this gracefuUest
of mysteries," observes Pacheco, " Our Lady is to
be painted in the flower of her age, from twelve to
thirteen years old, with sweet grave eyes, a nose
and mouth of the most perfect form, rosy cheeks,
and the finest streaming hair of golden hue; in a
word, with all the beauty that a human pencil can
express." The " human pencil " in question cer
tainly did justice to the directions of this lawgiver.
But he has occasionally omitted the crown of stars
for which Pacheco afterwards stipulates, and also
another of his recommendations, the downward
pointing of the moon under her feet; he has also
left. out the requisite dragon, but even Pacheco con-

130 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
eludes that this may be omitted if desired, since " no
man ever painted it with good will ! "
Murillo lived in the Jewish quarter of Seville dur
ing his later years. Ford alludes to the fact that his
" painting-room, nay, his living-room — for he
lived to paint — was in the upper floor, and as
cheerful as his works."
There is a copy here of a picture by Murillo in
Munich of two girls sitting in the street counting
money. This is interesting chiefly as showing the
other side of this highly spiritual artist, who never
painted high life, popularly so called; he either
chose the slums or the heavens ! Sir David Wilkie
pronounced that " for female and infantile beauty
he is the Correggio of Spain."
Murillo's Death of St. Clara is a delicious paint
ing. The colour is exquisite : beautiful rich whites,
a celestial blue, and a delicate red are the predom
inating tones. It is one of the loveliest Murillos out
of Spain. It was only obtained for this gallery in
1894, being purchased from the E^rl of Dudley.
The composition, although almost in the form of a
procession, is not at all stiff. The Saint lies on her
pallet at the left, where the background is daiic,
and the faces of the attendant friars come only into
the light in salient points. The Virgin Martyrs,
robed in creamy draperies, approach as in a vision,
each bearing a palm. Christ leads the crowned

ILLO.  DEATH OF ST. CLARA (dETAIL)

Spanisb /Blasters 131
Madonna in the midst. The figure of the martyr
nearest the bed, stooping to adjust the coverlet, is
of surpassing grace. The heads and faces are all
extremely beautiful. No more satisfactory example
of Murillo could be seen than this majestic work.
He is at his best, — graceful, yet restrained ; un
affected, yet brimming with celestial imaginings.
The possession of this treasure makes up for the
fact that the Madorma and Child, No. 705, on
the adjoining wall, is inferior to most of Mu
rillo's Virgins. It is not so strong nor so char
acteristic as those in the National Gallery in Lon
don. The picture of St. Rodriguez, to whom an angel
is bringing a wreath, is interesting. It is the study
of a figure in full ecclesiastical vestments — a de
lightful example of Church embroideries! He
stands firmly and simply, his eyes cast up, while
a little Cupid-like cherub descends from the sky.
There are no accessories in the picture, except a
balustrade by way of background filling.
Of the greatest Spaniard of all 'we have scant
opportunity to judge in Dresden: Diego de Silva
Velasquez is only represented by three small por
traits of men. One of them, No. 699, a portrait
of the Count of Olivares, may be only a studio
replica. Such pieces are numerous, — or it may
have been an early work of the master, though an

132 "Cbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
inferior example of his powers. In texture and
outline it is not unlike the picture which has caused
so much discussion of late, — the recently acquired
Portrait of Philip IV. of Spain in the Museum of
Fine Arts in Boston. The black of the costume,
however, shows more modelling, and the touch is
somewhat looser. The portrait of a gentleman
with short hair, — evidently an aristocrat, — No.
697, is a good bit of the master's work. The figure
is seen below the waist line, and the painting is rich.
But the most beautiful is the study of an elderly
man. No. 698, in which the later style of Velasquez
is displayed. The atmosphere is smoky and tender ;
the painting of the thinned gray hair is almost
evanescent. Like all of Velasquez's men, these
three persons live and breathe as few faces on can
vas have ever done.
The Duke of Olivares was a minister of Philip
IV., but was banished in 1643 ^'^^ ^ Quixotic outr
burst of charity toward a bar-sinister relative who
was not considered eligible for Court life. Olivares
adopted this young man, and had his portrait
painted by Velasquez. Evidently Velasquez was in
sympathy with the Duke in the stand which he
took, for after his exile, the painter used to visit
Olivares in Loeches.
Mr. Richard Ford's tribute to Velasquez as a
portrait-painter is apt at this juncture : " His por-

VELASQUEZ.  PORTRAIT OF AN ELDERLY MAN

Spanisb /©asters 133
traits baffle description and praise; they must be
seen. He elevated that branch to the dignity of
history. He drew the minds of men. His power
of painting the circumambient air, his knowledge
of lineal and aerial perspective, the gradations of
tones in light, shadow, and colour, give an absolute
concavity to the flat surface of his canvas. We
look into space, into a room, into the reflection of
a mirror." The autocrat Pacheco presented him with his
daughter in marriage. " After five years of edu
cation and training," he says, " I married him
to my daughter, induced by his youth, integ
rity, and the prospects of his great and natural
genius." He more than fulfilled the expectations
of his exacting father-in-law. Every one knows
to-day that Velasquez is perhaps more generally
regarded as a great master than any other painter
who has ever lived It took two centuries to call
this to general attention.
Every study of flesh was with him an individual
thing. He had no trick for producing certain forms
of complexion or certain expressions of eye, — each
time he painted a face he created a vital work of
art, free from precedent, habit, or established man
ner. Compare the three faces before us — is there
any small recurring detail by which a critic could
say that one was rendered by the same hand as the

134 TLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
others ? Each has touches necessary to the subject ;
each stands alone.
Velasquez's whole life was practically determined
by a note from Philip IV. to the officer at the head of
the department of artistic appointments at his court :
" I have informed Diego Velasquez that you receive
him into my service, to occupy himself in his pro
fession as I shall hereafter command . . . Given
at Madrid, on the sixth of April, 1623." His first
portrait of Philip was an equestrian, and was ex
hibited in the High Street, a festival being given in
its honour. " There," says a chronicler, " in the
open air did Velasquez, like the painters of Greece,
listen to the praises of a delighted public." His
happy and proud father-in-law disported himself
on this occasion in flowery verse; if the Inquisition
were at all particular concerning the virtue of truth
ful utterance, they ought to have called Pacheco
down for his highly imaginative allusions to the
Sovereign ! The octave of the sonnet which he
wrote runs as follows :
" Speed thee, brave youth, in thy adventurous race
Right well begun. Yet dawning hope alone
No guerdon wins. Then up, and make thine own
Our painting's richest wealth and loftiest place.
The form august inspire thee, and fair face
Of our great King, the greatest Earth hath known ;
In whose bright aspect to his people shown
We fear but change, so perfect is its grace 1 "

Spanisb /iDasters 13s
Philip's form was among the least augfust, and
his face among the least fair (except in being pasty
pale) in the kingdom; such tribute must have
caused a smile before the mirror of Majesty,
if Philip had the slightest sense of humour !
Velasquez grew in favour with the king forth
with, and was his friend and companion for many
years to come. He made two Italian tours, the
second one, in 1648, being of special interest, as he
was commissioned to buy pictures for the Spanish
court. No wonder that the Madrid gallery is so
marvellous, when one remembers that the selections
were made by the greatest artist of his day !
When he arrived in Rome he was requested to
paint a portrait of Pope Innocent X., which he
accordingly did. (This was the Pope whose body
was so poorly watched after his death, that, during
the night, the rats ate part of his pontifical nose!
The narrator of this anecdote says that the poor
rats had a curse denounced against them for this
offence, with bell, book, and candle, like any public
malefactors!) In 1658 Velasquez was made a Knight, of San
tiago. The order, after it had been conferred, was
brought in question on certain technical grounds,
and had to be submitted to the Pope. Philip was
much annoyed at the delay, and remarked to the
envoy : " Place it on record that the evidence satis-

136 XLbc Hrt Of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
fies me! " All was settled agreeably, and the painter
received his decoration in November of that year.
Velasquez died at the age of sixty-one, in 1660.
The body lay in state in the dress of the Knight of
Santiago, and the interment was dignified and be
fitting his rank and importance. He was buried in
the church of San Juan. This building was after
ward destroyed by the French. A sketch of Velas
quez after death, made by Alfaro, is reproduced in
Stirling Maxwell's " Annals of the Artists of
Spain." There is a magnificent example here of the work
of Juan de Valdes Leal, a painter of the latter half
of the seventeenth century. It is a tall figure of
St. Basco of Portugal before his monastery; majes
tic in pose, the figure is painted in low tones, black
and white predominating.
Valdes Leal was of an unhappy disposition, jeal
ous and suspicious, and caused himself much unnec
essary trouble by insisting upon competing with
Murillo, whereas, if he had only had the philosophy
to take himself at his true valuation, he might have
been very proud of his achievement. His wife was
also an artist.
It is matter for regret that there are no examples
of the work of Goya or the later Spaniards in
Dresden. Two other Spanish pictures are to be noted in

VALDES LEAL.  ST. BASCO OF PORTUGAL

Spanisb /iDasters 137
other parts of the gallery — one by Periera, and one
by some member of the school of Juan de Juanes.
They will be mentioned when we treat of that part
of the collection where they are hung.

CHAPTER V.
PAINTERS OF THE FRENCH AND ENGLISH SCHOOLS
French art is not very satisfactorily represented
in the Dresden collection. Of the early masters
there is scant opportunity of judging; there is only
one little portrait of Jeanne de Pisseleu, hanging in
the twenty-first cabinet, by some member of the
school of Frangois Clouet, the Court Painter in
France from 1541 to 1572. This is all we have
prior to the seventeenth-century masters, and of
them, not very important examples.
As the French pictures are dotted about here and
there, it will be well to specify, especially in the case
of the earlier ones, where they are to be found.
The sixth cabinet contains most of the se\enteenth-
century works of interest, — here Claude Lorrain
may be seen ; while across the hall marked E on the
plan, the cabinets on the other side also contain
some French pictures of this period. In one of
these. Cabinet 44, is a pretty, florid picture by
Simon Vouet, a painter born in Paris, though a
follower of the Eclectics of Italy. Of those here
'38

XLbc ffrencb anb Englisb Scbools 139
represented, he comes chronologically next to
Clouet, as his dates are from 1590 to 1649. The
subject of the picture is the Apotheosis of St. Louis,
that delightful Royal saint of France, one of the
most picturesque figures in mediaeval history, as
interpreted by his faithful " Boswell," the Sire de
Joinville. Vouet can hardly be called, typical of
French art-impulses; but French art at that time
was something of a continental compilation, and
had little actual individual expression.
A contemporary of Vouet was Le Valentin, who
painted the very interesting Old Violinist in the
fortieth cabinet. This is said to be possibly in
tended for Homer. At any rate, it is rich and glow
ing, and the handling is charming. Le Valentin led
a Bohemian life, in which he came under the influ
ence of Caravaggio in Italy.
Nicolas Poussin and his adopted pupil-brother-in-
law, Caspar Dughet, are to be seen in the sixth
cabinet. Nicolas Poussin was born in 1594, and
is among the earliest Frenchmen of note. The story
of his life is well known : how he went to Rome,
married a girl who nursed him through an illness,
and how Poussin afterward adopted her younger
brother, who was also an artist. Poussin, Claude
Lorrain, and Salvator Rosa lived near each other
on the Pincian Hill in Rome — a significant group.
Poussin's style was formed chiefly on a study of

I40 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
the antique; the cold Renaissance of Classic per
fections (which ceased to be perfect when they
were intentionally introduced into an alien environ
ment) was the chief message which he brought to
France. His works at their best are in the National
Gallery in London. In Dresden there are only a
few really worthy examples. The colour and
handling in the Venus Reposing are excellent, —
" Repose " is hardly an adequate term for the aban
doned intoxication suggested by the study of the
nude. The overturned wine-jar and empty tazza
indicate an orgie, and the figure of Venus is that
of a person in a drunken lethargy. Yet the figure
is beautiful in spite of these Bacchic features. The
face is of the aimless stupid t)rpe which connotes the
satisfied animal nature. The first example of Pous
sin's Adoration of the Magi is here, — the compo
sition was repeated later in a similar picture in the
Louvre. The pale blue robe in this painting is too
crude. A very good example of Poussin's classical
achievement is seen in the Nymph Syrinx pursued
by Pan. The Narcissus gazing at his own reflection
in the brook is an early picture, if executed by
Poussin at all. There is a curious imaginative bit
called the Kingdom of Flora, in which nymphs are
seen changed to flowers, according to one of Ovid's
Metamorphoses. There is a striking portrait of Poussin himself.

NICOLAS POUSSIN.  PAN AND SYRINX

Ube jfrencb anb Snglisb Scbools mi
executed by a pupil, and with the inscription " Si
Nomen a me quceris N. Poussin 1640, F." There
is an old engraving from this picture which bears
the signature " V. E. Pinxit." It is rich in tone,
and an interesting likeness of this brilliant French
man. There are also four landscapes by Gaspard
Dughet, uninteresting and uninspired, as are most
of his heavy studies of nature.
The Holy Family, by Charles Le Bmn, is good ;
it is academic, but a pleasing composition. This is
almost a replica of a picture of the same subject
by the same painter in the Louvre.
Claude Gellee, or Claude Lorrain, was born in
Champagne, in the Duchy of Lorraine, in 1600. He
had little schooling, and in fact, spelt his own name
in various ways, so that when he came to make his
will, before his death, he had to specify that the
correct spelling of it was Claude Gellee! He was
the leading landscape painter of his day. His
father, a pastry cook, had complained bitterly while
the boy was small, that he could neither teach him
to manage an oven nor to make a pie! He was
advised to put him in the Church, his brother quot
ing the old proverb, "If your child is not good for
an3^1iing else, he will be good for the Church ! "
But, as Claude could not be taught to read, this
was also impossible. He finally obtained a position

142 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
as colour-grinder to an artist. When Claude was
thirty-six years old, he was still grinding colours;
when he was forty-five, he had become the cele
brated Qaude Lorrain, rising by the sheer power
of his own talent out of absolute obscurity into fame
and prominence. It was a remarkable development
in less than ten years.
While on his travels, there is a tradition that he
stayed awhile in a town named Harlaching, near
Munich. On the strength of this rumour. King
Ludwig I. of Bavaria erected a monument there to
his memory.
His art seems to us to-day to be academic ; it is
conventional; but when he painted, he was among
the first to study landscape at all for its own sake.
The primitive idea still obtained that a picture must
include a great many subjects. The later ideal of
taking a part of a scene, and interpreting it accord
ing to some special mood, had not then occurred
to any one. A landscape must contain nearly every
known feature of a romantic country, or it was no
picture worthy of the name! Claude studied con
scientiously in the open air, trying on his palette
to " match tints " with nature, and then taking the
canvas home to finish in his studio. Such a pro
ceeding resulted in pictures which to modern eyes
seem to lack spontaneity, but one must go back in
imagination and realize how little even this had

Ubc ifrencb anb Enolisb Scbools 143
been done up to his time. Italy had a message to
him which even artists who had been brought up
in that country had failed to perceive. The Clas
sical element appealed to him, — the country such as
Virgil had pictured in his Georgics, and the ruins
of the crumbled magnificence of Rome. When any
painter looks at a scene, it is necessary for him to
decide whether he is going to treat it as a scene with
figures, or as a picture of figures with the scene as
a background. Claude chose the first method. He
had a definite ideal of a picture of nature; it must
be a wide distant view ; there must be all the com
ponent parts of a romantic landscape in each sepa
rate study; rocks or something high to meet the
frame acceptably on either side, and, in the fore
ground, some little distorted human beings, to give
sense of scale, and to introduce the human element;
and such dreadful little people, usually! Had he
been content with indicating these figures which
he insisted upon using, it would have been better;
but no ; he must go to the Academy and draw from
models, so that he might strive to do something
entirely out of his line, in drawing strictly correct
human anatomy, clothed in Contadina costume or
classic rusticity. He knew his own shortcomings
in this department, and used to admit that his land
scapes were sold, but that his figures were given
gratis !

144 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
Claude was something of a hermit. He never
visited his friends, nor did he encourage a neigh
bourly spirit in them. He gave himself entirely to
his art, and pegged away with unfailing industry.
This constant application, unenlivened by human
intercourse, probably accounts for the lack of sym
pathetic rendering of his fellow creatures, and his
artificiality. His very poetic and lovely Acis and
Galatea, in this collection, is a happy exception to
this rule. It was painted at the time of the plague
in Rome, when most of the citizens fled, and while
Claude and Poussin went serenely on with their
business regardless of the storm and stress without.
Certainly there is no suggestion of a physical terror
in this placid sea, on which the soft glow of the
sunlight falls so tranquilly with its high rocky prom
ontory at the right, and the lovers in their little
improvised tent in the foreground. A playful little
Cupid is amusing himself with a couple of doves.
Acis and Galatea have taken a mean advantage of
poor Polyphemus, the Cyclops lover of the nymph,
who sits on the opposite bank, piping contentedly,
little suspecting what is going on beyond the little
shelter which so discreetly tums its back upon him !
The other Claude, the Flight into Egypt, was
among the personal effects of the master, and was
mentioned in his will, as " painted on the spot by my
hand!" This spot certainly was not Egypt! The

<-I <Oaz <

a

XLbc dFrencb anb JEnglisb Scbools us
picture might possibly come under the condemnation
of Ruskin, who speaks of the " mourning and
murky olive-browns and verdigris greens in which
Claude, with the industry and intelligence of a
Sevres china painter, drags the laborious bramble
leaves over his childish foregrounds ! " This is elo
quent criticism, and there is some truth in it. This
picture used to be catalogued as " A Shepherdess
Listening to a Shepherd playing on a Pipe," but
it may be observed that in the left background is
the episode which has changed the name of the
picture : the Flight into Egypt, Joseph leading the
ass upon which sits the Virgin holding her child.
The more one looks at this picture the more epi
sodes one detects. A goat appears to be committing
suicide incontinently at the right, by jumping into
a ravine. Among these pictures hangs one by the Flemish
artist, Gerard Lairesse, who was the original of the
Classicists. His doctrine of the good and the beau
tiful is thus summed up in his own words : " What
is beautiful? A landscape with upright trees, fair
vistas, azure blue skies, ornamental fountains,
stately palaces, in a learned architectural style, with
well-built men and women, and well-fed cows and
sheep. What is ugly? Ill-formed trees with aged,
crooked, and cloven stems, uneven and pathless
ground, sharp-cut hills and mountains which are

146 Tlbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
too high, rude or dilapidated buildings, with their
ruins lying strewn in piles, a sky with heavy clouds,
swampy water, lean cattle in the field, and ungrace
ful wayfarers." This definition proves that art is
after all largely dependent upon fashion. Nowa
days it would be almost possible to oppose these
definitions exactly to each other; what Lairesse
considered indispensable to beauty reads to us like
a very conventional catalogue, in fact, almost a
burlesque, so nearly have we come to believe that
the higher beauty consists largely in most of the
elements which he considers ugly !
Lairesse has given us a beautiful cold unimpas-
sioned idyl in his Parnassus. Sweet svelt Muses
ringing about in a decorous dance, well-dressed
mortals in conventional stage attitudes of embrace,
pretty fluffy trees, and a majestic Minerva giving
advice to an obstreperous flock of Cupids, — all
very charming and piquant, and harmlessly mirth
ful; that is Lairesse's idea of the Classic mount.
Gerard Lairesse was born in Liege, in 1641, but
afterward went to Amsterdam, where he died in
171 1, after having lost his eyesight at about his
fiftieth year.
Frangois Millet, usually called Francisque, was
born in Antwerp, in 1642, but painted chiefly ii
Paris. Among the landscapes in the sixth cabine
is one now given to him, although it used to 1

RR. H43a 43 1 42 I 41 1 40 | 39 I RR. I P.r]

\

\

\

::\

] 52

53

54

|55
¦ J

56

57

.58159

60

T?.r'.

r 1

• 1

ft

• «.

61

Ill T

u
V
— —
•
.J
• «
1
• •
62
RR.
63
PLAN OF THE GROUND FLOOR
P. R. Private Rooms of the Administration, etc.
NORTHWEST SIDE
KOOM 39. Italian. XVIII. Century.
40. Italian. XVII. and XVIII. Centuries.
41. Italian. XVI. and XVII. Centuries.
42. Italian. XVI. and XVII. Centuries.
43. Italian. XIV. to XVI. Century.
43a. Closed. Anteroom. SOUTHEAST SIDE
52. Pastels and Miniatures.
53- French. XVIII. Century (Rigaud).
54. French. XVIII. Century (Watteau).
55. German. XVIII. Century (Graff).
56. German. XVIII. Century (Graff).
ROOM 57.
58.
59. 60.
61.62.6364.
65. 66.67.
68.69.
T.U.
German and Italian. XVIII. Century (A. Kauffmann).
Italian. XVIII. Century (Batoni).
XVIII. Century.
XVIII. Century (ist Canaletto Room).
XVIII. Century (2d Canaletto Room).
XVIII. Century (3d Canaletto Room).
Pastel Rotunda.
Italian. XVIII. Century (G. M. Crespi).
XVIII. Century (Dietrich).
XVIII. Century (Dietrich).
XVIII. Century (Dietrich).
XVIII. Century (Pesne).
XVIII. Century (Silvestre).
Half lighted Rooms.
Decorative Italian pictures of the XVIII. Century.
Italian Italian Italian
Italian
German.German. German. French.
French. V.
tlbe ifrencb anb JEnglisb Scbools 147
included among the works of Gaspard Dughet. He
was a follower of the latter. This is one of his
principal works.
In the forty-fifth cabinet there is a battle-piece
by Jacques Courtois, generally known as il Borgo-
gnone, a follower of Salvator Rosa, in Italy, al
though bom in France in 1621. This picture is
confused in action, and the colour is uninteresting.
Courtois left France when he was only fifteen, so
that he hardly comes under the head of French
painters. Most of the other French pictures are to be seen
on the ground floor. It will be well to descend at
this point, as all the works of art below may be
examined at the same time.
In cabinet fifty-three, the full-length portrait of
King August III. of Saxony, one of the Royal
founders of the Dresden gallery, is to be seen,
painted by Hyacinthe Rigaud. The figure is
majestic, and yet has a charming breezy quality as
well, which prevents it from being formal. The
face is young and full, sweet in expression, and not
spoiled by the ridiculous hair-dressing of the period.
In this picture he appears in his robes as Electoral
Prince in Paris. A little negro attendant is behind
him, serving as a foil to his fair and kingly comeli
ness. The glittering armour and rich ermine-lined
mantle help to make this a striking royal portrait.

148 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
Rigaud was quite a character among the painters
of his day. He disliked to portray any but young
and good-looking subjects. When elderly princesses
applied for their likenesses, he hated to undertake
the work. " If I paint them as they are," he would
say, " they will think I have not done them justice;
if I flatter them, the portraits will not be recog
nizable! " One lady found fault with him because
he had not coloured her cheek as rosily as she her
self was wont to do. " Where do you buy your
colours, M. Rigaud?" this lady asked. "They
seem rather dull." Whereupon Rigaud looked fix
edly at her, and replied, calmly, " I believe we both
get them at the same shop, Madame."
Louis de Silvestre the Younger was a pupil of
Charles Le Brun. He was a Frenchman, but was
Court Painter to August the Strong in Dresden.
Here may be seen, in the sixty-ninth cabinet, the
celebrated portrait mentioned by Carlyle, in which
August and his cousin, Frederick the Great, appear ;
" Large as life, in their respective costumes and
features (short Potsdam Grenadier-Colonel and
tall Saxon Darius or Sardanapalus), in the act of
shaking hands; symbolically burying past grudges
and swearing eternal friendship, so to speak." Car
lyle voices the general sentiment and taste as he
goes on to say : " To this editor the picture did not
seem good for much." In the entrance-hall are

XLbc Jfrencb anb Englisb Scbools 149
two other portraits by Silvestre, one of August the
Strong on horseback and one of August III. as
Electoral Prince, also an equestrian. It is said that
one of the recreations of the second King of Prus
sia used to be to paint likenesses of his grenadiers ;
when he got the paint too red he simplified matters
by rouging the subject until he looked like the
picture !
Alexis Grimou, who was a native of Switzerland,
although here included among the artists of the
French School, painted the figure of a Flute Player,
No. yy2, in the fifty- fourth cabinet.
Antoine Pesne, though born in Paris, in 1683,
was made Court painter in Berlin, where he after
ward died, in 1757. His own portrait may be seen.
No. 775. Pesne studied for a time, too, in Venice.
He attracted the attention of the father of Frederick
the Great, Frederick William I., and was engaged
by him to transfer his activities to the Prussian
Court. He was sometimes called in to discuss mat
ters when Frederick the Great and Voltaire were
squabbling. It is to be regretted that we have not
one of Pesne's portraits of Frederick William — ^
they are described as very interesting. " Most
solid," says Carlyle, " plumb and rather more ; eyes
steadfastly awake, cheeks slightly compressed, too,
which fling the mouth rather forward, as if asking,
silently, ' anything astir, there? All right here? ' "

ISO XTbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
His picture of Little Fritz, too, as a drummer-boy,
is a sympathetic and charming rendering of the
boyhood promise of the Great Frederick; it is in
the Palace at Charlottenburg. Carlyle alludes to
him as " painter Pesne, a French immigrant, or Inv
portee, ... a man of great skill with the brush,
whom history yet thanks on several occasions."
Unfortunately, in the Dresden gallery we have no
really characteristic pictures by him, but only in
different studies of unimportant likenesses and sub
jects. It is possible that the half-length figure of
a girl in a' straw hat, with pigeons, may be the
picture spoken of by Carlyle, when he relates the
rural tastes and interests of the Queen, telling how
she used to invite parties of Salzburg Emigrants to
come and visit her at Monbijou, treating them to
supper and Bibles! In this connection Carlyle
says : " On one occasion she picked out a handsome
young lass among them, and had Painter Pesne over
to take her portrait. Handsome lass, by Pesne,
shone thenceforth on the walls of Monbijou, and
fashion thereupon took up the Tyrolese hat, which
has been much worn since."
The great epicure in passing fashion and the
whimsical extravagances of the eighteenth century
was Watteau. He began by painting what might
be called " repeats " of saints — stock pictures or
dered at so much a head, for seven years, at Paris.

Ube ifrencb anb Engltsb Scbools 151
But as soon as prosperity allowed him to select his
own subjects, he dropped his uncongenial saints, and
tumed his attention and talents in the direction of
high life, portraying the gallantries and fastidious
etiquette of the aristocratic life of France, being
known as the originator of a new school, that of the
" Fetes Galantes." With him are generally asso
ciated Pater and Lancret, who appear grouped
together in Dresden, so that we may as well exam
ine all three at once. In the fifty-fourth cabinet the
works of Watteau, Lancret, and Pater are hung,
making a dainty boudoir of graceful affectations.
Of these pictures Watteau's Love Feast is rather
the most attractive. In a beautiful garden such as
the one described by Lope de Vega, " wherein all
Ovid stood translated into bronze and marble,"
delicately gowned ladies and courtly cavaliers are
toying with the tender passion in a coy and artless
group, which is divided into couples, although there
seems to be no objection on the part of these lovers
to the presence of a crowd! A statue of Venus
presides over this curious galaxy. The separate
studies of the girls are charming; a sweet coquet
tish little person sits erect in her unyielding bodice
at the foot of the statue, while her swain, less
stiffly posed, sits by her. A beautiful study of
graceful draperies is seen in the central group, in
which the lady's back is turned; her pretty head

'52 XTbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Oaller?
is canted at a charming angle. One couple is seen
preparing to leave the general concourse, and these
are looking back over their shoulders, at a playful
pair on the vine-covered grass. A river scene on
the left adds to the charm of the picture, combining,
as is usual with Watteau, the extremes of sylvan
simplicity with the height of luxury and fashion.
Two of the costumes in this picture exhibit to spe
cial advantage the original Watteau plait.
The other painting by Watteau is called A Gar
den Party. The chief point of interest is an in
imitable bit of character study in the figure of a
well-appointed dandy who stands apart, his head
thrown back in a connoisseur-like manner, and both
hands planted on his hips, lost in admiration of a
nude marble figure of a nymph on a fountain. This
man's pose would appear to have proved an inspi
ration to Fortuny at a later date.
There are two subjects here known by the same
name, — A Quadrille under the Trees. No. 785 is
by Lancret, but was once ascribed to Pater; No.
788 is by Pater, and was originally considered a
Lancret. It is more or less a case of Tweedledum
and Tweedledee. The Paters and Lancrets have
most of them suffered from what we might denom
inate cross-ascription, and it is difficult for any but
very expert critics to determine why they were ever
changed ! They are all pretty — airy — alluring —

XTbe ffrencb anb Engltsb Scbools 153
restful, in their well-bred, dressy fashion. They
suggest a life of careless, selfish, unquestioning
merriment, leading the people slowly but surely to
the maddened mob and the Guillotine. De Gon-
court speaks of Watteau " dont I'oeuvre ressemble
aux Champs Elysees de la Passion ! " and " Wat
teau le Pensieroso de la Regence," while the digni
fied Horace Walpole remarks that " his shepherd
esses, nay, his very sheep, are coquettes ! " His
trees are " Tufts of plumes and fans and trimmed
up groves," and, according to Wilkie (who wrote
particularly of those examples in Dresden), "in
quality too light and feeble, but elegant and gay in
the extreme." Soft smoky blues, tender puce pinks,
limpid apple greens, and rich opalescent whites, —
these are the tints which the artists of the Fetes
Galantes knew so well how to employ. And while
we classify the school in this rather arbitrary way,
as the painters of the Fetes Galantes, we must not
forget that if their subjects were ephemeral, their
art was brilliant. This ineffable blending of soft,
liquid tones, this composing of harmonious lines
and subtle effulgence of atmosphere, — these qual
ities are seen nowhere developed in the same degree,
so full of poetic fluency, as in the works of Wat
teau, Lancret, and Pater. And another quality
characterizes them: a quality all too rare in art.
They are, even when dealing with caresses and

1 54 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
amorous frolics, absolutely pure and refined. There
is an elevation of decency, to say the least, which
is absent in the clever pictures of the Dutch School,
and the mythological incidents as treated by Italians.
Innocent — mirthful — theatrical, but never vicious
or sensual, Watteau and his followers are seers of
a very exquisite vision.
Lancret's Dancing in the Park at the Castle is
a particularly happy example of this painter. The
alert poise and young, erect grace of the girl, who
stands in the centre, opposite her fantastic partner,
is the centre of interest. Idling groups of dandies
and ladies are lounging about under the trees, and
two quaint children in full Watteau plaits are on
the steps in the foreground. It radiates the spirit
of dance and the lilt of the Spring.
There is an old French poem which states in
rather extravagant terms the influence of Watteau :
"... Un jour Dame Nature
Eut le desir coquet de voir sa portraitttre.
Que fit la bonne m&re ?
EUe enfanta Watteau ! "
Pierre Subleyras, a painter of Paris and Rome,
1699- 1749, 's here represented only by a small
replica of his larger picture in the Louvre, Christ
in the House of Simon the Pharisee. It is rather
theatrical.

XCbe ifrencb anb EnQlisb Scbools 15s
There is one of Nattier's portraits in the fifty-
third cabinet, that of Maurice de Saxe, afterward
Marechal of France. Jean Marc Nattier began
very early to show promise as a painter; when he
was a little boy, he received a Royal compliment
from Louis XIV., — he made a drawing from
Rigaud's portrait of the King, and when his
Majesty saw it, he observed to the boy, " Monsieur,
continue to work thus, and you will become a great
man." And in this one line of decorative contem
porary portraiture. Nattier certainly has stood su
preme ever since. With a wonderful talent for
painting a plain person so that she became beautiful,
while the likeness was retained, he grew readily in
favour among courtiers. A mannerist, a " make
up-man," and a genial Court pet, Nattier was a fit
exponent of the qualities which surrounded him.
Maurice de Saxe is a familiar name to many
chiefly as having been the lover of Adrienne Le-
couvreur. The French actress lent him thirty thou
sand pounds to help him forward in his career.
Again we have recourse to Carlyle, who says : " The
reader has perhaps searched out these things for
himself, from the dull history book? Or perhaps
it was better for him if he never sought them."
Maurice was a libertine, and many passages in his
life are best unnoticed. Later he turned out to be
a great war tactician, deserving his honours in this

156 XCbe Hrt Of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
field, where he played fairer than he did in love.
What inimitable irony is Carlyle's ! " Marechal de
Saxe," he continues, " A glorious ever-victorious
Marechal; and has an army very high-toned, in
more than one sense: indeed, I think one of the
loudest-toned armies ever on the field before. Loud
not with well-served artillery alone, but with play
actor thunder barrels (always an itinerant theatre
attends), with gasconading talk, debaucheries, busy
service of the Devil, and pleasant consciousness that
we are heaven's masterpiece, and are perfectly ready
to die at any moment! " The death of Maurice de
Saxe is related with equal spice by Voltarie : " Went
down in a rose pink cloud, as if of perfect felicity :
of glory that would last for ever, which it has by
no means done. He made despatch; escaped, in
this world, the Nemesis which often awaits on what
they call ' Fame.' By diligent service of the Devil,
in ways not worth specifying, he saw himself
Nov. 21, 1750, flung prostrate suddenly: 'Putrid
fever ' gloom the doctors ominously to one an
other: and Nov. 30, the Devil (I am afraid it
was he, though clad in roseate effulgence and melo
dious exceedingly) carried him home on those kind
terms, as from a l^niverse all of Opera" Maurice
de Saxe was the author of a volume entitled " Mes
Reveries;" a strange " mihtary farrago," observes
Carlyle, " dictated, I should think, under opium."

XCbe ffrencb anb Engltsb Scbools 157
This Dresden portrait was painted when the Count
was still young, in 1720, before the glories of vic
tory had so set him up. It is a fitting sample of
both artist and man, — they both reflect the bom
bastic self-satisfied vanities of their period.
Jean Baptiste Greuze is represented here as a
genre painter; we have none of his pretty enam
elled children or softly simpering ladies. A simple
paterfamilias is reading the Bible to his children,
and it is a quiet domestic scene. Greuze as a youth
fell in love with a beautiful girl, in a social position
superior to his own, so that he suffered from unre
quited love ; he used to be called the " love-sick
cherub " by his playful comrades. This tinge of
sentimentality and melancholy he transmitted to
nearly all his works. The picture in Dresden is
not by his own hand, being a copy of an original
in Paris. This picture created a great sensation in
Paris when it was painted : it was an entirely new
style. It was his first important picture, and he
became famous from the moment it was exhibited
in the Salon of 1755. His ambition, however, was
to be classed among those who painted in the heroic
style, and to be catalogued as a genre painter was
a mortification of the spirit to him.
There are but four examples of the glorious art
of England in the eighteenth century to be seen in
Dresden, and for lack of a better place they will be

158 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
considered here. These pictures are in the fifty-
eighth cabinet, with the exception of a portrait by
Sir Godfrey Kneller, which is in No. 57.
" It is better to have real portraits," says Walpole,
"than Madonnas without end." Sir Godfrey
Kneller is the subject under discussion, and Wal
pole is right so far as Sir (jodfrey is concerned. It
would surely have been a pity if Kneller had painted
Madonnas instead of portraits, for they would un
doubtedly have been very inferior Madonnas,
whereas the portraits, although not fine achieve
ments, are at least interesting as preserving some
record of the subject. Sir Godfrey was bom in
Lubeck in 1646, but he is recognized as a painter of
the English School. A great part of his life was
passed in London. Among other extensive works,
he was engaged by King William to paint the Beau
ties at Hampton Court. He was advised against
this selection, as lacking in tact; as Lady Dorches
ter put it, " If you asked for the portraits of all
the wits at Court, would not the rest think you
called them fools ? " We have not one of his " beau
ties " here to pronounce upon, but only a portrait
of young Lord Euston. Kneller was the friend of
Steele, Addison, Dryden. and Pope. He was of a
commercial turn of mind, however, and, on many
occasions, painted very poor pictures on the strength

XCbe Jrencb anb Engltsb Scbools 159
of his reputation, satisfied if he received good pay,
whether the work was worthy of him or not.
Sir Joshua Reynolds is most inadequately repre
sented in a life-size portrait of Mr. Will James in
the costume of the Dunstable Hunt. The picture
is hard and poor, and enough to make an English
man very regretful that this should be the only
example of this great master in the Dresden col
lection. There is also an indifferent likeness of himself
by Enoch Seemann, a painter who was born in
Danzig, but who came to London as^a boy and was
educated under British influences. He died in
London in 1792.
But of the work of Sir Henry Raeburn there is
a specimen as fine as it would be possible to produce.
It is the portrait of Sir Lucius O'Beirne, Bishop of
Meath. It is only a head, — not at a first glance an
important work, — but it is beautifully soft in mod
elling, — a thoroughly worthy Raebum portrait.
Raeburn's special power is one which is difficult
at first to define. There is a marked individuality
pf touch, which baffles one : it is not that he ideal
izes his subject, in the ordinary sense, for his
brawny men are not handsome; but in a keener
way, he does idealize, and that, I think, is the real
secret of his art. He idealizes the character: the
traits of his sitter. If the man before him is a

i6o XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
good-natured man, Raeburn makes him positively
radiate with benevolence and good-will; if he be
a clever man, Raeburn paints a coy expression into
his eyes, which convinces us that this man's wit is
simply scintillating. If the subject be an intellectual
man, the artist puts such fire of penetration into his
face that he seems to intensify the man's ability, and
the picture becomes imbued with the colossal
thought which only waits for utterance. Thus,
without flattering the outward person, Raebum in
tensifies all the characteristics of his subject, so that
the portrait is worthy of study, not only as a repre
sentation of the person as one sees him casually, but
an interpretation of all his chief moods and his best
thoughts. It is not alone a question of colouring,
or handling, or modelling, or composition, or any
of the other features which go usually to make a
fine work of art. All these are good, — excellent,
— but can be met elsewhere in equal complete
ness. The key-note to the art of Raebum is psychic
idealization. Sir Henry Raeburn began life very simply. An
amusing story is told of his early days, when he
and John Clerk, afterward a famous judge, were
youths together, living in lodgings, and occasionally
dining with each other to discuss the world and
their prospects. One day Raeburn was invited to
dine with Clerk; upon sitting down to table, they

XTbe ifrencb anb £ndlisb Scbools i6i
discovered that the landlady had provided three her
rings and three potatoes. " Did I not tell ye,
woman," exclaimed Qerk, rising in majesty of
wrath, " that a gentleman was to dine with me,
and that ye were to get six herrings and six pota
toes ? " In after years, John Clerk, then Lord
Eldin, and Sir Henry Raeburn had many a laugh
together over their youthful hardships !
One of his sitters has left a description of Rae
burn's methods in attacking a portrait : he first en
tered into conversation, so as to get his subject into
a pleasant and natural mood, then, having placed
him in the required attitude, he stepped back and
viewed the sitter for some moments. After looking
at him thus for a time, Raeburn came quickly for
ward, and painted in the features of the face in a
few moments, without either drawing or bounding-
line. " I had sat to other artists," writes this gen
tleman, adding that their method was different;
that they made careful drawings, and filled out
details with conscientious exactness. " They gave
more of the man," he says, " Raeburn gave more of
the mind."
Raeburn was a member of the Royal Academy,
of the Imperial Academy in Florence, of the Acad
emy of Fine Arts in New York, and was also elected
to Honorary Membership in the Academy of Arts
of South Carolina. The modest invitation of this

i62 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
latter institution was gracefully worded : " Your
character and talents have been our admiration for
many years; we have named you as an Honorary
Member of our Institution, and should you accept
it, you will confer a favour upon us." Raeburn
accepted this courteous election, and became a mem
ber also of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
Henry Raeburn was sixty-seven years of age
when he received a summons to appear before the
King to be Knighted; he was then appointed
" limner and painter in Scotland, with all fees, prof
its, salaries, rights, privileges, and advantages
thereto belonging."
He has been criticized for " hoisting his people
up " and giving a " pigeonhole view " of their nos
trils; but after all, there is no one who can better
make them live and express their message; not a
call to admiration of their outward beauty, but
a call to the comprehension of their personalities.

CHAPTER VL
PASTELS AND MINIATURES, WITH LATE GERMAN AND
ITALIAN PICTURES HANGING IN ADJOINING ROOMS
Pastel is what might be called a pretty art, as it
was practised in its Golden Age : that is, in the
eighteenth century. It is distinctly lighter than oils,
and not of the same character as water-colour.
When it first came in vogue it was looked upon with
some suspicion, for unless it was kept under glass
the texture was very perishable; but its beautiful
freshness and durability when so protected won for
it many advocates. It did not darken with time
like oil ; there was no process of degeneration possi
ble to pastel, for when the pure chalk had absorbed
the pure pigment, that constituted the medium;
and it was unchangeable, provided that the pigment
was pure in the beginning, which was easily con
trolled by the artist himself. Dampness is its only
enemy; and with glass before it and with a proper
backing, that is not a very formidable foe.
It is not known who first employed pastel, but
163

i64 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
there is a drawing in three tones by Federigo
Baroccio, which was executed in 1528, and may be
regarded as one of the earliest specimens of coloured
chalk used as a deliberate pigment, and not intended
simply as a sketch.
The miniatures and pastels in Dresden are hung,
some in Room 52, and some at the extreme oppo
site end of this series of cabinets on the ground
floor, the rotunda, 63 on the plan. Some of the
pictures mentioned will be found in 52, but, when
this fact is not specified, it may be understood that
they hang in the Rotunda.
Painters in water-colours naturally tumed to a
possible pigment which should be applied in a dry
state. From distemper to pastel was an easy step:
the same elements, gum and water, were employed.
These gave to the dry colour the necessary firmness
to compose it into sticks. When dried into a paste,
the water-colour pigment actually became pastel.
At the end of the seventeenth century pastel devel
oped, and remained the fashionable medium for
portraitists. One of the foremost of these workers
was Rosalba Carriera, of whose pictures the Dres
den gallery has an unusually perfect collection.
Having already become the vogue through her mini
atures, Rosalba decided to adopt the new vehicle,
which she did so successfully that she was soon in
greater demand than any of the other pastel artists.

pastels anb /IDtniatures 165
With a silvery charm of touch and a tendency to
flatter her subjects, Rosalba simply captivated the
fashionable world.
Rosalba Carriera was bom in Venice in 1675.
She showed talent early, beginning with designs
of point lace and fans. The influence of her early
training is visible in her works. Point lace and fans
are almost the extent of her accessories. She also
decorated snuff-boxes, which soon led her into
miniature painting. She had a prosperous career
and was popular in Rome, Modena, Paris, and
Vienna. Ten years before her death she became
blind. In miniature art she occupied a recognized
position. Her miniatures, although affected, do not
lack freedom and grace. The cold gray tones to
which she became accustomed in pastel affected her
style as a colourist in this line also. She is melo
dramatic, and she is often at fault in her drawing.
Still, there is an element in her work which has
kept her memory alive. Some of her miniatures
are on vellum, painted in a gum medium, by a
method formerly employed by French painters and
illuminators in manuscripts.
The portrait of Rosalba herself shows us the art
ist in full face, taken as far as the knees. She wears
a Polish cap. She is not handsome, her expression
being rather anxious and pensive. Her dress is
blue, and a black and white fur pelisse partly envel-

i66 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
ops her. She looks a little faded, not being in her
first youth, but the eyes show penetration and are
of an agreeable grayish blue; her mouth is firm,
and the face, instead of beauty, exhibits charac
ter. Rosalba Carriera was a simple plodding worker,
in a time when art was suffering a decline. Even
in her generation she was not regarded as original
or great; but she was much in demand, being a
sincere worker, and a faithful portraitist in pastel;
and that chanced to be the fad of the hour. Rosalba
executed many likenesses very acceptably and was
a woman of some charm, though far from an inno
vator in portraiture. She was less inspired than
La Tour, whose faces are full of individual expres
sion. Perhaps we should not find her very inter
esting to-day, were it not that she kept a journal,
which was printed in Venice in 1793, '" which,
during the years 1720 and 1721, she jotted down
little remarks about her life and her works, fur
nishing an interesting and piquant account of her
time spent in the French capital. In the Regency,
in the midst of the life of the Court of Louis XV.,
she became fashionable, and the gay world paid
her its utmost compliment by ordering portraits by
her hand ! As many of the pastels in this collection
are alluded to in her diary, it will be interesting to
examine them with her own comments in mind.

pastels anb /iDiniatures 167
She was forty-five years of age when she went to
Paris. Rosalba's name was derived from " White Rose,"
given to her on account of the delicate flowerlike
qualities of her work.
Among the first commissions with which she was
favoured in Paris was a portrait of Louis XV. at
the age of ten. Dresden possesses this miniature.
It is in Room 52. A few privileged visitors were
allowed to wait on the young Louis at Dejeuner.
Rosalba alludes to going, on such an occasion, to
finish his portrait, and relates in an amusing man
ner how certain small accidents occurred during
the session. In August she received this commis
sion : " I received an order from the King to paint
a miniature of him for the Duchesse de Ventadorn,
and, the same day, I commenced another little por
trait of his Majesty."
" Aug. 3. Ordered the ivory for the miniature
of the King.
" Aug. 19. Commenced the portrait of the
King." The method of Rosalba was to begin by sketching
on another surface, afterward carrying it out upon
the ivory. She made a finished sketch first, and
then copied it, so that the sitter was not obliged to
pose during the tedious process of the actual minia
ture.

i68 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
September 27th she again alludes to this work:
" I went with my mother, Giovanna, and M. Jean,
to the King's cabinet. I worked on a portrait in
miniature on a card fastened in my box." The por
trait of Louis XV., as Dauphin, No. 9, is the one
painted in 1720, in Paris, and given by the King
later to August III. at the time of the marriage of
the Dauphin to the daughter of this prince.
A letter to Rosalba from M. Crozat on August
II, 1 72 1, announces the death of Watteau: "We
have lost our poor M. Watteau. He ended his days
with his pencil in his hand. His friends are about
to publish a discourse on his life and works. They
give due homage to the portrait of him which you
painted in Paris only a little time before his death."
This picture is alluded to in the Diary, on Febra-
ary nth : "I undertook to paint for M. Crozat the
portrait of M. Watteau in pastel." Watteau was
much interested in the work of Rosalba Carriera,
and a letter from his friend, Vleughels, to this lady,
in 1 7 19, has the following clause: "An excellent
man, M. Watteau, of whom without doubt you have
heard, has the greatest desire to know you, and to
have a piece of your handiwork : in return will send
you one of his. ... He is my friend; he lives
with me, and he asks me to present his most humble
respect and his hopes of a favourable answer."
Rosalba apparently agreed to the proposition, and

ROSALBA CARRIERA.  LOUIS XV. (pASTEl)

pastels anb /Btntatures 169
Watteau had his wishes granted, for in her diary
for 1721 (when she was in Paris), she wrote: " In
the moming I paid a visit to M. Watteau."
Among the earliest entries in the Journal, on
June 17, 1720, we find a note: "Made an agree
ment with M. Aran, to finish for him an Apollo
and Daphne." In the miniature room. No. 3 cor
responds to this description.
In 1720, while Rosalba was in Paris, she was
received into the Royal Academy of Painting and
Sculpture, having been made an Academician of
San Luca in Rome in 1705, and in Bologna also in
1720, on her way to Paris. When she visited
Vienna in 1735 the Empress of Germany, Amelie,
did her the honour of becoming her pupil. Her
portrait may be seen here in pastel. No. 20. The
tones are very delicate.
A little gratified worldly streak displays itself
when Rosalba writes, on December 7th : " I went
to the Academy ; while I was away, some princesses,
duchesses, and other personages came to our apart
ments, where they found my mother." She relates
with the pride of comradeship, too, that M. Hya
cinthe Rigaud made her a present of an engraved
edition of his portraits.
Evidently artists in those days had to deal with
bargain-driving clients as well as they have in our
time ! Rosalba remarks tersely in her Diary : " I

170 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
have refused the proposition to make two portraits
together as one." No allusion is made as to the
name of the thrifty person who had tried this time-
honoured trick.
The Empress Elizabeth, wife of Charles VI., is
a noble and gracious princess, to be seen in the
portrait No. 19. She wears beautiful pearls, and
a diamond clasp secures her mantle over her light
reddish gown.
An interesting episode in the career of Rosalba
is her intimacy with Mariette, a writer of note in
her day. In his " Abecedario," his life's work, he
tells many things concerning her. He greatly ad
mired her, and certainly must have been the victim
of an ecstatic enthusiasm when upon one occasion
he likened her to Correggio! He wrote a sonnet
to her of which the general trend is here translated :
" To the virtuous young lady, Rosalba Carriera,
celebrated in conversation, in song, in music, and
especially excelling in the art of the painter." He
goes on: "Tell me, gentle Rose" (aube sereine
in the original meaning dawn — a play upon her
name), "is it the earth or heaven that has given
you your sweet name? Or, by reason of your
numerous talents, are you the flower — the Rose —
and the Dawn (aube) of all virtue? Seeming a
woman of earth and yet a goddess celestial, you
have equal charm whether you speak or sing; the

pastels anb /iDtniatures 171
harmony of your voice enchains our souls, while
your lyre vanquishes every modem Orpheus. But
when I admire the works of your pencil, I am con
vinced that a second Apelles is reincarnated in you.
. . . Ah, Dawn, have not your colours given the
light to the world? " Such words as these betoken
the euphuism of sentimental decadence. Nothing
could be less deserved than such adulation applied
to indifferent art productions. Mariette is evidently
a chronic flatterer. He writes in a letter September
19, 1726: "The Count de Morville has placed in
his cabinet one of your works. For neighbours it
has Rubens, Paul Veronese, Giorgione, Andrea del
Sarto, and Poussin. Let me assure you in all truth
fulness, the painting of Rosalba possesses graces
which are not to be found in any master of our cen
tury. I can assure you that your picture causes
M. de Morville and his friends the most extreme
pleasure." Rosalba had certainly many admirers in high
places. In a letter Colle exclaims : " You have
proved yourself master of an art which Guido Reni
himself could not have surpassed." Such testi
monials, whether deserved or not, must have been
highly gratifying to the artist. August III., the
art-loving King, was one of Rosalba's chief admir
ers. He collected numerous works by her hand, and
his minister was instructed to purchase them

172 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
wherever they were to be found. One day August
III. heard that there was a charming pastel by
Rosalba in possession of a friend. Donna Marina
Capitana. The King asked her for it, and was re
fused; upon that, he offered in exchange 150 gold
sequins and a magnificent Dresden china service;
this was too large an offer to be rejected! He
obtained the coveted picture, which now forms one
of the Dresden collection.
The year 1723 was one of triumph for Rosalba
She was invited to Modena in order to paint the
portraits of the six princesses, as well as that of
their father, Rinaldo, Duke of Modena and Reggio,
who reigned from 1694 to 1737. We have here
some of these portraits. From them we may judge
of her success. No. 3, in Room 52, is the Princess
Anna Amelia, Numbers 17 and 18, in the same
room, are the heads of Princess Henriette and Prin
cess Anna Amalia Josefa, while No. 10 is the Duke
himself. It was at the solicitation of their grand
mother, Mme. d'Hanovre, that these portraits were
executed; as Mariette remarks: " she had her rea
sons, too, for it was desirable to find them hus
bands ! " Rosalba, while engaged on these pictures,
writes to her sister Angela : " Blessings on these
princesses and their father, who think of nothing
but to make it agreeable to me and to urge me not
to leave here as long as I find it pleasant to remain!

pastels anb /Ibiniatures 173
At every touch I add, they exclaim, ' This is su
perb ! This is the most beautiful of the beautiful ! '
and again, ' But you work too much ; there is no
one who can paint with such ability ! ' I have not
slept for two nights; I don't know whether I am
overworking or if I have taken cold." The Duke
also permitted Rosalba to make a copy of his Mag
dalen by Correggio, which is in Dresden.
Also in Room 52, No. 7 represents Frederick IV.,
King of Denmark, who ordered this portrait on a
visit to Venice in 1709, at the same time commis
sioning Rosalba to paint miniatures of twelve pretty
Venetians who had attracted his admiration. No.
8, the portrait of the Abbe Metastasio, is the chief
work of Rosalba in this museum. It brings the
Italian before the observer like actual life, and is
striking in its lights and shades.
Cardinal Albani was another of Rosalba's pa
trons, and she painted four pastels for him. " The
picture of the lovely Muse," he writes, " is delicate
beyond my hopes; although my confidence in your
rare merit exceeds bounds." There are several
Muses in the Rotunda — perhaps this is among
them. It was indeed a tragedy when Rosalba's blindness
began to creep upon her. A pathetic letter, in 1 749,
tells how her affliction came. " It is three years
now," she writes, " that I have been deprived of

174 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
sight; and you shall leam by my own hand how
far I have recovered. I see, but, as is usual after
an operation for cataract, rather confusedly. . . .
While I was blind, I cared for nothing. Now I
long to see everything, but I am forbidden to use
my eyes much until after I have submitted to a
second operation." This groping for help was of
no avail. The second operation was not successful,
and she remained blind for ten years. Her last
letter to Mariette is dictated to her sister : " I see
no more than if I were in the darkness of midnight.
Imagine my grief at not being able to read your
beautiful work! "
When she came to die she arranged for her
funeral beforehand and indicated the place of her
burial. She passed away in April, 1757. The
report that she died in great want is entirely un
founded. Her will is extant, in which she makes
disposition of a comfortable small property, which
would have been impossible had she been indigent.
She founded a perpetual mass for the child of one
of her poorer friends ; she left two hundred ducats
to Felicita Sartori, her favourite pupil, who was
then the wife of Counsellor Hoffmann.
The other pastels by Rosalba in Dresden are
principally what are termed " fancy pictures ; " em
blematic figures, such as Charity embracing Justice,
and personifications of Europe, Asia, -Africa, and

pastels anb /Miniatures 17s
America. A girl holding a cock in her arms sym
bolizes Vigilance; Minerva stands for Wisdom;
Justice is detected by the inevitable scales, a girl
with a cup of water typifies Temperance, while
Truth is indicated by a solemn-looking personage
with a mirror. Spring, Summer, Autumn, and
Winter are also seen, painfully lacking in original
ity as to their attributes, but pretty and decorative.
The Fates, with their spindle, thread, and shears,
are seen in seventeenth-century disguise. Earth,
Fire, Air, and Water also occur with appropriate
emblems. Various Virgins and Magdalens are
also portrayed, and there are several unknown por
traits. Diana figures several times — first in pink
draperies, then crowned with flowers, and again
with pearls. Once she wears purplish red, and once
she appears with the crescent over her brow. In
each case she is a lady of the period, probably " as
suming a virtue which she has not " in electing to
be portrayed as the goddess of chastity. When one
reads of the revels and the informal dinners and
suppers given among the courtiers of that period,
one readily believes that all the ingenuity of the
Greeks was turned to account in devising risky
situations, to which the addition of a little original
French spice lent a flavour quite unique among
exotic entertainments !
Rosalba's pupil, who began life as a little servant.

176 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
being taken from this career by her discerning
teacher, is represented in Dresden by several minia
tures, to be seen in the fifty-second room in the Old
Electoral Collection, which was presented to the
Dresden gallery by the Elector Frederick Christian,
about 1763. This pupil, Felicita Sartori, was a
protegee of Rosalba in Venice, after which she
came to Dresden to work, where she married Hoff
mann, as has been mentioned. Her miniatures here
are chiefly copies from pictures by Rosalba, while
some are reproductions of famous pictures, such as
Apollo and Marsyas by Longhetti, Mercury and
Argus by Rubens, and Cignani's Joseph with Poti
phar's Wife, the original of which is among the late
Italian pictures in the same gallery.
There is one pastel by Guido Reni in the Rotunda,
a study of St. Francis.
Of the celebrated Maurice Quentin de La Tour,
born at St. Quentin in 1 704, we have two examples.
It is not possible to judge of this greatest of all art
ists in pastel by his portraits in Dresden : it is desir
able to see the collection at St. Quentin in order to
understand how broad, free, and original he really
was. Count Maurice de Saxe, of whom we have
already made mention, greets us here, rendered in
pastel by La Tour. La Tour lived with his brother,
they both being bachelors. In most of his portraits
the chief charm is in the extraordinary and vital

pastels anb flbiniatures 177
sparkle of the eyes: this is obtained partly by his
method of allowing the lower lid to touch the pupil,
which always gives concentration and brilliancy.
Diderot alluded to the " light and life " in the faces
of La Tour, which made them charming quite inde
pendently of their being accurate portraits —
which, however, they always were.
A list of the works of La Tour reads like a page
from the Almanach Royal : kings, queens, dauphins,
princes, barons, and dukes bristle in every direction.
His own portrait, which is at Amiens, shows a
merry, keen, jovial face, with twinkling eyes and a
smiling but roguish expression. He has painted
himself in a blue velvet coat.
When Quentin La Tour returned to the delightful
little town of his nativity — St. Quentin — he was
eighty years of age, and had achieved much fame.
The city was illuminated for his reception, and the
magistrates headed a procession in festal garb to
welcome him, while the bells chimed merrily. If
any of my readers are familiar with the bells of
St. Quentin, which may almost be said to play pop
ular airs every fifteen minutes, they will be able to
form an oral impression of La Tour's home-coming.
One is struck in glancing at the group of pastels
by Raphael Mengs by the difference in tone between
this painter's works and any other portraits in the
Rotunda. They are much warmer than the resf.

178 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
The silvery quality is replaced by a deep golden
tone, almost coppery. Here we have portraits of
himself and of his father, Ismael Mengs, who was
also a painter in pastel and enamel to the King of
Poland. Raphael Mengs was regarded by enthusiasts as
the equal of Raphael Sanzio. We have already
seen how prone the connoisseurs of this eighteenth
century were to make much of their pastel artists.
He had one trait in common with La Tour, which
was lacking in Rosalba, and that was correct draw
ing. His delineation is always good. His best
works are in Dresden, so that one can form a better
estimate of him than of La Tour. There are also
two portraits by his sister, Theresa Concordia
Mengs, in one of which Raphael appears in person.
From this and from the two other likenesses of
himself by his own hand, which may be seen here,
we may form some idea of his personal appearance.
The one in the red coat, No. 167, is full of Hfe,
a bright, interesting face, serious, but with possi
bilities of keen penetration. The face is delightful.
We have also portraits of singers and painters; No.
172 shows us the Court Painter, Louis de Silvestre,
of whose work we have had occasion to speak.
King August III., who was so influential in the be
ginnings of the Dresden gallery, may be noticed in
No. 173, and the Elector Christian, who probably

pastels anb /Ibiniatures 179
founded the Old Electoral Collection of miniatures,
is portrayed in No. 174. The pretty Cupid Sharp
ening His Arrows is familiar to all through its
frequent occurrence in photograph and colour prints.
In Room 52 we have a number of the interesting
miniatures of Ismael Mengs, the father, chiefly
religious studies; apostles and sacred figures.
Ismael Mengs was a native of Copenhagen, being
born in the late seventeenth century ; but he became
Court painter at Dresden and died there in 1764.
A few miniatures by the son and daughter may also
be seen in this room.
Perhaps one of the best known figures in art,
familiar to every child in America since it has. been
adopted for the sign manual of a leading firm of
chocolate manufacturers, is Liotard's celebrated
Chocolate Girl. Here in Dresden we have the
original of this famous young person, standing erect
in her prim clothes, daintily bearing her little tray
set with its steaming cup and a glass of water. A
very delicate, coquettish, Dresden-china genre this
is, charmingly simple and straightforward of pur
pose, and exquisitely t}rpical of the French matu
tinal atmosphere of the eighteenth century. No
wonder she has such a reputation! With her pink
cap and yellow bodice and gray skirt, she is herself
a confection in tender shades and lines. The pic
ture is on parchment, and the quality is exquisite.

i8o XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
Jean Etienne Liotard was born in Geneva in 1702,
and was a great success with his pastels, miniatures,
and enamels. He was called the Turkish Painter,
because he spent several years in Constantinople.
He wore the Oriental costume, being an original
person, and quite independent of comment; he
travelled considerably, living for a time in France,
Holland, and Italy. He died in (^neva in 1789.
His model for " La Belle Chocolatiere " was Mile.
Baldauf, a chocolate girl of Vienna The lovely
Baldauf made such an impression upon the Count
Dietrichstein through her portrait that he fell in
love with her and finally married her. Algarotti
purchased the picture and gives an account of it in
a letter to a friend. " I have bought from the
famous Liotard a pastel about three feet high. It
represents in profile a young German femme de
chambre, who carries a tray upon which is a glass
of water and a cup of chocolate. The picture is
almost without shadows on a plain background and
is lighted by means of two windows whose reflec
tions appear in the glass of water. The work is
in delicate half-tints with insensible gradations of
light and in perfect relief. It is not mannered;
and although painted in Europe, it is almost in
Chinese taste. They are the enemies of shade, as
you know! As to the finish of the work, to sum
it up in a word, it is a Holbein in pastel! "

LIOTARD.  THE CHOCOLATE GIRL

pastels anb /iDiniatures iSi
The picture of La Belle Lyonnaise, No. 162, is
a portrait of the artist's niece, Mile. Lavergne.
Liotard himself, in his Turkish attire, may be seen
in No. 159. It is said that in Paris Liotard was
considered a little dry and hard in finish: his col
ouring is very low in tone and the French con
sidered his carnations too pale ; but that is a matter
of fashion.
Among the miniatures are several by a well-
known Dresden painter in enamel, Sophie Dinglin-
ger ; they are chiefly family portraits in the artist's
own circle. The Preuss Collection comprises forty-
nine busts of celebrated rulers, chiefly copied from
portraits by noted artists. The collection was owned
by Herr Friedrich Preuss, who donated it in 1843.
Most of these portraits are familiar. Several Popes
and Emperors, Kings and Queens, are here set
before us, prettily displayed in the alluring tex
tures of ivory and fine colour. There is also a
collection which was bequeathed in 1858 by Carl
Leopold Christoph von Reitzenstein, one of which,
No. 135, Portrait of Jerome, King of Westphalia,
is by Isabey. The Grahl Collection, presented in
1891 by the widow of the painter himself, consists
of seven ivory miniatures by August Grahl, who
was bom in Mechlenburg in 1791, and studied in
Beriin, ending his life in Dresden in 1868. Well-
known historical characters, Thorwaldsen, Countess

i82 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
Potozka, and Princess Elizabeth of Prussia, here
appear. While we are on this lower floor, it is well to
glance through the other rooms, which contain
chiefly late German pictures, although there are
several late Italians represented here also, among
them the interesting Canaletto.
Anton Graff's excellent portraits of himself may
all be seen in the fifty-fifth room, one as a young
man, and one a full-length figure, seated with his
palette and brushes and a delightfully alert expres
sion on his face, a masterly study of himself in old
age. He was a good painter. He was professor
at the Dresden Academy, and died in this city' in
1813. His likeness of Dr. Ernest Platner, No.
2180, B, is especially to be commended, but all his
portraits are well worth looking at.
The well-known Vestal Virgin by the mellifluous
Angelica Kauffman is here. One does not appre
ciate the charm of this painting from any of its
numerous copies. There is a beautiful quality
about the dark white draperies which has never been
quite reproduced. Her " Young Lady as a Sibyl,"
too, is fresh and charming in a delicate robe of
sweet soft blue. Angelica Kauffman had a roman
tic if not a pleasant career in private life. She was
taken at the age of fifteen to Milan to study paint
ing, working afterward in Naples, Rome, and Ven-

pastels anb /Miniatures 183
ice. In England she also became very popular, and
was made a member of the Royal Academy in 1768.
She was twice married, once to an impostor who
called himself Count Horn, and later to an early
love, who did not prove to be much more satisfac
tory! Goethe, while deriding the puerile sentimen
tality of Kauffman, nevertheless pays this tribute
to her technical skill : " No living painter surpasses
her either in grace of representation or in the taste
and capacity with which she handles her brush."
An excellent picture by Raphael Mengs hangs
here, — in fact, the same subject, Joseph's Dream,
is treated twice by him. Raphael Mengs's father,
being a miniaturist himself, wished his son to follow
art as well. When the lad was only thirteen, he
used to shut him up to copy all day in the Vatican,
with only a piece of bread and some water for re
freshments : he was not allowed to come out until
he had accomplished the day's task.
The delightful little children by Christian Vogel
used to be considered portraits of the artist's two
sons ; but the picture is now thought more probably
to represent a couple of the Schoenberg Princes.
The composition is charming in every way, and the
attitudes of the children unaffected and natural as
they play with their toys and picture-books.
Balthasar Denner, a German painter of the early
eighteenth century, painted some studies which hang

i84 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
here. The benign, wrinkled face of the Old Lady
with a Golden Kerchief is exceedingly well done.
The head of a boy with a flute by Christian Sei-
bold. No. 2092, is a nice bit of work, not in the
fashion of our day to be sure, but, we must admit,
an accurate and pleasing example of the style of
the early eighteenth century. Seibold was a pupil
of Denner, whose work we have just mentioned.
This was a conscientious school, if lacking in atmos
pheric illusions!
Christian Dietrich, (Tourt Painter in Dresden
during the middle of the eighteenth century, domi
nates three rooms in this section. His pictures are
various, ranging in subject all the way from naked
boys in a pond to the Holy Family, and from Shep
herds and Cupids to warriors, prodigal sons, and
lute-players. Nearly fifty pictures await the atten
tion of the sightseer who has plenty of time ! Die
trich was a general eclectic. He fell into the man
ner first of one master and then of another, indul
ging his tastes, doubtless, and amusing himself, but
not leaving a very substantial legacy to art
The rooms on the other side of the entrance-hall
— thirty-nine to forty-three — contain some more
of the late Italian pictures. A few are worth notic
ing, but there are not many masterpieces stowed
away in these apartments. In Room Number Forty-
one, Giorgio Vasari, the writer whose invaluable

pastels anb /Ibiniatures 185
works are a quarry for all Italian art biography, is
represented by a picture of the Mother of Christ
and the Magdalen, with the body of the Saviour.
The four Evangelists may be seen in the four cor
ners. The picture is small and rather pleasing.
The tone is cool. Vasari is not a great painter,
but this is a really good example of his work.
Vasari does not at all realize that he is one of a
declining school. He says calmly : " We paint six
pictures in a year, while the earlier masters took
six years to one picture, and yet these pictures are
much more perfectly executed than those of the
early school by the most distinguished masters."
He considers that technical finish is the aim of art ;
he has no idea of the true value of progress or of
the necessity for original thought in composition.
Sassoferrato occupied a position in Roman art
similar to that taken by Carlo Dolci in Florence.
There is a Virgin and Child of his here, which is
curiously effective in its lighting. The painting is
thick, the drapery of red and blue, and the halo
rather dull. Wilkins says that this picture " gives
out light like a plaster cast," owing to the use of a
certain white medium.
In the forty-third room, the St. Onophrius was
painted by Vasco Pereira, who painted in Seville
between 1579 and 1585, but who was a Portuguese
by birth. His colouring is usually harsh, although

i86 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
he drew well. Pereira was employed by Vargas to
paint a fresco, which offended Pacheco, because Our
Lord was represented as wearing only a tunic !
In the forty-second room we have the Daughter
of Herodias again, with the head of John the Bap
tist. It is by Lo Spada (Pietro Marascalco), who
has signed his name clearly. The colour is interest
ing. There is a crisp yellowish green tone, comple
mented by a mere tint of pink.
There is also a Flemish copy of the Lotto Virgin
and Child with Four Saints, the original of which
is in the Bridgewater gallery; the copy hangs in
No. 43. In 41 there are two good copies of Gior
gione, — an old Astrologer casting the horoscope
of a boy, who lies on the ground, while a young
man in armour and a woman in white stand by.
The astrologer sits before a ruin, where a broken
statue of Venus stands in a niche. There has been
some suggestion that the female figure in this pic
ture might represent Lucretia Borgia, but the only
reason given for this theory is the fact that in the
corner of the picture there appears an eagle, which
was the " family bird," so to speak, of the Estes.
The kneeling St. Francis de Paula, in the pic
ture by Francesco Solimena, in the fortieth cabinet,
is commending a boy to the Virgin and Child who
appear in the clouds above. St Francis de Paula
was godfather of Francis I., and he is here sup-

pastels anb /Miniatures 187
posed to be interceding for his godson's welfare.
St. Francis de Paula lived in Calabria, where he
founded an order, of which the motto was " Cari-
tas." He died in 1507. Another example of Soli-
mena's work has been noted in another place.
And now to close our observations on the late
Italians it is necessary to cross the entrance-hall on
the ground floor and proceed in the opposite direc
tion, until we arrive at Cabinet No. 57. Here we
have another Repentant Magdalen, this time by
Pompeo Battoni, which tries us by its extremely
uncomfortable attitude, reading from a book alt an
almost impossible angle. It is affected and
thoroughly unintellectual, though quite popular
among those who mistake contortion for grace
and regard maudlin inanity as a symptom of re
ligious exaltation.
Here is a half-length figure of a man, with a pair
of spectacles in his hand, painted by Giuseppe
Nogari in the eighteenth century, which is treated
in the extreme of the " sfumato " style, but which
is very attractive, as is also, in the sixtieth cabinet,
a study of the Apostle Peter, which is positively
feathery in its softness of outline. It is the hazy
flickering of the light that is going out.
Magnasco's works have often been ascribed to
Salvator Rosa. He is not a very well-known artist,
and there are four excellent specimens in Dresden

i88 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
from which he may be studied; two landscapes
hang in Cabinet 65, while the others, studies of
nuns and monks, are in No. 59. In the 64th cabi
net we have an example of the work of Longhi — a
portrait of a lady in a cap and veil. No. 595. The
elaborate etiquette of the complaisant eighteenth
century was portrayed by Longhi in Italy, as much
as by Watteau and Lancret in France. The superb
self-satisfaction of that society which was so bril
liantly flowering on the surface while its roots were
suffering from blight and degeneration shows it
self in the courtly display of upholstered human
beings who were ashamed of any genuine emotions.
The works of Canal and Canaletto are to be seen
in this section of the gallery in great profusion.
These topographical portraits are unique, and
although to be seen in nearly all collections of any
magnitude, they have always a certain charm of
their own. It will be well to distinguish between
Antonio Canal and his illustrious nephew and pupil,
Bernardo Belotto, known as Canaletto.
Antonio Canal was a Venetian, living from 1697
to 1768. His father was a scene painter, a fact
which accounts for the panoramic quality of Canal's
paintings. His tastes ran rather to architectural
subjects, and six of his finest pictures of Venice are
to be seen in Dresden, hanging in the series of
rooms from 55 to 58.

pastels anb /Miniatures 189
Canal visited England in 1746; Walpole says,
" he was then in good circumstances, and, it is
said, came to vest his money in our stocks." He
remained about two years, and painted many Eng
lish pictures.
Bemardo Belotto, or Canaletto, was born in Ven
ice in 1720; he studied with the elder Canal and
after some years went to Dresden. His paintings,
of the city in his time, are most interesting to com
pare with the same views as they appear now. In
Rooms 60, 61, and 62, we have Canaletto's studies
of Dresden; they are not especially beautiful as
pictures, but are faithful representations of the
place in the eighteenth century. Canaletto can
hardly be classed as a landscape painter. He oc
cupies a position toward the works of man similar
to that occupied by Claude and Salvator toward the
works of nature. His pictures are records of build
ings instead of hills and rivers; the practical side
of residential and business interests are emphasized
instead of the charms of solitude and romance. The
views of Pirna, No. 618 to 627, are attractive. The
little Market Place, No. 623, is a delightful mediae
val scene, which repays careful examination. The
interesting steep-gabled buildings, the old towers
with their exotic spires, lead up to the distant for
tress of Sonnenstein. When Canaletto left Dres
den, he went to Warsaw, and we have here, in Nos.

19° XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
634, 635, and 636, details of the Saxon Palace
there. In one of these pictures, signed, I747' No. 602,
some of the figures are portraits of notables of the
period. One may distinguish Joseph Frohlich, the
Court Fool of August the Strong and August III.,
the painters, Dietrich and Thiele; Niccolo Pozzi,
called Niccolini, may be observed from his unusual
size. The queen's physician, Philippe de Violante,
is also depicted, and Canaletto himself, making a
sketch on the spot !
No. 607 shows the famous Japanese Palace built
by August the Strong about 1720; while No. 638
shows the Kreuz Kirche, ruined by bombardment in
1 765 ; the tower, however, is still standing. This
collapsed in the following June, so that this picture
was the only record of its appearance before that
time. Canaletto died in Warsaw in 1780. His
work is hardly as fine as that of his uncle in some
respects — in artistic arrangement and selection.
He was among the first to recognize that sunlight
gives a silver glitter rather than a golden glow on
the objects which it strikes freely in the open air.
In Room 59 is to be seen Piazettas Young Stand
ard Bearer. It is a dashing broad work. The
effect of the profile on the white of the background
should be noted.

CHAPTER VII.
EARLY FLEMISH, DUTCH, AND GERMAN PICTURES:
DURER AND HOLBEIN
By an arbitrary and unexplainable plan, the ear
liest pictures of the Flemish and Dutch schools are
hung in the rooms at the end of the gallery, so that
we must wend our way through the halls, H, J, and
K, without bestowing a glance upon the fascinat
ing Rembrandts, Rubens, and other great masters,
and examine first the row of small rooms in the
right wing of the building. In the corner room,
corresponding to the one occupied by the Sistine
Madonna on the left side of the gallery, we come
upon another treasure of this priceless collection —
the precious triptych of Jan Van Eyck, who must
be regarded as the founder of the Flemish school
in the early fifteenth century, although he himself
was pupil to his own elder brother, Hubert Van
Eyck (of whose work we have no example here),
and who shares this distinction with him.
An entirely different ideal dominated early Flen>
ish art from that which ruled the Italians. To
191

192 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
approach Flemish or Dutch pictures with intelli
gence one must change one's point of view com
pletely. It is not effect which we must seek; it is
detail. Tender but overexact were these early
Northern artists. Step a few feet away from one
of their pictures and you lose the chief charm.
In this exquisite little shrine painting of Van Eyck
we see the Virgin and Child at the end of a narrow
chapel. For faithfulness of rendering there is no
specimen of this master more interesting than this
triptych. The painting of the elaborate Oriental
rug on which the throne is placed, and the delicate
brocaded hanging behind the Virgin, are worthy
expositions of the microscopic productions of the
early Flemings. Again we see the contrast to the
Italians; the faces are so finished, so smoothed
down, so painstakingly drawn, that the efiFect of
beauty is quite lost. Texture of skin is evidently
regarded as more important than anatomical struc
ture; clearness of delineation of eyes and eyelashes
receives more attention than does the ultimate ex
pression of the face. What \\'^illiam Hunt used to
warn his pupils against — " niggling " — is here
supreme. It is very brilliant and very perfect, but
it is " niggling " nevertheless. The architecture, —
the little carved caps, — the sweet little bull's-eye
windows, the tiny triforium, and the row of statu
ettes, — all are in keeping with the sentiment which

JAN VAN EYCK.  CENTRAL PANEL OF TRIPTYCH

Durer anb 1)olbein 193
regarded religion as a jewel to be enshrined; no
wonder that a reaction came later, and workaday
doctrines were carried to as great an extreme !
On the wings of the altar-piece we notice on one
side the Archangel Michael presiding over the kneel
ing " donor," while on the other side St. Catherine
peruses a tiny missal, quite oblivious of the wheel
which lies at her feet, and the sword on which her
right hand rests. These wings are supposed to
represent the north and south aisles of the little
central chapel, — one can trace the groined vaults
which offer their thrust to the arcade, and the side
windows beyond, separated by pilasters which match
the capitals of the nave. The upholstery of the pic
ture, so to speak, is faultless : the border of the Vir
gin's robe is enchanting, and St. Catherine's ermine
most regal. The armour of St. Michael, too, is
delightfully metallic. This school of work — of
which this triptych by Van Eyck is the finest exam
ple — is practically miniature painting in oils.
One of the exquisite features of the triptych is
the landscape; it is only two inches high, and a
half an inch across, but in it may be seen a town
(or else a monastic settlement), and a foreground
of fields with little trees, blue shadowy hills beyond,
terminating in a distant Alpine effect, snow-capped,
and reaching into the cloudless sky. As Hamerton
says : " In this early landscape we have plenty of

194 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
detail; nothing is slurred over, either from negli
gence or in obedience to any theory of simplifica
tion." It is as clear and sharp-cut as a steel en
graving. The picture was probably painted for a portable
shrine, for it was customary for grandees in those
days to carry with them, when travelling, a religious
picture. It may have been the oratory companion
of the famous Philip, Duke of Burgundy, — Philip
the Good, who was a patron of Jan Van Eyck, and
often visited the painter, as well as paying him the
more practical compliment of renting his house for
him! Calls at the studio from this Duke were
hailed with joy by master and apprentice alike, for
Philip never left the workshop without showering
gold upon the workers to right and left. He also
employed Jan Van Eyck to go on delicate diplomatic
missions for him, which is the final test of the con
fidence which he placed in the artist. The first of
these little trips was made in August, 1426, and is
alluded to as " a certain distant pilgrimage and
secret journey, of which no further mention need be
made." The triptych was originally ascribed to Albrecht
Diirer, and has been thought the work also of
Hubert Van Eyck; now, however, the question as
to its identity seems to be settled. While the dra
peries are very rich in detail, there is the early

Durer anb f)olbein 19s
Flemish disr^ard for general effect, so that they
fail to strike one as graceful. The characteristic
sharp crinkly folds usual in pictures of Jan Van
Eyck are, however, absent in this composition.
As to the much discussed question of the inven
tion of oil-painting, it seems evident that Jan Van
Eyck can hardly be said to have " invented " this
art; rather, he perfected the adaptation of oil in
mixture with coloured pigments. The discovery
was gradual, and the result of constant experiment :
Jan was perhaps the first to produce pictures satis
factorily rendered in this medium.
A Treatise on Architecture by Filarete appeared
in 1464, in which are certain remarks upon oil-
painting, which was not then understood so well in
Florence. " In Germany," says this Treatise, " they
work well in this manner, and especially distin
guished are Master Johan of Bruges and Master
Roger" (meaning Roger van der Weyden), "who
both paint admirably in oil-colours. Question : Tell
me how this oil is employed, and of what kind is it?
Answer: Linseed-oil. Question: Is it not very
dull? Answer: Yes, but the dulness can be re
moved, though in what way I am unable to
state." Linseed-oil was used freely by all artists who
painted in that medium in those days. There is a
story told by Palomino about a Bohemian artist

196 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
who returned late one night to his home, with some
fish to be fried for supper. There being no oil such
as was customarily used for culinary purposes, he
directed his wife to use linseed-oil. The result
was, however, that fish, frying-pan, and all were
cast relentlessly out of the window by the disap
pointed artist : for, as Palomino observes, " Lin
seed-oil, at all times of a villainous flavour, when
hot, is the very devil ! "
A painting by Jan Van Eyck was once taken to
Naples, where it created great excitement. The
artists flocked about it, examining it, giving it the
closest scrutiny, even, as a chronicler says : " put
ting their noses to it, and clearly perceiving the
strong smell which it had from the admixture of
the colours with oils; nevertheless it remained a
secret to them." This first example of oil-painting
seen by Italians caused them to regard it as a vehi
cle to be applied chiefly to miniature, and may
account for the contempt in which oils were held
by Michelangelo, who said that fresco-painting was
the work of men, but oil-painting only fit for
women !
The time of Jan Van Eyck's death has been
assigned to the year 1440. There is a register in
the archives of Bruges which mentions a lottery
drawn in 1445: "the widow of Jan \'an Eyck —
two pounds," proving that Jan was not then alive.

Durer anb ibolbein 197
Both the brothers Van Eyck had very striking epi
taphs. Hubert's reads as follows : " Take warning
from me, ye who walk over me. I was as you are,
but am now buried dead beneath you. Thus it ap
pears that neither art nor medicine availed me.
Art, honour, wisdom, power, affluence are spared
not when death comes. I was called Hubert Van
Eyck ; I am now food for worms. Formerly known
and highly honoured in painting, this all was
shortly after turned to nought. It was in the year
of the Lord one thousand four hundred and twenty-
six, on the eighteenth day of September, that I ren
dered up my soul to God in sufferings. Pray God
for me, ye who loVe art, that I may attain to His
sight. Flee sin: turn to righteousness: for you
must follow me at last."
Jan's epitaph is almost as solemn, and both show
that simple direct faith and honest, ingenuous virtue
which helped to make the serious Northern nations
stalwart and reliable : " Here lies Johannes, who
was celebrated for his surpassing skill, and whose
felicity in painting excited wonder. He painted
breathing forms, and the earth's surface covered
with flowery vegetation, completing each work to
the life. Hence Phidias and Apelles must give
place to him, and Polycletus be considered his infe
rior in art. Call, therefore, the Fates most cruel,
who have snatched from us such a man. Yet cease

198 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben ©aller?
to weep, for destiny is immutable : pray only now to
God that he may live in heaven."
The last is more laudatory, more flowery, savours
more of the Renaissance than the first. But per
haps the autobiographic quality of Hubert's epitaph
accounts in part for its modesty. His allusions to
" art and medicine " probably mean to apply to his
own skill, not that of an attendant physician, for
Hubert, as an artist, was necessarily also a chemist
The gloomy Roger van der Weyden next claims
our attention. Of all the early Flemings he is the
harshest in subject and treatment. His painting of
the Crucifixion may be seen in the twenty-first cab
inet. It is just round the corner from the lovely
Van Eyck. Van der Weyden was a pupil of Van
Eyck, and the teacher of Memlinc. He seems to
have embodied little of the inspiration which he
should have derived from the one and have trans
mitted to the other. The authenticity of this pic
ture has been questioned, but it is still catalogued
under the master's name. Crucifixions of this type
recall the story told of a witty remark made by a
Spanish artist when pressed to give an opinion of
a badly painted picture of this subject. Vargas re
plied : " Methinks He is saying. ' Father, forgive
them, for they know not what they do ! ' " It is
painful and misguided, but the morbid Roger prob
ably meant well, for he was a painstaking and con-

Durer anb Ibolbein 199
scientious person, with a forecast of the Puritan in
his make-up. He was born in Brussels, where he
chiefly worked during his life. He became a mem
ber of the Corporation of Public Works, and was
appointed Painter of the City, at a good salary for
those days — namely, a " third of cloth " of a tex
ture finer than that worn by architects. He was
likewise authorized to wear his mantle over his
right shoulder, whereas labourers, " varlets," and
even architects were allowed to throw their cloaks
only over the left shoulder. These rituals of cos
tume were closely observed. Van der Weyden con
tinued prosperous and respected : he travelled for
awhile in Italy, and his works were in even greater
demand after his return. One large commission
for an altar-piece is recorded in the words of the
Bishop who ordered it, as follows : " On the six
teenth of June, in the year 1455, I, John, Abbot,
bargained with Mr. Roger van der Weyden, the
master workman in painting at Brussels, to make a
picture five feet square, having eleven stories of
such device as the work will show." The prices of
parts are then enumerated, followed by the state
ment : " and was likewise paid to his wife and
workmen when the picture was brought, two pieces
of gold of four livres 20 den; it was brought by
the carman, Gillot de (Jonguelien du Roquier "
(quite a name for a mediaeval expressman!), "in

20O XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
the first week in June, in the year 59, on a cart with
three horses."
This gives some idea of the scale of work of
which Roger was capable. This worthy Abbot
John used to join the illustrious Philip the Good
in drinking bouts, and it is recorded that Philip
boasted that he had led the Abbot into such bibulous
excesses that he had been known to vanish under
the table!
Roger van der Weyden and his wife were pious
people of regular life, given to philanthropy. After
Roger's death, in 1464, the city of Brussels discon
tinued the post of municipal painter, so that he was
the last of this line.
Of the greater Flemish painter, Hans Memlinc,
we have no work here which is authentic. The St.
Christopher, in this twenty-first cabinet, is by some
member of his school, but can hardly be cited as
characteristic of the master, as the workmanship
is by no means so good. In an old English ballad
there are some quaint lines referring to the origin
of St. Christopher's name :
"... as with a child he once did wade
Under his load midway he faints, from sinking hardly stayed.
Admiring how, and asking who, was answered of the child
As on his shoulders Christ he bore, by being humbly mild,
So through humility his soul to Christ was reconciled.
And of his carriage, Christo-fer thenceforth himself was
styled."

Durer anb ftolbein 201
If one travels down the long corridor in the wing,
one will find in the Room O, a possible Memlinc
in the Adam and Eve under the Tree of Knowledge,
No. 803, but the attribution is quite uncertain. It
was originally supposed to be a German painting,
but later authorities consider it Flemish, and it
strongly suggests the work of Memlinc. Beyond,
in the room marked P on the plan, will be seen a
picture after Memlinc, of a man in a high hat ; this
is not, however, a better example than the others.
But none of the real lyrical charm of this master
can be seen in Dresden, and we may as well give
up any attempt to judge of his style from the school
pieces here to be seen.
Marinus van Rojmierswale, a painter of Zeeland,
who flourished from 1521 to 1560, is the author
of the strange crisp picture of the Money Changer
and His Wife; it is a curious colour scheme, a
cranberry red in the woman's head-dress contrasting
more acceptably than might be expected with the
bright red jacket. The man is dressed in blue. The
clutching, nervous hands would be sufficient indi
cation of the spirit of greed which is embodied in
this composition, even without the mean face of
the man exulting over his profits. The woman is
young and good-looking.
There are several water-colours by Hans Bol, all
in one frame. They are paintings on vellum, and

202 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
might almost be considered as remnants of the art
of the illuminator.
There are also two quaint portraits ascribed to
Lucas Cranach the Elder; they are painted in a
curious manner, having the effect of coloured var
nishes superimposed on a gold ground.
In visiting Wittenberg one sees the house of
Luther of course; that is presumably the goal of
the expedition. But one may also see, if one will,
the house of Lucas Cranach, who was a neighbour
and friend of Luther, besides being Burgomeister
of Wittenberg. At different times he was court
painter to three princes, — Frederick the Wise, John
the Persevering, and Frederick the Magnanimous.
Cranach also visited the Holy Land, from which
he seems to have absorbed little local colour, though
one has not full right to judge of his power as a
religious painter until one has inspected his larger
works in Wittenberg.
An original by the master's hand is Cranach's
head of the Margrave George von Brandenberg; it
is a drawing rather than a painting, and is in the
nature of a sketch, being quite unfinished. It is
the more interesting for that : it shows that the only
trouble with Cranach was that he did not know
where to stop. He was guilty, like most of his
German contemporaries, of overfinish. Had he
oftener adopted the strong lines here seen, and al-

Durer anb ftolbefn 203
lowed them to remain, he would have been a more
powerful painter.
Frans Pourbus the Elder is represented, but not
adequately. This twenty-first cabinet is full of
gems, and it is well to examine them thoroughly
before tracing continuity from artist to pupil in
other rooms. Jan Mostaert's figure of the Magda
len in a black cap has a lovely transparent green
background; and there are two splendid portrait
studies by Anton Mor, — the bust of a Canon of
Utrecht, the native town of Mor (some consider it
an early example of his master, Jan Scorel), the
other of a fair, bearded man in a fur coat and a
black cap, which is now pronounced as a mature
work of Mor. It is forceful. The facial expression
is of great vitality. There is an ingenuous little
picture on copper of Adam and Eve under the Tree
of Knowledge. It is the work of a follower of
Comelis van Haarlem, originally catalogued as un
known German.
Of Cranach the Younger, we have a few por
traits in this room; the Elector Moritz of Saxony
and his wife Agnes, No. 1945, a bust of the Elector
Augustus, rendered on millboard, and a study of
the Elector Moritz bareheaded, No. 1948. The
Elector Augustus may be seen again in armour,
painted by the Saxon Court painter of the late six-

204 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
teenth century, Zacharias Wehme. Other works are
considered in the next chapter.
The effect should be observed of the deliciously
luminous colours in the backgrounds of the por
traits, Nos. 1964, 187 1, and 839, as they hang in
order upon the wall; one is exquisite green, one
dull red, and one of clear, fine robin's egg blue.
The contrasting tints could hardly be rivalled by
an intentional arrangement. The last-mentioned
picture is a portrait of a bearded man holding a red
book. It has been catalogued as a Holbein, and as
a Mor, but is now given to the Master of the Death
of the Virgin.
The great Adoration of the Magi by the Master
of the Death of the Virgin is superb. It is a fine
example of the clear, varied colouring of this master.
There are many of these painters of the sixteenth
century, in Germany, who are known only by their
works; the names, the Master of the Lyversburg
Passion, Master of the Death of the Virgin, and
Master of Liesborn, having been applied to them
in default of their own names being forthcoming.
This master was a native of Cologne, and almost
all that is known of him is the fact that he worked
part of his time in Genoa, probably acquiring a
little Italian grace with which to endow his works.
The detail in this picture is sumptuous in the ex
treme. One might spend hours examining its intri-

Durer anb Ibolbein 205
cacies, and still find new beauties. The costumes
are most beautifully carried out. The landscape
background is among the loveliest in German art.
In this cabinet there is an exquisite speci
men of Holbein, the double portrait of Sir
Thomas Gonsalve and his son John. It is dated
MDXXVIII. It is a very important work of the
master, painted during his first stay in England.
It has a delicious blue background verging on
green, a colour much loved by Holbein. The older
man has a bit of paper in his hand, upon which
he has been writing. Both father and son, with
their curiously unshapely faces, are looking out con
templatively to the right.
Two pictures here are attributed to Bernard van
Orley, who came tinder Raphael's influence in Italy.
There is some question as to the authenticity of
these works — 8io and 8i i. One is a Holy Family,
and the other a portrait of a man in a black cap,
formerly assigned to Holbein. The religious pic
ture is full of theatrical effect. All the figures are
posing deliberately, and there is a great show of
artificial ruins in the surroundings ; broken columns,
crowned with weeds, are so numerous that if the
stable is intended to be under an inn, as is so often
suggested, the superimposed building would be
highly unsafe. The crumbling stone -floor and
steps add to the effect of desolation in the environ-

2o6 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
ment. Altogether it is as poor a picture as one
has often the opportunity of seeing.
A portrait of Bernard van Orley himself, by
Albrecht Diirer, hangs near by, — a fascinating,
thin, intellectual face treated with frank recognition
of anatomy, the head relieved against a glowing
coppery red background. It is a spirited, beautiful
example of Diirer as a portrait-painter.
" God sometimes granteth unto a man to learn
and know how to make a thing the like whereof
in his day no other can contrive." So wrote Al
brecht Diirer; no character is better adapted to
illustrate this remark than his own.
The main facts of Diirer's life may be traced by
applying to his own diary; he was the third son
in a family of eighteen children, and the parents
seem to have been worthy of their charge. " My
dear Father was very careful of his children," says
Diirer, " to bring them up God-fearing . . . where
fore he daily taught us to love God and deal hon
estly with our neighbours. . . . My father took
special pleasure in me because he saw that I was
diligent in striving to learn." After having been
apprenticed to a goldsmith, whose craft he absorbed
readily, Albrecht was put under the guidance of
the painter, Michael Wohlgemut, for a period of
three years. He enjoyed and respected his master:
" During that time God gave me diligence," he con-

Durer anb Ibolbein 207
tinues, " so that I learnt well ; but I had much to
suffer from his lads." Like all " ugly ducklings,"
in youth, he was misunderstood by the stupid or
ordinarily endowed boys.
Diirer then spent four years in improving travel,
and on his return was married according to the very
impersonal European custom. " Hans Frey treated
with my father," he explains, " and gave me his
daughter, Mistress Agnes by name, and with her
gave me two hundred florins, and we were wedded."
There is no mention of an ecstatic wooing ; it ended
as such matches are liable to do. Incompatibility
led to dislike; Pirkheimer, Diirer's most intimate
friend, even goes so far as to say that " she so
gnawed into his heart and to such a degree tor
mented him," that she actually hastened his death.
" She watched him night and day, drove him to
hard work . . . that he might earn money and
leave it to her when he died." Pirkheimer, with the
intolerance of a sympathetic companion who thor
oughly understood the situation, bursts out : " But
then! Nothing was enough, and in fact she alone
is the cause of his death ! "
Diirer went on an extensive Italian journey in
1505, taking this opportunity to escape the pesti
lence which was then ravaging Nuremberg. His
letters from Venice to Pirkheimer are among the
most fascinating historic records in existence. " The

2o8 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben 6aller?
nobles all wish me well," he coyly remarks, "but
few of the painters." These same artists, however,
showed good judgment when they pronounced his
work in colour inferior to his black and white.
The whole spirit of the Renaissance is personified
in Albrecht Diirer. No interest in life was a closed
book to him. He was as many-sided as the age
in which he lived. He was, in his religious ideas,
broader than a Romanist, yet he was not a real
Protestant. His scientific studies produced a won
derful mental balance which made him capable of
seeing all sides of a question. While he was de
voted, as few men have been devoted, to " art for
art's sake," he was too good a business man not
to insist upon just payment for his labours. There
is a letter to one of his patrons in which he claims
that he ought to receive a hundred florins more than
the price actually paid; he assures him that none
but the best colours had been employed (which was
certainly true, for Diirer's colours have stood the
test of centuries), and that for ultramarine alone he
was out of pocket to the amount of twenty-five
florins. He concludes by observing that he had had
another offer for the picture, of a price far exceed
ing even what he now demanded, but that he had
not accepted the proposal, as he so greatly \alued
the friendship of the present purchaser — (and here
we have Diirer as a diplomatist!) — "I would also

Durer anb ftolbein 209
rather have this painting in Frankfort than any
where else in all Germany," he says. " It will be
seen by many artists, who perhaps will let you know
whether it is masterly or bad." He concludes : " It
will last fresh and clean for five hundred years,"
but he stipulates that he will not be responsible
for it if holy water be sprinkled on it!
Yet throughout all these wily dealings with his
fellow men, Diirer, while proving himself shrewd
and capable of looking after his own interests, him
self complained, " I am a fool at a bargain." He
was a rollicking free spirit, full of merry good
nature, dropping in, doubtless, at the Bratwurst-
glocklein, that quaint sausage shop and restaurant
which is built out on one side of the church of St.
Moritz, suggesting a solution for some of our mod
em parishes which wish to combine their spiritual
ministrations with the spirituous entertainment of
the bar, — a fine combination of church and saloon !
Or he went with a few congenial fellows to the
Goldner Posthorn, to sip the good wines which
were there to be tasted.
Diirer was as versatile as Leonardo da Vinci.
He was not content until he had mastered various
sciences and crafts; and painting was only one of
his many forms of expression.
If his figures are often meagre and unsatisfactory
from an aesthetic point of view, it must be remem-

210 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
bered that his standard was unique; he had a
theory of measurement for human beings which
resulted in his adopting an average length of limb,
an average cast of face, an average height, and an
average corporosity : after making numerous meas
urements of all sorts of people, he finally arrived at
a general idea of proportion which he deduced by
combining all these peculiarities, and reducing them
to a composite type, and this type he took, quite
arbitrarily, as his ideal. The question of beauty
was entirely secondary. He did not seek for beauty,
or rather, he found satisfaction in the contemplation
of types which to our eyes lack beauty, but which
to him, undoubtedly, were full of some grave Teu
tonic charm, not always easy for us to detect Some
men are colour-blind. Diirer was beauty-blind.
To describe his character, we quote the words of
Joachim Camerarius, an intimate friend, — and
there was never a man more beloved by his friends
than Diirer : " Whatever conduced to pleasantness
and cheerfulness and was not inconsistent with hon
our and rectitude, he cultivated all his life and ap
proved even in his old age." Truly, this is the joy
of living.
We have here the opposite extremes of Diirer's
manner : the famous Dresden Altar, painted in thin
chalky tempera, with its shadows hatched in linear
treatment — practically a liquid drawing — and the

Durer anb Ibolbein 211
remarkable little Cmcifixion, a miniature panel deep
and rich in tone, entirely different in workmanship
and even in feeling from the other. No better con
trasts could be selected to illustrate Diirer's versa
tility. The picture known as the Dresden Altar is an
early work. For some time the authenticity of the
central panel was doubted, but it is now all con
sidered to be the work of Diirer. The central pic
ture shows the Virgin, a homely Teuton enough,
bending over her child, who sleeps, laid out on a
little pillow. Beside the sleeping child stands a curi
ous little figure, in scale a pigmy of some six inches
in height, brandishing a sort of fly-brush, — an odd
conceit, it is intended as a caricature, but the mod
ern mind has little clue to its humour as such. Pre
sumably it burlesques an angelic attendant, with a
holy-water sprinkler; but it rather suggests a me
diaeval page, in hose, tunic, and girdle. The inex
plicable mop held aloft is baffling in its significance
on any other hypothesis than the angelic one. The
child is almost grotesque in its hideousness. It is
not realistic — heaven forbid that human babies
should resemble this ugly little figure! Hovering
above the mother is a flock of tiny chembs, bearing
a severe crown of metal and velvet. Through a
plain casement window in the background, there is
shown a delightful little street scene in mediaeval

212 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
Germany. The two wings at the side of this compo
sition display St. Anthony and St. Sebastian. The
latter, attended by another school of Cupid-like
angels, has his hands in the attitude of prayer, while
on a slab in front of him a tall single flower stands
in a perfectly modern and mundane glass of water.
St. Anthony, grasping steadfastly an open book,
modestly and firmly keeps his eyes lowered to the
page before him, while about his head hover tiny
sprites of the strange and exotic types usually recog
nized as " temptations " in the Middle Ages. These
forms, however, could provoke only aversion or
laughter in any intelligent saint, according to his
temperament! The technical qualities of this pic
ture are highly satisfactory. Diirer is better in this
medium than in his oils.
Diirer's morbid attention to detail resulted from
his early experience with a goldsmith and an en
graver. His spaces are all filled with most exquisite
minutiae. In this he resembled other Germans of
his period, but he used his details in a more brilliant
way than any of the others. In fact, this is because
Durer was a great thinker, and if he needed a point
of light to bring out some value in a picture, he
would not be content to stick in an irrelevant flower
or a bird which bore no relation to the subject of
the picture; every tiniest trifle is considered, and
only introduced for a good reason, \\'hether that

Durer anb ftolbein 213
reason be always apparent to modern observers or
not. All the life and spirit of the Renaissance can
be traced in his varied works. In painting, writ
ing, engraving, and in philosophy, he is the leading
spirit of the Germany of his day.
When a painter is dominated primarily by a
passion for beauty, it not infrequently happens that
he will sacrifice truth and virility in reaching for it.
This is evident in the works of the Eclectics and
of Carlo Dolci and Guido Reni. The more intel
lectual apprehension of beauty as nature in its
rugged purity, touched with the ideal inspiration
of thought rather than sentimental rapture, is a
higher conception.
Artistic culture was not so conscious or so appre
ciative in the Netherlands, in Albrecht Diirer's time,
as it was in Italy. A balmy sensuousness and a
recognition of the true ministry of the aesthetic side
of life was characteristic of the Renaissance in Italy.
Diirer, writing from Venice, feels it : " Oh, how
I shall freeze up again," he says, " when I turn my
back on this sunshine! Here I am a lord; at home
I am a nobody ! "
The other painting here by Diirer — the small
Cmcifixion — is, as has been said, "probably the
most finished of Diirer's works," and " a miniature
creation " of singular expressiveness. It dates from
1506. It was painted in order to demonstrate to

214 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
the Italians what was the Northern standard of
perfection of art in a small compass. It has
achieved its mission : it has proved it to the whole
world. It was executed during his stay in Venice,
in 1506, which date appears on the cross. The
loneliness of Calvary, the "darkness over all the
earth," against which the beautiful figure is shown
in its purity and grace, are emphasized by a soft
sunset glow in the background, — red and golden in
tone, it relieves the lower part of the composition.
A distant hilly landscape, with a few slender trees
against the illuminated horizon, and a low stretch
of dark sea at the foot of the hills, give a sympa
thetic tone and sentiment in keeping with the sub
ject. Diirer's Procession to Calvary is a copy of a mon
ochrome in possession of Sir Frederick Cook. There
is also a copy at Bergamo.
Diirer is the link which forms connection between
mediaeval Germany and the Renaissance. He still
stands as the one great typical Teuton : in a rough
sense, one means Diirer when one alludes to German
art, and the popular impression is that Germany
stands for these characteristics, at least in the period
when art flourished most. But modem Germany
and its art, as we shall see later, has not perpetuated
such traits.
Hans Holbein, born in Augsburg in 1497, was

Durer anb Ibolbein 215
one of a family of painters. When still a youth,
he and his brother went to work in Basle, a city
extremely inspiring for artists, for, according to
tradition, there was at least one learned man in
every house. Holbein attracted much interest from
the Burgomaster Meyer, and about eight years after
his coming to Basle, he painted the celebrated pic
ture, the Madonna of the Meyer family. After
some travelling about, Holbein returned to Basle,
and in 1520 became a citizen and a member of the
Painter's Guild. This was the year that Luther
was excommunicated; Raphael died in that year,
and the meeting of the Field of the Cloth of Gold
took place between France and England. It was
an important year for all the nations. Erasmus,
too, settled in Basle at this time, and he and Hol
bein became friends. The portrait of Erasmus may
here be seen: it is like the original in Longford
by Holbein, and is probably by a pupil or follower.
It hangs in the twenty-first cabinet. Then for art
ists came the decline in prosperity which followed
the Reformation. Holbein found it difficult to earn
his living, and with the exception of Meyer, he had
no valuable patrons. He turned to engraving, in
which, unless we count Diirer, he reigns supreme.
But he decided that there were more lucrative fields
elsewhere; so, in 1526 "Master Haunce," as he
was called, arrived in England. He lived for most

2i6 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
of the remainder of his life in the historic part of
London, the country suburb of Chelsea: Sir
Thomas More, Nicolas Kratzer, and Archbishop
Warham became, through Erasmus, his friends.
With the exception of a trip back to Basle, at the
time when the plague rendered London unsafe, he
remained in England. Again in 1543 the plague
visited London; and this time, he was one of its
victims. There is no record of the day or place
of Holbein's death, nor of the place of his burial.
The Black Death came and claimed the painter, just
as he had so graphically pictured in his woodcuts
of the Dance of Death, and we can imagine the
grim figure clutching him and taking its revenge
for the weird satire which he had perpetrated, by
cutting him off without even a record for the
world. We turn now to the celebrated Madonna of the
Burgomaster Meyer. Holbein painted it in 1526,
just prior to his journey to England. Until 1822
the Dresden picture was considered the original, and
from that time to 1871, there was controversy as
to whether this or the picture in Darmstadt were
the true portrait. Finally, in 1871, there was a
great exhibition of Holbein's works, held in Dres
den, and at that time the two pictures were placed
side by side. It then became evident to students
and critics that the Darmstadt Madonna was un-

HANS HOLBEIN. — THE MADONNA OF THE BURGOMASTER MEYER

Durer anb ftolbein 217
doubtedly the original, and that the Dresden speci
men was only a " free copy by some unknown
artist." The subject of the picture is the Meyer Family
worshipping the Madonna and Child. On one side
the Burgomaster himself kneels, with his young son,
who holds an unclothed child, pressing it protect-
ingly against his breast, and proudly exhibiting his
now vigorous health to the observer. On the oppo
site side the two wives of the Burgomaster appear,
and his plain little daughter. The first wife, having
died, is represented dressed in the grave-clothes of
that period, her chin swathed as is usually seen in
early examples of shrouds in Germany, as, for in
stance, on the quaint stone carvings on sepulchral
monuments in Wittenberg.
The subject of this painting has also been the
cause of some divergence of opinion. One critic
thinks that the child in the Virgin's arms is intended
to typify the soul of a child who has died in the
Meyer family. Another considers that, upon the
recovery from illness of the child who stands below,
the infant Christ assumed the disease, which was
troubling the mortal child until his Saviour took it
upon Himself. Ruskin interprets it as an answer
to the prayer of the Meyer family, the Madonna
appearing to them with the infant Jesus : " She puts
down her Christ before them," says Ruskin, " takes

2i8 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
their child into her arms instead ; it lies down upon
her bosom and stretches its hand to its father and
mother, saying farewell." This latter interpretation
is poetic and beautiful, and is borne out by the shy,
weakly little child in Mary's arms; but I think
possibly, if the intention of the picture is to return
thanks for restoration to health of a sick child, that
it is sufficient to say that the sick child is repre
sented as recovered, in the central nude figure, and
the infant Christ is extending a hand in blessing,
Holbein having been realistic enough to represent
him, like a human child, as a little overcome with
the concourse of strangers, and therefore, tuming
to his mother, retiring and diffident, though obe
diently extending his hand. The tendency of Hol
bein's art toward literal and human emotions would
account for such a method of representing Our
Lord during His helpless infant years. Holbein was
not a Romanist himself, so that he would see no
impropriety in departing from the traditional
path. Mr. Russell Sturgis considers that the facial ex
pressions of the homely people in the Burgomaster
Meyer Madonna are more truly devout, in that the\'
are " more concentrated and more unconscious,"
than those of Raphael, Botticelli, or Ghirlandajo:
they have certainly a quality of realistic dutiful so-

Durer anb ftolbein 219
briety, which is quite lacking in the more artificially
pious faces painted by the Italians.
In the days of Sir Horace Walpole this picture
passed for the portrait of Sir Thomas More and
his family. Walpole calls attention, to the discrep
ancies, which were just beginning to be realized at
the time when the picture was reinstated as the
Meyer Madonna. His remarks on this subject are
interesting, compared with those of later writers,
as showing the various stages of art criticism. In
speaking of the picture Walpole says : " It was evi
dently designed for a small altar-piece to a chapel ;
in the middle on a throne sits the Virgin and (Thild ;
on one side kneels an elderly gentleman with two
sons, one of them a naked infant ; opposite kneeling
are his wife and daughters. The old man is not
only unlike all representations of Sir Thomas More,
but it is certain that he never had but one son. For
the colouring, it is beautiful, beyond description,
and the carnations have that enamelled bloom so
peculiar to Holbein, who touched his works until
not a touch remained discernible! ... By the de
scription of the family picture of the consul Meyer,
... I have no doubt but this is the very picture :
Meyer and More are names not so unlike but that in
process of time they may have been confounded,
and that of More retained, as much better known."
Apropos of Sir Thomas More's only son: the

220 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben ©aller?
child proved to be half-idiotic; the disappointed
father remarked, " We have prayed so long for a
boy, that now we have got one, I believe, who will
be a boy so long as he lives ! "
A close comparison by means of photographs,
since it is not possible to study the originals, syn
chronously, one being in Darmstadt and one in
Dresden, reveals certain significant variations in
these two Meyer Madonnas. In the Darmstadt
picture, the shell-shaped niche behind Mary's head
is squat and of poor proportions; the copyist de
cided to improve upon this, and so raised it a good
deal, giving a far more ideal effect of height to
the figure of the Virgin. The face, too, is idealized,
and really " prettified." It is positively amusing to
look about and see how each face has been smoothed
down and flattered ! The long ungainly nose of the
ungraceful girl has been pared down to quite a
decent shape; and most of the rugged character
has been planed out of the Burgomaster. The
change in the face of the kneeling boy is especially
naive. The original is looking down in an unaf
fected way; in the Dresden copy this youth is look
ing coyly out of the corners of his eyes at the spec
tator! In colour, too, there is quite a difference.
The blue robe of the Virgin, in the Darmstadt pic
ture, is of a delicious liquid softness, while that at
Dresden is darker and much less interesting. There

Durer anb ftolbein 221
are many other notes of difference between the two
pictures. Holbein was as accurate in his details as Diirer,
but he had advanced farther than the other, in that
he understood how to step off, as it were, mentally,
and get a view of his work as a whole; the detail
supplemented the general effect, but did not domi
nate it or detract from it. He understood broad
values, even when they were values of porcelain
like finish. He was essentially a painter of the old
German school, no breath of impressionism had
reached him, but he saw clearer than Diirer the
value of combining character with beauty. He kept
his own individuality out of his pictures, and was
faithful in rendering likeness. Diirer had set up a
type which he almost invariably used when free to
choose; but Holbein went each time to the special
model, and his skill in portraiture was endless and
marvellous. So clever and ready was Holbein in
catching a likeness with a few lines, that the follow
ing story is told of him. A nobleman, whose name
had escaped the memory of the artist for the
moment, had been visiting his studio. In conver
sation with Sir Thomas More, Holbein wished to
allude to this person. Not being able to mention
him by name, Holbein picked up a bit of red chalk,
and made a rapid sketch, which Sir Thomas imme
diately recognized!

222 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
We are fortunate in having in Dresden one of
the three portraits which are generally regarded as
Holbein's best. The three pictures so specified are
the likeness of Jane Seymour, in Vienna, the Por
trait of George Gyze, in Berlin, and the Portrait
of Morette, in Dresden. The last represents, ac
cording to more recent authorities, the envoy from
Francis I. to England, Charles de Solier, the Sieur
de Morette, although up to late years it was be
lieved to be the likeness of a famous jeweller in
Henry VIII.'s service, with whom Holbein had been
intimate in England. It is certainly one of the most
important portraits in the world, whoever was the
original. This picture was once attributed to Leo
nardo da Vinci, and when critics began to find rea
sons for ascribing it to Holbein, the King of Saxony
would not encourage the name being changed, as
that would leave the Dresden collection without a
Leonardo, and all the European galleries prided
themselves upon possessing examples of da Vinci's
work. So, until the death of Friedrich August the
picture was allowed to remain as a Leonardo. But
after his death, in i860, it was unanimously re
stored to Holbein, and is as perfect a specimen of
his best painting as can be seen anywhere. Dresden
is to be the more congratulated upon possessing it,
for the reason that the honour of owning the orig
inal Meyer Madonna has been wrested away from

HANS HOLBEIN.  PORTRAIT OF MORETTE

Durer anb ftolbein 223
the gallery. Morette is a remarkably handsome
man, with beautiful eyes, full of keenness and spirit.
He is dressed in black and white, the varied tex
tures of satin, silk, fur, and damask being marvel
lously rendered. The chief note of decided colour
in the picture is the curtain, of liquid, soft green.
A gold chain is about his neck, and he holds in his
gloved hand a dagger which is attached to his belt.
The pose is dignified but easy. The painting is
finished as delicately as any piece of jeweller's
craft. From a study of the drawings of Holbein, one of
which may be seen in the same room with the fin
ished portrait, we learn that one secret of his power
as a painter of likenesses was, that he did not wear
his sitters out with long painful sessions, making
a quick but thorough sketch, from which it was
possible to do much of the technical part of his
work without insisting upon hours of posing. This
is the reason his people keep their animation, and
why their expressions are so natural and alert. He
did not believe in flattering his subjects ; he thought
more of fidelity to natiire than of pictorial effect.
He had more power of idealization than Diirer ; he
was a little less insistent upon ugliness; but he
painted what he saw.
All painters of the German school selected virility
for their standard rather than grace : strength had

224 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Oaller?
more message for them than beauty. Holbein's art
was full of the Renaissance. Diirer's was conscien
tiously Gothic. Holbein gave something of Italian
idealism to German sternness.

CHAPTER VIII.
OTHER NETHERLANDISH AND GERMAN ARTISTS
Germany and the Netherlands in the sixteenth
century exhibited a strange amalgamation of an
cient tradition and modern mental progress. Until
these conditions adjusted themselves there was war
between old religious sentiments and free new
thought, and the result was unfavourable to the
advancement of art. By the early seventeenth cen
tury things had become more settled, and the fact
that they were free from the Spanish domination
made it possible for Flanders to develop an inde
pendent national style, — hardly a school, as it was
all in one generation, and the artists left no follow
ers to perpetuate their aesthetic traditions. The
Dutch school was created for the expression of the
daily life of the people; not consciously, but nat
urally, genre subjects came to be painted when the
need for religious pictures had passed. With Prot
estantism in the Netherlands, as in Germany, the
subjects selected by painters had changed.
This was a simple portrait art. Whether the
225

226 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
portrait to be executed was of a person, a street, a
building, an animal, or a vase of flowers, it was
photographically faithful, and, in many cases, ampli
fied far beyond this, into dainty gems of atmosphere,
texture, and expression. In Protestant Holland this
realism of genre portraiture predominated, while
in that part of the Netherlands where Spain still
wielded influence, the religious subjects demanded
by the Roman Catholic Church continued to form
the themes of artists. We must begin our study
of these later Flemings and Germans by examining,
before we leave the wing containing the Rooms O,
P, and Q, the works of the least conspicuous of the
sixteenth and seventeenth century masters which
hang there. The task will not occupy much time,
for any visitor to the Dresden gallery wishes to
escape from this corridor of comparatively uninter
esting landscapes and animal studies into the large
halls where Rubens and Rembrandt reign.
The St. Catherine in the style of Cranach is a
bit of colour to be noticed. The robe of olive green
relieved against the deep robin's-egg blue sky is
a very striking scheme. The portrait of Henn,- the
Pious, too, by Cranach (1915), is decorative, being
in dull tones and very highly glazed. This bears
the monogram of Cranach and the date. 1537.
The Adam and Eve and the Lucretia and Judith
are four panels of long, thin nudes. They are a

"Wetberlanbisb anb (Ber man Hrtists 227
rather painful row of lean, mannered personages.
Wilkins, in his " Art Impressions," makes a few
very intolerant but amusing remarks concerning
these works of Cranach and his followers. He
begins : " Truly handsome, well-proportioned mod
els must have been scarce in Cranach's time, or else
he had a taste for the lean: his works conveying
but one idea — that of utter nakedness." . . .
" they make one ashamed to think that humanity
could be so very plain ! " " Why," he continues,
" the cellars of Paris or the hovels of Skibbereen
would display finer forms than that of Cranach's
Adam and Eve, who stand in the first position for
a Mazourka!" Perhaps Adams and Eves are
among the most trying of all subjects to early paint
ers, who had no available human models; and
among the later artists, who had perfected technical
appliances, the true spirit, the larger conception of
the subject of the Fall of Man is submerged in the
simple study of the temptation of a weak man by
a beautiful woman !
The large and blood-thirsty winged altar-piece of
the Martyrdom of St. Ursula is also to be seen in
the Room O. It is by Jorg Breu, the Master of the
Guild of Augsburg. The work is going on apace.
The virgins, to whom such mde allusion is made
by Thomas Hood, when he puts into the mouth
of his travelling maid the words " eleven thousand

228 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
old maids," are being attacked in a relentless way,
and are composed into an alarming scene of carnage.
At Cologne, in the naive little church of St. Ursula,
this tradition is explained in an intelligent way.
No claim is made, or ever was made, that St. Ursula
brought eleven thousand companions with her from
Rome in the slender bark in which they are fre
quently represented in art! It happened that there
was a massacre of young women in Cologne in that
year, and among those slain was Ursula, and such
attendant maidens as had come with her. Eleven
thousand is a good round number, and one might
as well state that as any other; at any rate, piles
of human remains, bearing the marks of the weap
ons used by the Huns and Goths, were discovered
in one spot : these were all the bodies and skulls
of women; there is nothing impossible about the
relics displayed in this interesting Church. Whether
it is possible to prove, at this distance of time, that
every skull there displayed is the actual head of a
virgin who was martyred on this occasion, any one
may determine according to his or her own per
sonal credulity.
The studio piece of Cranach the Elder, David
watching Bathsheba bathing, is extremely quaint.
The coy glance from the eyes of a girl in the comer
is inimitably amusing. The picture is a good deal
out of drawing, but has a cheerful charm quite

fletberlanbisb anb (Berman Hrtists 229
independent of beauty or correctness. It is Gothic,
and almost in the spirit of grotesque.
Of the Hercules sleeping, surrounded by pig
mies, by Cranach the younger, little can be said
except that it is an absurdly inadequate treatment
of the subject. It might be taken for a study of
Gulliver in Lilliput land ! A little army of gnomes
are hacking, prodding, and shooting at the hulking
sleeper. An arrow sticking in his chin seems to
cause him no inconvenience, and does not disturb
his slumbers!
There is an amusing example of the work of
Hendrik Bles, a study of apes, who are plundering
the wares of a pedlar. The man lies sleeping under
a tree, and the ingenious little creatures are going
through his pack, using everything they find there
in some original way. The neckties are all draped
high up on a tree; some of the monkeys have put
on waistcoats, and thus bedizened are approaching
the sleeping pedlar. One thrifty little ape is drop
ping a large turkey down over a ledge of rock,
apparently, with foresight, for future use. The
picture is signed with an owl, which was the em
blem of Bles, through which he obtained the Italian
nickname, Civetta.
There is a very attractive piece of genre painting
of uncertain Dutch authorship. No. 849, being a
double portrait of two girls, holding each other by

230 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
the hand. It has been ascribed to Amberger and
to Mor; but sufficient evidence is lacking to pro
nounce it a genuine example of either. It is quite
worthy, however, of a good name, and no one
should pass it by without attention being called to it.
Jan Scorel was a friend of Albrecht Diirer, whom
he visited in Nuremberg. His works have usually
a good deal of grace, and his finish is refined and
delicate. The David with the head of Goliath, No.
844, was once ascribed to Angelo Bronzino. The
sentiment of the work leans toward that of the
Renaissance Italian style. Scorel painted for some
time in Italy, sojourning in Rome, and visiting Ven
ice. The results of his observation are notice
able in his work, which is not characteristically
Dutch. Peter Brueghel the Elder, nicknamed the Droll,
was one of the first to interpret the vulgar life, in
the primitive form of genre painting. " The mon
strous," remarks Fielding, " is much easier to paint
than describe; and the ridiculous to describe than
paint." In Brueghel's Peasants Brawling he has
combined to a remarkable degree these qualities,
and has managed to paint both ! Brueghel worked
in Antwerp and Brussels. He had certain of the
naive rustic qualities of Millet. He is by many
pronounced to be the first appreciator of the rural
picturesque.

iRetberlanbisb anb (Berman Hrtists 231
In the Temptation of St. Anthony, formerly at
tributed to Lucas van Leyden, and certainly in his
style, there is that same mingling of the monstrous
and the ridiculous. Lucas van Leyden is considered
as rather the patriarch of the Dutch school. He
was a friend of Diirer, and a notable man of his
time. His works are rare, but later criticism is
gradually restoring this example to him.
The compositions of Hendrik van Balen make a
good show, being six small mythological subjects
hanging in the Room P. Van Balen is to be re
membered as a teacher of the noted Van Dyck, of
whom we shall treat in the next chapter.
Quaint studies of animal life are to be seen here,
in the wooded landscape by Roelant Savery, in
which all the animals of Paradise are displayed
according to the Netherlandish conception, and in
Frans Francken's Creation of Animals, No. 946,
some of the animals represented are by Velvet Brue
ghel. It is a very entertaining study. All creation,
from porcupines to parrots, are seen arranged in
couples ; in the background flies a Phcenix. Proba
bly the fact that there was only one Phcenix accounts
for his subsequent extinction ! The companion piece
to this picture is the Creation of Adam and Eve.
It is now generally conceded that this is by
Francken, and that the other, with the exception of
Brueghel's animals, is largely the work of pupils

232 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben ealler?
or by some weaker hand, simply composed to com
plete the pair.
There are several copies of the works of Rubens,
the originals of which are to be seen in other galler
ies. The Rape of Proserpine having been burnt in
Blenheim, this copy is perhaps the best means of
judging of the picture.
Numerous works of Jan Griffier are to be seen
here; glens, mountains, valleys, in abundance; all
more or less interesting if one has time to examine
them in detail, but demanding some close attention
if they are to be appreciated. Jan Griffier was bora
in Amsterdam, but worked in London also, where
he died in 1718. He began as a carpenter, but
was restless in this trade, and, through striking up
an intimacy with a boy who worked at decorating
pottery, he gradually discovered his true calling.
Then he became assistant to a tile painter, graduat
ing shortly after into the studio of a flower painter.
Van de Velde, Ruysdael, and even Rembrandt be
came interested in him, and he received some desul
tory instruction from each. Their protege left the
Netherlands to work in England soon after the Fire
of London; he married and settled in that city.
He amassed quite a fortune, was known as the
Gentleman of Utrecht, and, when he made a visit
to his native Holland again, he sailed in his own
yacht to Rotterdam! After being twice ship-

fletberlanbisb anb (Berman Hrtists 233
wrecked, he gave up the luxury -of this aquatic es
tablishment, and returned to London, where he
ended his days, living to be seventy-two years old.
Two attractive genre pictures by Vinck Boons
may be seen in P and Q. An excusable divergence
of opinion exists as to the spelling of this artist's
name; whether Vinck Boons or Vinck Booms is
chosen, in either case it suggests the note of a bass
drum! His pictures are pretty and rustic.
Hans Jordaens's grotesque composition, men,
women, and an ape at a meal, is worthy of notice.
It is in one of the smaller divisions or carrels in
Room P.
The Head of Medusa, by Victor Wolfvoet, is too
violently terrible and realistic. The little drops of
oozing blood are only repulsive and detract from the
classic interest which one would otherwise feel in
the microscopic finish.
The four men at table in an Inn, which was once
considered an original Brouwer, is now relegated
to the class of copyist's work, while No. 1063,
Peasants smoking in a Room, is also from a draw
ing in Vienna by Brouwer.
" In the Witches' Kitchen," after David Teniers,
is rather an effort at wit; you feel that the humour
is forced ; and the Old Man embracing a Giri in a
Cow Shed is as sordid as it sounds. There is some
reason, however, to believe that 1085 B, which

234 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
has long been regarded as a studio piece. Two Men
Playing on Lute and Flute, may be an original
Teniers. A master of the transition from the Flemish to
the Dutch school is here represented — Alexander
Kerrincx, who lived from 1600 to 1652. In the
eighth carrel three of his studies may be seen.
The head of a man in a small black hat, after
Frans Hals, is worth examining. The original is
in a private collection in Paris, but even the copy
is firm, crisp, and delicate.
Some rather gruesome and warlike scenes, with
names almost amusing in their ferocity, — such as
Cavalry Fight with some Men hanging on Trees
in the Middle Distance, — are by a Dutch painter,
Jan van Hughtenburgh of Haarlem. Another
bluntly described bit of realism. Landscape with
Gallows, is by Jan Looten of Amsterdam. Thor
oughly Dutch, too, are the Fiddler and a Girl Danc
ing and a Girl Sitting on a Man's Knees, by Gerrit
Lunders. In the fifth carrel, too, is a Gerard Dou, which has
recently been credited again to its author, the Boy
and Girl with a Mouse-trap. It was probably placed
among the copies simply because it was defaced,
and not easy to determine. The cheerful little pair
of Winter scenes, — Sports on the Ice, — by Avers-
camp, are in the fifth carrel.

fletberlanbisb anb (Berman Hrtists 235
A few of the seventeenth-century Germans are
here as well ; and, though it is rather out of chrono
logical sequence to consider them at this point, it is
better than to retrace one's steps down this wing
in order to examine them in precisely the correct
order, especially as, to any but careful students, such
a proceeding would have no advantage at all. There
is quite a collection of the works of the Germans of
this time who, tired of their own native turn of
thought, being more given to repose and realism
than to energy and flights of fancy, addressed them
selves to a consideration of tlie Venetian methods.
These men, roughly speaking, were Hendrik von
Balen, Christopher Schwartz, Johann Rottenham-
mer, Heinrich Schoenfeldt, Joseph Eismann. Some
who also developed their art by studies in Rome
were Philipp Peter Roos, Franz Tamm (called
Dapper), and others with whom we have nothing
to do in pursuing our course through the Dresden
gallery. Karl Skreta was an artist of Prague, where his
works may be seen to best advantage. He came
under the Italian influence, and it greatly affected
his style. He intentionally based his principles on
those of the Eclectics. He is represented here by a
large number of Saints and Evangelists.
The Repose on the Flight into Egypt is by Johann
Rottenhammer, who, though born in Munich, was

236 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
a disciple of Tintoretto; the Emperor Rudolph II.
was his patron for a time, but he finally died in
great want in Augsburg. He sometimes collabo
rated with Velvet Brueghel.
The prolific family of Roos may be observed:
Johann Heinrich Roos, the father, and Johann Mel-
chior Roos, his son, also the more celebrated son
and pupil, Philipp Peter Roos, known as Rosa di
Tivoli. Jan Heinrich Roos was primarily a cattle
painter. He often chose such scenes as market
places, displaying his animals in more varied sur
roundings, in this way, than in pastures only. Rosa
di Tivoli painted chiefly shepherds and flocks in
landscape surroundings. He was a son of Heinrich
Roos ; having lived at Tivoli for some time, he was
called by that name to distinguish him from the
rest of his family. Philipp often painted very large
compositions with a broad, bold stroke, quite unlike
the general German painter of his period. The tal
ents of the Roos family are characteristically dis
played in rather tiresome studies of sheep, relieved
by one stag picture, by Melchior.
Michael Mirevelt of Delft has some pleasing por
traits here. He began by painting altar-pieces, but
afterward developed into a painter of likenesses.
The finest is his Old Gentleman leaning on a stick,
No. 1 3 18, and one of the clearest bits of detail is

|H

H

^^

^^^^
^^9
^^H
ii^l
^^Hl^n
W^W
^^
^B
H
^^^V itT
W^
^
^H^H
^^H
M
jlgl^^
'"> ^
H
^^S^ \
Y^%
vji
M
n
1 Igfl
¦
1
^^^
iH
w^^
vHLfy, '-. ^^^^k.
-**«*»««.
H
1^^
1
i
J ^
B..--
i
fletberlanbisb anb (Berman Hrtists 237
in No. 1 32 1, in which the lace is rendered with ad
mirable faithfulness.
Proceeding now in Room L, we find a Death of
the Virgin, No. 674, which is hardly likely to be by
the Spanish painter, Juan de Juanes, but it is prob
ably from his studio.
A beautiful rendering of a smile is to be noted
in the face of the girl in Caesar van Everdingen's
picture of Bacchus and two Nymphs. The pretty
face, looking so coyly over her raised shoulder, is
the whole picture. All else is accessory — even the
charming child who poses as Cupid holding a jug
and glass, and the satisfied Bacchus himself, are
secondary. Here, and in the next room, may be seen a couple
of striking portraits by a little-known painter, one
of the minor pupils of Rembrandt, Christopher
Paudiss, who was a native of Lower Saxony, in the
seventeenth century. The one in this room is a
portrait of an Old Man in a Fur Cap; it has a
smoky blcK)m, and is cool and mellow. It is almost
a monochrome, with hardly any colour about it.
In Room M one should notice Paudiss's picture of
a Hungarian servant in a high cap; the head is
massive — rather more than life size; it is a har
mony in soft browns. These two pictures attract
the eye at once, by their general excellence, although

238 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
there is little that is remarkable aboirt the subjects
themselves. Aelbert Cuyp was a great painter in his way.
Eugene Fromentin says, " a true, fine Cuyp is a
painting at once subtile and gross, tender and robust,
aerial and massive." At the same time his name
is not associated with any innovation; he was not
original, nor very imaginative, or especially creative.
In other words, he was a very able painter. He
used the materials at hand with skill and wisdom,
but he did not add to them. There are two exam
ples of his work here. One, however, the Boy with
a Greyhound, is not quite certainly by his hand,
while the other, a large landscape in which a white
horse is held by a groom, is now restored to the
master, having for some time been regarded as
doubtful. Copies of two other pictures by Cuyp
hang in this room also.
One of Rembrandt's pupils has done an interest
ing thing in working out from one of the master's
etchings a large oil-painting of Christ Presented
to the People. The composition is not satisfactory
on this scale, and the main figures look like actors
on a stage.
The bust of the Emperor Vitellius, wreathed with
bay leaves, low on his brow, comes perilously near
to being a caricature. The Emperor is fat, but
not well-liking; he is painfully chuckle-necked, and

fletberlanbisb anb (Berman Hrtists 239
seems to have lost all his teeth, judging by the
tightly closed mouth and short chin. This portrait
is by Frans de Vriendt, or Floris, who was born in
Antwerp, but studied Michelangelo and the antique
in Rome, and upon his return was inappropriately
called the Raphael of Flanders ! By glancing at his
other pictures one may see how much claim he had
to such a title. His Adoration of the Shepherds
hangs in L, — and his painting of Lot and his
Daughters in P. Floris was a bombastic and vain
person, and he degenerated under the misplaced
adulation which he received.
There are a few Rubens here, which must be
observed. Among those not so far transferred to
Van Dyck (as is the fate of the majority of por
traits formerly attributed to Rubens) is the lovely
fair woman with her hair braided and laid around
on the back of her head. It is altogether the work
of Rubens himself, and is singularly refined and
beautiful. The lady might be a descendant of
Titian's Bella.
The Portrait of an old Bishop is dated 1634. It
is beautifully illusive in treatment, the paint seeming
still liquid, and the touch so soft as to be almost
hazy. It is possible that the signature is a forgery.
But there is a smoky, misty halo of white hair about
the venerable face, that the master might well be
proud to have painted.

240 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
The Garden of Love is a sort of Flemish Fete
Galante, — Dutch beauties and cavaliers foreshadow
the more coquettish types of Watteau. The orig
inal is in the Rothschild collection, and there is a
very similar one in Madrid. This is a copy, but
a faithful one, and the picture is full of typical
features. Helena Fourment repeated several times
is its chief theme. Attended by various lovers, she
is seen embracing one, listening to sweet words
from another, and in different stages of flirtation
with others. Little Cupids disport themselves in a
fountain, and there is a portico in the background,
which combines all the most objectionable features
of the decadent Renaissance. Still the effect is
dressy and gay. There is little thought bestowed
upon it, and yet it is full of charm and g^ace. The
original is one of Rubens's best late works. It
was kept in his own possession until his death, when
his wife bought it. Afterward Philip IV. purchased
it, and it hung in the Royal bedchamber. It is a
confection of colour; pinks, greens, violets, and
yellows blend in delightful harmonies. This Gar
den of Love is very like the conceptions of Wat
teau : Rubens seldom fell into this mood, but it is
one in which he is very pleasing. His decorative
pastorals of this description probably stimulated
Watteau, who may be said to have dramatized such

fletberlanbisb anb German Hrtists 241
pictures, turning them into theatrical tableaux in
stead of possible scenes.
The Young Man Dressed in Black, by Bartholo-
maus van der Heist, is a most attractive and strik
ing portrait. The face is full of expression, and his
pose, looking over his shoulder, is fascinating, al
though the face has more intelligence than beauty.
It is effectively lighted. Van der Heist was a
painter in Haarlem and Amsterdam, living from
161 3 to 1670. Sir Joshua Reynolds thought very
highly of his work.
The Young Woman in a straw hat and the
Young Man who wears a wreath are by Salomon
de Bray, a painter of Haarlem in the first half of
the seventeenth century. They are well painted,
with good lights and shadows.
Van Dyck's figures of the Apostles, Simon, Peter,
Paul, and Bartholomew, should be noticed. They
were only recently given to Van Dyck. The Old
Gentleman and Old Lady by Van Dyck are also
excellent, as is the portrait of the venerable Thomas
Parr at the age of one hundred and fifty years. The
so-called Van Dyck's Danae is in the room M.
Lying on her couch, she is reaching up, with ecstatic
gesture but with imperturbable facial expression, to
the shower of gold which is descending. The at
tendant looks a good deal more excited over the
curious manifestation than does her mistress. It

242 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
is probably not by Van Dyck, but by some later
artist. One should proceed now through N, in order to
look at the later Flemish painters in the cabinets
1 8, 19, and 20, before commencing a study of
Rubens, Van Dyck, and Rembrandt, and the Dutch
school. We approach these rooms in the opposite
order, beginning in No. 20. Here we make ac
quaintance with the famous Brueghel family.
Jan Brueghel was one of those three artists of
the same surname; to distinguish them, they are
colloquially spoken of as Peasant Brueghel, Velvet
Brueghel, and Hell Brueghel. Peasant Brueghel is
that old Peter Brueghel, whom we have had occa
sion to observe in connection with his works hung
in Room P. Jan Brueghel, his son, is known as
Velvet Brueghel, while Peter's other son won the
euphonious pseudonym of Hell Brueghel on account
of the free and satanic style of his compositions.
Velvet Brueghel was a clever delineator of small
landscape subjects, and also a brilliant painter of
flowers. His finish was very elegant, and his touch
crisp and smart. There is an unfortunate tradition
that Brueghel earned his nickname because he
always dressed in velvet; but the name is really a
corruption of Brueghel de Vlours. — meaning flow
ers, — which, written velours, was afterward misin
terpreted. In the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-

fletberlanbisb anb German Hrtists 243
first cabinets are distributed various works by Velvet
Brueghel, chiefly landscapes with small figures. One
of the pictures now given to Velvet Brueghel was
originally attributed to his brother; it is the small
Temptation of St. Anthony, on copper. No. 878.
The mistake in identity is excusable, for it is quite
a characteristic little Hell, like most Flemish and
Dutch treatments of the subject. Among the other
numerous works here by Velvet Brueghel, No. 896,
a landing-place with a village church, stands out.
The greens are transparent, and the water remark
ably liquid. There is an intimate charm about the
picture, A Ford across a Stream, No. 895. The
covered wagon, the rustics, apparently moving their
belongings to a new home, are the spot of fore
ground interest, while the beautiful rolling country
reaching away in the background is pastoral and
romantic in the extreme. On an eminence at the
right is seen a gibbet, but there is no criminal hang
ing from it ; on the opposite side of the composition
is a delightful little fairy wood, into which it seems
that one might penetrate by the little path, and enjoy
the cool, quiet shade relieved by pale sunlight.
There are no examples of Hell Brueghel in Dres
den. Jan Brueghel the younger, a son of Velvet
Brueghel, may be seen in a few small landscapes.
No. 918, Lot and his Daughters, used to be attrib-

244 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
uted to Hell Bmeghel, but is now catalogued as a
work in the style of Peter Schoubroeck.
In the twentieth cabinet is an excellent little copy
of Rubens's Judgment of Paris, with many touches
from the master's hand. The Archduke Ferdi
nand wrote of this : " I have only one fault to find
with it . . . the excessive nudity of the three god
desses . . . the Venus who occupies the central
place is a very good likeness of the painter's wife, —
the most beautiful of all the ladies of Antwerp."
In the nineteenth cabinet one is struck with the
soft, rich colour and smoky outlines of the peasant
subjects by Brouwer. The brawling youths, fight
ing in a purely animal way over their cards and dice,
are most coarse and brutal, and yet they swim in
so beautiful a haze of tone that one quite overlooks
the meaning of the picture in admiration for its
texture. Adriaen Brouwer was bom near Haar
lem, about 1605. His mother was a maker of the
local costumes (for a peasantry does not go to a
dressmaker, but rather to a constructor of its own
special uniforms), and the little Adriaen was early
put to work to assist her in designing floral pat
terns with which she decorated these clothes. It
chanced that the great painter, Frans Hals, saw
him at work, took an interest in him, and offered to
take him and bring him up as an artist. The mother
agreed, and the boy went willingly to live with his

fletberlanbisb anb Oerman Hrtists 24s
voluntary instructor. But his path was not strewn
with roses. There can be no doubt that Hals was
far from a pleasant man to get along with ; he was
a harsh master; besides this, he taught the boy to
portray amusing scenes of low life, which he sold
for drink and luxuries for himself, instead of allow-"
ing Adriaen to earn what he could with his own
work. Adriaen van Ostade was a pupil of Hals at
the same time, but he was paying for his tuition,
and was therefore better treated; he, and some of
the other pupils, were indignant at the way Brouwer
was abused, and they helped him to escape. He
hid under the organ in the Cathedral in Haarlem
until he was discovered, and persuaded to return
to Hals. Conditions did not improve after this,
and he again took himself off; this time he stayed.
But he was already demoralized, and spent all the
money he could earn in drink and gambling. Such
scenes as he depicted were in his daily experience.
He had a brief and boisterous success, such as his
art would appear to warrant. He got into prison,
and although both Rubens and Rembrandt were
willing to befriend him, on account of his real
genius, he had so far deteriorated that his life has
to be chronicled as unworthy, and his art an unex
plainable flower of rare and exotic quality.
David Ryckaert's Peasant Family, illustrating
the old proverb, " As the old birds sang, the young

246 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben (Bailer?
ones will pipe," is an amusing bit of rustic group
ing, but very inferior to the same theme as treated
by Jordaens. The children on the left, imitating
their elders in drinking, are absurdly out of draw
ing: little stunted beings, without a trait of real
childhood about them. Ryckaert was a copyist of
Teniers. The same faults are seen in the picture
of still life by this artist, which hangs across in
the fiftieth cabinet, in which occurs a figure of a
small boy whipping a top. He is ridiculously small
in scale compared with the other figures. There
is something attractively quaint about this little boy,
however. Ryckaert was a pupil of his father, an
indifferent artist of the same name.
The rather brigand-like compositions of Peter
Snayers are not very interesting. Robbers and ban
ditti, wars and rumours of wars, in scenery com
posed for the purpose, like a stage setting for
William Tell, are the chief component parts.
Cavalry skirmishes by various other unimportant
Flemish painters may be seen, and some landscapes,
occasionally attractive, by Lukas van Uden.
In the twentieth cabinet hang numerous examples
of the work of Peter Geysels, an Antwerp disciple
of Jan Bmeghel. Hendrik Steenwyck the younger,
who painted largely in Antwerp, but who removed
to England, dying in London about 1649, '^ the
painter of three good architectural views of Gothic

fletberlanbisb anb German Hrtists 247
churches. Steenwyck and some of his compatriots
tumed their talents in the direction of their own
Northern architecture, stimulated to the effort by
the fact that nearly all architectural painting had
been based upon classic models, and as a reaction
against the inevitable Roman Ruins, they produced
some really good examples of Gothic styles. There
are also two quaint paintings of halls, with Charles
I. and Queen Henrietta Maria standing, one in
each, in a conventional manner. Both of these
halls are portrayed chiefly for the purpose of draw
ing pleasant arched vistas into porticoes beyond.
They are a quaint pair of pictures, and have con
siderable interest. They may be the ones mentioned
in the catalogue of Charles I., as "perspective by
Steenwyck, with the King and Queen in little by
Belcamp." Sir Horace Walpole alludes to a " little
book of perspectives by Steenwyck," which sold
among the King's belongings for two pounds ten
shillings. No. 1 1 15 represents the entry of Louis XIV. into
Arras, and is by van der Meulen. This artist.
although a native of Brussels, may be almost re
garded as a Frenchman, so long did he work for
Louis XIV. The action is spirited, and the render
ing clear and crisp. Van der Meulen died in Paris
in 1690.
The Antwerp flower painters and still-life artists

248 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
are well displayed here. To persons who feel an
interest in this very exact branch of art, the nine
teenth and twentieth cabinets will be especially fer
tile in suggestion.
The painstaking Daniel Seghers may be studied
at his best. Seghers was a pupil of Velvet Brue
ghel, but he soon afterward became a Jesuit father.
In his cell he made it his delight to cultivate flowers
and plants, from which he painted most accurate
portraits, placing the cut flowers in a glass, and
treating them thus, in simple envirorunent. Two of
these studies, Nos. 1201 and 1202, are signed, " D.
Soc. Jesu," instead of with his full name. He
visited Italy chiefly for the purpose of drawing all
the native flowers, and returned to Antwerp laden
with beautiful sketches. He lived in Antwerp from
1590 to 1661.
Cornelius de Heem was a Utrecht painter of
still life and flowers; his detail is delicate, but his
work is not up to the standard of that of his father,
John David de Heem. Nevertheless, for those who
admire groups of goblets, lemons, grapes, and
oysters, the cleverly executed No. 1225 will no
doubt prove gratifying.
Many others are here: Jan van Kessel, Ottmar
Elliger, and Nicholas van Verendael, whose amus
ing burlesque in red and sharp yellow, Monkejrs
Regaling Themselves, is especially good. It is a

m
> .JwsIIIXHo<oM

<;;><i
,-1OXu

fletberlanbisb anb German Hrtists 249
satire upon the groups of feasting peasants which
were so much in vogue at the time, and is a well-
composed caricature. The figures are all apes, but
are dressed in the festal garb of Flemish merry
makers. One monkey with his back to the spectator
is telling a story, gesticulating with one hand while
he holds a teapot or wine- jug in the other, in such
a way that it is pouring its contents on the floor.
Two female apes have small infant monkeys in
arms, who reach eagerly for the cake in the centre
of the table. In a corner two young apes are seen
exchanging a kiss, and in the foreground a trio of
bearded ruffians have got hold of a dish of pan
cakes which they are eagerly devouring.
David Teniers the younger was also a painter of
the rustic manners of the peasant class, but he was
seldom as coarse as Brouwer, and sometimes posi
tively refined and delightful. Perhaps his people
are a shade less ugly than those of Brouwer and
Ostade, certainly his genius is versatile, and his
command of subjects enormous. There is often in
his simple rural characters a dignity like that of the
figures of Jan Steen ; to this ability to paint genre
he added a talent for landscape. He was called in
his day the "Proteus of Painting." In Dresden
we can judge well of his numerous phases, for he is
splendidly represented in this gallery. His earliest
pictures are Smokers in the Village Inn, No. 1066

250 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
(I will give the numbers to distinguish these pic
tures, as so many of them have similarity at first
glance), and the two landscapes, one moonlight,
with shepherds around a fire, No. 1064, the other
a river view with shepherds and flocks resting.
Both of these last were originally ascribed to the
elder Teniers, as were also several other of the land
scape subjects, among them the Bleaching Ground,
No. 1067, and the Inn by a Riverside, before a
Town, No. 1068.
David Teniers was born in Antwerp in 1610, and
was first instructed by his father, which accounts
for the number of his early pictures which have been
given to David Teniers the elder. Some authori
ties affirm that he studied with Rubens, and some
that he was a pupil of Brouwer ; but both of these
statements are without much historical foundation.
He was quick and versatile, which t\vo qualities
made him the prolific painter which he afterward
became. The subsequent events of his life may be
briefly rehearsed. He became a member of the
Guild of Antwerp about 1623. He was married to
Anne, daughter of Velvet Bmeghel, in 1637, and
became the father of seven children. By a second
marriage he added four more to the record of his
offspring. He was Dean of the Guild of St. Luke in
1644, and was among those interested in the building
of the Academy of Fine Arts in 1663. He became

fletberlanbisb anb German Hrtists 251
Court painter to Archduke Leopold William, the
Governor of the Spanish Netherlands, of whose
picture-gallery he was also appointed inspector.
When Don Juan of Austria succeeded Leopold, he
confirmed these appointments, and Teniers became
wealthy and popular, residing in a splendid castle,
known as the Three Towers, the Chateau of Perck,
of which a view is to be seen painted by him in
the London National Gallery. Art connoisseurs
and members of the nobility were among his guests
at his lordly mansion. Among his royal patrons
were Philip IV. of Spain and Queen Christina of
Sweden. Teniers's works after 1640 were far finer than
his earlier ones, as is but natural; experience and
practice developing his power every season into
greater ripeness. To look about in the nineteenth
and twentieth cabinets among his pictures is an
education. One of the most delightful is his Com
pany of Smokers, No. 1071. There is no vulgarity
in this beautiful work, yet it is entirely natural and
merry. Greuze used to say, " Show me a pipe, and
I will tell you if the smoker is by Teniers." His
smoking scenes are considered particularly charac
teristic. Teniers is seldom seen to better advantage than
in the Deliverance of St. Peter from Prison; as
a religious picture this is absolutely absurd, of

252 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
course ; but as a study of soldiers at play it is most
attractive. The light and shade on the glittering
armour and on the rugged yet graceful forms are
exquisite. The little vista beyond into the cell in
which St. Peter is seen, guided by the angel, is
charming, and a foretaste of De Hooch. Another
fine study of grouping similar to the others is his
Peasants Chalking Up the Score, seated about an
Inn table, No. 1073. A beautiful clear picture of
armour is seen in his Page in a Guard-room, No.
1678, back in the eighteenth cabinet. Some of
Teniers's smaller and less finished pictures are
known as " after-dinner pieces." because they were
begun and completed during an afternoon. Cbnsid-
ering his marvellous attention to detail, Teniers
worked rapidly.
In his youth and in his age Teniers's art was
not so satisfying as during his middle period. It
has been said that his career, like the fishes that he
so often painted, was better in the middle than at
either end !
The Alchemist, No. 1072, is especially fine in
detail. It is an interesting study into the lore and
superstition which were so strangely combined in
old times. Here we see the philosopher at work,
with his bellows, surrounded by his tools, pestles
and mortars, retorts, bottles, and jars; the still
life is admirable, and the opportunity of the subject

aiH

fletberlanbisb anb German Hrtists 253
almost unlimited. The stmcture of the furnace at
which the alchemist is working is like that of the
kitchen ovens in many old Dutch and German
houses that are still shown.
Twice in the Dresden gallery St. Anthony is
seen " catching it," — once in a spacious cave, and
once in an old ruin. In both he is surrounded by
the absurd little grotesques by which the Teutons
have so often represented temptations: frogs, sit
ting on their ridiculous hind legs and holding up
their hands in some sort of incantation or expostu
lation ; silly long-nosed pipers and a vortex of bats.
In No. 1079 a pretty woman neatly clad in Puri
tanic style holds out a cup of wine in a disinterested
way to the saint who is so beset.
No. 1075 is a portrait of the master himself seated
by a cask. It is interesting to know that this is
David Teniers's own impression of himself in 1646,
which is the date of the painting.
There are three of Teniers's famous Village
Fetes in Dresden : the larger ones, with couples
dancing, hang in the nineteenth and twentieth cab
inets, while the Village Feast at the Half Moon Inn
is in No. 18. All of them are hilarious and full
of life. The little figures should be closely observed.
Here are some gossips gathered about a table for
refreshments ; here are couples dancing strenuously ;
again, lovers have withdrawn, and appear quite ob-

254 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
livious of surroundings. It is rustic merrymaking
at its height, and these three pictures are justly
precious and famous.
As regards David Teniers's methods of proceed
ing in his work, we have testimony from a biogra
pher to the effect that he first prepared a light
ground with plaster of Paris or chalk, on which his
various tints of gray and brown were scumbled;
at this stage he sketched in figures and accessories
with bistre, touching in the main shadows. Half
tones were then superposed, care being taken to
retain great transparency. His finish was accom
plished with body colour, and somewhat loaded in
the lights, with spirited little dashes and an occa
sional glazing.
Proceeding now to an examination of the works
of Rubens and Van Dyck, we return to the hall J,
passing through K, to which we shall return later,
when we come to a consideration of Rembrandt
and the ramifications of the Dutch school.

CHAPTER IX.
RUBENS AND VAN DYCK
Perhaps the chief characteristic of Rubens as
a man was absolute adaptability. A pliant dispo
sition, sensitive to every emotion, able to put him
self in the place of another to such an extent that
a ready sympathy and a resultant tact endeared
him to all, it is the more credit to him that he lived
a moral life, uninjured by evil influences and stimu
lated by good.
One noticeable element in the character of Rubens
was his strange mixture of great power and malle
able sweetness of disposition, which laid him open
to varying influences. As I shall try to show, his'
life was unusually subject to the sway of others;
while he had enough initiative and perseverance to
develop his great genius to its full extent, it is easy
to trace, all through his life, the results of a number
of defined impressions made upon him by the lives
.with whom he was thrown, or by circumstances in
which he was placed.
On the tomb of the father of Rubens, it is stated
255

2s6 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
that he lived in Cologne nineteen years, and for
twenty-six years lived in peaceful union with his
wife. This statement throws little light on the
birthplace of Peter Paul. There has been con
troversy on the subject, some writers affirming that
he was born in Cologne, and others that he first
saw the light in Antwerp. During this stage of
uncertainty, it was suddenly discovered that all evi
dence pointed to Peter Paul Rubens having been
born in a small town in the Rhenish provinces —
Siegen. This is now generally accepted as the birth
place of the great artist.
It would seem that the first great influence upon
the early art of Rubens was through his probable
master, Adam van Noort. This painter has been
variously reported as a brutal drunkard, and as a
rather genial ne'er-do-weel. That he was in some
degree improvident is proved by the fact that after
his death, the past year's rent was remitted to his
wife, as stated : " for the love of God and by reason
of the great poverty of the defunct ! " In one of
his matchless epigrammatic estimates, Eugene Fro
mentin says of van Noort, " He had a way of
striking the canvas and imprinting upon it a tone
rather than a form, which made it resound under
the brush." The painter with this quality of touch
certainly left his impression upon Rubens. " He
massed many stout figures in a little space," says

IRubens anb lt)an D?cft 257
Fromentin, — obviously this trait was also perpet
uated. Again : " Everything that could shine,
shone." Rubens's work itself could not be more
accurately indicated. Van Noort's method of
" rendering the action of vivid light upon the blood,
the moisture and gleam contracted by the skin from
the heat of the day; ... by much red intensified
by much white — " was certainly brought to its
ultimate limit in some of the fat and abominably
juicy specimens whom Rubens painted.
Whether one thinks of Rubens as the finest of
colourists or not, one must at least award him the
palm of supernal brilliancy. His colours are
brighter, gayer, and more lucid than those of any
other artist. The juicy quality is particularly un
pleasant, often, in flesh; especially the flesh of ex
tremely stout women. At all events he stands alone
in rendering this species of mellowness of fat.
Three of the most marked influences in the life
of Rubens proceed from three women. In the first
place, his youth was guided and sustained by a very
remarkable mother; next, his first wife exerted a
refining influence over him, and kept his life happy
and peaceful by her comprehending cheerful devo
tion. It was not until middle life, when he married
Helena Fourment, that his intensely florid and over
blown pictures predominated. It will be interesting
to glance at these three women who had so much

258 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
to do with the development of the masterful art
ist. His mother was strong and devoted both to her
ideals and her sense of duty as a wife. His father,
John Rubens, who was a lawyer, was detected in an
entanglement with a wealthy woman, and wrote to
his wife in abject humility from jail ; her reply to
him was one which proved her to be a rare charac
ter, selfless, and high-minded. " Even if a long-
lasting affection had not preceded this misfor
tune," she wrote, " I could never hate you suffi
ciently to be unable to pardon a fault toward my
self. . . . Never write again, ' Your unworthy
husband,' for everything is forgotten." When the
wretched man was finally released from prison, he
was sent into strict retirement, and his dutiful wife
followed him. About four years after this Peter
Paul Rubens was born. The boy never knew of the
unfortunate episode, which proves that the family
lived in harmony.
After a delightful residence during his youth in
the Court of Mantua, where he was employed as
a painter, Rubens and his brother, their parents
having died, took a house together in Antwerp.
He did not marry until he was thirty-two, and then
he fell in love with Isabella Brandt. She justified
his affection in every way, and was a woman of
keen perceptions, good-humoured appreciation of

IRubens anb IDan D?cft 259
fun, and withal the cheerful helpmeet which a man
needs to keep him from being unduly sobered by
constant and exacting work. His art at this time
shows much of her influence; she was refined in
appearance, and it was during his life with her that
he painted his supreme masterpiece, the Descent
from the Cross, as well as many religious pictures
of a more restrained type.
As his family increased, Rubens and his wife
found it expedient to move into a more spacious
house, and here, also, the great studio was opened,
that workshop where the master, aided by his pupils,
drove a thrifty trade, turning out to order hundreds
of pictures which are most of them, alas, ascribed to
Rubens himself. It has militated greatly against
the excellence of his reputation that he has been
credited with nearly all the work of his atelier as
well as with his individual productions. It was his
habit in filling orders for pictures, to proceed on
strictly business principles; a painting by his own
hand commanded a certain price; while for a pic
ture finished by Rubens, after his scholars had done
the chief work, a smaller amount was asked; a
cheaper combination still could be made by having
the design alone by Rubens, and the actual work
by the school. This great art institution did a
great deal for the cultivation of taste in the city
of Antwerp ; but other conditions were too strong :

26o XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
the political vicissitudes of the time prevented the
benign influence from being of long duration. The
long wars in the Netherlands, together with the pes
tilence, put an end to his prosperity, and he moved
to Brussels for better precaution. But he could not
escape the devastating plague, and his beloved wife
died of pestilence in the midsummer. This bereave
ment was a very real grief to Rubens. A letter
written at this time to a French statesman, shows
how deeply he had felt the blow. " In truth I have
lost an excellent companion," he said, " and one
worthy of all affection, for she had none of the
faults of her sex. Never displaying bitterness or
weakness, her kindness and loyalty were perfect
. . . since the only remedy for all such evils is
the oblivion that time brings, I must undoubtedly
look to time for consolation."
At a casual glance it might seem that oblivion
came fairly promptly in the form of Helena Four
ment, whom he married in four years after Isa
bella's death. A letter of Rubens's, however, leads
one to believe that it was a marriage of a practical
and less lofty motive than that of a second love.
" Not being able to accept a life of celibacy," he
wrote to Pieresc, " I have determined to marry
again." He goes on to explain that the lady is of
only middle class origin, adding, " I feared to find
pride in my companion, that special blemish of the

IRubens anb Dan D?cft 261
nobility, this is why I have chosen one who will
not blush to see me handle a paint-brush."
It is hardly necessary to comment upon the sub
sequent influence of Helena upon the art of Rubens.
She appears, clothed and nude, — as Saint or as
courtier, — always the same voluptuous, indolent,
unintellectual type of bovine woman.
Rubens was essentially a man of culture. All
that foreign travel and wide experience could do
for him was accomplished, and he shows contin
ually the results of his extended studies. He copied
the works of the most famous Italians in Rome and
in Mantua, during his stay there in 1602, culling
one thought from Michelangelo, and another from
Correggio. His brother Philip, travelling also in
this year, wrote to him : " How I should like to
hear your impressions of Venice, and of the differ
ent cities of Italy that you have already visited,
especially of Rome ! " This elder brother also may
have exerted some influence upon Peter Paul ; for,
when he seemed to him to stay overlong as a copy
ist, at the Court of Mantua, Philip wrote to him:
" Take care that the duration of your visit is not
prolonged. ... I implore you by all you hold
sacred, by your talent itself. ... I have reason to
fear, knowing your easy temper." This is another
example of the power of another character over
that of the painter.

262 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
Rubens was entrusted with various diplomatic
missions. His very suavity and graceful ease of
manner made him especially valuable in arrang
ing delicate affairs. Princes sending him on these
pleasant embassies took care that he should be well
provided with suitable funds in order to appear
well and accomplish his office. In 1603 he went to
convey certain gifts and works of art to Spain. The
Duke of Mantua wrote to his minister there, " If
Peter Paul needs money for his return, you must
furnish him with it." Quite untrammelled by finan
cial considerations, with no anxiety, he had noth
ing to do but use his natural endowments to agree
able purpose, and to enjoy the delights of foreign
travel and the fascinating social side of being an
ambassador in times of peace. The minister did
not quite relish the demands upon the Mantuan
funds for the maintenance of this decorative official.
He makes a memorandum of " giving money to
the Fleming that he might purchase new clothes,"
and he allowed his dissatisfaction to carry him to
the length of failing to present Rubens to the King
on the first opportunity ! Rubens painted many pic
tures in Spain, principally portraits. In some of
these the influence of Spanish art, though uncon
scious, is traceable.
After his Spanish visit Peter Paul retumed to
Mantua, and it was at this time that he painted one

IRubens anb IDan D?cft 263
of the large canvases in the Dresden gallery, the
Drunken Hercules. It was painted in about 1603.
The picture is intended to be symbolical ; man, de
graded through drink and debaucheries, staggering
through life conducted by evil creatures of brutish
wantonness. The picture is a perfect epitome of
vulgarity, but is clever in its handling. The black
shadows on the right are curiously contrasted with
the soft light at the left, but the balance is not at all
disturbed by this daring scheme. The power of
composition is supreme even in the early days of the
master. The treatment is bold and sincere. It was
an early prophecy of these great fleshly studies to
which he so largely devoted himself in later years.
The Roman school had spoken its message to him
when he conceived these half-S)mibolical and half-
naturalistic beings.
Rubens delighted in scenes of drunkenness and
revelry. Himself a perfectly correct liver, domestic
and sober, he took pleasure in depicting those orgies
whose nature he knew well enough to make him
avoid them. As one sees a very plain spinster de
vote herself to the pemsal or even to the produc
tion of highly sentimental love-stories, so Rubens
indulged himself by depicting scenes in which he
would have shrunk with horror from participating.
Among the early pictures is the large canvas.
The Champion of Virtue Crowned by the Goddess

264 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
of Victory. One is certainly convinced that this
armed knight must be worthy of the honour; if
he is proof against his Coronation, and the practi
cal embrace of the beautiful goddess who presses
the wreath on his brow, he deserves his title!
It is not to be wondered at that an artist should
become rather sensual in his tendencies while living
at a court like that of Mantua. When a royal lady
was to be given in marriage, the prospective impe
rial bridegroom's first request was for a portrait
and " measurements of her stature and body." The
body dominated the mind in his patrons : once more
Rubens's art responded to the influence of environ
ment. When his much revered mother died in 1608,
Rubens left Mantua and retumed to Antwerp. In
his first grief he devoted himself to painting relig
ious pictures in that city. Here was a new influence
brought to bear upon him; that of sorrow. The
solemn Adoration of the Magi, the Dispute of the
Sacrament, and other subjects of a sacred charac
ter claimed his attention during this period. Then
came his marriage with Isabella Brandt, and the
sweet, elevating effect which his new happiness pro
duced upon his plastic nature.
In 1 6 ID he was made court painter to the Arch
dukes of Bmssels, with the " oath pertaining to the
Court Painter of their Serene Highnesses." As a

RUBENS.  THE CHAMPION OF VIRTUE

IRubens anb IDan D?ch 265
portrait-painter Rubens was now in much demand.
In this capacity he is not intimate ; he uses a type,
the nearest in his repertoire to which the subject
will conform, but the type dominates rather than
the actual personality then represented. In this
respect he is far inferior to Velasquez. His por
traits did not interfere with his accomplishment of
one of the world's greatest masterpieces, the De
scent from the Cross. Less flamboyant than the
Elevation, which was painted earlier, when he was
fresher from his Italian impressions, it denotes a
settled peace and majesty of grief which are deeply
appealing. Another sorrow had left its mark upon
his sensitive soul: the death of his brother Philip.
The next picture in Dresden in order of execution
is the St. Jerome. It is rather red and crude, but
in some respects finer than Rubens's later work.
The attitude is reverent, and the whole is a digni
fied composition. But it is not very much more. St.
Jerome is a rather stout, healthy-looking hermit, — -
it must have been early in his career, before the
mortifications of the flesh had made great inroads
upon his constitution ! Yet he is advanced in years.
In short, the subject is not very deeply studied or
intellectually apprehended on this occasion. The
picture is signed by Rubens's initials in full. It was
painted by order for Italy, and belonged to the
Modena Gallery. It would seem that Rubens had

266 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
collected all the possible types of vegetation in the
desert to which St. Jerome retired, in order to give
a little sample of each. Leaves, grass, trees, and
bushes are carefully differentiated.
Next in order among the Dresden pictures is the
Lion and Tiger Hunt, but this is largely the work
of pupils, of whom he had many in his working
studio at this time. It is scattered in interest and
rather confused.
Again the impressionable Rubens allowed a de
lightful element to creep into his art, — he began
painting little children, while his own were playing
about him. His chubby cherubs, whether intended
to be sacred or secular, were all based upon the
same blooming models.
His academy was as well ordered as his life. His
pupils were all trained, each in a special direction,
with admirable judgment, partly with a view to
their own development, and partly in order to fill
the spaces in the master's pictures, which, from this
time on, are seldom entirely by his own hand, imless
the subject were of special importance. Sometimes
Rubens supplied only the original drawing; some
times he touched the picture up afterward, and some
times he painted the figures, leaving it to his pupils
to fill in the backgrounds and accessories. Some
of the pupils of Rubens were already well-known
artists who came simply for the advantage of col-

¦Rubens anb Dan D?cft 267
laboration with him : as assistants, they studied with
him, not as ordinary untrained pupils who were
just beginning their researches. Among these was
Van Dyck, of whom we shall next make some study.
Velvet Brueghel also assisted Rubens at this time,
painting animals and foregrounds with much bril
liancy. There is an interesting list of pictures preserved
in a letter from Rubens to a patron. This patron
was negotiating an exchange of certain antiquities
for one of his paintings. Rubens quotes the num
ber of his works then available, giving statistics as
to their workmanship. This letter is invaluable in
determining the authorship of certain pictures. One
of these reads : " Daniel amidst many lions ; painted
from life ; original ; entirely by my own hand." An
other : " Achilles clothed as a woman ... a charm
ing work and full of many beautiful young girls."
Here also occurs the " Hunt of men on horse
back with lions, begun by one of my pupils after a
picture that I did for his most Serene Highness,
the Duke of Bavaria: wholly retouched by me."
The patron, Sir Dudley Carleton, demurred some
what at the prices of some of the pictures, where
upon Rubens wrote an honest letter which shows
a charming lack of duplicity for a courtier ! " The
reason why I wish to make the exchange entirely in
pictures," he says, " is sufficiently clear, for although

268 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
I have put them down at their exact value, never
theless they cost me nothing, and as everybody is
more inclined to be generous with the fruits of his
own garden than with those bought in the market
... I do not wish ... to exceed the bounds of
prudent economy."
Rubens was delighted with Van Dyck, and the
more delicate sense of colour possessed by the latter
was probably of use in tempering Rubens in his most
glowing period. Indeed, they worked together so
much that critics now are having much discussion
as to certain portraits of this time, — whether they
be by Rubens or Van Dyck. For instance, the Gen
tleman Standing by a Table, No. 960, has recently
been pronounced by Doctor Bode, an eminent (kr-
man critic, to be by Van Dyck, while Emile Michel
claims that it is too completely the work of a past
master in portraiture to have been produced by a
young beginner. For at the time of this portrait's
painting, about 16 19, Van Dyck was not a finished
painter, while Rubens was at the height of his art,
and therefore more likely to have executed this
clever portrait than the pupil. Michel thinks that
Doctor Bode has gone a little too far in giving some
of Rubens's pictures to Van Dyck, although un
doubtedly hitherto many of Van Dyck's pictures
have passed for Rubens's. Comparisons can be
made particularly well at Dresden, and although

IRubens anb Dan D?cft 269
in a book of this size it is not possible to go into
the controversy to any extent, yet it is interesting
to see how many of these pictures have been attrib
uted in recent years to the later master. Rubens
always called Van Dyck his " best pupil," and the
theory that he was jealous of him as a rival has no
foundation. The Boar Hunt in Dresden is by Rubens's hand.
In the larger replica in England, the work of his
pupils can be detected, but this one is genuine. He
has taken a fine opportunity to ensnare his boar in
the gnarled roots of a tree which has been struck
by lightning, and there, brought to bay by the dogs,
rustics, and hunters, the hideous monster forms
the centre of interest. The scene is tumultuous and
the subject unattractive.
The Old Woman with a Brazier is a curious de
parture from Rubens's usual style. Her face is
illuminated from below, by the dull glow from the
coals. Elsheimer had introduced this treatment of
light. She is looking with quizzical interest out of
the canvas at some object, presumably the specta
tor's right hand. This picture is a fragment cut
from a work in Brussels, Venus in Vulcan's Forge.
It is there replaced by a clumsy figure of Vulcan.
To be sure, this study could have had little signifi
cance in its original situation in the picture in
which it was painted; probably the old crone was

270 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
admiring Venus, who occupies a position about in
the direction of her surprised eyes. But just who
the old lady was intended to be, in the Forge, is
a question, and no doubt the owner saw that by
eliminating her, he might possess two works in
stead of one, and conscientiously had a Vulcan sub
stituted. Rubens was a temperate and sane man in all de
partments of life. Neither in food, drink, play, nor
even in gossip, did he ever go to excess. His was
an even and lovable nature, not a wild neurotic
specimen of what is often wrongly termed the
" artistic temperament." His house at Antwerp
was a beautiful and dignified structure, in rather
florid style for our taste, but nobly proportioned
and with attractive features.
Rubens's journey to France to paint his celebrated
set of portraits of Marie de Medici was beset with
small difficulties, of which one seldom hears; in a
letter he said : " If instead of the scheme made by
the court, the choice of subjects had been left to me,
no one need have feared scandals or equivocal com
ments ... if they would only give me a free hand
nothing would be easier, for such abundant and
splendid material would suffiqe for the decoration
of ten galleries." And again : " I have had enough
of this court; if I am not paid with . . . punc
tuality ... it is possible . . . that I shall not re-

IRubens anb Dan D?cft 271
visit it. . . . Time passes, and to my sorrow I am
kept from home." When he finally decided to re
turn home, he found difficulty in securing good
horses ; he had to travel with " poor half-dead
beasts walking single file, led by postilions." His
return was in 1625; in 1626 he lost his beloved
Isabella. We have already indicated what a sorrow
the loss of his wife was to Peter Paul, and how,
partly to divert his mind, and partly because the
times were ripe, he went to Spain soon after. It was
to " seek peace and ensue it " that Rubens under
took this mission. Flanders had need of England's
cooperation, and Rubens became the diplomatic
mouthpiece of the provinces. " War is a chastise
ment from heaven," said he, " and we ought to do
our best to avoid the scourge." Velasquez and
Rubens became intimate friends at this time.
The portrait of his two sons is in Vienna, but
it was once supposed that the excellent copy in
Dresden was the original. It is a fascinating har
mony in light blue and golden yellow; but it was
probably executed in the studio — perhaps under the
master's inspection. One reason for deciding upon
this as the later of the two copies is, that in the
original, it was evidently intended to paint the
boys only to the waist; as an afterthought, the
panel was elongated, and the full figures substi-

272 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
tuted for the busts. This was painted before the
death of their mother.
In 1629 Rubens continued his negotiations for
British interest by going to London. He was high
in favour with Charles I., and he induced the King
to agree in writing not to ally English forces with
those of France while the treaty should last.
Rubens speaks naively of England in a letter to
Dupuy : " The island in which I now am seems
to me a place well worthy the curiosity of a man of
taste." If somewhat patronizing, this was intended
as a compliment. On another occasion he marvels
at the art treasures to be seen in London, " instead
of the barbarism to be expected in such a cli
mate, at so great a distance from the culture of
Italy!" Soon after his return his marriage to Helena
Fourment took place. His frankly given reasons
for this union have been quoted. The wedding was
a gorgeous one, a clause in the contract calling upon
the bride's parents to be financially responsible for
the ceremonial : " in such a way as to deserve hon
our and thanks."
Then followed a succession of mythological
pictures, clothed figures, nudes, in fact, — Helena
in every style, yet always the same; fat, smooth,
moist, lacking in intellectual animation, an amiable,
peaceful animal, and yet apparently entirely satisfy-

¦Rubens anb Dan D?ch 273
ing to the soul of Rubens. In Dresden we have her
as Bathsheba bathing ; as Diana returning from the
chase ; as one of the " blessed " in the Last Judg
ment; and (from the studio, not entirely painted
by her husband) as Atalanta, receiving the hideous
boar's head from a very operatic Meleager. In the
Garden of Love she appears in court dress, — we
think her more attractive in this guise. Her charms
were too vast for entire nudity to be becoming.
Dr. John Moore, who did not pretend to be an
art critic, put his finger on the point at which
Rubens is so unattractive to this unanalytic ob
server of keen wits but with little aesthetic training.
" The strength and expression of this great artist's
pencil, the natural glow of his colouring, and the
fertility of his fancy deserve the highest encomi
ums," says Doctor Moore, in the late eighteenth cen
tury, from Dresden; " yet one cannot help regret
ting that he had so violent a passion for fat women.
That kind of nature which he had seen early in life
in his own country had laid such hold upon his
imagination that it could not be eradicated by all
the elegant models he afterward studied in Italy.
Some of his female figures in this gallery are so
much of the Dutch make, and so fat, that it is rather
oppressive to look at them in this very hot
weather ! " Whistler's remark about Rubens seems
just when we look at many of these pictures.

274 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
" Whether or not Rubens was a g^'eat painter, he
was certainly an industrious person."
The attractive Diana Returning from the Chase
is a studio piece, but has many touches of Rubens's
upon it also. Another mythological subject, the
Sleeping Argus, is by the master's own hand. The
wily Mercury has lulled his watchful foe to sleep,
by imitating on his pipe the monotonous sounds
which illustrate the story of Pan and Syrinx, with
which he has been regaling him. The pretty white
heifer, lo, comes stealthily around to Mercury, as
if she knew that her thraldom was now over. It
is a charming pastoral, and one of the few subjects
of its class in which the fat women are absent! It
is a relief to meet a Rubens now and then which
deals only with masculine tjpes.
The enormous Neptune Subduing the Waves,
which is quite a Shakespearean Tempest, once
adomed a triumphal arch erected in Antwerp in
1635. It is touched up by the master, but is a
studio work in the main masses. It is known by
the title, " Quos Ego!"
A Bacchanale, from the studio. No. 974, shows
a satyr pressing out grapes, assisted by some elfin
children, while a tigress lies at their feet with her
cubs. Among the most charming works of Rubens's
studio is the large canvas. No. 1000, known as

RUBENS. — DIANA WITH HER NYMPHS HUNTING

¦Rubens anb Dan D?cft 275
Diana with her Nymphs Hunting. It has a quaint
element about it which is seldom found in the work
of Rubens or his pupils. It is a sort of fantastic
genre, a link between the usual mythological scenes
and the Fete Champetre. Diana — a fully clothed
maiden of the fields, half-shepherdess and half-court
lady — wears a brocade robe jauntily caught up
over a silk skirt, and a little flat velvet hat on one
side of her pretty head, while the classical com
promise is made by her bare feet in sandals. The
nymphs are modern down to the feet — they, too,
wear sandals! One buxom peasant in Dutch cos
tume blows a winding horn, while two little girls are
carrying the loaded quiver of the huntress. The
stately straight yet willowy figure of Diana is not
typical of the school, but it shows with what good
effect Rubens's type might have been modified. The
picture was once unanimously given to Velasquez.
Rubens's last years were passed in the beautiful
and romantic Chateau de Steen, which he purchased,
and in which he and his Helena dwelt to their mu
tual satisfaction. He probably painted the Garden
of Love (in Room M) while he was living on this
estate, the subject being suggested by the surround
ings. He became a sufferer from gout and his
work was after that necessarily rather slower.
In 1640 the accounts of Rubens's health were
alarming. The Archduke Ferdinand wrote to

276 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
Philip IV. explaining the delay conceming certain
pictures which he had ordered : " Rubens has been
crippled in both his hands for over a month, with
small hope of his being able to use his brushes
again." Rubens had already made his will, fearing
that he was not destined to live long. It is recorded
by the Notary that Peter Paul and Helena had both
appeared before him, " sound of mind, heart, and
memory, . . . although the aforesaid gentleman
was ill in body and in bed." His last illness was a
painful one. Walpole disposes of him in a sum
mary way, remarking : " He died of the gout in his
own country in 1640." But it is probable that some
complication more serious was added to his usual
complaint. One of his feet was operated on, — the
bill of the " barbers " in attendance is extant, " for
their attention to the defunct's feet."
In examining any collection of Rubens's pictures,
one may arrive at a fair idea of his technical meth
ods. The painter, Delacroix, sums up the facts : " I
am sometimes angry with him, and quarrel with his
coarse forms," he says. " But how he rises above
the small qualities that are the whole baggage of
the others! ... his chief quality ... is his ex
traordinary vividness, ... his extraordinary life.
. . . There is no great artist without this gift."
When Rubens died in 1640, his family received
a large fortune which he had amassed, and instantly

¦Rubens anb Dan D?cft 277
tendered proof of their respect for his memory by
giving him a thousand-florin funeral !
It is but nomial to turn from Rubens to Van
Dyck. One often wonders, with Fromentin, what
Van Dyck would have been without Rubens. In
what channel would this marvellous technical ability
have turned? (For probably he would never have
carved out an independent course for himself.)
Van Dyck, in his art and in his character, followed
the line of least resistance. Easily influenced to
good or evil, he yet had sufficient sanity to keep
him from falling into the excesses of his model, and
his work, while it is full of Rubens's knowledge
and charm, lacks all its objectionable features, and
has the delicate touch of the refined personality of
Van Dyck himself. As a pretty girl may look like
a handsome man, lacking the qualities which give
the man strength, and yet would give the woman
coarseness, so a picture by Van Dyck is full of
Rubens's expression without his earthiness.
Anton Van Dyck was born in Antwerp in 1599.
He was baptized in the cathedral the day after his
birth. His early years were passed among artists,
Snellincx, Jan de Wael, and Jan Brueghel, to some
of whom he was probably related. The first influ
ences, at any rate, were aesthetic ones. The boy was
sent to Van Balen to study when he was ten, and
on the same day Sustermans was admitted to the

278 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
school. The youths entered at once upon a friend
ship. Sustermans was afterward the court painter
in Florence. By the time he was fourteen years of
age. Van Dyck was painting portraits; at sixteen
he set up his own establishment apart from his
family; possibly this early liberty may have sown
the seeds of a later libertinage, for he was unfortu
nately rather profligate in after-life. Jan Brueghel
was with him in his studio Hfe at this time.
Van Dyck was admitted into the Guild of St.
Luke in 1618, an unusual honour to a youth of
nineteen; and he paid his " wine dues " in full the
next year. In 1618 he painted the two fine por
traits in Dresden, which were first g^ven to Rubens,
Nos. 1022 and 1023. It is not known exactly when
he went to paint in Rubens's studio, but among the
early pictures executed under the influence of that
master are the Drunken Silenus and the St. Jerome,
which hang here.
The Drunken Silenus is dashing in colour, and
the attitudes and general treatment are suggestive
of his master. The red and gray are like the shades
frequently used by Rubens, and the Silenus and his
male companion are reminiscent of various figures
which he painted. The pale woman on the left is
rather a precursor of the style which was to be
Van Dyck's own. The thoughtful young man in a
cloak looks across in a tragic way at the Bacchante;

¦Rubens anb Dan D?cft 279
one might imagine that he was a lover, who had
been paying his court to the girl, and that this
revelation of a drunken father had interposed an
impassable barrier to their happiness! He looks
like a scholar, helpless before the besotted vulgarity
of the death of the intellectual life.
Another early Van Dyke is the St. Jerome. As
it hangs, near that of Rubens, it is easy to compare
the two. Evidently Van Dyck was forming his
own style all the time, in spite of what he learned
from Rubens. He has modified the red tones, and
his saint is less sleek and well fed. As the same
model posed for Silenus and for St. Jerome, it is
highly creditable to Antony that he was able to put
such different interpretations upon the same ana
tomical pecuharities !
In 1620 the Earl of Arundel persuaded Van
Dyck to go to Ejigland. Not much is known about
this first visit of Van Dyck, the chief allusion to
it being an entry among the State Accounts, which
takes the form of an order to pay to " Anthony
Vandike " a sum of money " for special! service
by him performed for his Majestie," and also " a
passe for Anthony Vandike gentleman, his Majes-
tie's servant, to travaile for eight monthes, he hav-
inge obtayned his Majestie's leave in that be
half." On Van Dyck's return to Antwerp, therefore, he

28o XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
occupied the position of a Court official of King
James I., instead of as a pupil to Rubens. He was
only twenty-one, but was now famous in several
countries. Among the pictures painted at this time
was the Old Man, No. 1022, in M, which was orig
inally attributed to Rubens. This, and its compan
ion, the portrait of an Old Woman, No. 1023, are
now given to Van Dyck in his early period. They
are splendid specimens, and surely must have been
good likenesses.
When Van Dyck left Antwerp to pursue his
travels, in October, 1621, Rubens gave him his best
horse as a parting gift. Van Dyck, mounted on
this charger, started off bravely. In the course of
his trip in Italy he had the pleasure of seeing again
his old friend, Sustermans, in his position as Court
Painter in Florence. He spent two or three years
in Genoa. The sketch-book which he used in Italy
is still preserved, and is a most interesting record of
his stay. Among other drawings in this invaluable
volume is a study of the ancient Sofonisba Anguis-
sola, at that time ninety-six years old, and blind.
Sofonisba had been a leading painter herself, and
had personal recollection of Titian and his contem
poraries; she also gave the young artist some val
uable points about methods of painting old age.
Van Dyck probably left (jenoa about 1627. He
retumed to Antwerp, but his style had now changed

¦Rubens anb Dan D?cft 281
considerably, and his likeness to Rubens was less
marked. Italian influence, and his great admiration
for Velasquez, had given him a penchant for grays
and cooler shadows, for blacks and lower tones.
While religious subjects were to Rubens simply op
portunities for scenic and anatomic display, to Van
Dyck they took on a different aspect, and he is more
reverent in treating sacred themes. This may be
noted in his figures of the Apostles which hang
in M.
The masterly portraits, 1023 C and D, were
originally given to Rubens. One is known as a
Gentleman drawing on his Gloves, and the other as a
Woman in a Dress Laced with Gold. The Portrait
of a Lady with her child is charming and winsome ;
and the brown-haired young man, who was also sup
posed to have been painted by Rubens, is remark
able for his vital eyes. The bust of a man in
armour. No. 1043, ^^ attributed to Van Dyck, but
is questioned. It is very good in quality, however,
very much modelled, but the outline rather hazy.
One reason why Van Dyck is so good and so ver
satile is that he never as an independent painter
actually created a type of his own, as so many men
have done; this method, while it often characterizes
greater artists, usually renders them less satisfac
tory in likenesses.
The Youthful Jesus treading on the Serpent is

282 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
not a powerful work, and shows how much better
Van Dyck was when drawing his inspiration from
nature instead of from his imagination.
It seems to me that the Portrait of a Com
mander in Armour, with his flaming red scarf con
trasted against the cool steely tones, is as perfect an
example of this painter at his best as any in EJirope.
The firm, cool reserve, so well typified by the hard
trustworthy armour, and the dash of red, suggesting
enthusiasm and courage, make this noble picture a
great emblematic war-note as well as a superb por
trait. An interesting comparison can be made between
the Portrait of a Gentleman in black near a pillar,
and the Portrait of a Man, seated, in a fur coat
In the first all the tones are fine and cool ; the re
served aristocrat, with his well-tempered good
breeding, is seen, and the sentiment is carried out
fully. On the other hand, the warm browns in the
second portrait are full of depth and purpose; it
is a different kind of personality which Van Dyck
wishes to portray : this is probably a portrait of a
Prince of (jenoa, one of the Giustignani. He is no
quiet man of leisure, but a leader of men, who is
extending his hand in debate or command, — a man
of action and hot in temperament; Southern blood
contrasted with Northern; a world of differentia
tion in character may be seen between the two.

.¦ja

^

,. J
vBv '^'
V.
#
f
k
' /
h I
/J
1
epi
\
1
pp^^Hi
'¦'l^i
1
feg^^MSj
m^M
f
VAN DYCK. — PORTRAIT OF A COMMANDER IN ARMOUR
¦Rubens anb Dan D?cl: 283
People have criticized Van Dyck for a certain suave
sameness; this is unfair.
In 1 63 1 or 1632 Van Dyck retumed to England,
and became court painter to Charles I. At this time
he was thirty-two years of age, and at the full
measure of his ability. He was presented with a
house in Blackfriars, with Inigo Jones as architect
at his bidding, and he had summer apartments in
the Royal palace at Eltham. He now began to
paint English royal likenesses, alluded to in the
Warrants of the Privy Seal, as "Our ane royall
portraiture, our royall consort, and one great piece
of our royall self, consort, and children." In Dres
den we have one of his portraits of the three chil
dren, and the copy by Sir Peter Lely of the por
trait of Charles in the habit of St. George, the orig
inal of which was burnt at Whitehall. One of the
twenty-five likenesses which he painted of Queen
Henrietta Maria also hangs here: she is attired in
blue satin. The English royal portraits are rather
more conventional than some of Van Dyck's Conti
nental work. The picture of the three children is
charming in colouring, being almost entirely yellow
and white.
While he was living at court Van Dyck became
extravagant and licentious. He complained play
fully to the King : " Open table for one's friends
and open pockets for one's mistresses soon show

284 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
the bottom of the exchequer." The King and Queen
consulted together, and decided to save their valua
ble painter from ruin by arranging a suitable mar
riage. His bride so chosen was Mary Ruthven, a
well-connected young girl, through whom Van
Dyck became related to many families in the nobil
ity. There is a tradition that when the news of
his intended marriage reached his mistress, Mar
garet Lemon, she, in a fit of jealous rage, attacked
him with scissors, trying to wound his right hand
in order to incapacitate him for further artistic
work at court.
After going back to Antwerp for awhile at the
time of Rubens's death, in 1640, Van Dyck retumed
to England much out of health. He died in Decem
ber, 1 64 1, and was buried in St. Paul's near John
of Gaunt. His body and his monument were des
troyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666.
His effect upon English art was marvellous, all
the more remarkable because, out of his career of
twenty-five active years in painting, only seven years
were spent in London, and his best works were not
produced there.
We have several descriptions of Van Dyck's
methods of painting. While he was working in
Genoa one of his clients complained that he was
obliged to sit for seven whole days from morning
to night, and was not permitted to watch progress.

¦Rubens anb Dan D?cft 285
only being allowed to see his own portrait after it
was finished to the artist's liking. There are also
accounts of his insisting upon having his sitters
dine with him, that no time might be lost. But
an Antwerp patron, of whom Van Dyck painted a
likeness on three separate occasions, tells that the
master, with great method, arranged to work only
a short time each day on any one portrait, having an
appointment for each sitter, never keeping one
client more than an hour. When this time had
expired, the sitter was politely invited to retire,
and an attendant brought a fresh outfit of brushes
and canvas for the next. Frequently the main work
on these portraits was given to his students to com
plete, while Van Dyck made the first drawing, and
put on the last touches himself. This enabled him
to produce such numerous portraits in a given sea
son. Van Dyck was much eulogized after his death
by his British appreciators. Abraham Cowley
vmtes: " His pieces so with their live objects strive
That both or pictures seem, or both alive ;
Nature herself amazed doth doubting stand,
Which is her own, and which the painter's hand I "

CHAPTER X.
REMBRANDT AND SOME OF HIS CONTEMPORARIES
As one glances about for a general impression
among the Rembrandts in this delightful salon, K,
it has to be admitted that nearly all are uniform in
tone. One is less struck with the amazing variety
of this master than in some other galleries. The
only distinctly bright and highly coloured specimen
is No. 1550, the gay portrait of Rembrandt with
his wife, Saskia, on his knee. This most popular
domestic scene is very lively, and shows a pleasant
camaraderie which undoubtedly existed in this his
first and happier marriage. The question of his
second marriage has of course occasioned discus
sion; his life with Hendrickje was certainly not
ideal from the point of view of ethics. But as there
are no portraits of Hendrickje in Dresden, we need
not specially emphasize this phase of the artist's
career !
A magician in light and shade: that is Rem
brandt. Often his drawing is at fault; his colour
is little to be considered, except as tone ; he knows
286

REMBRANDT.  REMBRANDT AND SASKIA

¦Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 287
how to suffuse a whole canvas with a glowing qual
ity of gold or russet, but as an actual colourist he
does not rank among the first. He never considers
beauty except as it shall result from his wonderful
disposition of shadows. He depicts a hideous face
and body with greater frequency and apparently
with greater relish than a beautiful one. Power —
gloom — depth of mystery — all these are his
tools, and he handles them as he sees fit.
Many of his so-called portraits are perplexing,
because they do not resemble other portraits of the
same characters; in other words, critics have had
what M. Michel calls a " mania for identification,"
and the result is that dozens of women's portraits
have been called Saskia, simply because his wife
was named Saskia; and a sentimental insistence
upon recognizing her in every face he painted has
governed those who have assigned names to Rem
brandt's pictures. No wonder our idea of Saskia
is a trifle vague ! I do not know why people should
suppose that an artist never uses but one model any
more than they should imagine that every verse
written by a poet reflects some personal experience.
We do humanity an injustice when we claim that
all Rembrandt's nude personages are realistic. Only
the most selected types of ugliness could look like
some of them. But extremes meet in this dual ar
tistic personality. Complete ugly realism vies with

288 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
imaginative dreams, as may be seen by looking first
at No. 1558, Ganymede and the eagle, and then at
1563, the Sacrifice of Manoah. In this last, to be
sure, the intentionally visionary part of the picture
is less poetic and delicate than the human figures.
Rembrandt Harmenz van Rijn was bom in Ley
den in 1606, in a pleasant street looking out toward
the West, with only the moat and ramparts of the
old town intervening between it and the open coun
try. The events of his childhood are obscure, but
it is known that his father was a prosperous man,
so that the son's youth was probably uneventful,
in that he was properly educated and reared in a
comfortable home. His mother was a good Chris
tian, and gave him early instruction in religious
matters, and in a study of the Bible.
The first teacher of Rembrandt in his artistic
capacity was a little-known painter, \'an Swanen-
burch. This elementary instruction must have been
intelligent and thorough, and in spite of the fact that
Swanenburch has left little to testify to his aesthetic
ability, it is evident that he had to a considerable
degree the pedagogic faculty. After some period of
study with various masters and afterward in Rome,
the young Rembrandt returned home and set up
for himself, as a chronicler says, " to study and
practise painting alone and in his own way." In
1630, although he was still a beardless youth, his

¦Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 289
fame was established. We have no example here
of his earliest work, but the first pictures which hang
in Dresden are the portrait of Willem Burggraef,
painted in 1633, and a portrait of his wife, Saskia,
done in the same year.
His first pupil, Gerard Dou, came to him in 1628,
when the master was only twenty-one. About three
years later, Rembrandt settled in Amsterdam, where
he soon fell devotedly in love with the congenial
Saskia, and their house and his studio became a
rendesvous for the art-lovers of that day. Amster
dam was the great Mecca of artists in 1630 and
thereabouts: in Evelyn's Diary for 1641 he states
that it is " certainly the most busie concourse of
mortals now upon the whole earth, and the most
addicted to commerce." Pupils now thronged to
study with Rembrandt; Ferdinand Bol, Govaert
Flinck, Philips Koninck, Eeckhout, Jan Victors,
and many others. Each of these students paid a
hundred florins a year for the privilege of working
with the greatest living master!
Reports were spread about the trials of Rem
brandt's life with Saskia: as is nearly always the
case with persons in a conspicuous social position,
there were plenty of aspiring groundlings who
would have been gratified to see them in discom
fort. So it was noised abroad that his wife was
very extravagant,, and that she had dissipated his

290 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
" dot " in " dress and ostentation." But there
seems to be no further evidence that these reports
had foundation, and their life together, though not
long, was a merry one, and they loved each other,
perhaps not in the prudent way of more discreet
and elderly people, but with perfect satisfaction to
themselves, we have every reason to believe! The
poor girl died in 1642, and Rembrandt, a disconso
late widower, began an early deterioration; for the
strength of his character was not of sufficient fibre
to be led by suffering.
Soon after this the general dissatisfaction which
was expressed about his great picture known as the
Night Watch (and which is now recognized as an
afternoon sortie of Banning Cocq and his Conv
pany) also discouraged him, and made him a little
reckless. Dealing with his pictures in Dresden in chrono
logical order, the next in date was the painfully
hideous Infant Ganymede, in 1635. Malcolm Bell
has properly described Ganymede in this picture as
" blubbering in terror as he is howked upward . .
by his shirt-tail in the claws of the eagle ! " About
this time the cheerful portrait of Rembrandt with
Saskia on his knee was painted. The face of the
artist is certainly not flattered : he has given no
ideal touch to either of these convivial youngsters,
who, with their tall wine-glasses and their peacock

¦Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 391
pasty, are enjoying " all the comforts of home."
The 9ame blunt-nosed, good-natured face greets us
here as in the portrait of Saskia as a laughing
young girl.
The beautiful picture of Samson Propounding
the Riddle at the Wedding Feast — a large and im
portant work — was the principal achievement of
Rembrandt in 1638. Apart from its exquisite
technique and charming lighting, it is not remark
able, however, as a composition, and is not a con
tribution to realistic Scriptural painting.
The Bittern Shooter followed in 1639. At a
first glance we see only the upheld bittern; one
might suppose the picture intended as a puzzle —
" Find the shooter! " — for the man is in so dense a
shadow that he hardly appears at all.
Saskia's portrait, painted in 1641, is to be seen in
the panel No. 1562 : the girl has become a woman,
and a more serious expression is to be detected in
her eyes; she had only another year to live, and
was probably even then suffering from the under
mining ill-health which so soon resulted in her
death. In this same year was executed the Dresden pic
ture which exhibits much more poetic and religious
feeling than is usual in Rembrandt's works, the
Sacrifice of Manoah and his Wife, The two main
figures are treated with great sentiment and tender-

292 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
ness, and not without conventional beauty; but the
phantom, which looks for all the world like a short,
stout Dutch monk, if one could find such a thing,
is a trying anticlimax !
In the Old Woman Weighing Gold one sees the
clear, direct treatment which afterward became
Rembrandt's chief heritage to his scholars; the sa
lient points only are touched with light, allowing
all unimportant details to be lost in shadow. It
has perfect finish, and yet it is not " finicky; " and,
although full of a lively worldly sentiment, it has
certain soft, dreamy qualities at the same time.
The Portrait of an Old Man, No. 1671, is a mag
nificent study of age. Among the younger men
who appear in Rembrandt's portraits here is the
Young Warrior in Armour, and the gentleman in a
red fur-trimmed cap, seated in a chair. This last
is a most beautiful profile, the only light in the pic
ture being thrown on the face. There is some
question whether this portrait may not be by Fabri-
tius. The Entombment is only a studio work
touched up by the master, the original being in
Munich. A very different Rembrandt is seen in his Por
trait of himself with a sketch-book. No. 1569. This
was a sadder and probably a wiser man than the
youth who held his bride on his knee: it was
painted in 1657.

k

REMBRANDT. — SACRIFICE OF MANOAH AND HIS WIFE
"Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 293
Specially fine is the Man with a Pearl-trimmed
Hat, No. 1570, most decorative and ornate, as is
also the Jewish Rabbi, which is, however, only a
copy (perhaps by Koninck) from the original at
Chatsworth. It is sad to trace a career to a tragic close, but
such was the ending of the great master's life. A
general moral decline set in : he became involved
in a love-affair with Hendrickje Stoffels, a hand
some servant whom he afterward married; he
apparently lost all grip on prudence in money mat
ters, as is evidenced by records of a sale necessitat
ing the dismembering of his home and studio, at
which time his pictures and engravings were all
disposed of at the ridiculously inadequate sum of
five hundred florins. It is also possible that his
sight began to fail him, for after 1661 he made no
more etchings, and his portrait heads are usually
rather larger than life. In the death records of
Amsterdam occurs this passage : " Tuesday, Octo
ber 8, 1669, Rembrandt van Rijn, Painter, on the
Rozengracht, opposite the Doolhof. Leaves two
children." The great artist was laid to rest at the
foot of a staircase in the church, but when the
coffin was opened some years ago, tltere were no
traces of his remains. This is all that we know of
the end. Like a comet which blazes through the

294 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
night, he disappeared: he has left as priceless a
heritage as any painter who ever lived.
It is interesting to contrast the lives and work
of the three great masters of technique who were
so far in advance of their own day, — Rubens,
Rembrandt, and Velasquez. Rubens, great in ex
pressing the joy of living and the impersonal sweep
of popular ideals in great decorative masses : Rem
brandt, great in holding up before us the mystery
and romance of imagination and the subtler
thoughts of the elect : and Velasquez, who combined
both these qualities, leaning neither to the romantic
nor to the realistic, — sane, complete, and re
strained, a past master in the use of pigment and
touch, unsurpassed in composition and design.
Before leaving the hall in which Rembrandt
reigns, one must stop and enjoy the pictures which
hang here by some of his followers.
One of Rembrandt's most creditable pupils was
Govaert Flinck. His native town was Cleves, where
he was born in 1615. He is one of the few artists
with whom Rembrandt exchanged portraits. His
work is much like that of his master. In the strik
ing picture of David giving the Letter to Uriah,
he is seen at his best, the gorgeous )rellow of the
satin robe radiating a rich glow which harmonizes
the whole. Govaert Flinck died in Amsterdam in
1660.

¦Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 295
Ferdinand Bol's Repose on the Flight into Egypt
is an unusual composition, in lustrous brown tones.
The very earthly trait of extreme physical weariness
is here the chief characteristic of Mary, who leans
her head on her hand as if greatly tired with her
journey, while the charming little stiff bimdle of
a very human sleeping baby lies on her lap like any
little peasant.
The Jacob before Pharaoh is rather exaggerated,
and too yellow throughout. Jacob's position is too
menial, and Joseph looks too much the proud mon
arch. There is no natural human response from
Pharaoh. His Jacob's Dream of a Ladder Reach
ing to Heaven may also be seen here : the long
stately figure of the angel is charming.
Ferdinand Bol's own portrait by his own hand
hangs in the fourteenth cabinet; it is No. 1606.
The effect is strikingly Rembrandtesque in the popu
lar sense. This clever artist was a close follower
of Rembrandt; he was born in Dordrecht in 1616,
but painted most of his life in Amsterdam. He was
the first to enter Rembrandt's house in Amsterdam,
where he lived until 1680, dying in that year a very
rich man. Some critics place him above Van der
Heist, second only to the master himself. These
three paintings by him in Dresden display his genius
at its full, and are not dwarfed nor overshadowed

296 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
by being hung in the same room with Rembrandt's
pictures. Another follower of Rembrandt, Salomon Ko
ninck, born at Amsterdam in 1609, is represented
by two delightful pictures. The Hermit Reading
is full of tender, soft grays pervaded by a golden
glow, while the Astronomer, though somewhat
doubtful in attribution, is a masterly treatment of
a virile old man whose intelligence shines on his
illumined face.
There are two good portraits by Van der Heist :
one, a wife of the Burgomaster Bicker of Amster
dam, is a stately presentment of a conventional lady
of Holland, with her quilled ruff and neatly trimmed
cap and cuffs. The handling is free. The other is
more informal : a woman looking out from behind
a green curtain. This is a vivid and striking por
trait. As has been said, Sir Joshua Reynolds
praised the work of Van der Heist.
One of the most delightful bits of cool tone is the
portrait by Ludolf Leendertsz, of a woman holding
her little daughter by the hand. The daylight in
this picture is unusually clear, and the child is a
sweet study of a little Dutch lass of the seventeenth
century. The faces are full of vitality, and the
action and pose, especially of the child, bewitch
ing. Quite interesting is the Paris and CEnone by Jacob

¦Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 297
van Loo, who was a pupil of his father, Jan van
Loo, in Paris, where Jacob died in 1670.
Gerard van Honthorst, a much admired painter of
the first half of the seventeenth century, was gener
ally known by the Italians as Gherardo delle Notti,
owing to his predilection for studies by night and
candle-light. His hideous Dentist hangs here, — it
is too corpselike, and unnecessarily ghastly, and is
enough to make a plucky man shudder ! Gerard van
Honthorst was a native of Utrecht, but spent much
time in Italy. Rubens had a genuine admiration for
him. In the room L may also be seen two of his
candle-light studies. Charles I. sent for Honthorst
to come to England, where he painted many of the
nobility. His work is not very sympathetic, how
ever, and usually lacks beauty. His types are coarse,
and his effects, while startling, have none of the
charm with which Rembrandt knew how to portray
extremes of chiaroscuro.
The Child and Dwarf with a Large Dog, by Jan
Fyt, is an interesting group. Fyt is recognized as
one of the greatest animal painters of the Flemish
school. He has been reported as an assistant of
Rubens, but this is improbable, as he was only fif
teen at the time of Rubens's death. The pretty
child forms a sort of scale by which the spectator
may judge of the extreme size of the dog and the
unusual diminutiveness of the dwarf. He seems a

298 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
link, a human standard of the normal in proportion.
This picture is in Hall J, with the Rubens.
Another painter of note in this hall is Jacob Jor
daens, of whom several examples may be seen. A
contemporary of Rubens and a pupil of Van Noort,
his pictures demonstrate still farther how much
Rubens derived from his early master, for Jor
daens's pictures are frequently taken for Peter
Paul's, and yet Jordaens was not a pupil of Rubens.
This proves that the source of influence was the
same for both. Jordaens's paintings are all very
large, and hang in the hall with Rubens's pictures.
The Ariadne and Bacchus is loathsome. All the
grossness of Rubens is emphasized in Jordaens.
Not much religious sentiment has crept into the
Presentation in the Temple, and, to make a tech
nical criticism, the feet of the kneeling figure in the
foreground are inexcusably badly drawn. The
cheerful genre picture, " As the Old Birds sang, so
the Young ones Pipe," is amusing, and painted in
pleasant tones, but there is a certain lack of real
humour in the fact that the two children are shown
as literally playing on little pipes! The family is
seated, gathered about a table. The elders are
making merry, and two of them are singing. This
very unimaginative treatment of the text is curi
ously devoid of ingenuity.
Perhaps the best of Jordaens's achievements is his

¦Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 299
Diogenes Looking for an Honest Man. The philos
opher is making his way through the crowded
market-place, holding aloft his lantern and wearing
no clothing excepting a cloth about his loins. Every
one is laughing at him, with the rollicking, good-
natured mirth with which a crowd usually greets a
" crank." The venders of fruits and vegetables are
laughing broadly; a boy politely salutes Diogenes
with his thumb raised to his nose ; the older people
smile tolerantly, and one fat, absurd-looking person,
with proper, modem eye-glasses on his nose, puckers
his brow in an effort to imagine what on earth the
philosopher means! This picture is replete with
humour, and repays close observation. It is magnif
icently handled, too.
No. 847 is a portrait by Anton Mor. Morelli
asks humble pardon for having ever taken this pic
ture for a Moroni, even at a distance. He says that
his mistake was wholly inexcusable, for the paint
ing is undeniably Flemish. One respects the spirit
of a true " sport," when a critic so clever as Morelli
is willing to come forth manfully and acknowledge
an error. It gives one additional confidence in his
judgment. The extremely unattractive but beautifully exe
cuted still-life pieces of Jan Weenix are displayed in
all their inordinate detail. Why a man who could
paint as accurately and as finely as Weenix should

300 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
select a dead hare, a dead deer, and a dead cock,
through which to express himself, passes under
standing. Here we have a large canvas covered
with work which would be creditable in a miniature,
and the result, — a rabbit hanging in a most un
gainly way by one leg, surrounded by small di
shevelled game and the implements of the chase, set
against a background of an extremely ornate vase
and a profusion of flowers, — how uninteresting
these masterpieces are! Of all aesthetic specialists,
those with whom I can least enter into a sympathetic
understanding are the painstaking purveyors of still
life and dead birds!
That enormous and busy scene, the Great Bear
Hunt, is uncertain in its ascription. It is by some
pronounced to be a work of Snyders, and by others
to be painted by Paul de Vos. It is rather a speci
men of Dutch than Flemish art, but the point of
authorship has not been decided.
It is strange how generations of critics will pass
over the work of a great painter until one, more
tmly cultured than the rest, with a more trained vis
ion and a better judgment, rises to pronounce him a
genius, and thus raise the fashion for his works. .\rt
ought to be quite independent of fashion, but this is
unfortunately not the case. A notable example of
this feature in critical appreciation is X'^ermeer of
Delft. In his own day he was famous : technically he

¦Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 301
was a great artist ; and yet for nearly two centuries
his name was practically forgotten, many of his
works were assigned to Pieter de Hooch, and the rest
overlooked. Until M. Thore, writing under the pseu
donym of W. Biirger, took up the search for facts
about Vermeer of Delft, there was hardly anything
known of his history ; and this period of silence had
made it difficult to discover data which would have
been more available a century earlier. The actual
bare facts are all that are known : his birth was in
Delft in 1632; in 1654, at the age of twenty-two,
he was already a recognized painter in good stand
ing, for his name was on the books of the Guild of
St. Luke as a Master. It is evident, however, that
he was poor, for he was obliged to pay his entrance
fee of six florins in instalments. He had married at
twenty-one, in spite of his poverty. In 1662 he was
elected Dean of the Guild, which honour was re
peated in 1670. These facts show that his local
fame was high. An art lover of that period writes
that he went to see Vermeer in 1663, and that the
artist had not a single picture to show, every stroke
of his brush having sold; the connoisseur was
obliged to go and see the pictures at the homes of
the owners. That his fortunes improved with age
and fame is proved by his portrait of himself in
his studio, which is now in Vienna. He paints him
self dressed in the prevailing style, in expensive

302 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
materials, working in a studio with a well-tiled floor
and hung with tapestries and brocades and well
furnished. As if to perplex us further as to his
personality, the perverse Vermeer has left us only
this one likeness of himself, and that is only his
back view! So one can form no idea at all of his
appearance beyond the broad Dutch build, and a
shock of hair!
It is supposed that Vermeer was a pupil of Fabri-
tius. The circumstances of his death are not
known; but in 1675, in the full tide of his success,
the records show that he died in Delft. He was
forty-three years of age, and left eight children.
His burial took place in the Old Church in that, his
native city.
The Dresden gallery is unique in possessing the
only life-sized picture ever executed by Vermeer.
In fact, both of his paintings in this collection are
interesting as being quite uncharacteristic, and yet
both singularly fine works, showing that he had not
only one manner, or one prevailing scheme of col
our, as some writers are apt to assume.
The large picture of the Girl and her Lover is
the first to greet us, as it should, it being an early
work. It is one of his first productions, in fact.
Vermeer is especially famous for what is known
as his " moonlight blue," combined with lemon yel
low. This picture has none of the cool quality sug-

if

pn^p

^

^

^^Kv^'-

if

a^^i

Wi^g

^' ^

J

*i

\i

^¦¦^^jll^MU^J^^^H '

kIM

A\
•'•In
S
i
^^^
-
f
M
h
;.:.|
KEi'Pi.;
^^
>^^
f^ ¦#.
"¦
¦:-^C.
^ %.4
''^^^^
Wm
A, "X
¦/
VERMEER OF DELFT.  A GIRL AND HER LOVER
¦Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 303
gested by his habitual combination. It is of an
exactly opposite tone. If a man were to set him
self the task of painting a picture from the compo
nent parts of fire, — the blaze, the smoke, and the
purple concentrated spots here and there, he could
not plan a more symbolic colour scheme than this
to typify the element of flame. The characteristic
lemon yellow of Vermeer is seen in the bodice of
the girl, who, holding a glass of wine in one hand,
extends the other to receive a coin which is being
offered by a blustering fellow whose scarlet coat
comes in direct contact with the crude yellow. His
gray. hat tops his head, as a little gray smoke would
rise above a lurid blaze such as this. A smouldering
red and yellow scheme, on gray, is seen below, in
a Persian rug which is cast across the balcony-rail
ing in the foreground. An old woman bends
eagerly forward to see if the bribe is about to be
accepted, and seems to rejoice in an evil way upon
observing the girl's outstretched hand and smiling
face. She is in black; a cinder, as it were, in the
midst of a conflagration. The subject is not a
pleasant one, but it is treated by a master, and there
is much underlying thought in this suggestive dis
position of colours. The smoky background is ap
propriate, and no criticism can be offered regarding
the technique. The flashily dressed lute-player on
the left, in his dashing black and white costume,

304 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
and with his leering expression, may be regarded as
the bellows fanning the flame. No one so far as
I know has given Vermeer credit for suggesting
this elemental conception, but it seems to be a justi
fiable interpretation of the colour scheme, which is
so unusual for this painter. The picture is over
four feet square. As is fitting for so large a canvas,
the treatment is broader than in most of Vermeer's
work, and the sharp red and yellow, harmonious in
spite of their primitive rawness, are laid in broad,
daring masses.
Instead of beginning by painting small pictures,
and gradually branching out into a larger size, Ver
meer began by treating his subjects on a large scale,
and refining his handling afterward, so that he
never, even in his tiniest cabinet pieces, lost a certain
breadth of feeling which makes his pictures power
ful in spite of their minuteness.
Some writers have called attention to the likeness
between Vermeer and Rembrandt; but Vermeer's
theory of lighting is exactly opposite to that of
Rembrandt. This divergence in their conceptions
of light seems to make such a theory unfounded.
Rembrandt nearly always painted with a dark back
ground. Objects were placed against this, and the
surface and salient points nearest the spectator il
luminated. The effect was light in darkness. Ver
meer is more liable to paint a light background,

¦Rembranbt anb Contemporaries 305
illuminated from the side, with his figures compara
tively in shadow silhouetted against it, in a dark
foreground, — practically shadow in light. Again,
Vermeer has been likened to Pieter de Hooch; so
much so that many of his works were given to De
Hooch. There were differences just as marked as
those between Vermeer and Rembrandt, however,
and it may be well to observe them, since it makes
our enjoyment of both the keener when we have
these points called to our attention. While De
Hooch frequently used the light background with
the same effect as Vermeer, he nearly always painted
a room in conscientious perspective, showing part
of the floor and the ceiling, while Vermeer usually
selected a corner, with neither floor nor ceiling vis
ible, but generally with a window as a means of
letting in a flood of light, which he hardly ever
omitted. Also, De Hooch painted genre of a humble
sort, as a rule, — good little " hausfraus," with
bustling ways of neat care-taking; cosy scenes of
middle-class life. Vermeer selected more often the
aristocratic and elegant subjects (the picture just
described is one of the rare exceptions to this rule),
and his ladies are usually well gowned. One would
go far before finding another Vermeer depicting low
life like that in his large early picture in Dresden.
Vermeer had a wonderful versatility in technique.
"His large painting here is smooth and oily; beauti-

3o6 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
fully liquid and glossy, so that one longs to pass
one's fingers over the glassy surface, though the
detail is not worked up nor belittled.
In tracing the pupils and direct followers of Rem
brandt, it will be necessary to go through the long
line of cabinets in which the smaller Dutch pictures
hang, and, as they are scattered without any special
plan, it will be more satisfactory to mention these
artists as we normally come upon them, instead of
skipping from cabinet to cabinet in search of iso
lated pictures, and then returning to examine others.
In this expedition we shall come across, in its place,
the other example of Vermeer of Delft.

CHAPTER XI.

DUTCH PAINTERS

In Dutch art the subject is secondary. A casual
glance at the names of Dutch pictures, taken at
random in any gallery, suffices to show how little
attention was paid to the story told by the picture ;
how everything depended upon the chiaroscuro, the
perspective, the handling, and the curious concave
effect which pervades these little correct gems of
execution; that quality which allows you to look
into and almost through the composition. Take
the Dresden collection, for instance: what are the
subjects? "Landscape with Four Naked Men;"
" An old Woman with a Candle in her Hand ; " " A
Glass of Wine in a Stone Niche, surrounded by a
Wreath of Flowers; " " Still Life with a Lobster; "
" A Fish Stall ; " " Still Life with a Poem in Praise
of the Herring ; " " Fruit and Oysters with Orange
Blossoms ; " " Collision between a Horseman and a
Peasant's Cart ; " "A Wagon with a white Horse
Kicking;" "An Alchemist smelling a Bottle;"
" Cavalry Fight with some Men hanging on Trees
307

3o8 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
in the Middle Distance; " " Bust of a Blue-eyed Gen
tleman with Hair turning gray;" "Plants with
Insects and other Creatures, among them a Toad."
It is out of all proportion to quote so many of these
eccentricities, but as this is the only mention that
will be made of many of these works of art, we must
be pardoned if we add a few more specimens : " A
drove of Pigs near an Oak Forest ; " " Sheep, Cat
tle, and the Artist, among Ruins;" " Fmit-piece
with a Stag Beetle;" and "A Pond with Ducks
and other Birds upon it." It shows how little the
Dutch cared what they were regarding when they
looked upon a picture, provided that it was well
rendered. There is no effort made to portray his
toric scenes : even the possibilities of contemporary
history are overlooked, and a choice is made instead
from among the absolutely domestic scenes of pri
vate life. The very breakfast-table, in the disorder
of a finished repast, was considered a sufficient ex
cuse for a cabinet picture; a bunch of flowers was
regarded as a scene, and the advent of a snail among
them as an episode. The one thing demanded of
a Dutch painter was that his work should bear the
closest inspection : it was to be studied in the bou
doir, by the dim light which filtered in through
shuttered windows; it must stand the test of the
lorgnette and the most critical scmtiny ; but it need
not cause an emotion or awaken a thought beyond

Dtttcb painters 309
the curiosity of the beholder in wondering how it
was ever possible to accomplish its technical perfec
tion ! As Fromentin has aptly remarked, " Drink
ing, smoking, and kissing maids cannot be called
very rare or attractive incidents.''
In other words, Dutch pictures entirely lack plot.
Never, until the very different reaction among the
realists in the late nineteenth century, was there
such a dearth of incident in art. Treating these
pictures, then, in the spirit in which they were pro
duced, we must approach them without expecting
emotions or ideas, simply as wonderful achieve
ments of the craft of the painter, small, intimate,
often pleasant, sometimes stupid, but invariably neat
as a Dutch housewife.
The public sale of paintings in markets was cus
tomary in Holland as well as in Spain. As is well
known, Murillo's early talents were turned toward
these pictures for the " feria." In Evelyn's Diary
we find a passage, written in 1641, mentioning the
"annual marte or faire " in Rotterdam, "so fur
nished with pictures, especially landscapes and droll
eries, as they call those clounish representations,
that I was amazed." Naturally this profusion of
paintings made household decoration quite lavish:
another traveller tells that " the interior of Dutch
houses is yett more rich than their outside; not in
hangings, but in pictures, which the poorest there

3IO XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
are furnished with-all, not a cobbler but hath his
toyes for ornament." Sometimes it seems to have
been considered a courtesy for artists to introduce
into their paintings of interiors, tiny reproductions
of well-known pictures by their contemporaries. In
one of Jan Steen's pictures in Berlin there occurs
Frans Hals's " Drinker," hung high on the wall,
and in one of Pieter de Hooch's interiors there is
to be seen a representation of one of Ter Borch's
cabinet pictures. Hogarth also adopted this idea
in Ejigland, and has often introduced famous pic
tures hanging on the walls of the apartments which
he portrayed.
Philips Wouwermans's pictures hang in all these
cabinets, distributed here and there. His works do
not attract the eye, although many of them are
interesting when examined. His Stable at an Inn,
No. 1424, has a spacious, dark, cavemlike fore
ground, looking out into the light; a white horse
very properly stands in relief before a dark wall,
while a black horse and rider are silhouetted against
the light horizon. It is interesting to compare his
Hunters Going to the Chase and another picture
called the Return from Hunting. In the first, No.
1440, one sees the active spirit of the moming, with
the brisk horses and men and dogs; in the latter,
No. 1439, the evening glow, the tired and relaxed
steeds, and the thirsty dogs, drinking at the foun-

Dutcb painters 311
tain. Wouwermans's battle pieces in this gallery
are famous. One of them, No. 1463, is much en
hanced by the introduction of a burning windmill,
which gives a counter interest and an unusual light
ing to the cavalry charge which forms the main
subject. There is fine action in the figure near the
centre, a man on horseback, mounted on a noble
charger like one described by a Spanish author as
" not so thin lady-like as the Barb, nor so gross as
the Neapolitan, but between both." This picture
should be noticed in Cabinet 15.
The grouping of his pictures is always good.
This feature is sometimes overlooked because it is
not conspicuous, but there are few artists who have
turned out so many uniformly excellent pieces of
proportion in composition. Industrious and facile,
and gifted with an even, reliable talent, he has exe
cuted a grea.t number of pictures, without taking
the first rank as a genius. There are over sixty of
his works in Dresden. A detailed account of them
would be out of place in a volume of this size. It
used to be almost assumed that any picture with
several figures, in which a white horse was promi
nent, must be by Wouwermans. But this theory
was of course not long-lived. Wouwermans is not
a landscape painter pure and simple; he is not a
figure painter; nor yet is he primarily an animal
painter ; but in all three in combination he is excel-

312 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
lent. There is no special weakness which has to be
overlooked, his landscapes, figures, and animals are
all equally acceptable.
Wouwermans was a native of Haarlem, bom in
1 6 19, and studied with his father and Wynants,
until such time as he chose to elope with a young
lady, after which he stayed for awhile in Hamburg.
Upon his return he became a member of the Guild
in 1640. He lived to be only forty-nine years old,'
dying in 1668. No contemporary artist has left
so large a stock of works behind him. Each picture
has in it some definite episode. It may be of a
trifling nature, but it is always a reason for the
selection of the subject. Of these works there re
main over seven hundred. His Scriptural subjects
are very rare. In Dresden may be seen two, the
Angels Appearing to the Shepherds, No. 1411, and
the Preaching of the Baptist, No. 1466.
It is supposed that three styles may be detected
in Wouwermans's works : that his early works are
generally warm and russet in tone, his middle pro
ductions less so, and his mature work quite silvery
and full of daylight. To judge of the value of this
theory, one would have to know the dates of the
various pictures. The Glad Tidings is early; but
the others, not being dated, are not easily classified,
except by taking this as a premise, and deciding
their epochs by their tones.

11

'>- ^\' %'

I

iHJUJHjgjHHK M > tfj

f1,
VAN DER WERFF.  EXPULSION OF HAGAR
Dutcb painters 313
The oily, slippery gleam of Van der Werff's pic
tures greets us in the seventh cabinet. Smooth
skins, enamelled complexions, velvety grass, and
shimmering satins, a mellifluous overbloom of pink
Dresden china rustics : these are the things which
delight Van der Werff. What could be less like an
amorous shepherd and his lass than these two coy,
silky smirkers in an exotic arbour, in No. 1812?
What less like the Expulsion of Hagar (except
Jan Steen's treatment of the same theme) than the
graceful Greek ballet-girl saying a fluttering adieu
to the benign Apostolic gentleman in the strong
light, in No. 1822? Another smooth, sleek captiva-
tor is his Venus, who sits in a careless attitude on
a bank, coquettishly glancing out at the spectator
while she divests herself of the last folds of a Lib
erty scarf! All is honey-sweet — would be beau
tiful decoration on a box of fine confectionery.
Many others hang here, but they are rather cloying,
although exquisitely rendered. The Judgment of
Paris is decidedly pretty : the figures are fauWessly
elastic and buoyant, the hands and arms being so
extravagantly graceful that they are perilously near
to being affected. Sweetly insipid, they are adapted
to please the people whose mental grasp is satisfied
by Boug^uereau and Carlo Dolci. Not that I mean
to give the impression that either of these artists
is not greater than Van der Werff ; but the type

314 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
of satisfaction is of the same order. Adriaen Van
der Werff was born near Rotterdam in 1659, and
lived until 1722, — well into the decadence. A por
trait of him may be seen in No. 18 13. His wife,
a brisk, dressy individual, is seated at the left, while
the three well-clad children are apparently giving
an informal concert on the other side. They appear
to be singing, while one, holding a flat shell and a
paint-brush, is probably intended to suggest heredi
tary talent. Behind them, towering in a sort of
satin toga carelessly slung about him, and with a
knotted scarf at his throat, is the magnificent and
bombastic painter himself, — he looks just as one
expects him to.
Hermann Saftleven, an artist of Rotterdam and
Utrecht, is the author of several inconspicuous land
scapes in these rooms. One of the uninteresting
pictures of the class of which we have spoken is
Still life with a Kingfisher, supposed to be by Hon-
decoeter, but of questioned authenticity. In No. 9
are several pictures with landscape tendencies by a
pupil of Polenburgh, Johannes van Haensbergen.
In the realistic Dutch character are An Oyster
Breakfast and Dead Game with a Partridge and a
Bulfinch, by Willem von Aelst.
Here may be seen a rather decadent composition
by Sperling, a pupil of Van der Werff, representing
Vertumnus come in the disguise of an old woman

Dutcb painters 315
to persuade Pomona. The idea is not strictly pleas
ant ; the gloating hag, with her hand on her heart,
seems to be taking a mean advantage of the ingenu
ous Pomona, who, not suspecting the sex of her
visitor, has not troubled herself to disguise her own
nudity. The pretty little pictures of Frans van Mieris are
scattered about in all the rooms so that they must
be noticed at various times on a tour through the
gallery, but it is better to treat of them all together.
Frans van Mieris was a pupil of Dou, and was
bom in Leyden (some say Delft) in 1635. His
father was a lapidary, who would have been glad
of his son in his own trade, as was the customary
expectation of Dutch fathers, but the boy soon
proved himself adapted to a more exalted art.
Never an intellectual painter, not attempting such
expression as Ter Borch nor such intuition as Steen,
Mieris was a charming purveyor of pleasant scenes,
suitable for drawing-room decoration; gallants,
ladies, rich stuffs, and all the paraphernalia of the
well-to-do homes of Holland. These cabinet bits
naturally became very popular, and his rather sugary
style was much applauded by those who were tired
of seeing peasants and tavem-brawlers at every
turn. His courtly little studio pictures in Dresden,
1750, the artist painting a lady's portrait, and
the Connoisseur in the Artist's Studio, No. 1751,

3i6 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
are hung in the eleventh room, and give a good
idea of the appearance of this painter in his environ
ment. Mieris was reputed to be a rather hard liver :
he was a friend of Steen, and undoubtedly spent
many evenings at Steen's tavern in company with
his friends. There is a legend that he caught his
death from tumbling into the canal one night on his
way home when under the influence of liquor, but
this report is not vouched for by any very indubi
table historian. His Soldier Smoking is a delight
fully lazy and casual composition ; the man seems
easy and well-bred beside the average Dutch smok
ers which one meets in art !
The Lute Player with her Teacher is a very at
tractive painting; the detail is exquisite, and the
quality and texture of the changeable red and yellow
jacket of the lady must have been a source of de
light to the fair connoisseurs of Holland. The
Young Woman receiving a love-letter, too, is very
pleasing. Mieris is obvious, and not as piquant as
the painters who seem to have some better reason
for producing a picture than simply to provide an
acceptable parlour ornament.
The Jolly Toper in an Arched \A'^indow, by
Willem van Mieris the younger, son and pupil of
Frans van Mieris, is to be seen here. There is
rather a degeneration, however, from his father's
work. There are many examples here of Willem

Dutcb painters 317
van Mieris, the best perhaps being the Young Man
with a Hurdy-gurdy resting, while a girl brings
him wine, No. 1766, in which the detail is capital,
and the tones clear.
A striking gray sea piece, the waves being re
markably well painted, is the Storm on a Rocky
Coast, by Simon de Vlieger. It is in the eighth cab
inet. No. 1552, in the eleventh cabinet, is a study of
moonlight on a river brink, by Aert van der Neer.
The trees and little church are almost as silhouettes
against the sky, and the effect is charming.
Although Caspar Netscher was born in Heidel
berg in 1639, he is reckoned as a Dutch painter.
He is preeminently a painter of " conversation "
pieces. His people are richly dressed, and his style
is elegant in the extreme. His handling is free
and broad for a worker in such minute detail. He
painted in Holland, with a short visit to England.
The youth of Caspar Netscher was clouded by a
terrible experience. After his father's death, his
mother, with her three little children, was obliged
to fly before the Swedish soldiers, she being a
Roman Catholic. She took refuge in a fortress
which was afterward reduced to subjection by fam
ine, and the poor woman saw two of her children
starve to death. Caspar was the only survivor.
After this they managed to escape to Arnheim,
where they were under the protection of a philan-

3i8 XCbe Hrt Of tbe Dresben Galler?
thropist who saw to the education of the boy. Turn
ing to art by every preference, young Netscher soon
became a good painter, and by the time he was
twenty supported himself with his pencil. He
started on a journey to Italy, but when he arrived
at Bordeaux he fell in love, and never went farther
south; he soon returned, married, to The Hague,
and in 1663 he became a member of the Society of
Painters. Netscher was famous in portraiture. When
William III. was asked to sit to Ter Borch, for his
likeness, he replied, "I have sat to Netscher; no
one can rival him at a portrait." Netscher died at
the age of forty-five in 1684, being a terrible suf
ferer from gout. Dresden is the best gallery in
which to study him, as a large proportion of his
best pictures hang in these cabinets. All the way
from the eighth cabinet, where is his incomparable
Letter Writer, with unusual beauty of face, to the
seventeenth, they occur here and there, and should
be looked for with interest.
Caspar Netscher's beautiful textures of satin
gleam from some of these little pictures : exquisite
whites and golds shine in the study of a Lady with
a Little Dog, having her hair arranged by a maid;
Mme. de Montespan is seen twice, once in pure
white, and again, playing the harp, with the little
Duke de Maine, in a childlike spirit of imitation,

Dutcb painters 319
seated at her feet picking away at a guitar ! A lady
singing in a stone window, with a youth playing
the lute behind her, is also an attractive composi
tion. These are in the seventeenth cabinet; in the
thirteenth are also some of Netscher's. The Sick
Lady and her Physician, a most popular theme, is
effective, as are also the genre subjects of a some
what lower social scale, the Old Woman Spinning,
and the Woman Sewing. The Girl with a Parrot
is a copy, but is gay and interesting in colour.
Netscher is fond of introducing Persian rugs for
table-cloths; and most decorative spots they are.
The Dutch masters all used them freely, but
Netscher perhaps oftenest of all.
A couple of still life studies by Abraham Mignon
should be noticed ; he was a pupil of De Heem, and
several of his works are scattered among these
Dutch rooms; though Mignon was a native of
Frankfort, he studied with De Heem in the Nether
lands. Cornelis van Polenburgh has decorated the ninth
cabinet with many attractive landscape subjects,
and in each may be seen his charming little figures.
Polenburgh was specially celebrated for his small
nude figures : a novelty in Dutch art of the period.
He was born in 1586 at Utrecht, spent some time in
Italy, and also in England, where he painted por
traits of notables, finally returning to his birth-

320 tCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
place, where he lived until 1667. His Httle flying
figures are particularly charming. The inimitable
humourist, C. S. Calverley, has spoken of birds
which were " as rosy as pinks, or as roses pinky."
Such a phrase must be coined for Polenburgh's
aerial infants. Whether they are Chemby Cupids
or Cupidy Cherubs, will never be decided. Polen
burgh was reputed to be a student of Raphael, but
Walpole certainly speaks truly when he remarks,
" it is impossible to say where they find Raphael
in Polenburgh!" His pictures have a smooth,
varnish-like surface, but they are rather neat and
pleasing than original or significant. Polenburgh
frequently filled in the figures in Steenwyck's per
spective studies.
A very grateful female figure, lighted with much
effect, is to be observed in Berchem's Reception of
the Moor. A merchant is seen before whom a
finely dressed, swarthy Moor is standing. It would
seem that the story of Desdemona and Othello had
reached the artist, and that he represented the meet
ing much as it was described by Shakespeare.
Berchem lived in Amsterdam during the latter sev
enteenth century.
In the tenth cabinet one comes upon the other
example of the delightful Vermeer of Delft, quite
unlike the large genre subject wliich we examined
in the room with the Rembrandts. .\ different

VERMEER OF DELFT.  LADY READING A LETTER

Dutcb painters 321
side to the painter in every particular is to be
noted in this exquisite little gem, a young girl read
ing a letter by an open window. The first impres
sion is that of a bath of cool green light — too acid
for sea-water, but more like the colour of an unripe
lemon. The curtain, painted so roughly yet so
cleverly, is the first surface to catch the eye: its
liquid green folds are as opposed to the colour senti
ment of the other picture as it would be possible to
plan. The same tender lime colour glows on the
gown of the girl, who is reading — and really read
ing; not posing with a letter before an audience.
The crispness of Vermeer's touch is sometimes
likened to that of Hals, and there is much in com
mon. His outlines are always softened, never hard.
In this way he is a great painter of atmosphere.
There is hardly a more charming example of his
work in Europe than this little green lady.
Frans Hals was born in Antwerp about 1580,
but his family being Haarlem people, he spent most
of his life in that town. He was the real founder
of the Dutch school. We have none of his large
pictures in Dresden — only some portraits. The
two heads of men, tiny, but dashing, do not in the
least exhibit the master's true qualities of breadth
and light. In one of them. No. 1359, he certainly
laboured under a great disadvantage on account of
the singular hideousness of his sitter!

322 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
Frans Hals, popular in his own immediate day,
but soon forgotten, was only rediscovered, as it
were, by artists like himself. People had not real
ized the power of his work, until men like Sir
Joshua Reynolds and later Eugene Fromentin came
to study his great broad strokes. Then it was that
these men revealed to the dulled sensibilities of
those who called themselves critics, this inestimably
brilliant leader. Only a man who used a brush
himself could fully appreciate the rapid, true, accu
rate work of Hals ; only a man who knew the uses
of hght and shade could detect the work of the
great master who knew so well how to bring day
light into the confines of a canvas. We do not even
know who his master was; he is certainly the
product of no then existing school. There has been
a suggestion that the master of Rubens might have
been the master of Hals, but this is almost entirely
conjectural. As there are none of his early works
remaining, it is not easy to trace his progress: he
bursts upon us in his full ripeness, and in nearly
every picture by his hand there is a power and vital
ity which are developed to a surprising degree. He
was preeminently a great painter of men. Nature,
aside from human nature, seems not to have made
an appeal to him; he introduces as little still life
as is consistent with his subjects. Humanity and
the human face in expressions of joy and optimism

Dutcb painters 323
are his preferences. Even animals he did not care
to introduce. Great studies of cheerful men and
women are what we generally associate with his
name; there is no man who can so subtly produce
the impression of a smile held in abeyance as can
Frans Hals. He was a great precursor of modern
reahsm; poetry and mystery were closed books to
him. His imagination was never displayed. Facts
— great human facts — and a power making for
cheerfulness — these are the characteristics of Frans
Hals. His handling was not only original, but at
that time unique. The long flat strokes have an
individual charm which cannot fail to delight any
man who has ever tried to give expression himself
through the same medium.
He used a canvas fairly coarse, but seldom as
heavy as those employed by the Venetians. Once
in awhile he used oak panel, while he was in his
early stages of development. The two little por
traits in Dresden are on wood. Perhaps one can
get a better idea of Hals's late manner from the
painting by his son, of Hille Bobbe and a Smoking
Man, which hangs in Hall K. It is very spirited,
and the touch is much like Frans Hals's own later
work. His brushes were usually of medium size, except
when he used a fine brush for hair and details. His
colour is usually well diluted, and he seldom loads

324 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
with heavy, dry impasto. Therefore his pictures
are better lasting than some of his contemporaries,
and are even and smooth in the actual plane of the
surface, though the effect will often be rough. He
was a rapid worker, and finished his task at once,
so that it all dried evenly, and is less liable to crack
and scale. Hals had certain limitations, whether
intentional or accidental we do not know. There
has never been a religious subject by his hand, or
a nude, or a classical scene. He was purely con
temporaneous — he did not dig into the past for his
inspiration. The question of his having been a hard drinker
and a worthless fellow is answered by his achieve
ment. Gay and volatile he may have been, and hot-
tempered and difficult to live with; but he must
have been nearly always in a reliable state, for an
intoxicated man cannot be a brilliant painter. The
bottle occasionally inspires eloquence, and some
times wit, or a musical ecstasy ; but for the accurate
use of a brush in fluid paint, a wavering hand or
elated vision are out of the question. There is no
doubt that he got into financial troubles. The
workhouse and the Police courts had to be heard
from, particularly at the end of his life. In 1656
his baker sued him for two hundred Carolus Gulden :
in 1662, he himself applied for aid to the municipal
council, and received a hundred and fifty florins.

Dutcb painters 325
Later they pensioned him with two hundred gulden,
and presented him with three loads of peat. He
died in great want, and was buried in 1666, in the
choir of St. Bavon at Haarlem.
Ruysdael has painted the topographical portrait
of Holland. Each characteristic of his native coun
try is brought out in the course of his studies. Ruys
dael is the central figure in the landscape art of the
seventeenth century. It is interesting to see how
his subjects bear out the statement of Kugler, that
there is in Ruysdael a renewal of the spirit of
nature-worship ascribed to the early Germans by
Tacitus. " The land," writes Tacitus, " though
varied to a considerable extent in its aspect, is yet
universally shagged with forests, or deformed by
marshes: moister on the side of Gaul, more bleak
on the side of Noricum and Pannonia. . . . they
unite in worship of Mother Earth, and suppose her
to interfere in the affairs of men, and to visit the
different nations." The belief of the ancient Ger
mans conceming the sunrise was that " the sound
of his emerging from the ocean is also heard, and
the form of a deity with rays beaming from his
head is beheld. ... In their ancient songs, . . .
they celebrate the god Tuisto, sprung from the
earth." Very little is known of Ruysdael; he was bom
about 1630, and died in 1682; he was a friend of

326 tCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
the painter Berchem, and of Hobbema: Solomon
Ruysdael was his elder brother, and possibly his
first teacher. There are not many records of his
life. A few documents are extant in which his
name occurs, and that is almost the only testimony
as to the events of his life.
He began as an engraver, perhaps under the in
struction, or at any rate, under the influence, of
Everdingen of Haarlem. He soon abandoned the
burin and the " eau forte " for the pencil, and some
of his paintings would appear to date from his
twentieth year, when it is possible that he had trav
elled somewhat.
Up to the time that Ruysdael was made a
Burgher of Amsterdam, in 1659, his works
amounted to about two hundred and fifty. He de
veloped and advanced enormously on his arrival in
Amsterdam. This was really the most important
event of his life, so far as we know his history.
One of the rare records states that in 1661 he
served on a Committee regarding the inspection of
certain art treasures; in 1668 he is mentioned as
a witness at the marriage of the painter, Hobbema
In 1667 he made a will in favour of his half-sister:
it is evident that he then considered his health in
a precarious condition. He had contracted a serious
rheumatic condition from sitting among the damp
polders when he made his sketches. His pictures of

<
o

Dutcb painters 327
this type certainly would account for any rheuma
tism or malaria which he may have had.
Houbraken writes, " I discover no evidence that
fortune ever favoured him with her company." He
was unappreciated, and his art was not a sufficient
means of support. To prevent himself from starv
ing, he undertook to paint landscape backgrounds
for his fellow artists, filling in their pictures for so
much a foot. Some of the pictures in which he so
collaborated have been saved, more on his account
than because of the value of the other artist's work.
For instance, in Hall K, there is a mediocre picture
by Jan Vonck, No. 1637, which is chiefly interesting
because Ruysdael painted the wooded scene. The
deer pursued by dogs is of secondary importance.
Finally, in the year 1681, there is a record that
his friends arranged to pay for his maintenance at
the Haarlem Hospital. Ending his days thus in an
Institution, this sad life came to a close in 1682,
when another mention occurs, of " opening a tomb
for Jacob Ruysdael in the south aisle of the church
of St. Bavon, four florins."
One of the most poetic of Ruysdael's pictures, full
of romantic solitude, is the Monastery. The de
serted building, crumbling into min, leads the eye
toward a verdured slope, while on the right is a
clump of graceful trees, casting a cool shadow on
the damp, marshy foreground. One cannot but

328 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
fancy that the Monastery was abandoned because
of the amount of malaria which must have lurked
in this lonely spot.
Another landscape in which there is a species of
defunct human interest is the Jewish Burying-
ground, in this same cabinet. This cemetery was
in Amsterdam. The dank little spot, with its neg
lected tombs, past which a small cataract tumbles,
typifying the indifference of Nature to human loss,
is full of mystery. A storm has just passed; a
sullen shadow of mist still veils the church in the
background, while the promise of the rainbow is
held in the distance.
Dresden abounds in these damp, peaceful, un
wholesome specimens of Ruysdael. Of his wilder
mood we have few opportunities to judge: The
Ford in the Wood, in the sixteenth cabinet, is a
study of placid water : one of the few pictures in
which a cart, horse, and men appear. The Chase,
too, — a stag being hunted across a stream, — is
much the same in general topographical arrange
ment. The atmospheric feeling is cheerful in this,
and the animation given to the scene by the active
little figures is immediately felt.
The view of Castle Bentheim up on its high hill
is most romantic. The luxuriance of the foliage
and undergrowth in the foreground is very rich.
It is thought that the elaboration of this part of the

Dutcb painters 329
picture was probably added in later years, as the
aerial perspective of the castle and the hill is some
what amateurish, and is probably the work of
Ruysdael's early days. There are three character
istic waterfalls : one usually associates the name of
Ruysdael with these manifestations of nature.
Fromentin calls our attention to the way any
picture by Ruysdael " rests solidly with its four
corners upon the shining flutings of the frame."
He lays much stress upon the fact that Ruysdael
considers the appearance which his work will have
when framed, and plans his tones so that the bright
gold may be becoming to them.
A distant view of a Ruysdael is not a fair test.
He was as conscientious as a Pre-Raphaelite, and
the light does not penetrate the picture for your
examination imtil you come nearer. His pictures
are not animated : they are often almost heavy and
frequently positively morose. Yet he is unique, and
piques the interest through his mysteriousness and
the evidences of a mind back of his work, the more
interesting because there is so little known of his
history. Often one feels that the intention of a landscape
is to perpetuate some mood of the artist, as in the
Monastery the sentiment of quiet is emphasized.
The Monastery is a most famous work ; the damp,
marshy foregrounds of his pictures of this period

330 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
suggest the influence of the drawings brought by
Everdingen from Scandinavia. He could not paint
either figures or cattle successfully; he had no
adaptability for rendering anything but the expres
sion of nature, and even in that he usually employed
a limited palette; grays and greens predominating.
Solitude is the chief characteristic of most of his
pictures : whether this is felt principally because he
was unable to represent animal and human life, or
by intention, is the question. Ruysdael was too
impersonal to be the fashion. He had no striking
mannerisms : he was slow and faithful, and without
any tricks; painstaking, at a time when skill and
rapidity were in demand. Hardship and a lack of
a comprehending appreciation on the part of his
contemporaries gradually undermined his enthusi
asm, and consequently his work fell off. The mor
bid love for storms and torrents, for scenes of nat
ural cruelty, and stem, relentless cataracts, offset
with sombre, brooding pines, characterizes his later
style. He was a thinker, and his compositions all
show this. Whether the thought were gloomy or
cheerful, the mental process is never absent. Until
the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries,
Ruysdael did not become the fashion, and conse
quently was overlooked. His life must have been
full of disappointment, but his work connotes a
character which had arrived at the true peace; the

Dutcb painters 331
ability to adapt his longings to his environment.
Even in sorrow, no repining or bitterness appears.
The Two Cavaliers in a Sandy Road, by Thomas
de Keyser, lacks power, yet it gives a certain early
seventeenth-century impression of out-of-door life:
the man in advance h£is a falcon on his wrist, and
the broad-chested, stubby steeds are not without
action. Adriaen Van der Velde is primarily regarded as
a landscape and cattle painter, but of all his pictures
in Dresden the most striking is a masterly scrap, —
a woman drinking, No. 1656, in which the handling
is magnificent. Van der Velde and Wouwermans
were close friends, working together as boys in the
studio of Jan Wynants. Wynants evidently had a
discriminating wife. This lady gave her husband
warning, saying : " You may imagine that you have
a mere pupil in this youth ; but if you are not care
ful he will soon become your master." Relations
between master and scholar, however, did not be
come strained, although the good wife was justified
in her prophecy.
We have three pasturage scenes which are very
typical, one in this room, in which the artist's own
portrait appears. In the fourteenth cabinet is his
Sports on the Ice, a typical Dutch winter scene,
with skaters and sledges. A gabled house stands
high on a cliff at the right.

332 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
The famous Water Mill of Meindert Hobbema
stands in the twelfth cabinet upon an easel; it is
a rare gem bought in Munich in 1899, and brought
to Dresden. It is as exquisite a specimen of this
artist as any that exist ; its soft green and its tender,
clear atmosphere make it a masterpiece of priceless
value. Eeckhout's Vision of Jacob is not so graceful a
composition as that by Ferdinand Bol recently ex
amined. The angels are not so tall, willowy, and
spirit-like. Gerhard van Eeckhout was a pupil of
Rembrandt, and a pleasing painter of this school,
but must come decidedly under the head of an imi
tator. Here we see two specimens of the remark
able young cattle painter, Paul Potter. To most
people Paul Potter stands only as the painter of
the Young Bull at The Hague; volumes have been
written about this picture, which holds a unique
position in the field of art. These smaller panels
in Dresden would hardly predispose one to place
Potter among the great geniuses of the world. Yet
he has been accorded such a place ; and we cannot
overlook the fact. Perhaps one secret of his enor
mous fame lies in the fact of his early death. Bora
in 1625, he only lived until 1654, and having this
short-lived glory in common with the great Italian
may account for his being styled the Raphael of
Animals. But whoever would have an opinion on

Dutcb painters 333
this point must compare Potter's Bull with the Sis
tine Madonna. Then he is in a position to determine
for himself whether he considers the appellation a
just one. Sentimental people have claimed that the
youthful Potter died of overwork. Overwork did
not kill Rubens, nor Rembrandt, nor Van Dyck,
nor any of the extremely prolific painters of history.
More exactly scientific people admit that Paul Pot
ter was consumptive, and that is a sufficient reason
for his early death. The life was a pathetic one;
his character seems to have been lovable, and his
talent and ambition conspicuous from the first. The
wonderful part of his achievement is that he was
self-instructed, and that he was a full-fledged painter
at fifteen. Whether he would have continued to
advance at the same rate had he lived to grow older
is a question which never can be answered. It
seems to me that his position in art hinges chiefly
upon these qualities of precocity and pathos. And
they are powerful factors in fame, perhaps as ra
tional as any others. Paul Potter's Cattle in a Pas
ture should not be unnoticed. It is very character
istic, and is dated 1652. The paint is so thin in
places that the wooden panel can be detected under
neath, and yet the effect is that of a tender glow.
This was painted only two years before his death.
Gotfried Schalcken was an imitator of Gerard
Dou, though a pupil of Hoogstraeten. He lived

334 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
much at The Hague, where he died in 1706, but his
earlier associations are with Dort. He is an apostle
of the candle. The Girl Holding an Egg to the
Light is interesting: the bargain-loving market-
goer is testing eggs in this way at the stall before
buying them. A dozen meant a real dozen in those
days. Every egg must be edible ! A curious study
by sharp candle-light is that of a young man who, in
very obscure darkness, holds a lighted candle before
the marble bust of a woman, whose face the flame
illumes garishly. This trick of casting lights was
much liked by Schalcken; in Cabinet 8 there is a
picture of a lady holding a light so that it would
illuminate the face of the spectator, — a singular
fancy. The illusion is good; one feels inclined to
shield one's eyes from the glare, in order to get
a better look at the girl.
A merry, frosty scene of sport is by Isaac van
Ostade, a pupil and brother of Adriaen, who lived
from 1 62 1 to 1649. Amusement on the ice is the
title of this crisp little picture, and skaters are seen
skimming the glassy surface, while wood-cutters
are also guiding their teams across the hard, frozen
river. One should not pass the little panel called the
Wine Bibber, by Arie de Vois. a Dutchman of the
early seventeenth century, without noting the deli
cious study of facial expression in the picture.

Dutcb painters 335
Nikolaus Knupfer, a little-known artist, who had
the honour of being the master of Jan Steen, has
painted a portrait of himself and his family, which
hangs in this room. It is a most attractive group,
merry and naive; evidently Knupfer knew some
thing of the joy of living, and his very love for his
home life may account for the fact that there are
few things told of him by the chroniclers. That he
could paint well is manifest. He represents himself
as leader of a little domestic orchestra. He holds
a sheet of music, and is evidently keeping time. His
smiling wife holds a nude child of two years, who
stands on the table, in a martial attitude, playing
vigorously on her little pipe. A child of eight or
ten is singing from another sheet of music, while
a smaller one is throwing back his head in amuse
ment, and pointing derisively at the baby and its
musical efforts. The whole certainly suggests a
family harmony.
In Pieter Codde's Soldiers in a Guard-room, the
touch is like that of the French artist, Meissonnier.
This little panel is No. 1391.
The best piece of still life in the gallery is an
extremely disordered breakfast-table, on which
glasses and goblets appear, a dish with part of a
pasty, on the top of which lies an Apostle spoon,
and an overturned silver cup of beautiful design.
A dagger lies on the table, and at the other side an

336 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
old-fashioned timepiece, with its open case. A key
on a ribbon depends from this. The quality of the
transparent glass and the sparkling liquid within
could hardly be more perfectly presented. Such
rendering of still life reminds us of the famous
fountain in Rome, above which was painted a cor
nice, so skilfully imitated that birds, in attempting
to alight upon it, not infrequently fell into the
water below! A critic of i860 said of the Dutch
school that they thought more of satin than of sun
shine, and that their people looked like " models
painted by candle-light strained through crape."
The names of the pictures by Egbert van der
Poel will serve to classify them among the unimagi
native Dutch works already alluded to: Male and
Female Peasant in a Stable Near an Oven; and
Courtship in a Peasant's Room.
Gerard Dou was born in Leyden in 1613. His
father intended him to follow his own trade, as an
engraver on glass, and had him taught drawing
for that purpose. For a time he devoted himself
to this craft, but he soon showed such decided ar
tistic talent that his father very wisely sent him to
study with the " skilled and far-famed Mr. Rem
brandt " in 1628.
Gerard commenced his independent career with
intentions of becoming a portrait painter; but his
slow, minute work proved too great a tax on the

Dutcb painters 337
patience of most sitters, so that he was fain to in
dulge his taste chiefly in genre pictures, in which
a considerable amount of still life occurred, — a
safe model for such a plodding, snail-like worker,
since it did not get restless with being so labori
ously studied ! The " Vanitas " picture of the
period — a skull, Bible, and hour-glass — proved a
great resource for Don's early efforts ; these morbid
subjects were bought in great numbers by the faith
ful, being considered as wholesome reminders of
the future.
In many of Don's early works we recognize the
famous old model of Rembrandt, — an aged man
with white hair and beard. In Don's Hermit in
Dresden, painted about 1631, this person occurs.
All the usual attributes of a " Vanitas " are also
introduced. Perhaps if Amsterdam had then had
its famous Zoo, Dou would have made a little pil
grimage there and learned to paint a lion, so that
this picture would have taken on the greater dignity
of a St. Jerome! The Flowers and Still Life are
admirably rendered, — detail was his passion, and
it grew stronger always.
The Portrait of the Artist in his Studio is a
crowded piece of still life, in the midst of which
Gerard Dou sits with a pen, apparently in the act
of writing on a picture in a book. Very little
actual thought is visible in such a composition —

338 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
the nice finish was what the artist was thinking of.
It would have been quite impossible for Dou to
have worked in such an atmosphere! He was so
morbidly particular that he would allow no move
ment in his studio while he was working, for fear
of disturbing some dust which might spoil his
" enamail " surface. If he had been familiar with
the method of making lacquer, — if he had known
that every time a coat of the varnish is applied,
the object being decorated is taken out to sea in
a small boat, so that it may dry where there is no
dust, I have no doubt that Gerard would have set
up a rowboat and started off up the canal into the
open sea between coats! I question whether Dou
himself gave its name to this picture. HFs studio
must have been intentionally as bare as it conve
niently could be.
Orlers, a chronicler of Dou, says that " every
body who saw them could but admire their pretti-
ness and curiosity, and his pieces were soon held
in great esteem by lovers of art," and Philips Angel,
court painter, remarks upon " a curious dexterity
indeed which he achieves with a sure and firm
hand." Sandrart gives a description of Don's
method of work: "he rubs down his colours on
glass," says the narrator, " and makes his brushes
himself; he keeps his palette, brushes, and paints
carefully away out of the dust which might soil

GERARD DOU.  PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST IN HIS STUDIO

Dutcb painters 339
them, and when he prepares to paint he will wait
quite a long time until all dust has completely set
tled. Only then does he very quietly take his palette
out of its box near at hand, the prepared colours
and brushes, and begin to work : and when he has
done he puts everything carefully away again ! "
Dutch studios were all equipped with collections of
prints and engravings, which the painter often con
sidered in the light of models, using what other
men had designed instead of what he might com
pile himself from figfures and nature. This time and
labour-saving expedient was commended by De
Piles, who observed that "it is good to make use
of the studies of others, without any hesitation."
Diirer's Treatise on Perspective was a book always
found in Dutch studios, which were all furnished
with a few, but valuable, books ; the Bible and Ovid
were the most popular quarries. Landscape artists
made first drawings from nature, and then finished
them in the studio. This accounts for their lack of
daylight. Dou liked the arched window as a secondary
frame for his subjects. In most of his more im
portant works this is to be seen ; sometimes a plain
stone arch, as in the Old Schoolmaster Mending his
Pen, No. 1709, and again an ornately carved aper
ture, as in the Violin Player, No. 1707, which, prob-

340 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
ably without foundation, has popularly been sup
posed to be a portrait of the artist himself.
Another peculiarity of Don's besides the use of
the arched window was his love for studies of deep
gloom with candle-light effects. There are several
characteristic specimens of this type in Dresden.
Modern critics are too prone to speak of this sort
of study as " artificial." From the daylight point of
view, of course, it is artificial ; but we must remem
ber that the whole evening, — a good part of the
time in a Holland winter, — these candle effects
must have been familiar sights, for the only method
of lighting the houses in those days was by means of
lanterns and candles. Little chandeliers, apparently
quite inadequate, hang in most of the pictured inte
riors of the best rooms, while cellars and kitchens
had to get on with tiny spots of light amidst heavy
darkness. Therefore these extreme arrangements
of light and shade must have been seen every day
by Gerard Dou. It is said that he used to arrange
his model as he wished, in a dark room, with a
candle, and then paint the picture thus prepared by
looking through a hole in the door, which concen
trated the darkness and emphasized the lights ! The
minute work which he executed so continuously had
a bad effect upon his eyes, so that when only thirty
years of age he was obliged to depend upon spec
tacles. As many of his pictures were copied, indeed

Dutcb painters 341
transcribed, from reflections in a concave mirror,
which he employed to reduce his designs to their
selected proportions, it will be readily understood
that his optic nerve was subjected to severe
strains. A great collection of Gerard Don's works was
the Cabinet de Bye, in Leyden. Many of the paint
ers, his contemporaries (Rembrandt and Van
Goyen) had been obliged to go elsewhere to seek
more prompt sales for their work ; but Dou, having
all that he could do, remained there, with the result
that he practically controlled the art market of the
city. From this collection came two of the Dresden
pictures, — No. 171 3, the Girl and Youth in a Wine
Cellar, and No. 1 708, a study of still life, which was
originally employed as a cover to the case which
held the first. The dim background of the cellar has
just enough atmosphere about it to make one feel
that one could see farther in if it were not so dark ;
it does not suggest simply a mass of neutral paint :
as with the famous Night School in Amsterdam,
the instinct is to raise one's hand to keep out the
glare from the lantern, in order to see more clearly
what is beyond! A more perfect illusion with
painted light could hardly be found.
Dou seldom went to high life for his inspiration :
he painted the homely scenes of every day in the
streets. By placing so many of his figures in win-

342 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
dows he gives the impression that they were simply
sights which he had passed as he walked about ; but
knowing the length of time devoted to the painting
of each, we know that in reality the pose must have
been of rigid durability.
He certainly was not what is meant by a prolific
painter. Beginning at fifteen, and working until
he was sixty-two, he only left about two hundred
works behind him. Sir Joshua Reynolds said that
he looked at Don's pictures " with admiration on
the lips, but with indifference in the heart." Cer
tainly there is nothing to inspire lofty thoughts or
deep emotion. He and Mieris are masters of tri
fling things — the " petty masters," as they have
been denominated — after all. Pretty lights falling
on delicately wrought objects, that is the limit of
their message.
Don's fame was of gradual development. In
1640 he was a well-known painter; in 1660 he was
recognized as one of the most esteemed artists of
the century. His pictures were regarded as objects
of great value, and were sent by the States as g^fts
to Sovereigns. Charles II. of England received
three. Evelyn alludes to them in his Diary as
" painted by Dou so finely as hardly to be distin
guished from enamel." There is an interesting echo
from the journalism of the past, in an adver
tisement appearing in the Haarlemische Cou-

Dutcb painters 343
rant in 1665, calling attention to the collection of
Don's paintings belonging to Johan de Bye, then
on exhibition : " Be it known to all gentlemen and
amateurs that . . . every day except Sundays from
II to 12, should there be no compulsory hin
drance, 29 pieces may be seen most admirably
painted and wonderfully finished by the skilled and
renowned Mr. Gerard Dou, . . . praying ... if
any one finds pleasure in the art displayed, he will
be pleased to speak of it to the owner." What a
delightfully unstrenuous life this connotes! Fancy
a city life in which " gentlemen and amateurs " are
free to drop in from eleven to twelve to look at pic
tures ! In the catalogue of this exhibition is allusion
to the Dresden picture with its cover, -^ the wine
cellar already described, — where it is called " a
double piece, on the outside a curtain, a clock, and
a candlestick, within, a candle-light scene being a
cellar." It was chiefly through this allusion, to
gether with the pedigree of the pictures, that the
Dresden authorities finally recognized the relation
between the two panels.
Other specimens of candle-light effects, this time
not confined to cellars and kitchens, are No. 1706,
a Girl Gathering Grapes, and No. 1712, a Girl
Watering Flowers Outside a Window. A further
testimony to Don's lack of thought or effort to pro
duce verisimilitude, is to be noticed in the way in

344 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
which he makes his people look off away from the
task in hand, reducing the attitude to a pose, instead
of an employment. There is none of the concentra
tion of Vermeer of Delft's little green lady reading
her letter ! Don's models are self-conscious and not
natural. There is a good deal of sameness in these
smirking people at windows; aside from the mar
vellous technique and atmosphere, the pictures by
Dou and Mieris are not such as to induce deep
study. There is some question as to the genuine
ness of the Hermit Reading.
Three of the studies of old women in Dresden
are portraits of Rembrandt's mother. Rembrandt's
parents bo,th seem to have been very accommodating
in sitting as models for him and his pupils. In one
of these, the mother is seen with her spectacles on,
reading a paper, — the colour scheme runs from
brown to dark red and violet. In another, she holds
an open book, but, like most of Don's models, she
is looking up — she is not reading. The third study
shows her also with a book, while a wallet and a
drinking-glass lie on the table by her. The tones
in this are cooler — soft blue and g^een predom
inate. Little is known of Gerard Don's death. As is
often the case, the chief information comes from the
burial register. On February the ninth, 1675, there
is this concise entry : " Mr. Gerrit Dou, painter."

Dutcb painters 34s
That is all that is known of the end of this brilliant
career. Gerard Dou had a fanciful way of signing his
name on prominent bits of his pictures: the Old
Schoolmaster is signed on the desk; the portrait
of himself is signed on the table ; the Doctor, who
is looking into the laughing face of the girl before
him, aiding his vision by means of a candle, is
signed on the chair. In the Girl Gathering Grapes,
the signature appears on a bit of paper on the sill of
the window. In the Wine Cellar it appears on the
cask. We come now to a consideration of the jovial
Jan Steen. The facts of his life are clouded in
mystery, with the exception of a few dates, and cer
tain testimony to be found in his works regarding
his tastes and ideals. He was a member of a very
respectable and worthy family. The fact that he is
entered on the records of the Leyden University as
a student twenty years of age proves that he must
have been born in 1626. He was undoubtedly not
very successful financially, although one of the clev
erest of the genre painters of the seventeenth cen
tury. The English were the first to appreciate Jan
Steen. The Duke of Wellington particularly ad-
> mired his works, and the artist Leslie considered
him the greatest genius of the Dutch painters of

346 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
familiar life. Here is an evidence of the British
love for a story in a picture.
Jan Steen was rather a convivial fellow, not pru
dent in money matters, for he sometimes had to pay
his wine merchant in pictures! His talents were
very varied, and his interests keen and diverse. He
was at home in all sorts of subjects, from the tavern
brawl to the drawing-room, and from the evil pas
sions of men to the joyous gaiety of little children
at play.
While he was young, he was in the studio of Van
Goyen, whose daughter he married. Van Ostade
also married a daughter of Van Goyen, so that these
two painters came into brotherly relations, and were
probably congenial. Steen was a Roman Catholic,
but there is no evidence that he was a devout one.
His religious pictures are singularly feeble.
One of the few dates by which we can judge of
Steen's whereabouts is that of i66i, when he was
thirty-five years old, and was living in Haarlem
with his wife and children. In 1670 an apothecary
made a raid on several of his pictures in payment
of a bill for dmgs supplied during his wife's last
illness, she having died in 1669. He married again
in three or four years.
It has been said that Steen was on friendly terms
with the devil even while painting his cloven foot!
Probably much of his reputation as a dnmkard is

JAN STEEN.  THE MARRIAGE FEAST AT CANA

Dutcb painters 347
based on the simple historic fact that, being hard
up, and having a house left to him as a legacy, he
decided to use this property by opening a tavem;
after all, a very thrifty way of tuming over his
investment, for art was not a high-paid commodity
in those days. Naturally, as a proprietor of a public
house, Jan Steen was frequently seen there, and un
doubtedly made himself as popular as possible with
the guests : hence all the reports of undue convivial
ity. It is not likely, however, that the man to whom
the tavem meant bread and butter allowed himself
to become a sot. Also, the internal evidence of his
five hundred carefully finished and well-conceived
pictures goes to prove that his head must have been
steady most of the time.
Unfortunately we have in Dresden no specimen
of his really characteristic work. The two chief
pictures are religious in name, — certainly in noth
ing else ! and this was the branch in which he was
least at ease. The Marriage at Cana is an absurd
contemporary Dutch revel. A fat purveyor offers
wine to a dandified fiddler, while a lazy peasant
woman in disordered attire sits in the foreground
leaning on a cask, holding a cup of wine to the lips
of a little boy. This child is, however, very charm
ing, and gives some idea of Steen's sympathetic
rendering of youthful forms. Far off in the back
ground is seen the supper-table, while an extremely

348 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
conventional figure of Our Lord with one hand
pointing upward and the other downward, appears
on another flight of steps. The only cause for con
gratulation in this composition is that the artist evi
dently had the sense to recognize his own limita
tions, and did not attempt to make the sacred figure
prominent. It is simple genre. The Mother and
Child, No. 1726, in the seventeenth cabinet, is at
tractive, stiff, and quaint. The Expulsion of Hagar,
however, on the same wall, is a most unfortunate
interpretation of the Scripture story. The blubber
ing, short, stumpy, blonde Hagar, with a bare foot
larger than her head, stands on the door-step, hold
ing her Dutch apron to her eyes, while Abraham,
with a consolatory pat on her shoulder, waves his
hand toward the door of his dwelling. Inside this
door Sarah is seen, unnecessarily hag-like, huddled
over like an infirm octogenarian, and the whole ar
rangement is so in the seventeenth-century style,
— so casual, — that one seems to hear Abraham
saying in a soothing voice, " You see how I am
placed, my dear ! " Ishmael, a pretty boy, glancing
out of the corners of his roguish eyes at the specta
tor, is kneeling in the foreground, stringing a bow.
In the background is a Dutch barn-yard enclosed by
high walls. A dog in the foreground, carefully
painted, as if the artist thoroughly enjoyed it, is

Dutcb painters 349
busily engaged in attacking fleas. No more ridic
ulous anticlimax could be planned.
Wilkie has stated that " ugliness is stimulating,
and sometimes serves to bring out beauties in juxta
position." This must be the subtle spell which at
tracts us in the tavern scenes of Brouwer, Steen, Os
tade, and others. When Tacitus wrote his famous
treatise on Germany in the first century, he made
mention of traits which even now might illustrate
certain tendencies in that nation, and certainly apply
to the pictures which we have to study. He says
the Germans are " impatient of toil and labour, and
least of all capable of sustaining thirst ! " In these
tavem scenes we can quote Tacitus with consider
able relish.
Adriaen van Ostade, who has been called " Rem
brandt in Little," was himself an amiable and
quietly disposed citizen with a curious taste for por
traying scenes of hideous brute drunkenness and
revel. If he had had more soul in the selection of
his subjects, and in their treatment, he would have
been a great painter. As a craftsman he was most
finished. He was born in Haarlem in 1610, his
father being a tradesman, and he was sent to study
with Frans Hals, in whose studio he became the
friend and champion of poor little Brouwer, who
was so badly treated by the master. Ostade was a
member of the Guild of St. Luke; he married a

3S0 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
daughter of Jan Van Goyen, a sister of the girl who
married Jan Steen. He was an artist by profession
and every association. He tumed his attention to
rather unimportant subjects for reproduction. He
went in early life to Amsterdam, where he painted
stable and field scenes, anticipating somewhat the
sentiment of the English George Morland.
He produced three or four hundred pieces in oil,
and also worked in water-colour. While his pic
tures are all cleverly done, it would be hard to point
to any one and say, " that is a masterpiece." Wed-
more uses a happy expression in characterizing Van
Ostade. He claims that he was " alive to the pic-
turesqueness of litter." This is particularly mani
fest in his Artist in his Studio, No. 1397, in Dres
den, painted in 1663. When one hears that the
Dutch artists seemed morbid about dust, and that
some of them even waited some minutes after en
tering the studio to let the dust subside before com
mencing work, we must remember what kind of a
place a studio was, and it will seem only a proper
precaution! Surely a man walking through Van
Ostade's studio would have raised a perfect cloud
of dust! Absolute untidiness reigns: even the
brushes and paints, which in most studios do receive
some attention, are simply dropped on the floor, or
stuck into any old receptacle. A painter who is
indifferent to every other law of order will usually

'^^^^^^^^^1

1 ¦^*^';.'

^^^_

. '- ¦-. -""'t!^7""- ¦.«¦;-

•y.s^.

¦ ''' ¦ . -^ , '" -,

ADRIAEN VAN OSTADE.  THE ARTIST IN HIS STUDIO

Dutcb painters 351
see to it that his tools are in condition for work:
it would seem that Van Ostade expected nothing
but a space in which to throw things! There is a
sheet suspended from the beams above, to protect
the actual wet paint on his easel from the dust
which probably fell when a rat galloped through the
attic. Van Ostade himself is seen sketching from
a lay figure, which is fixed in a running position,
across the room. A conscientious little colour-
grinder is busily at work in the next apartment.
Rickety stairs are seen in the background, one
flight going down, and another hardly more than
a ladder leading up to the rafters. Skulls and ant
lers, jars and portfolios, chipped casts and rolls of
vellum, abound Jill over the floor and walls. It is
a typical den such as delights the soul of a man
whose imagination is so active that it is capable of
clothing a wooden model, and covering the floor
with a green sward, while at any moment the newel-
post becomes a fir-tree, or the ceiling is invested with
thunder-clouds! Such a mind is little affected by
the actual state of the physical surroundings.
In his Habitues of a Village Inn (No. 1396),
Van Ostade resembles Teniers in general arrange
ment, the rough guests in the foreground being
seated around a table, while the others are seen in
the background. The Two Peasants Regaling
Themselves, No. 1398, is a tme study of gluttony.

352 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
The latest and most interesting of his pictures in
Dresden is the well-filled composition. Peasants at
a Village Inn, No. 1400. The merry mstics are
assembled in gay mood, seated on benches and in
dulging in beer and other refreshments.
A pupil of Gerard Dou was Pieter Comelisz van
Slingelandt, a native of Leyden, born in 1640;
pretty upper-class genre pictures by him are the
Young Lady with an Unmusical Dog and the Lady
at a Harpsichord. The first of these shows a laugh
ing girl well clothed in the preposterous Dutch
winter dress of velvet trimmed with fur, and then
deliberately cut low in the neck! She holds in her
arms a small spaniel, apparently filled with indigna
tion against a young man who leans over the chair
of the lady. This gentleman has evidently been
playing the violin, which accounts for this violent
protest on the part of the dog. Another objecting
little dog is seen in the picture on the opposite wall,
representing a lady sitting by a window, through
which an old woman is handing her a fowl.
In Nicolas Maes one sees the antithesis of Paul
Potter and Raphael, — one has to contemplate the
man who ought to have died young, — the man who
out-lived his success. Starting brilliantly, he fell in
ignomy into a premature decadence after his with
drawal from the influence of Rembrandt He was
bom in Dort in 1632, and in 1650 went to study

Dutcb painters 353
with Rembrandt, with whom he remained for ten
years, doing excellent genre work. When Jordaens
asked Nicolas Maes what line he followed in art,
Maes replied, " I am but a portrait-painter." He
had learned the necessary art of flattering his sit
ters, and evidently his ambition was to be a portrait
artist, while in spite of it he has come down to
posterity as a genre painter. How constantly men
aspire to be regarded as proficient in some art for
which they have not capital qualifications, dissatis
fied with the work to which they are in reality better
adapted ! One cannot help recalling that wise little
verse : " As a rule a man's a fool,
When it's hot he wants it cool,
When it's cool he wants it hot, —
Always wants it as it's not ! "
So, unwilling to figure as a genre painter, in which
line he displayed great ability, Maes tried to confine
himself to painting likenesses only. He went to
Antwerp, where this degeneration gradually over
took him. He died, a great sufferer from gout, in
1693, at Amsterdam, where he had returned in
1673. We have only a portrait by which to judge him
in Dresden: there is a genre picture, No. 1643, ^^
the thirteenth cabinet, which has been attributed
to him, but not with certainty.

354 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
Gabriel Metsu and Gerard Ter Borch are to be
seeti in the sixteenth room. At first their works
seem similar, but certain distinctive characteristics
may be noted upon closer examination. For one
thing Metsu is supreme in his comprehension of the
expressive power of the hand. His hands are stud
ied as special subjects, — look at those in the Young
Couple at Breakfast. There is also, as a rule, more
dignity in the work of Ter Borch. Ter Borch has
made more study of facial expression, and is the
more intellectual of the two. As we go from one
to the other we shall see various little individual
points to note.
Metsu loved red. In the Young Couple at Break
fast, the dashing red and black gown of the lady is
charmingly contrasted with the blue and tan clothes
of the man. There is hardly any reliable record of
Metsu's life. Bom probably in 1630, it is likely
that he lived to be only a few years over thirty. The
dates now generally conceded are 1630- 1667. He
was probably a pupil of Dou in Leyden ; afterward,
it is thought that he came under the influence of
Rembrandt at Amsterdam. His parents were also
both artistic, so that heredity and environment were
both on the aesthetic side. A charming little panel,
A Lady with a Lace Pillow, gives us again an op
portunity to study these exquisite hands at work
so deftly; the night piece, No. 1737, a Smoker Sit-

Dutcb painters 35s
ting by the Fire, is a fine rendering of a dark room ;
it has the sense of depth, and suggests the possibil
ity of penetrating farther into the gloom, which is
not simply a dense shadow.
Gerard Ter Borch was a genuine pioneer among
the Dutchmen. He was the first to recognize the
superiority of expression over technique. And his
technique is no sufferer through this knowledge:
a certain breadth even on so small a scale is the
immediate result, and comes with welcome relief
after the feats of enamel finish which are so char
acteristic of most of his contemporaries. A painter
of high life, with its reserve and good breeding con
spicuous in all his little pictures, it is not at all the
vain, vapid side of the aristocracy which he seizes
upon, but the more serious, genuine, and usual little
episodes into which his refined manner, and knowl
edge through personal experience (he having been
an aristocrat himself), have given him unusual in
sight. His treatment of white satin is especially
radiant, and he frequently introduces it. There is
a certain figure of a woman clad in shimmering
white satin which occurs in his pictures in Paris, in
St. Petersburg, and in Dresden, — she stands with
her back to the spectator, and is evidently always
based upon the same study. In Dresden she is
called " A Lady in her Room : " beyond her, in the
shadow, is seen a bed with red curtains. There are

3s6 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
some very precious examples of Ter Borch in the
sixteenth cabinet; notably two studies of Soldiers,
one an officer writing a letter, while his trumpeter
waits to take and deliver it, the other, which might
be a companion piece, shows a trumpeter, having
delivered a letter, which is being read by an officer.
There could not be a more satisfactory technique
than that of Ter Borch in dealing with what one
might call soldiers in private life, — that is, not in
war subjects. When we come to consider his
women, they certainly have very tumed-up little
noses ; but it is not the stupid turn-up of the rustic
nose, — it is rather a choice, disdainful little nose !
In No. 1830, for instance, see how chic and smug
the little lady is, as she firmly washes her hands
under the stream from the silver ewer held by her
maid. Perhaps this lady displays Ter Borch's very
best satin gown of all, — surely nowhere has
gathered satin been more skilfully portrayed. It
is not often that one sees in art so well expressed
the transitoriness of action as in these tightly
clasped hands — one knows that there is movement,
that the hands are closing on each other.
The Lady Playing a Lute, with her Cavalier, is
charmingly attired in a blue jacket and a pink skirt;
there is much colour in this lovely panel: the dull
blue in the hangings above is a very good tone.
Gerard Ter Borch was bom at Zwolle, in 1617,

GERARD TER BORCH.  A LADY WASHING HER HANDS

Dutcb painters 357
His father was a well-to-do man, who delighted in
his son's early manifestations of talent.
He was an infant prodigy. His father was very
proud of his early efforts, and kept his childish
drawings filed and dated. His youth was passed
in the picturesque place of his nativity, — Zwolle,
but when it was time for him to study seriously, he
was sent to Amsterdam. His father's interest in
his son's career never flagged, and his letters to
him contained good advice as well as practical
assistance. C)ne letter announces : " I send you the
manikin, but without the block which should serve
as its pedestal, for this is too large and heavy to
put into the trunk. You can have one made, how
ever, at slight cost : " then follows the admonition :
" Do not let the manikin have too much repose, as
you did here, but use it continually."
When King William III. visited Deventer, in
1672, he had his picture painted by Ter Borch; it
is said that he scarcely gave the painter time to
accomplish more than a sketch, but that it was so
masterly and brilliant that an art lover of Amster
dam took it in exchange for a travelling-coach!
One can readily understand how satisfactory Ter
Borch's portraits must have been by looking at the
treatment of the head, hat, and shoulders of the
officer in No. 1833. As he sits there reading the
letter, with a discreet symptom of a smile deepen-

3s8 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
ing the comers of his lips and the lights playing
so illusively on the various textures of hair, felt,
and cloth, he convinces us that the master who could
deal in such subtleties would never be at a loss to
catch an individual expression.
Ter Borch had the advantages of foreign travel,
visiting France, Spain, and Italy. Thus he was
able to possess the gift of culture to a rare degree
among his contemporaries. He was also in Eng
land for a time. After his travels he settled down
to good work and he became the favourite painter
of the aristocracy. His home life was simple and
perhaps lonely; he had no children, but when he
died, in 1681, the whole town of Zwolle tumed out
to do honour at his burial there : he was laid in the
family vault, with " G. T. B." as his only inscrip
tion. The Herring Eater, No. 1755, is signed by
Domenicus van Tol, who was a pupil of Dou. In
the ninth cabinet there is another " window piece "
by him of a woman winding yam. The Herring
Eater is seen in an arched window, with a sugges
tion of a kitchen interior beyond. His pipe and a
circular tobacco-box lie on the sill by him.
A natural bit of human life is seen in the cook,
who is bargaining with a Dutch fishwife, in the
picture called A Rotterdam Fishwife. The critical
attitude of the purchaser, who wishes the price re-

Dutcb painters 359
duced, and the confident manner of the seller, who
prefers to maintain the high figure which she has
evidently named, is well contrasted. There could
hardly be a more typical little view than that in the
background of the tall gabled houses on the still
water. The minute still-life painters, Rachel Ruysch and
Jan van Huysum, are to be met in these rooms.
Let us commend them to those who enjoy them,
and who are ambitious to perpetuate such a school.
It is certain that still life undoubtedly has its advo
cates. How often one sees an uncultured person
stand in front of a splendid portrait, and, ignoring
all else, exclaim, " Oh, how beautifully that lace is
painted ! " Doctor Channing told of an American
who, looking at a picture of the Marriage of Cana,
by a Spanish artist, remarked, " Well, he was a cute
man who made that jar ! "
Melchior d'Hondecoeter's Bird of Prey in a Poul
try Yard is a good study, spirited and clever. There
is some thought here: an appreciation, at least, of
barn-yard life, if the term is not too dignified for
the subject! The defiant cock and hen, ready to
fight to the death with the base intruder, have
almost the human traits of besieged citizens, while
the tiny chicken, so safely guarded between its
elders, makes just such a show of bravery as does
a soldier's little son when he sees his father on

36o XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
parade. The hawk has clawed a small chicken, and
this act of vandalism is the immediate cause for the
outcry. Hondecoeter is really the finest painter of
game, dead or alive, who lived in that period: he
is wonderfully true to nature, and a genuine artist
in his line. His detail is sincere, and no man has
ever painted feathers with less objectionable realism.
Those who enjoy pictures of poultry will realize
his superiority.
Comelis Bega, in his Dance in the Village Inn,
might have been an inspiration to Wilkie when he
composed his famous Blind Fiddler. Bega was a
pupil of Van Ostade, and his interpretation of rus
tic life is very pleasing and spirited.
Jan Lieven's Bust of a Young Warrior in profile
is beautiful in line and in texture. It should not be
overlooked in the seventeenth cabinet. Here also
is an interesting picture, called The Enticement, in
which a Trumpeter is seen trying to detain a young
lady to breakfast. It is by Johannes Verkolje, a
late seventeenth-century artist of Amsterdam, and
the materials and textures in the picture are very
rich. There is also a curious little picture by Hen
drik Pot, of a gentleman in black, standing in a
room. It is rather striking in its severe contrasts
and singular lack of conventional balance. No.
1 39 1 A is a cheerful Musical Entertainment by
Jacob Ehick, a pupil of Hals, who painted in Haar-

Dutcb painters 361
lem in the seventeenth century, dying in 1660. The
composition is effective, and the lady with a viol
at the left is bewitchingly pretty.
Jacob Ochtervelt, an artist of Rotterdam and
Amsterdam, painted a brilliant picture here, No.
181 1, representing a gentleman slicing a lemon into
a glass for a lady who holds in her lap a little dog.
A fascinating little girl is playing with the pet.
The colour scheme of the picture is similar to that
of Vermeer's Soldier and Lass, pale red, yellow, and
white. The colours in this instance, however, are
an3^hing but flamelike. The Turkey rug adds a
note of warm richness. The facial expressions are
excellent. Sir Joshua Reynolds has advised our
going to the Dutch school to leam art ; but it is also
a danger that we may leam the vices of art, for the
lamp is used instead of the sun in their shadow
effects.

CHAPTER XII.
MODERN GERMAN MASTERS
The tendency of modern paintings to be showy
and large, and often sensational, is due to the fact
that, whereas in old days the Dutch masters painted
little gems to be hung on the walls of private houses,
modem Germans and Frenchmen have to paint with
a public exhibition in view. If a picture is placed
among hundreds of others in a huge gallery, it must
be very striking in subject and in colour, and usually
rather large, in order to attract attention. These
modern conditions make it impracticable for artists
to produce many small, tender pictures, — they are
overlooked. The artist must compete with the
other producers of his own day; as a rule he must
dominate by some conspicuous, popular quality if
he would succeed financially. This test may be un
fair, but it is a real one, to which he feels that he
must submit.
In 1879 there was a great exhibition of modem
painting in Munich, and since that German art has
shown much French influence, while still retaining
362

/Robern German /Rasters 363
certain national characteristics. Modem art in Ger
many gives one at once a very positive impression,
and that is, that it is a shade more modem than any
other school! There is a whirl of advance, — of
sometimes exotic outstretching, — but always new,
original, and thoughtful. At the commencement of
the nineteenth century, when French art was follow
ing and developing and amplifying traditions, Ger
man art simply broke loose, threw off the yoke of
tradition, and reached out for liberty. Like all very
independent movements, such individualism some
times fell into error, but it erred from over-vitality ;
and much can be forgiven when faults result from
the mere over-exertion of a genuine power. In the
twentieth century, — now, — German art is among
the most interesting aesthetic expressions of the na
tions. When I say interesting I do not mean the
most finished, or successful, or satisfying ; but it is
full of mental and psychic expression, and, as a
humari face, when endowed with these two attri
butes, will often outshine a more faultless anatom
ical physiognomy, so in art, these qualities lend a
certain resilience and charm to pictures which, on
a technical basis, we should have to admit as infe
rior. Looking about among the modern masters in
the Dresden gallery, we shall understand this.
In trying to overthrow the yoke of tradition, the
nineteenth-century Germans met with several impor-

364 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
tant losses. First, they lost the sense of colour.
Through a phase of absolute draughtsmanship, they
relinquished, probably unconsciously, their feeling
which had been growing for centuries, of both
colour and atmosphere. These two qualities elim
inated, it is not remarkable if their pictures were
hard, and coldly tinted. Two chief charms of art
were temporarily lost. Thus it may almost be said,
although it seems a paradox, that modern German
art began with a decadence.
Soon a striving after the classic spirit appeared;
instead of being simply copyists of the Greek types,
certain Germans seemed to have been positive re
incarnations; the spirit which inspired the Greeks
displayed itself in strictly novel forms; elemental
thoughts began to be expressed, and elemental emo
tions to be felt. This is the only way to revive
Greek art. There is no use in trying to design a
better Laocoon or Niobe; the aim should be, with
all appliances and powers of later times, to find out
what sort of aesthetic spirit produced these master
pieces, and enter into that spirit fully.
Soon artists began to attempt historical accuracy.
Study of the past was not only study of story, but
also of conditions and costume and accessories.
They w;ere no longer placidly happy in a Marriage
at Cana taking place in a Venetian Palace, or in
a Holy Family enthroned in a Dutch mansion with

/iDobern German /Rasters 365
a view of the canal and a church out of the window !
Realism in a new sense developed. The Classicists
in France had recognized and applied these princi
ples, and in Germany the impulse toward verisimili
tude began to be felt. The idea of representing
scenes as they actually occurred caused a greater
interest than ever in history, and less in every-day
life of the present, until a still later reaction came,
in favour of an even more accurate realism, which
dealt with contemporary life.
During the turbulent period between 1813 and
181 5 much material was furnished by the national
history, full of stirring scenes, and lending itself to
the dramatic spirit of the painters. Genre and con
temporary life, however, had played so large a part
in the art of the eighteenth century, that it is not
to be wondered at if for a time it was cast aside.
The earliest cult of this newly awakened anti
quarian spirit had its centre in the Dresden Gallery,
where its disciples, August William and Friedrich
Schlegel, took possession and held sessions nearly
every day, with Schelling and Gries, writing and
lecturing, and propounding their convictions. They
were practically the German Pre-Raphaelites. Their
literary organ, a publication entitled Europe^ set
forth the principles of this new school, which was
so strangely based on the old. Schlegel wrote much
upon the subject. " An evil genius has alienated

366 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
artists from the circle of ideas and the subjects of
the old painters," he claimed; and he advised an
effort at antique expression. He wished the painter
to " select the style of the old German school as a
pattern." This was the swinging of the pendulum
from genre and commonplace subjects to the ex
treme of religious and imaginative subjects. It had
its impetus, but it had to swing back again later!
This is in accordance with the course of the con
stant vibrations of artistic impulses in history.
Early in the nineteenth century an enthusiastic set
of young artists went to Rome to study Christian
art, just as, in France, there had grown up a body
of painters who studied classic Rome. These men
were known as the Nazarenes. Overbeck, Cornelius,
Pforr, Schadow, Veit, and Julius Schnorr, together
with Steinle and Furich, formed a colony almost
like a monastic settlement. They lived for art
alone. They marketed and cooked for each other in
tura, living the true simple life, with plain, nour
ishing food, their minds set on higher things, and
discussing matters only relating to the fine arts.
They were devoted to mediaeval art ; they shunned
the Renaissance, and wandered about by twilight,
communing upon aesthetics, in a manner extremely
hazardous in that climate. In the evenings they
took turns in posing in a Venetian mantle which

PLAN OF THE SECONB FLOOR
22-38. Masters of the XIX. Century. (Chiefly German.)

368 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
lacking in all that makes art live through changes
of time and space, are represented very inadequately
here. Peter von Cornelius was born in Diisseldorf in
1783, and spent his first years as a pupil at the old
academy there. Of his idealistic Roman work we
have no opportunity of judging, for he is seen here
only in portraiture : his likeness of Godfried Malss,
painted in Frankfort about 18 10. Comelius was
one of the leaders of the Nazarenes. When they
were entrusted with a really important work of
fresco-painting in the Villa Massina and Casa
Bartholdi, Comelius was one of the chief perform
ers. When the frescoes were unveiled in 1819, the
German artists had a brilliant festival in Rome,
which is said to have been strictly mediaeval in its
costuming and setting. The Crown Prince Ludwig
was present, and it was a gala occasion. Prince
Ludwig was delighted with Cornelius. " There has
been no such painter," he enunciated, " since the
Cinquecento." He employed him to paint largely
in Munich, believing that German art had at last
arrived at its true expression. This work was
simply a revival of Italian decadence. He was an
extreme eclectic, but all the qualities which he bor
rowed were carried to excess. He was more ram
pant than Michelangelo; he was more sweet than
Raphael. There was no message for posterity in

/Robern German /Rasters 369
art like this : it was not for the good of his follow
ers that he was Principal of an Academy. King
Ludwig, however, regarded him in the light of a
great discovery. " Comelius was born to be the
head of a school of painting," affirmed this mon
arch. Cornelius was Director of the Academy of
Diisseldorf and Munich, going finally to Berlin,
where he died in 1867. He developed the national
subjects, illustrating the Rhine legends and Faust,
proving himself a true disciple of the spirit of Al
brecht Diirer. Many of his frescoes are to be seen
in the Loggia of the Munich art gallery. He be
came professor here in 1825.
The personal appearance of Comelius is thus de
scribed by a pupil upon first meeting him. " He is
quite a little man, in a blue shirt and a red belt. He
looks very stern and distinguished, and his black
gleaming eyes impress you ! " This pupil had come
across the master at work in a public building. He
was up on a scaffolding, but " descended from his
throne, changed his blue smock for an elegant frock
coat, drank a glass of water with an easy manner,
and made my flesh thrill with a short explanation
of what had been painted and what was still to be
done, tucked a few writing-books under his arm,
and went upon his business to the Academy."
Cornelius despised accurate knowledge. His doc
trine was to study Homer, Shakespeare, Goethe, and

370 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
the Bible; " the brush," he would say, " has become
the ruin of our art. It has led from nature to man
nerism." By way of adhering to nature, Comelius
was guilty of painting a Greek hero with six fingers
in one of his frescoes. When this was pointed out
his only answer was : " And if I had given him
seven, how would it affect the general idea ? "
A criticism on the unpractical side of the life of
these men in Rome appears in a letter from Niebuhr
in 1816: he said: " Comelius has a wife and two
children. He is very poor, because he labours for
conscience and his own satisfaction, and purchasers
for works of such high standard are not to be
found." Niebuhr proved himself a kind friend to
the struggling artists. Bunsen tells that " Come
lius and Platner, each with his wife and each pair
having two infant daughters, were lodged in a
house . . . which had been hired by Niebuhr for
them for the summer months." While Niebuhr was
in a Diplomatic position in Rome, he was so fortu
nate as to discover some valuable manuscripts in the
Vatican : he wrote to an influential English lady :
" I should like to sell them in England for a good
price, by way of earning some money for our young
artists. Among these there are some really excel
lent young men who are langiiishing for means of
cultivating their talents, and are hard put to it for
their daily bread. I should like to get enough

flbobern German /Rasters 371
money to set a few of them to paint a fresco in the
Library." Mr. Beavington Atkinson gives an amusing de
scription of the German artists in Rome; he says:
" On successive visits to Rome I have always found
the Germans in sufficient force to assume a distinct
ive Nationality . . . the Cafe Greco has been their
resort, a place renowned for coffee, tobacco, noise,
and dirt. The . . . Germans enter as a bois
terous crew, accompanied occasionally by a rough
dog . . . they are bearded, sturdy fellows . . . the
German guttural and the American brogue break
into a republic of discord, glorying in the biggest
of words and the thickest of smoke. . . . German
artists in Rome are gregarious, and somewhat Bohe
mian; they congregate promiscuously, they talk
freely of what they are painting, without fear of
plagiarism . . . they meet asi ' hail fellows well
met : ' they are kindly in heart, in the hour of weal
they show themselves joyous, in woe they lend to a
brother a helping hand."
Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld was born in Leip
zig in 1794. He worked in Rome, too, as has been
stated, and his picture, the Family of St. John the
Baptist Visiting the Holy Family in a Rose Garden,
shows how much Italian influence had to do with
the art of these Germans, who, in spite of it, retain
the national sentiment, too. After his work at the

372 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
Villa Massina in Rome, he executed the decorations
in the halls of the Palace in Munich, with the Nibe-
lungen stories: after which he went to Dresden,
where he was Director of the Gallery. He died
there in 1846. When Schnorr made his famous
set of Biblical illustrations, the painters of Dresden
turned out to show their appreciation of his achieve
ment : they gave him a magnificent celebration in
1862. He was presented on this occasion, which
was a regular Jubilee, with a very beautiful Bible,
a splendid writing-table, and a handsome drinking-
cup; while the Municipality so far recognized his
importance as to make him a Doctor of Divinity,
and to give him the Freedom of the City. The por
trait of Schnorr, by Leonhard Gey, No. 2279 A,
may be seen here. Gey was a pupil of Schnorr,
afterward professor at Dresden.
Then followed Rethel and Schwind, the commer
cial Schwind, whose reply to a compliment has gone
on record : an admirer congratulated him upon
being the creator of an original German romantic
ideal, and Schwind replied, " My dear sir, to me
there are only two kinds of pictures, those sold and
those unsold. To me the sold are always the best.
Those are my entire aesthetics ! " No one ever so
maligned himself as Schwind on this occasion! It
is to be regretted that there is no opportunity in
the Dresden gallery to study some of his exquisite

/Robern German /Rasters 373
elfin creations, his subtle interpretations of Nature
with little woodland creatures interjected as if quite
by accident; tiny nymphs which seem parts of the
foliate formations, and little sprites full of the spirit
of the old legends of the Rhine and the Black For
est. He is a forerunner of the delights of Bocklin,
with whom we shall make acquaintance later.
Anselm Feuerbach's Virgin and Child with Mu
sical Instruments shows the Renaissance of colour
in the early nineteenth-century school of Germany.
Feuerbach was one of the first Germans who rec
ognized the importance of going to France again in
order to try and resuscitate the colour sentiment in
art, which had so considerably died out. His work
has been characterized as " Parisian design strug
gling with Venetian grandeur," and one can see
what is meant by this criticism. He was born at
Speier in 1827, and studied at Diisseldorf and Ant
werp, becoming later a professor in the Vienna
Academy. Feuerbach was a many-sided character :
he was diffuse, and therefore lacked concentration.
He was of a sensitive, almost feminine, nature, with
a soul full of music, capable of interpreting his
model, as it were, so that from a common modern
figure he could evolve Qassic or Mediaeval grace
and feeling.
Like all artists with genius, he was misunderstood
by the mundane people about him. He had the faith

374 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
bred of certainty that his own work would some day
meet with appreciation, but that is not a very com
forting conviction while one's contemporaries are
laughing! He used to say: " After fifty years my
pictures will possess tongues, and they will tell the
world what I was and what I meant." Perhaps this
lack of recognition was the reason for the pensive
note which pervades his work. Even his Greeks
are not glad. Tender and mournful faces, and atti
tudes suggestive of dejection, are seen in most of
his compositions. His very colour, which, in his
early days, was cheerful and free, grew sombre, as
his life drew to a close. His psychological history
may be read through his pictures. Saddened, strug
gling against fate, he went unappreciated to his
grave. He died in a hotel in Venice quite alone.
The bust of a Jew with a black beard, No.
2225, is by Julius Hiibner, an artist without great
force in producing pictures, but an excellent critic
and professor. He was a pupil at Diisseldorf, and
then, after being a professor, became director of
the Dresden Gallery, and was the author of its
catalogue from 1856 to 1884. Hiibner was also
a Ph. D., and a learned man. The " Golden Age "
is also by his hand. Dresden has always had a
charming habit of showing its appreciation for
her artists. When Hiibner's golden wedding ar
rived, his pupils and friends met to celebrate the

/Robern German /Rasters 375
occasion, and surrounded him, eager to testify to
their devotion with gifts and congratulations.
Ludwig Richter, a beloved artist, popular, rest
ful, refined, was born in Dresden in 1803. His
position in art is rather an enviable one : the inno
cent, glad, and childlike qualities make a genuine
appeal. Listen to his words in a letter, — how
calm and peaceful his ways would appear ! "I
am certainly living here (in Dresden), in a rather
circumscribed fashion, but in a very cheerful posi
tion outside the town, and I am writing you this
letter — it is Sunday afternoon — in a shady ar
bour, with a long row of blooming rose-bushes
before me. Now and then they are ruffled by a
pleasant breeze, which is also the cause of the big
blot being on this sheet, as it blew the page over."
What a flavour ! Which of us does not recall some
sweet June day in a walled garden or shady park,
when we have sat down to write, and observed this
same phenomenon of the breeze turning the page!
It comes as an invitation to idleness, to quiet con
templation, fifled with nothing but peaceful sights
and humming sounds, while the scent of the roses
will come back if one only closes one's eyes ! Who
ever has missed this sensation — this languid thrill
of summer — has not yet lived all sides of life.
Richter's grandfather was a copper-plate en
graver, and the boy was much with him. The

376 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
sweetness which often results from a child's pasfi-
ing his life among the aged is evident in Richter's
sentiment. His art, as he himself understood it,
" never entered among the lilies and roses on the
summit of Parnassus," but " travellers who rested
by the wayside were glad of it." On his eightieth
birthday, the old painter thus summed up his own
thoughts. One feels through his art and his per
sonality the delightful note of " cosiness " and
tender friendship. A great American once pass
ing a bill-poster which advertised " A Fair for the
Benefit of Incurable Children," exclaimed, " I
ought to benefit by that ! I'm an incurable child ! "
In the same sense this might be said of Ludwig
Richter. He was an incurable child! The spring
of perpetual youth welled up in his heart to bless
him. Health and contentment are the messages
which he has spoken to those who have come after
him. Dresden was his home, and he lived there
until his death in 1884.
His early training under the copper-plate en
graver is evident in his minute finish and delicate
lines. His Ferry Across the Elbe near Aussig
is certainly a poetic conception: it may be almost
denominated as a poetic license! It displays a
boat full of romantic and languishing peasants;
one plays the harp, one stands in contemplation of
the rugged castle which rises from the shore, lean-

/Robern German /Rasters 377
ing his hands on the top of his staff, and one foot
on the gunwale of the boat; a dejected young
man sits on the front seat, looking into the water,
while behind him a proposal of marriage is appar
ently taking place between two young people, who
are quite oblivious of the little girl standing directly
behind them, and watching them curiously. A
little cloying is the romance in this boat-load.
But in the Bridal Procession in a Spring Land
scape, the redundant sentimentality disappears. It
is as fresh and virginal as the dear little bride who
leans so coyly on the arm of her boy husband, as
they come into the clearing through the woods.
The innocent, happy expression of these two pretty
little beings is positively wholesome, and the whole
picture seems to twitter with the tenderness of
spring and youth. The mother and father follow
the bride and groom, the father jocund and proud,
the mother happy and resigned. The thoroughly
German flavour of this picture is one of its chief
charms. The graceful children with wreaths on
long sticks, the distant goatherd cheering the pro
cession as it emerges from the thicket, and the two
white doves circling in the air, near a clearing
through which the little mountain chapel is visible,
— all this is as redolent of the Fatherland, as are
the fir-trees and the little woodland flowers. No
Pre-Raphaelite ever painted more exquisitely de-

378 XLbc Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
tailed foliage. In technical perfection it is posi
tively a tour de force, and should be examined
closely and lovingly; it exhales a certain spirit
which is all its own and Richter's.
Gustav Kuntz's Greeting from the Outside
World — a nun in her cell, leaning on the window-
sill, her cheek resting against her hands — tells the
story of unsatisfied longing, as the young and
beautiful face turns itself to look out on the beau
ties of the world.
Robert Kummer's Sunset on the Coast of Scot
land looks more like an eclipse, the sun being a mere
spot in the distance, while an undue amount of
darkness has settled around. Kummer was a Dres
den Academy professor, living from 1810 to 1889.
Jacob's Land of Promise, by Carl Peschel, is a
view of the desert, which is finely done: the angels
spoil the composition. Eliminate them, and the
study would be excellent.
Friedrich Preller's fantastic picture here repre
sents a centaur carrying off a nymph. Preller was
one of the ideal landscape artists of the first half
of the nineteenth century. In the twenty-fifth room
will be seen another of his pictures, a Norwegian
Coast Scene. Preller was fond of portraying land
scape with mythological figures, being a true lover
of things classical.
A pretty bit of genre is Ritscher's Visit to the

/Robern German /Rasters 379
Nurse. The little befrilled child is taken to the
home of her foster-mother, and is trying to make
up her mind to shake hands with the bluff young
peasant woman, whose lap is filled with carrots and
turnips. The nurse's own child, the Httle maiden's
foster-brother, sits on the floor, with his bare feet
out ahead of him, playing with a toy horse.
Rudolf Jordan is characteristically represented
by his picture in the twenty- fourth room; he and
his contemporary, Ritter, devoted themselves largely
to the study of North German fisher life. He is
one of the painters who grew up with Lessing, and
more or less under his influence. He was born in
18 10 at Berlin; he studied in the Diisseldorf Acad
emy, afterward becoming a professor. He died
there in 1887.
There is some charm about the pictures of Dres
den by Carl von Leypold, who was born in this city
in 1806, and lived there, being honorary member
of the Academy, until his death in 1874. The
view of the old Mercury Bastion from the Marien-
strasse is a very good picture, well painted and
with much local interest.
Interesting especially for all that its subject con
notes, is the picture by Theobald von Oer, entitled
Giovanni Bellini's Visit to the Studio of Albrecht
Diirer in Venice. Oer was a Westphalian, but a
pupil of both Diisseldorf and Dresden. He died in

38o XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
1885. The venerable Venetian paying his com
pliments to the young Northern painter is a sig
nificant moment for an artist's selection, and Oer
has treated it with some appreciation. Albrecht
Diirer, living in Venice, wrote to his beloved friend,
Pirkheimer, in Nuremberg : " My French mantle
and my Italian coat greet you, both of them. I wish
you were in Venice. There are many fine fellows
here among the painters, who get more and more
friendly with me: it holds one's heart up. Well
brought-up folks, good lute-players, skilled pipers,
and many noble and excellent people are in the
company. On the other hand, there are the falsest,
most lying, thievish villains in the whole world,
I believe, appearing to the unwary the pleasantest
possible fellows. I laugh to myself when they try
it with me ! " Diirer was canny ; he knew the
world, with his steady, cool Northern temperament,
among the warm-blooded sons of the Lagoons.
" They say my art is not on the antique," he con
tinues, " and therefore not good. But Giovanni
Bellini, who has praised me much before many
gentlemen, wishes to have something from my
hand. He has come himself and asked me, and he
will pay me handsomely for it. I understand he
is a pious man. He is very old indeed, and yet
among the best amongfst them." The picture shows
the well-known figure of Albrecht Diirer with his

THEOBALD VON OER.— GIOVANNI BELLINl's VISIT TO THE STUDIO OF ALBRECHT DlJRER

/Robern German /Rasters 381
long hair, standing before his easel, on which is
seen his Madonna of the Rose Garlands, which is
now in Vienna. The aged Bellini's tall but bent
figure is to be seen, and he shows a deep interest
in the progress of his young neighbour's work.
Delightful in drawing and crisp in touch is
Moritz Miiller's Child Reading. The intent little
face and the eyes so accurately focussed on the page
make it a picture to be noticed. Observe, too, how
charmingly the hair is rendered. The differen
tiation of the textures is quite remarkable.
A pretty study by Paul Kiessling is the head of
Mignon; it is more appropriate for the decoration
of a handkerchief-box than for any other purpose,
still, it is a face with a certain sweet appeal, and
should not be overlooked as one passes through the
twenty-fifth room.
Human nature in a monastery is exploited in the
picture by Griitzner, a Munich Academy professor,
who has frequently turned his wit upon the infinite
possibilities of the ascetic life. In this case, the hu
mour lies in the expression of the older monk, who
sees that two younger ones have discovered an
entertaining book in the library. Probably he him
self is familiar with the volume!
A Coast Scene by Andreas Achenbach may be
observed in this room, while in the next. No. 26,
there is a moonlight effect of a fishing village. One

382 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
must not forget, simply because his pictures are
not now in the same school as those of younger
painters, that in his prime he was quite a pioneer.
He appears now a little intentionally pictorial, yet
his work is quite realistic. The worst thing one
can accuse him of is not being quite " up to date,"
and time may show — it has before — that this
is a forgivable shortcoming. Andreas Achenbach,
born in Cassel in 1815, can hardly be claimed as
a twentieth-century painter, although living when
the century opened; of the nineteenth century he
has seen all phases, and his art has held its own
in the line which he selected. He had interest in
pageantry; he was the chief mover in a fete given by
the Paint-box Club to the Emperor and Empress.
It is said that when the fairy boat which he had
constructed came upon the scene, the Emperor shed
tears. " I have seen many festas," he exclaimed,
" but this surpasses all." Achenbach arranged the
drop-curtain which fell occasionally during the per
formance : it was a study of clouds, and was said
to be most effective. The " Kaiserfest " was wit
nessed by two thousand five hundred persons.
Carl Spitzweg was an original painter of genre
subjects. He was born in Munich in 1808, and
was almost self-taught. This fact no doubt helped
his work to have the individual quality which dis
tinguishes it. The picturesque Road to Church

/Robern German /Rasters 383
near Dachau is his. The homely rustic expression
of his pictures may be seen here, although there
is none of the imaginative " hobgoblinry " in which
he also frequently indulges. Sometimes he is al
most as fantastic as Bocklin, but his dreams have
less virility, and his monsters are more conven
tional and less unexpected in their anatomical
freaks. Spitzweg was an apothecary for some
time; not until he was thirty years of age did he
feel the call of the aesthetic side of his nature to be
irresistible. When he finally devoted himself to
painting, he remained in an attic room for a studio,
with no luxurious appointments, in the old part
of Munich, taking his subjects from the life about
him, when he did not revel in the creations of his
typically Teuton fancy. He was keenly sensitive
to colour effects; his work is always harmonious
in this respect. Often his pictures gleam in posi
tively daring flashes of red and green. Spitzweg,
as a part of his education, visited Italy, Holland,
and England. He died in Munich in 1885.
A good study of sheep is the picture by Otto
Gebler, One of the Seven Sleepers, which shows a
flock of sheep in a barn, having suddenly come
upon a little tired shepherd lad asleep in a rude
bed, upon which also the dog is curled up keeping
watch. The inquiring attitude of a black sheep
in the foreground is excellent.

384 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
Benjamin Vautier, who is classed with Knaus,
and who also superficially resembles Defregger in
his choice of subjects, is characteristic in his pic
ture, A Pause in a Dance at an Alsatian Wedding.
The colouring is a secondary consideration with
him; his pictures are drawings which are coloured,
rather than schemes of chromatic harmony. He
is informal and straightforward in his rendering
of genre life, rather more so than Knaus.
The famous Ludwig Knaus, who was born in
Wiesbaden in 1829, and who still paints in Beriin,
where he is head of a studio, painted the amusing
Life of a Rope Dancer behind the Scenes, which is
in the twenty-sixth room. Perhaps no modern
artist is more widely known to-day, through his
charming Holy Family, or his dear little chubby
child upon whom the geese are making so uncere
monious an attack, or his rural scenes; his works
are familiar in home and school, and he is not only
popular but really beloved by many of his admir
ers. It is easy to see what an impression he made
even as early as 1855, when Edmund About wrote
of him in such a sympathetic strain ; " I do not
know whether Herr Knaus has long nails; but
even if they were as long as those of ^lephistoph-
eles, I should still say that he was an artist to his
fingers' ends I His pictures please the Sunday pub
lic, and the Friday public, the critics, the bourgeois.

/Robern German /Rasters 385
and — God, forgive me! the painters. . . . The
most incompetent eyes are attracted by his pictures
because they tell pleasant anecdotes ; but they like
wise fascinate the most jaded by perfect execution
of detail."
In the work of Knaus the popular appeal is
strong: much is sacrificed, as a recent critic has
remarked, " to sentiment and familiar realism."
Still, the work is good, and the subjects sympa
thetic, with power of selection which proclaims an
artist who knows the popular mind and also the
intellectual demand. The picture by which we are
to judge Knaus in Dresden is one of his most
entertaining. It is a view behind the scenes in a
travelling show. By the tattered hangings, and
near the sordid clothes-line and little stove, which
constitute the housekeeping outfit of this family of
strolling acrobats, the father of the family, in the
dress of a clown, but with an expression truly
pathetic on his weary face, is seated, holding a baby,
to whom he administers a nursing-bottle. Near
him are two trained white poodles, and his two
pretty little children, in fluttering circus robes,
warming their hands at the glow of the stove. At
the right his wife, a good-looking young woman
with handsome limbs, in pink tights, protruding
in a startling way from beneath the striped shawl
in which she is wrapped, sits involved in a flirtation

386 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
with a showily dressed dandy. The articles of the
wardrobe strung upon the clothes-line interfere
with her husband's vision of this episode. The
grim humour and pathetic disorder of this scene
are wholly natural, and the hazards and trials of a
Bohemian existence are epitomized with a good
deal of power.
The picture by Claus Meyer, called Three Cats
and Three Kittens, is excellent. Again one feels
the Dutch influence, and this time it is De Hooch
and Vermeer of Delft who live again ! The women
in this picture are in old German costumes, and
the composition is charming and effective. Claus
Meyer painted chiefly in Munich, though Hanover
was his native place.
Diez's study of wounded soldiers and a march
ing army is dramatic and interesting. Diez is
quite Dutch in his feeling, and one sees influences
of all the great leaders of the Netherlands in his
touch. Diirer and Rembrandt, Teniers and Brou
wer, all are reincarnated and modernized in his
work. He was by birth a native of Bayreuth, and
became professor in the Academy of Munich.
The beautiful transparent colour should be no
ticed in the picture by Josef Weiser, the interesting
Last Refuge, a scene during the defence of a mon
astery against invaders.
Fritz August Kaulbach is chiefly a " costume

/Robern German /Rasters 387
painter," who renders charming effects in semi-
historic style. His May Day shows a family party
of the seventeenth century, and is very attractive
in its way. The general atmosphere is that of a
Watteau, — graceful, dainty, and decorative. He
is somewhat eclectic, instead of being strictly orig
inal, but the results are very satisfactory. He culls,
but he culls with remarkable success, from the best
works of all times ; and his pictures are often posi
tively educational.
The painters of the Munich school developed
various processes; they revived fresco, and they
tried the use of wax medium. Another process,
employed a good deal by Piloty and Kaulbach, was
the use of a medium called " wasser glas," some
times alluded to as liquid flint. This is a partic
ularly permanent medium in wall decoration, and
is no more difficult to use than more perishable
fresco. There is a soft, attractive tremulousness in the
atmosphere of Ludwig Dill's Scene from the Vene
tian Lagoons. This silvery, peaceful stretch of
water, with its picturesque boats and its one little
steamer off in the distance, suggests the lazy local
spirit invaded by modern briskness. The low hori
zon and clear high sky give great feeling of space.
Really touching and full of pathetic incident is
C. L. Bokelmann's Emigrants Leaving Their

388 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
Home. We are so used to think of the arrival
of emigrants that we sometimes forget what heart
rending scenes must have often accompanied their
departure. The bent grandmother, kissing the lit
tle boys, — no doubt for the last time, — the little
child in its nightgown waiting on the door-step
to say farewell to its relatives, the serious faces of
the women, some of whom are weeping at the
prospect of parting, are all full of tender under
standing of the situation. The more one looks at
this picture, the more one seems to be standing
in the very little square itself, so gfreat is the veri
similitude. The tones of the picture and its han
dling are extremely beautiful.
Here hangs the only illustration of the g^reat
creative art of Adolf Menzel; it represents a
Sermon in the Old Klosterkirche in Berlin. Known
chiefly through his magnificent series of pictures
in the life of Frederick the Great, Menzel is pri
marily a great original genius in black and white.
He is a pioneer of the best naturalism, a naturalism
which recognizes the mind as being just as natural
as the body.
Menzel was an infant prodigy. He was born
in Breslau in 1815, but his father, realizing his
talent, as so few fathers of great artists seem to
have done, moved to Berlin especially that the
young Adolf might avail himself of the educational

/Robern German /Rasters 389
advantages of that centre. The boy, however, did
not care for the Academy. He refused the precise
form of aesthetic culture which had been planned
for him, but he adopted another; he studied
types in the city streets; used his keen penetration
for the purpose of noting details and facts which
had escaped the observation of ordinary people,
and thus became almost a self-made draughtsman.
He loved this adventurous original form of educa
tion, and continued in this manner until the death
of his father. The boy at this time was sixteen,
but the responsibility of the family devolved upon
him. Therefore he settled down, and, with the
balance and practical ability of the truest genius,
set to work at once as a lithographer, taking any
orders that came in his way. His first effort at
illustration was in an edition of Goethe. His career
was assured from this time on ; his name stood, as
it has ever since, for all that is best in five branches
of technique: pencil, chalk, pen, lithography, and
water-colour. His work is individual and of
rugged strength in its lines. His greatest contri
bution to art, perhaps, is in drawing, — he is abso
lute master of line and value. Sometimes he pre
ferred, when sketching from nature, to use the
simple lead-pencil, as it was so easily carried about,
and independent of conditions and the time wasted
in drying. But his pencil could express as much

390 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
as most men's paint. He had a never wearying
facility for reproducing all his impressions of every
side of life, and under all sorts of conditions. His
versatility is remarkable. His work is replete with
humour; he indulges in satire quite freely, but it
is a satire proceeding from an appreciation of
quaint and amusing situation, and is not inspired
by spite or spleen. He is a Carlyle of the crayon
when he comes to portray Frederick the Great at
Potsdam and Sans Souci. In his national inherit
ance he shows traces of the same qualities which
inspired Diirer and Holbein; when I say this, I do
not mean that he copies them in any sense, but that
the majestic Teutonic spirit which expressed itself
in their art according to the needs of their period
is again manifest in the productions of Menzel,
according to modem requirements and surround
ings. Menzel's illustrations for the works of Fred
erick the Great amount to two hundred, and are
individual and brilliant. They are the work of a
genius in historic interpretation : they have nothing
of the element of the romanticists by whom he was
surrounded, nor have they the least tendency to
the commonplace or the grandiose, such as usually
characterized court pictures in the early nineteenth
century. These illustrations are true to the life
of the period of Frederick and X'^oltaire, and noth-

/Robern German /Rasters 391
ing in old or new art is more complete as an
achievement than this series.
One sees nothing of the feminine influence in
the works of Menzel. His life seems to have been
quite apart from women, and he has spent much
time as a positive recluse. It is related of him that
at the age of seventy-eight he could still sketch
with firm, accurate strokes while travelling in a
train. Among his large and important pictures in
oil are also episodes from the life of Frederick.
He was a hermit, only going into society in order
to transcribe it and to paint it.
A personal friend of Menzel describes his " den "
in which much of his study and work was accom
plished. He says that the room was plentifully
stowed with books, — volumes on Van Eyck and
Diirer, — the works of Dante and Cervantes also
being among the favourites of the artist. In con
versation with his visitor, Menzel enunciated an
aesthetic principle which is most true in all depart
ments of aesthetics. He said that it was no use
supposing that Greek costumes would make a Greek
picture; that it was possible for modern figures
in modern dress to embody all the essential prin
ciples of the art of the Greeks, while the mere fact
of painting people with a classic effect in a scene
taken from Greece might fail absolutely of its pur
pose. Menzel's walls were decorated with portraits

392 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
by Holbein and Velasquez, and a statue of Michel
angelo's Moses occupied a space. Among con
temporary painters, the only one represented was
Meissonnier. Menzel was the senior and chief master in Berlin
art of the nineteenth century. The work of his
mature life took on a more modern note than that
which he had previously struck, but as we have only
this early painting in Dresden, by which to observe
his manner, we leave with regret the study of his
later development. The picture in Dresden is dated
1848, and was bought for this gallery in 1892.
Adolf Menzel died in February, 1905.
Menzel's illustrated Proverbs are famous. For
instance, when Frederick the Great says, " What we
have, we neglect and never appreciate sufficiently,
while we strive in vain to possess what we cannot
achieve " — Menzel portrays a caged bird, with
some cherries which have been put in for its delec
tation. The little prisoner cares nothing for the
fruit, and is only striving to get out of his cage;
while a free bird on the outside is making frantic
efforts to reach the cherries ! Liberty or fruit, —
how often the combination arises in human affairs !
Menzel was not much of a traveller. He went
to only one Italian city. Verona ; and explained
this by saying that there was so much in his imme
diate neighbourhood to be studied that he could not

/Robern German /Rasters 393
possibly go outside! He was intimate with Meis
sonnier, and, although he could speak no French,
and Meissonnier no German, they used to go prowl
ing together in the most congenial way; when
they saw something which called for mutual appre
ciation they would turn and squeeze hands!
Menzel has been called the " prophet of the
ugly." In 1835, when this was said, it was so
unusual for an artist to draw anything strictly
according to nature that one can understand the
reason for the nickname. He has also been char
acterized as the German Fortuny.
There is hardly a more charming child in art
than the little Arcadian who listens so attentively
to the shepherd playing upon a reed pipe in Ernest
Zimmermann's Music Lesson. The inquiring ex
pression on his earnest face is almost unrivalled.
A satyr sits by, beating time approvingly, and a
rabbit pricks up its long ears at the left. All is
glad and sylvan, and yet the child is positively
strenuous. Gabriel Max's Girl on Her Knees, the picture
called " Our Father," is beautifully executed, but
perhaps a thought too white in its impression.
Max selects subjects inclined to morbidness, or at
least to very grave seriousness. He is original in
his themes, possessing the one essential power in
modern aesthetic Hfe, whether in painting, music,

394 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
the drama or literature: the ability to start a new
emotion in the human breast. Essentially emo
tional, rather than intellectual, his pictures have
enormous and well-deserved popular charm. There
is feeling and thought in all his works ; that truly
German virility which never paints a picture simply
to fill a space, nor even to portray a scene, without
some undercurrent of intention. Emotions are ele
mental. Gabriel Max will always create an interest
and rouse an emotion in human hearts. He com
menced life in Prague, where, after the death of
his father, he began to work in that visionary psy
chic vein which has always predominated in his
pictures. Thoughtful, but not pedantic, bringing
tears to the eyes rather than instructing, his paint
ings are unique and characteristic, imbued with a
strong personality. The curious head of Christ on
the napkin of St. Veronica, that mysterious face in
which the eyes seem now closed, now open, is typ
ical of the spirit of his genius and one of his most
noted works.
Michael Munkacsy was bom in Hungary in
1846. His father was an Hungarian patriot; the
family life was very strenuous in troubled times,
and he was left an orphan at the age of four. He
was adopted by an aunt. His earliest impressions
must have been those of battle, murder, and sud
den death, for in a few years his aunt was killed

/Robern German /Rasters 39s
by members of the opposition. This time the little
Michael was passed on to an uncle, a rather stern
and very practical carpenter, and the boy was
made to learn the trade, and to make himself use
ful. Through his teens he was a journeyman car
penter, but his thirst for knowledge and culture.
led him to seek out college students, with whom
he found much in common, and he was popular
with the clever young men of his day. Indeed
his ambition for education caused him to overtax
his strength, and, from working all day and study
ing most of the night, he became a physical wreck,
and had to succumb to a long and serious illness.
After his recovery he decided that an artist's life
was the only one for him, and, as he could not get
much sympathy from those with whom he lived,
he started off to travel in order to pursue such
advantages as some of the cities had to offer. He
worked his way to Pesth as a mechanic, and, after
waiting a time to recuperate his fortunes, pushed
on to Vienna. He tried to provide for himself in
this city sufficiently to enable him to study at the
Academy, but his efforts were fruitless, and, as he
failed to pay for his tuition promptly, he was put
out of the institution. Practically self-taught, he
travelled on to Munich, and there set up a modest
studio and began to paint. Arriving with only
twenty florins, he soon sold pictures enough to

396 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
enable him to support himself: the battle painter,
Franz Adam, was particularly kind to him, evi
dently recognizing a kindred genius in the young
man who had already a tragic past. His pictures
took prizes and he was highly spoken of. He went
on to Diisseldorf, where he worked without further
instruction. He has been described as having a
strange appearance and being full of naive confi
dence. He spoke a broken German in a low voice
with a melancholy tone.
Munkacsy's Bohemian life at this time was of
an innocent and festive type; he rejoiced in Car
nival frolics and was always among the merry
makers. He liked his little joke. He had once
asked fifteen distinguished generals and war heroes
to dinner in his studio. The table was set for
thirty. He instructed his guests to sit down, leav
ing every other chair empty. The glasses were
filled, and the dinner was apparently about to pro
ceed, when, at a signal, the doors were thrown open,
and fifteen of the prettiest models in Paris, dressed
in the most fantastic costumes of various ages,
rushed in, laughing, and bounced into the vacant
seats! The old generals, surprised, but not dis
pleased, enjoyed their meal with much relish!
A rounded nature, Michael Munkacsy was by
tums " sad, mad, glad, yet perfectly sober." In
1870 he exhibited in the Paris Salon for the first

/Robern German /Rasters 397
time the picture of a Condemned Prisoner. This
made a great sensation, being a realistic and pa
thetic study of a condemned man sitting in his cell,
with his mourning family and friends about him,
while children eye him with a morbid curiosity.
But, in spite of his tremendous success, the artist
remained level-headed, and, unspoiled by adulation,
continued steadily at his work. He was decorated,
but returned quietly with his ribbon to his studio
in Diisseldorf, where he advanced continually in his
art, painting splendid genre subjects, more dashing
than Ribera, and sometimesi as brutal as Caravag
gio. His works at this time are full of realistic
types, often ugly: one might say that they had
power through lack of beauty. He is quite free
from any academic qualities.
Munkacsy lived in Paris later, and went after
ward to Budapest, where he resided for some
time. He died near Bonn in 1900. As great a
picture as he ever painted is his Crucifixion in
Dresden. The relief of the figures against the sky
is simply wonderful. The group is a large one,
the whole canvas being about twelve feet by six.
The centre of interest is at the right, where the
figure of Christ on the cross between the thieves
rises in awful grandeur, stately and noble. Ideals
are so varying that no Crucifixion in art has ever
yet satisfied a large number of people ; but perhaps

398 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
this modern picture has made its appeal to as many
souls as any other single work dealing with the
subject. The women at the foot of the cross are
full of grief, but the figures are less restrained and
dignified than that of St. John, who stands by,
overwhelmed with grief, his very helplessness mak
ing its pathos more strongly felt than action. In
the central foreground is a spirited figure : a youth,
who seems to hesitate between fear and curiosity;
he would go, and yet he would stay; a powerful
sense of the uniqueness of this death is borne in
upon him, but it terrifies the Jewish boy, who is
one of those that " know not what they do." The
bewilderment has spread to others in the crowd.
Two old Pharisees are attempting to argue them
selves free of responsibility. The noble rider on
horseback at the left looks back in awe as well as
wonder. Before him is a running figure, an old
man who wishes only to escape, horrified and con
science-stricken. The picture should be long stud
ied, for there is much thought in its composi
tion. Lenbach's Portrait of Paul Heyse is to be seen
in the twenty-eighth room. Paul Heyse was a poet
and novelist, bora in Berlin in 1830. He travelled
extensively in Italy, but after 1854 his residence
was made in Munich. He was one of the friends
of Bocklin, Lenbach, and their delightful set, of

/Robern German /Rasters 399
whom I shall speak when dealing with them in the
next chapter.
It is perhaps a little eccentric that Heinrich
Miiller, who was bora in Pultawa and lived and
died in Dresden, should select Lake Michigan as
the subject of his picture in this room !
The tragedy of the hills is vividly portrayed by
August Dieffenbacher in the picture of the father
of a family being brought home, having lost his
life in the winter blasts on the mountains.
One comes suddenly upon a familiar sight as one
enters the next apartment; it is often almost a
shock to meet face to face unexpectedly an old
friend, and that is the feeling that one has when
confronted with one of the most popular pictures
in the world, — familiar in every home, known by
every child, — the Boy Christ in the Temple, by
Hofmann. Perhaps it is finer in monochrome than
in the original, for Hofmann is a little crude as
a colourist; in a photograph one sees the sweet
face to better advantage than in the real picture.
Hofmann's Christ and the Adulteress is here also,
— it is a trifle theatrical. Critics do not recognize
Hofmann very seriously; but it seems to me un
pardonable to ignore entirely, as many do, the at
tainments of a painter who possesses as wide a
popularity as any man in his line. His Bible illus
trations are in most general use; his Christ in the

400 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
Temple is deservedly famous; it is not fair to
say that there is no art where there is so wide an
appeal. It may not be the art most appreciated
by the cultured, but it is autocratic to claim that
there are no good points in pictures which have
such a universal reputation.
The Burning Monastery is an example of the
work of Carl F. Lessing, who was born in Breslau
in 1808, and occupied important positions in Ber
lin and Diisseldorf, becoming later a professor and
director of the Carlsruhe School of Art. Lessing
was one of the rather visionary school, but these
men showed a keen appreciation of nature, which
marked a new era. There is more realism in his
work than in that of some of the earlier men, but
he is best known as a master of the " ideal land
scape " class. He died in 1880 at Carlsruhe. He
was an unconscious prophet of the great theory
which was to dominate later and greater painters.
This is well expressed by G. Clausen : "A land
scape should not be so much an inventory as a
translation or transcript of a mood of nature."
Lessing chose moods of nature for his study, and
rendered them with a good deal of fine feeling,
although in a very different spirit from that in
which a modem artist would approach them. He
loved landscape for its own sake, independent of
cultivation or civilization. " Had I been bom in

/Robern German /Rasters 401
the seventeenth century," he said, " I would have
wandered through Germany after the Thirty Years'
War, plundered, ruined, and wild as she then was."
This sentiment should be compared with the doc
trine of Lairesse, which I have quoted elsewhere
as a further proof of the fact that the spirit of
the times determines the standard of art.
The Lamentation over Christ, No. 2262, was
commenced by Julius Rotermund, who died very
early; the picture was consequently finished by
Eduard Bendemann, and is signed by both names.
It was completed in 1859. Bendemann was the
professor under whom Rotermund was studying
in Dresden, and was therefore the proper person
to complete his pupil's work. The pictures of
Eduard Bendemann are inclined to be convention
ally romantic, and do not exhibit much depth of
thought; neither are they especially excellent as
artistic productions.
Among those who turned earnestly to a study
of nature was Ludwig Gurlitt, who was borri at
Altona in 18 12. The picture of the Monastery
of St. Busaco in Portugal is by him. It was painted
in 1875. There is some of the clear daylight which
was brought to such perfection by the Englishman
Constable, to be seen in this study. He was a genu
ine realist, and was a leader among the men who

402 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
had thrown off the traditional yoke of artificial
landscape. Among the painters of modem village genre is
Franz Defregger, whose Mountain Smithy hangs
here. Defregger is well known to all through his
Tyrolese pictures, which, although rather monot
onous, are individually interesting. He always tells
a story, and this one is more dramatic than most
of his selections. In the Tyrolese Revolt in 1809
the war was conducted by such men as innkeepers,
herdsmen, shepherds, and even priests ; one Capucin
monk went upon the field and fought with only a
huge ebony crucifix for his weapon. The peasants
armed themselves in secret, making rude weapons
at all the forges and smithies in the mountain fast
nesses; they laid in wait with all forms of missiles
ready to their hands, until the terrible word of
command was given, — " In the Name of the Holy
Trinity, cut all loose ! " upon which it is said that
the very rocks, bushes, and crags seemed to be
endowed with life, and all nature appeared to aid
the revolutionists, for they were hidden behind
every tree and hill, and they poured down stones
and billets of woods upon the enemy, who was not
ready for such an assault, firing as well with the
true aim of huntsmen, never wasting their shots,
and doing deadly execution. They were unsuccess
ful, however, and their chiefs were afterward put

X

Z
OoS

o'J

/Robern German /Rasters 403
to death. But the spirit and force exhibited by the
Tyrolese on this occasion has appealed to their
artists, and is perpetuated nobly. Defregger was
himself born in the Tyrol in 1835, and has usually
preferred subjects dealing with the native life of
that community. In this line he is far happier than
when he attempts a Madonna or an important his
torical picture. Until he was fifteen, Franz took
care of his father's flocks; bareheaded and bare
footed, he mixed with the country folk, the herds
men and milkmaids, laying a splendid foundation
for health, and growing in knowledge of the inti
macies of rustic life. He did not realize his artistic
vocation until after he was twenty-three. He then
studied with Piloty, in Munich, but turned for his
expression to the vivid memories of his youth.
The tendency of memory — that of idealizing the
early life and seeing the most picturesque side of
the past — is observable in his simple peasant pic
tures, where the people all seem to be in holiday
spirit, and usually in festal array. The sterner
side of the peasant's history is seen in this Moun
tain Smithy, while the lighter side is well exem
plified by his picture, Hunters Taking Leave of the
Sennerin. In the Smithy, the honest and earnest
faces of the men, and the wondering faith of the
young girl are charmingly contrasted. The prim
itive cannon strapped to ita carriage awaits them,

404 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
and betokens the efforts of these plain people to
be ready to protect and to enforce their rights.
Defregger is now an Academy professor at Munich.
Alexander Calame was a Swiss artist, born in
Vevay in 1810; he worked much in Geneva, and
his picture here is of fir-trees near a mountain
sitream, which, though not in a very poetic way,
displays certain Swiss characteristics. Very correct
workmanship is his only redeeming feature; he had
little imagination or inspiration. When his works
— very uniform in expression — used to appear in
considerable numbers in the Paris Salon, the
naughty Frenchmen would shrug their shoulders,
and are reported to have remarked, " Un Calame,
— deux Calames, — trois Calames, — que de Ca-
lamites!" Calame began life by colouring views
of Swiss scenery, and there is no question but the
influence of this early practice can be traced in his
paintings. He died in Mentone in 1864.
Faint praise has been allowed to damn Hans
Gude, by dubbing him the Calame of the North!
His picture of Fishers Landing on the Seashore
is a correct, neat, estimable work. The colouring is
unobjectionable ; it passes muster, but fails to arouse
enthusiasm. Modern men are too apt to laugh at a really good
work, because it is executed in a method which
does not conform to the ideals by which they them-

/Robern German /Rasters 405
selves have been taught expression. At the same
time they will stand in reverence before a modern
work which happens to be a little better than they
can produce themselves, although it is a mere baga
telle in comparison with the older picture. Time
helps to balance these things; but it is almost im
possible to coerce the vogue of a day.

CHAPTER Xin.
MODERN GERMAN MASTERS — CONTINUED
As has been noted, modern German painters of
the early nineteenth century were academic; art
did not advance greatly for a time. To-day, how
ever, Germany has a great many individual artists
not members of a special school or cult, though
undoubtedly influenced, as all impressionist artists
must be, by the great Frenchmen. Each modem
German of importance is a law unto himself, and
that makes these artists, together, a most fascinat
ing body of painters to study.
Returning to the first hall, which divides the two
wings of the upper gallery, one is in the presence
of the great canvas by Max Thedy, called Adoratio
Crucis. This is intended to represent a real scene,
and yet in it there is also a possibility of allegorical
interpretation. The scene is in a church, where a
life-sized crucifix lies on the ground, and penitents
and worshippers are crowding down to kiss and
adore it. While it is peculiar, it is powerful. Max
406

/Robern German /Rasters 407
Thedy, a native of Munich, is professor at Wei
mar. The Portrait of Napoleon I., in his coronation
robes, painted by F. B. Gerard, was presented to
the Gallery by Napoleon himself. The figure is
a stately piece of regal upholstery, quite in the gen
eral spirit of the man and his times.
The modern French school is often alluded to
comprehensively as the " Impressionist " school.
This term is all very well as far as it goes. The
aim of modern painters is to reproduce, not a pho
tographic portrait of natural objects, as was the
ideal of the Pre-Raphaelites, but to secure in their
pictures some impression which the object has made
upon them, — a personal appeal, as it were, an in
terpretation of the object by the artist's own indi
viduality. The painter tries to express himself
upon a given subject, just as an author does; he
does not pretend to give a literal transcript of the
object which he has selected, any more than a
writer on Shakespeare contents himself by making
quotations from the plays. His own interpretation
must ^pear in both cases. Thus it will be seen
that in a measure any artist is an impressionist if
he does more than photograph a scene. But the
modera Frenchmen themselves invented a term
which distinguishes their school better — " plein-
airistes," or "open-air painters." In selecting

4o8 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
daylight and natural effects instead of arrange
ments of artificial light and deliberate pose in com
position, they were differentiated from all artists
who had gone before them, excepting a chosen few
who had been in advance of their times.
With this rendering of natural daylight and un
affected composition, there grew up a new use of
pigments. Instead of the paint being mixed on the
palette and applied in a single broad value of one
shade, it was placed in small patches, not mingled
together, but set so cleverly and with so perfect
a comprehension of the effect to be produced that
the canvas has often, on close scrutiny, the appear
ance of a mosaic, while at a proper distance the eye
unconsciously mixes the tints for itself, and the
result is much more vital than it would be if the
shades were all blended, as they used to be by most
of the old masters, with a view to close inspection
chiefly. Hals, Velasquez, and Moroni used to paint
directly and with spontaneity; the pigment lies at
once as it is intended to remain, and there are no
glazings or retouchings. Most of the later paint
ers used this method also, and in the art of to-day
it is the only method employed to any extent.
The decorative chalky Fisherman's Familv, by
Puvis de Chavannes, is one of the few modem
French pictures here. It is more than a study of
a fisherman's family, however, being symbolical of

PUVIS DE CHAVANNES.  FISHERMAN S FAMILY

/Robern German /Rasters 409
the three ages of man. Puvis de Chavannes was
a true poet, but no dreamer. His was a unique
gift; he was a mystic, and yet was not subtle nor
involved. He was a great idealist, with steady
nerves and a certain sane ability to portray wide
simplicity. Although he was so deeply in sympa
thy with the impressionist movement, he deter
mined on his own method, and adhered to it,
never being dominated by any other style. Be
fore entering any French studio, he had twice
been to Italy. He had always a sympathy with
seafaring folk, and uses them in an elemental and
ideal way. His feeling for harmony made him use
few colours, and those simple and broad. His
people have strong, well-knit bodies capable of
work. The sentiment which one feels is neither
religious nor pagan; it is ideafly human and a
newly created t3^e in art. Puvis de Chavannes
said himself : " Painting is not merely an imitation
of reality, but it is a parallel with Nature." His
use of pigments is as original as his design. At
a first glance it would often be difficult to say
whether he worked in oils, water-colour, or pastel.
As a matter of fact, although people often allude
to his " fresco," he never employed the medium of
fresco at all; his large decorative wall paintings
are in oil, on canvas, applied afterward to the wall.
One motto of his was, " One must trj' to paint sub-

4IO XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
jects taken from real life, but they must have a
general application." His beings are of no period,
and of no nation. In this he is supremely the mas
ter in the selection of essential elements of human
ity with the divine side recognized as fully as the
earthly. He used to say: "Nature? They say
that I ignore her? They fail to understand that
I do not copy, but I draw my inspiration from her."
In his actual life, Puvis de Chavannes was emi
nently practical. He worked steadily all day, a
healthy, robust man, with strong nerves and a fine
mental development. He seldom took luncheon,
not liking to interrupt his concentration, but at noon
he would eat a little dry bread and a few brandy
cherries. When his ideas stopped flowing readily,
he knew that he was physically tired, and had the
sense to stretch himself out and go to sleep, no
matter at what hour, always waking refreshed in
a short time. Few brain-workers realize the value
and refreshing stimulant of a short nap, or how
possible it would be for almost any one. Simply
to follow the dictates of nature, and to sleep when
weary, makes a worker capable of accomplishing
more in one hour after waking than he could in
four hours of conscientious plodding, after nature
has made its cry for refreshment. Puvis de Cha
vannes always sang at his work, and had that other
attribute of healthy nerves, the ability to throw off

/Robern German /Rasters 4"
care and responsibility when the day's work was
done, entering fully into cheerful conviviality and
getting a complete mental rest.
The lack of willingness to follow any master,
even in his early youth, when Puvis de Chavannes
went from studio to studio in dissatisfaction, may
in some degree account for the fact that his actual
drawing is often at fault. Some enthusiastic ad
mirers consider this intentional; they believe that
he meant to throw his figures out of proportion at
times in order to simplify the impression; but the
faulty drawing does not simplify, — it complicates
the impression, for one longs to adjust these con
spicuous peculiarities which are so inconsistent;
and if the lines were all firmly in the right places,
they would be twice as simple and direct in their
appeal. It seems to me that one must admit that
his figures and his details are often out of draw
ing; but the greatness of the man is the more
remarkable in that he rises absolutely to excellence
in spite of what would usually be a serious draw
back. The positive in his work is so much stronger
than this negative that it always dominates. For
nine years his pictures were refused by the Salon.
The academic artists could not forgive these tech
nical inaccuracies; it was not a quick road which
he ran to fame. Puvis de Chavannes was among
those to found the New Salon, and in 189 1 he be-

412 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
came its president. From this time his reputation
grew gradually, but it was not until he was seventy-
one years old that he reached the summit of his
fame. His friendship with the Princess Catacuzene
commenced when he was thirty, and has been lik
ened to Michelangelo's love for Vittoria Colonna.
She was his greatest inspiration, and he always
turned to her for approval of his work. Two years
before his death, they were married. She only lived
about a year. After this, the health of the master
failed, and he lost all wish to live without his be
loved companion. In the midst of his sorrow he
completed his last work, the Old Age of St. Gene
vieve, in the Pantheon, and then succumbed to
mortal illness. It is told by a personal friend that
when his last hour was at hand, he motioned every
one to retire from his room, and, by his own wish,
he died quite alone.
The sweet, wholesome sanity of the man has wit
nessed to itself in his choice of subjects. Nearly
all his pictures are peaceful, radiant, full of opti
mism, and the joy of living. Horrors and morbid
subjects did not attract him. He did not care for
storm and stress ; even war was symbolized by the
dignity of suffering rather than disordered despair.
Cool, calm, elevated, we feel that the name of Puvis
de Chavannes stands for all the noble qualities of

/Robern German /Rasters 413
the art to which he made such rich and original
contribution. In sharp contrast, the sentimental young attitudi-
nizer whom Gerhard von Kugelgen has chosen to
portray as the Prodigal Son is to be seen here.
This artist met with a tragic fate, being murdered
in 1820 near Dresden. He was professor of the
Academy. The correct and in every way excellent work of
Wilhelm Riefstahl is to be seen in the Funeral
Procession Past the Pantheon in Rome. His schol
arly rendering of detail is sound, and his pictures
are much liked in public collections, being at the
same time instructive and decorative.
Karl Hoff, a professor at Carlsruhe, where he
died in 1890, has painted a truly dramatic incident
in his large canvas entitled The Son's Last Greet
ing. A mother and daughter are learning of the
death and last messages of a young soldier from
one of his comrades in arms, who stands in rev
erence before their grief. The contrasting tones
— the soft grays and the bright garb of youth —
could not be more excellently managed. The pic
ture is an episode, almost a narrative. If one may
argue, as one has to among the moderns, that a
story is not a necessary feature of a picture, still
one may also reserve the right to enjoy and appre
ciate it when the painter is so clever that he can

414 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
combine the two, and give us something to think
of as well as something to look at. There is more
than one story in this picture. When one sees how
the handsome youth and the lovely maiden are gaz
ing into one another's eyes across the space which
separates them, both full of that sympathy which
is the first step toward a deeper love, one feels that
there should be a sequel; a painting on another
key, from which the sad note shall be missing.
Julius Roting's Columbus before the Ecclesias
tical Council of Salamanca is a strong picture, and
the figures, if a little theatrical, are well drawn and
lifelike. The historic detail is weH considered, and
the picture repays close observation.
The portrait of His Majesty, King Albert of
Saxony, hangs here, painted by Leon Pohle, an
Academy professor of Dresden. Pohle was bom in
Leipsic in 1841. He has painted several of the
royal family. In Room 35 may be seen the likeness
of Prince George, Duke of Saxony ; this picture was
presented to the gallery by the artist in 1899. The
portrait of King Frederick August the Just of Sax
ony, one of the noble princes of this house, greets
us in the thirty-first room. It is by Karl Vogel,
of Vogelstein, and was painted in 1823.
Dramatic and full of tragic situation is Carl
Bahr's scene of the Finnish Magicians foretelHng
the death of Ivan the Terrible. This picture was

KARL HOFF.  THE SOn's LAST GREETING

/Robern German /Rasters 415
painted in 1850. Carl Bahr was an artist of the
first half of the nineteenth century, as his work
denotes. The smooth mawkishness of Diethe's Supper at
Emmaus shows how low the standard of religious
art had fallen at this time. It is a relief to turn
to a different theme.
A realistic picture like the scene in the port of
Hamburg, caUed Going to Work, is in early morn
ing light. It is a good genre painting, and should
be examined for its little incidents. It is by one
of the Carlsruhe painters, Kallmorgen, who is pri
marily regarded as a landscape painter, but with
whom the human element is almost never absent.
The Ferry at Telemarken, Norway, by Siegwald
Dahl, is a remarkably fine specimen of the earlier
realistic school. As is appropriate to the subject,
the whole impression of atmosphere and colouring
is cold: the drawing is exquisite, and the aerial
perspective startlingly clear; great feeling for dis
tance is observable.
A blithesome thing is the Young Triton by
Carlos Grethe. Dashing through the deep blue
waves, the little red-headed merman pursues a rec
reant flying-fish, which has all it can do to escape
his swift stroke. The whole has a breezy feeling
through it, which almost brings the salt-sea smell

4i6 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
to one's nostrils. It is a capital performance in
its line.
The spirited scene from the Napoleonic era, rep
resenting Prussian Dragoons at Early Dawn, is by
Robert Haug; it was painted in 1891. The pic
ture is called after the name of an old German song,
" Morgenrot ! Morgenrot ! "
Hans Hermann, born in Berlin in 1858, has given
us a pleasant but rather photographic view of an
old Dutch town ; Hermann is hardly as original or
as full of life as some of his contemporaries.
Paul Baum, a Dresden painter of the last half
of the nineteenth century and early twentieth, is
considered by some as a satellite of Claude Monet.
He is fuH of talent: his two charming landscapes
here, Melancholy, No. 2293 D, an early spring land
scape, with a view of the Flemish flats, and his
autumn study, with first snow, No. 2293 E, are
interesting pieces of impressionist work.
Notice the soft greenish picture, a Comer of a
Peasant's Room, by Carl Bios ; the quality of lumi
nosity developed in that dot of sunlight is excellent.
A curious idea is that of Eduard von Gebhardt,
a painter of Diisseldorf; he has adopted the prin
ciple of portraying Biblical scenes in the German
costumes of the fifteenth century. A panel by him
presents a unique composition ; so far as I know,
it is the only treatment in art of its subject. It

/Robern German /Rasters 417
represents the Holy Women washing the anointed
body of Christ, which has been brought into the
house of his faithful friends. The body of the
Lord is laid on the plain floor, partly covered with
a white cloth, the head supported with pillows.
The three Maries are ministering, the Virgin weep
ing at his head, and the Magdalen anointing the
body from the alabaster box which she holds. Two
women, talking together, approach with basins of
water, while St. John stands reverently by, con
templating with anguish the cold form of his Mas
ter. Grouped at the other side of the large bed
room, lofty, entirely German, with its timber ceil
ing and diamond-paned window, are a number of
honest country-folk dressed as Luther and Diirer
might have dressed, sitting on chairs at the foot
of a canopied bed. Altogether the picture is a
strange one, and a notable example of the reaction
against the conventional " drapery studies " which
religious pictures had become.
The Roman peasants which Gustav Kuntz paints
so frequently are seen to advantage in his Roman
Pilgrim, who is kissing the feet of a crucifix by
the wayside, and his other Roman Pilgrim, who
is seated, piously regarding a festooned saint in a
niche in the wall. The same model served for both
studies. Franz Skarbina's Belgian Inn on the Shore of

4i8 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
La Panne is a typical painting of this Berlin artist.
He was original in his mode of procedure in his
artistic career. He was born in 1849. His first
works were scenes from the life of Frederick the
Great, based upon Menzel. Suddenly he branched
out in a new direction, and exhibited a picture of
Wiertz-like horror, in 1878, the Awakening of One
Supposed to be Dead. By the time he sent pic
tures to the Paris Salon in 1885, he had quite over
turned his old traditions, and passed through a
stage of naturalism into impressionism. This sin
gle example of his work shows great control over
atmospheric effects. It was painted in his full
maturity in 1891.
The Seamstress, by Max Liebermann, shows that
artist's pioneer spirit, he standing in the same rela
tion to German art as that occupied by Millet in
the Barbizon school When he commenced his
work, he was derided as an apostle of the ugly;
but, as time went on, he became better understood.
Liebermann, while recovering from an illness, was
obliged to spend many days lying in the open air,
with nothing to watch but the play of the sunshine
and the working peasants. It acted as a revela
tion in his art. The Old Sewing Woman sitting
at her window, with another chair in front of her,
that she may rest her feet on the rails, is a thor
oughly natural study. There is great insight in

/Robern German /Rasters 419
his work; it has the Teutonic characteristic of
thoughtfulness. Though sometimes heavy and
without extreme readiness in mellow colour effects,
he works more like Millet, putting the vitality of
the fields and the power of mental strength before
us. Liebermann has told us in his own words what
is his principle in art :~ " I do not seek," he writes,
" for what is called the pictorial ; but I would
grasp Nature in her simplicity and grandeur, —
the simplest thing and the hardest." This sober
monumental dignity is what Max Liebermann
stands for, and there is a changelessness, a lack of
evanescent fashion about his pictures, which makes
them belong to the genuine art of his country.
A pupil of the Dresden Academy, though bom
at Liege in 1833, is Jan Libert Oury. He is rep
resented here by a charming study of a nun: the
official title of the picture is A Nun Reading, but
a glance at the serious eyes lifted to ours, the wist
ful unsatisfied longing in the fixed gaze, shows us
that this nun is reading quite outside the open book
which lies before her; her interests are rather to
inquire into the secrets of the human heart, and
one longs to help her in her quest.
The striking composition of Hans Thoma greets
us here. A trifle suggesting the great genius of
Bocklin, Thoma stands as a connecting link be
tween the old and new art. Like Botticelli in his

420 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
symmetry, like Diirer in his stern mediaevalism,
he is yet joyous and pagan, replete with nature-
poetry, and pastoral in a Virgilian way, Greek yet
modern. Perhaps this is really being a classic.
Hans Thoma was born in the Black Forest in 1839,
where his childhood was spent close to nature.
Until he was twenty, he simply vegetated, and lived
almost like a hermit, with the exception of some
slight art instruction in the winters. After that,
he started on a career of travel, visiting Italy, Paris,
Diisseldorf, and Munich, where Bocklin's influ
ence was felt, ending in Frankfort, where he set
up his studio. His picture here, the Guardian of
the Valley, is a symbolic figure in armour, with a
nimbus, who might be intended as an archangel;
he watches over the slumbering valley by night.
This thought may often have come to him in his
calm forest home among the hills. The sentiment
of the Spring Idyl, too, is that inspired by a com
prehension of nature. The portrait of the artist
himself, with an autumn landscape for a back
ground, may be seen in the next room. Here we
have the formal note of decorative portraiture. It
is not quite free from affectation.
There is a powerful picture here by the French
man Germain David-Nillet. This study of con
trasting lights — this ashy gray woman standing
before this fiery red man — is called The Confes-

/Robern German /Rasters 421
sion. Is it the man, in a glow of shame, who is
confessing to the woman that which causes all the
colour to go from her and leave her clay-cold and
lifeless in a misplaced love, or is it the woman, in
the chill of a bitter remorse, who is making the
confession, — a confession which makes the man
burn with anger? The fact that it is not certain
which was the artist's intention renders the picture
doubly dramatic.
The modern realistic painter of Norway par ex
cellence — the man who stands for such principles
as those of Bastien Le Page and Dagnan Bouveret
— is Christian Krohg. He is a great narrator, he
is intensely dramatic, with the stern sordid truthful
ness of the pessimist. There is not special oppor
tunity to judge of these qualities in his Norwegian
Pilot-boat, in Dresden. One cannot do better than
quote Hamerton's well-digested opinion of extreme
realism which overlooks anything ideal as abso
lutely out of nature. " We may exaggerate because
we feel strongly," remarks Hamerton, " but we
far oftener exaggerate because we do not feel deli
cately." There is a species of blindness in such
realism ; and a man who can see only the gross and
hideous in nature and life (even low life) is but
a half-developed character. The example of Chris
tian Krohg in Dresden is a simple study of a boat
man and a boy. The pilot, with extended hand, is

422 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
pointing out an object of interest to the lad beside
him. The composition is original, only a small
portion of the boat being represented, and beyond,
the angry sea.
Old Age, a picture of two old goose-keepers, by
Count von Kalkreuth, is an excellent bit of natural
istic work of this painter. Gray and lacking in
sunshine, his pictures exhibit all that those who
dislike this school consider sordid. He is quite
relentless, and perhaps we are justified in thinking
him rather cheerless and uninviting.
A sort of Paul Potter of the nineteenth century
is Hans Olde, who, though educated in Paris, has
settled quietly down to cattle and genre painting in
the picturesque Holstein country. The picture of
a Holstein bull, which hangs here, was painted by
him in 1896.
Lenbach's portrait of Marco Minghetti hangs
here. Marco Minghetti was a famous Italian
statesman. He was bora in Bologna in 18 18, and
died in Rome in 1886. Under Cavour he was Min
ister of the Interior. He afterward became Pre
mier in 1863. He has written to some extent, and
has made valuable contributions to the literature
of economics.
Franz von Lenbach was one of the greatest
German painters who has ever lived. Startlingly
original in a time when artists were idealizing their

/Robern German /Rasters 423
portraits into their own conception of " great men,"
Lenbach began sternly to paint facts, — the man
just as he was, neither flattered nor reinforced by
any extraneous charms. He applied to photographs
for his accurate cold facts, not using them, of
course, as an aid, except to consult their inflexible
truth, and then he went to work on a plan of his
own. In most of his portraits the only really care
ful finish is in the eyes ; the head receives attention,
too, but the rest is often sketchy and indefinite.
These portraits by Lenbach are world-famous.
In all lands his rendering of Bismarck's face is
familiar : the popular impression of the appearance
of most of the celebrated Germans of the nine
teenth century is based somewhat upon Lenbach's
likenesses of them. His portraits are the only ones
in Germany thought worthy of reproduction by
engraving and etching, and they have been repeat
edly printed in various publications.
Lenbach was bom of humble parents in a little
village in Bavaria, in 1836, but worked his way
to fame without any singular hindrances. One day,
while driving with the Princess Bismarck, they
passed a poor man working on the roof of a cot
tage. " Just look, Princess," said Lenbach, " I,
too, have worked like him in my day ! " His ap
pearance was that of an alert, intellectual man, a
Httle Mephistophelian in type. While he was still

424 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
a young painter, he was asked his price. He re
plied, " It depends. I may ask twenty thousand
marks, or I may be willing to pay five thousand if
the subject is exceptionally interesting." He lived
up to his ideals, and, as wealth came to him, he
used it in the most intelligent way, in surrounding
himself with all sorts of fine pictures, antiques, and
such things as delight the soul of an artist. The
Villa Lenbach was one of the chief sights of Mu
nich. He was showered with royal gifts. The
Emperor, the Queen of Roumania, and many other
great ones testified to their appreciation, for,
though no courtier, and never having sought for
favours, he was the chosen painter of two genera
tions of German royalty. When Princess Bismarck
once complained that she never saw anything of
her husband or her sons, Lenbach observed, " Well,
what made you marry into such a hard-working
set of diplomats ? " Lenbach and Bismarck were
close friends. It was a familiar sight to see them
embrace each other when they met on the street.
When Lenbach was painting the portrait of Leo
XIII., the Pope's question showed the breadth of
the pontifical sympathies : he inquired, " .\re you
a good Christian?" instead of asking him if he
were a good Catholic. Lenbach had a keen sense
of humour, and expressed himself of the opinion
that wit was " the chief charm of human greatness."

/Robern German /Rasters 425
In art his taste was much gratified by the English
school. He enjoyed the portraiture of Reynolds
and the leading British painters of that period, and
also was a lover of Turaer and Constable.
Lenbach knew how to use every minute of his
time. A friend was once spending the evening
with him. He relates that, at one o'clock in the
morning, their conversation was interrupted, and
the friend was called away to answer a message
which he had received. When he returned, he
found Lenbach deep in a book; even ten minutes
at that hour was too much time to be wasted !
Lenbach's death was quite recent. Last sum
mer, 1905, a magnificent testimonial to his position
in German art was the great Lenbach exhibition
in Munich, where nearly all his leading works were
gathered under one roof. It was a splendid oppor
tunity to judge and understand the virility of this
man. Alas! His love for the English school has
probably led him into some rash colour experi
ments, for many of his pictures are cracking or
peeling already. But, as they used to say of Reyn
old's portraits, — even a damaged one is better than
anything else one can get!
Fritz von Uhde now demands our attention. His
large triptych, Bethlehem, greets us in the thirty-
sixth room, and is so much a departure from the
usual in religious compositions that we must try

426 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
and understand his position in his intense real
ism. Fritz von Uhde's father was an ecclesiastical
functionary, and he himself joined the Saxon Horse
Guards in 1867, being then about nineteen. He
stayed with the army through the French cam
paign, and in 1877 became a captain. Then he
left the warrior's life to become a painter in Munich,
after which a few years were spent with Munkacsy
in Paris. A hard worker and an original thinker,
his effort was to portray the life about him, adapted
to religious scenes. In this he does just what we
criticize in Rembrandt, Veronese, and others, who
were excused on the ground that they did not know
the countries and costumes which they attempted.
But in the case of Von Uhde and others of his
standard, this is quite intentional; of course any
nineteenth-century painter had every faciHty for
painting historic scenes as they had appeared, if
he wished to do so. But Von Uhde preferred to
treat Bethlehem as a common stable view, such as
might be seen in Germany or in any other country ;
he selects modern clothes and modern types delib
erately. His theory in so doing must be partly
symbolic, to impress the poor and lowly of to-day
with the fact that the Incarnation was for them
as for the Holy Land, — a t3T)ical re-Incarnation,
as it were, independent of time and place, with

/Robern German /Rasters 427
its message for the German day-labourer just as
much as for the shepherds who watched their flocks
by night. This principle is a worthy one, and we
rejoice in the spirit of universal Christianity that
it helps to interpret. But when one looks at the
angels sitting on the rafters singing, the old ideal
ism which is implanted in the human breast of all
ages revolts a little at the types which Von Uhde
has chosen. Human children, — well and good ;
but why half-starved gutter-snipes of selected hid
eousness, with careworn, prematurely old faces,
hanging their large bare feet over, with the toes
turned in? Is there not a compromise possible
between Albani's sugary cherubs and these raga
muffins singing so lustily, with wings on their
shoulders and bunions on their feet? There is
something a little incongruous about wings and
bunions. If an angel ha^ wings, why should it
develop corns? And must all modern shepherds
be cripples and consumptives? It seems to me that
modern realism has reached its limit in this com
position of Von Uhde's.
In many of his other works the balance between
modera peasantry and revealed religion is better
sustained; but in the Dresden example it seems
to have been carried a trifle far. The central pic
ture is much more pleasing than the wings.
A striking composition by Kuehl, full of piquant

428 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
spirit in spite of its subject, is the picture of the
sewing-girls in the Orphanage at Lubeck; it ought
to be sordid, yet it is filled with an unexplainable
charm, largely dependent upon the clear light which
streams in from the window in the back, — an
original mode of lighting. The bare walls and long
stretch of board floor ought to be monotonous, yet
they have not that quality. After all, light, confined
in a space and illuminating the spots best adapted
to receive it, is nearly always a sufficient adornment
for a study when it is well expressed. The touches
of red save the picture from coldness, and give
animation to the tone. Kuehl is much influenced
by Fortuny in his work. He was a native of Lii-
beck, his birth having occurred in 1850. A pro
fessor in Dresden and Munich, he stands high in
the modern German school. His peculiar lightness
of touch and a certain scintillating quality are at
tributable to the Spanish feeling derived from For
tuny ; consciously or unconsciously, he has adopted
that painter as a model.
George Hitchcock is here among the few Ameri
cans. He was born in Providence, Rhode Island,
and is famous for his beautiful paintings of the
splendid floral displays of a Dutch Springtide. This
picture is a study amidst the tulips of Haarlem.
Another American, Alexander Harrison, is the
author of the Evening by the Waterside. Harri-

/Robern German /Rasters 429
son is a Philadelphian, who has taken up residence
in Paris, painting there for many years. He works
in the samfe lines as Besnard and Cazin, sometimes
recalling Manet himself.
Gari Melchers, a native of Detroit, but working
in Paris and North Holland, painted the Dutch
Shipwright, in Room 35. These three are the
only Americans who are represented among the
modern painters. It makes one wish that some of
our other artists might appear on these walls, in
such good international company.
And now we come to the most original genius
of all : the matchless Arnold Bocklin. This strange
artist was born in Basle in 1827, the son of a small
merchant, — brought up in an atmosphere of rib
bons and threads. I am a believer in the virility
of early impressions: often unconsciously the eye
is affected by the first notes of colour which have
impinged upon the retina. When Arnold was a
little child, his mother had probably often carried
him into the shop ; is it not possible that his unusual
little eyes, roving about among the bolts of bright,
unrelated colour, may have grasped an impression
of clear, untoned tints, which stayed by him always ?
At any rate, however this might be, Bocklin has
used such a gamut of colour as defies all systematic
theories regarding harmony and tone. Some call
this art " bizarre ; " at any rate, it is surprising :

430 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
your attention is arrested whether you will or no,
and that indicates power in some form.
The good ribbon merchant was, at all events,
intelligent enough to recognize his son's unique
gifts, and he allowed him to study art at the Draw
ing Academy of Basle. In the University Library,
Arnold discovered the collection of Holbein's
works, and these he studied and copied by the hour.
That part of his dual art personality which is Teu
tonic is due to the influence of Holbein on his plas
tic young mind. His father did not encourage his
adopting painting as a profession, for he felt that
it was a precarious means of support, but time by
degrees convinced the elder Bocklin that fate had
something to say as well as fathers, and he reluc
tantly consented to a series of studies in Diissel
dorf and Belgium. Young Bocklin also went to
Paris, where he witnessed the horrors of the rev
olution in 1848. The reality of these terrible sights
left their impression on his sensitive mind. While
he was delighted with Corot, and enjoyed his Paris
ian stay, he did not feel his desires satisfied until
he finally pushed on to Rome. There the revela
tion came to him. The other side of his person
ality — the Greek side — sprung into consciousness.
The Italian, the classical, the romantic, — all were
before him, and here he fell in with congenial
spirits, Dreber, Feuerbach, and the poet Paul

/Robern German /Rasters 431
Heyse, whose portrait by Lenbach we have noticed ;
it was here, too, that he met the lovely Roman girl
who afterward became his wife, and with whom
he lived in ideal harmony. Now he began to ex
press himself in his own way, — a way not read
ily understood by the Philistines. A picture which
he sent home to Basle was met with derision by
the startled citizens, who did not know what their
young countryman was driving at.
His painting is an efflorescence of Italian and
Flemish styles; one sees Rubens, Jordaens, Titian.
and Botticelli, yet fused into an entirely new thing ;
as new as each human soul, in spite of heredity and
tradition. Soon after moving to Munich, he exhibited his
great study of Pan among the Reeds. It caused
quite a stir and much questioning as to the artist.
When it was discovered that Bocklin was young
and poor, that he was then lying ill with typhoid
fever in their own city, the connoisseurs and col
lectors began to investigate, and in a short time
Bocklin, recovered in health and comprehended at
last, became the fashionable painter of his day.
Count Schack gave him numerousi commissions,
and many of his best early works are to be seen
in the Schack Gallery in Munich. He went also
into plastic art for a little and in 1866 was engaged
to decorate the courtyard fagade of the art museum

432 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
in Basle with sculptured heads. He had recently
had certain difficulties with the magistrates of his
native city, and he took this opportunity to be re
venged upon them. He used them as his subjects,
executing six burlesque portraits as grotesques.
The caricature embodied in these masks is truly
Gothic in spirit, and they make one recall how the
cloistered artists of old used to vent their rage upon
unpopular superiors by thus perpetuating them as
laughing-stocks. Thus, in a spirit of irritation, his
fancy created exaggerated likenesses of these good
counsellors, secretaries, and officials.
After this, Bocklin painted for some time in
Florence, and afterward in Zurich, where he set
tled for the sake of his children's education. In
1890 he was generally recognized as one of the
leading painters of Germany, and the Pan Society
held a banquet in his honour; if one believed in
reincarnations, one would claim that Aristophanes,
speaking through the medium of pigment instead
of through verse, had revisited the earth. Such
elemental humour is classical, and the spirit which
animated the Greek satirist lived again in the Swiss
painter. His revel of colour was a shock to the
sensibilities of the matter-of-fact Germans of the
middle of the nineteenth century. But it prevailed,
and showed that in his case, although perhaps in
no other, it was permissible to use these crashing

/Robern German /Rasters 433
innovations. Let any man beware how he copy
Bocklin, or try to foHow in his footsteps! One
might as well plan deliberately to follow Browning's
method in poetry. The first thing which would
make either of these efforts entirely fruitless would
be that in neither case could the copyist possibly
discover what the method was!
When Bocklin was not painting, he was amusing
himself by indulging a pet hobby : he was inventing
and constructing a flying-machine. His was a
many-sided nature, and he was interested in nearly
every possible human emotion. If it were possible
to see all his pictures together, one might detect
something of every psychical condition possible to
man. And what shall we say of his attitude toward
nature? He is inexhaustible in representing her
moods, and he is equally fertile in fitting conscious
life to that of the mineral and vegetable kingdoms.
Here in Dresden we have a good example of his
ability to conceive of the elemental beings insep
arable from the Greek pantheism which so appealed
to his glowing imagination. Here we see a spring ;
the genius of the fount sits in the shade under a
flowery bank, while two satyrs have come to drink.
Mark the wholly plausible and natural construction
of these beings. They are not human. They are
what the union of a goat and a man might look

434 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
like. The goat nature is in the face, and the hu
man proportions are in the legs, in spite of the
hoofs in which they terminate. Bocklin is not
content to paint a sylvan swain, and then put goat's
legs on him, any more than he is content to paint
a mermaid as a pretty girl with a fish's tail. His
mermaids have fishy eyes as well ; the whole struc
ture of his beings is consistent. The heads suggest
amphibious possibilities, and no strenuous expres
sion of the human being with a soul or a conscience
is allowed to creep in.
Look at the blank fat face of the satyr who sits
on the bank in the Dresden picture. There are
no aspirations or ideals to bother him. He was
a thirsty animal, and he sits back in the content
ment of a quenched longing, sodden and satisfied.
A very lovely element, however, is introduced
into this picture. The brutal and the ephemeral
here meet in a delightful way. The little wreath
of spring-like sprites, slender babies of the fields,
born of dew and sunshine (not fat Renaissance
cherubs like those we have seen so often down
stairs), are dancing in a fantastic ecstasy on the
flowery turf above the spring. Their little shapes
are ineffably graceful, and for movement and ac
tion they rival any group of dancing figures that
I recall in art. Deep in the cool rocky shadow,
under the source of the spring, two tiny tribu-

ARNOLD BOCKLIN.  SPRING S DELIGHTS

/Robern German /Rasters 435
tary babies — the offspring of the Source — are
crouched, with their little upturned jars, in youth
ful imitation of the nymph above them! The
whole idea is quaint and absolutely original.
An early painting by Bocklin hangs in the thirty-
fourth room; it is also fantastic and interesting.
The nymph Syrinx, pursued by Pan, is seen run
ning to the river, and her metamorphosis into a
bunch of reeds is commencing. The fingers of her
outstretched hands are turning into reeds: the
process is not graceful, it is too suggestive of Chi
nese finger-nails. The landscape is in sympathy
with the subject, as Bocklin's landscapes always
are: even a certain hurtling rush in the foliage,
with a spiral vine, give the necessary action to make
us sensible of the haste with which the figures —
one so fair and one so dark — are moving. His
trees are always made to express the sentiment of
the other life in his compositions. When the sen
timent is one of gloom, tall, dark cypresses and
shrouded forms are used. When mirth and glad-
hearted fancy are the themes, then bright green
meadows and laughing soulless fauns are presented.
In all the many moods in which she may clothe
herself. Nature is shown to us, verisimilitude being
given to the Pantheism of the conception by the
introduction of consciously living creatures in per
fect harmony with their environment.

436 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
Bocklin has interpreted the mysterious link be
tween beings and things; there is that eternal ele
ment in his pictures which unites past with present,
and makes ancient things appear modern; the hu
man encounters the soul of nature, and they are
absorbed into one entity. As M. Rod has so well
expressed this spirit, — it is the Pantheism of the
dreamer. Max Klinger is a thinker and a poet. If some
times he is a little vague, or almost shocking in his
originality, there is always a definite conception of
his own, fantastic though it may be, which gives
value and uniqueness to his work. His Pieta is
his own idea of the scene. Visionary, in something
the same way that Blake was visionary, he also has
a flavour of Goya's sense of grimness. Max Klin
ger was born in Leipsic in 1857.
One of the greatest modera pictures in all Ger
many is Ludwig Herterich's Knight of the Faith,
standing with clenched hand at the foot of the cross,
awaiting death. It is a combination of realistic
painting and a visionary conception. The cross,
rendered in liquid soft green tints, is meant to be
symbolic ; the face of the Saviour is tumed toward
the knight in armour, as if whispering encourage
ment, hardly more real than a powerful memory
in the heart of the soldier. As he stands nerving
himself for what may come, it is as if that voice

/Robern German /Rasters 437
came to him in his own conscience, and, through
the mighty power of example, gave him the
strength and peace of the martyr. The Knight of
the Faith represents Ulrich von Hutten, who was
born at Castle Steckelberg, in Prussia, in 1488.
He was a great German humanist. He was placed
in the monastery of Fulda when he was ten years
of age, but, not intending to be an ecclesiastic, he
escaped from this institution some years later. He
then developed himself by studying the humanities
at Frankfort and at Pavia, in Italy. In 15 13 he
went into the army; Maximilian I. crowned him
poet in 1 5 1 7, for he was an able writer. After this,
he followed the career of a soldier, but always with
the highest religious principles. He was keen in
satire; he was also a friend and supporter of
Luther. This picture is the strongest, both in han
dling and in sentiment, among the modern pictures
in Dresden.
Ludwig Herterich is not only a great master
himself, but he is a wonderful teacher, having
trained the perceptions and opened the eyes of many
young pupils. His lack of dim speculation, his
direct venturesome spirit, and his forceful pictorial
talent have won him a high place among modern
realists who nevertheless are not afraid of mental
ideaHsm. An interesting canvas is that which displays a

438 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
group of Pilgrims at the Tomb of St. Elizabeth,
by Carl Bentzer. It is a large and forceful paint
ing, in good modern spirit, as regards its technique,
but not the work of an extremist. Every one
knows the history of the blessed Elizabeth of Hun
gary, who went about doing good so effectually
that the simple folk of her time thought her art
of healing was miraculous. How readily would a
trained nurse of to-day have been sainted had she
appeared unexplained in the middle ages! Eliza
beth was canonized four years after her death, and
in the same year was founded the great church in
her memory, with its shrine, which was visited by
so many pilgrims like these. The church took
forty-eight years in building, a fine specimen of
Gothic architecture. The stone steps about where
the shrine used to stand are worn quite hollow by
the knees of the faithful. It was a popular pil
grimage to the shrine of St. Elizabeth as to that
of St. Thomas of Canterbury in England. In this
picture, a pathetic girl, lying too ill to rise, on her
pallet, stretches out her hand to touch the sacred
tomb (which is in the form of a tablet in the floor).
Her mother is bending above her. watching anx
iously to see if any change shall take place in her
condition. An old man has laid aside his crutch
and gone on his knees to kiss the stone. Candles

/Robern German /Rasters 439
burn all about ; the effect of these Httle dots of light
is extremely good.
Striking and dramatic is the painting by Her
mann Prell of Judas Iscariot Bribed by the Phari
sees. Hermann Prell is one of the leading deco
rative painters of the day, and not only that, but
whoever will go from the gallery in Dresden to the
Albertinum will realize that Prell is not only a
painter, but an architect and sculptor of the first
rank, as well, for he has designed, in every depart
ment of the three sister arts, the magnificent stair
case in that building.
Hermann Prell was born at Leipsic in 1854.
Studying both in Dresden and Berlin, he is now a
professor of the Dresden Academy. In 1886 he
executed this masterly painting, so replete with
thought and expression. In the lonely valley stand
three men: two of the wily Pharisees and Judas
himself, clothed in a single rough garment with
a rope about his loins. The hesitation in his face,
the gripping hands, suggesting the struggle with
temptation to greed, the fixed beady eyes with no
deep purpose of honour, all mark him as doomed
to accept the bribe, which is being offered by the
smug hypocrites at his side. One of them holds
forth the alluring coins on his palm, the finger and
thumb of his other hand still bedded in his wallet,
reluctant yet wiUing to add to the amount if neces-

440 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
sary. The other, with oily persuasiveness, lays his
loose-jointed hand on the arm of the disciple.
These figures, against the long rolling hill back
ground, are splendidly conceived. A touch of the
sentiment so well expressed by Bocklin appears in
the background, three tiny white figures in the dis
tance rounding the edge of a white wall which is
topped by dark foliage, the valley behind them full
of sombre tints. Over the brow of a craggy hill
on the right, the moon is just beginning to rise,
showing silver and sharp behind the black ridge.
The whole is full of the tragedy of betrayal, —
subtle, forceful, and suggestive.
Theodor Hagen is the disciple of individual ex
pression. He is broad and progressive, both as
painter and instructor. Born in Diisseldorf, and
living there as professor, he has been of inestimable
help and encouragement to many young artists.
His only picture here is No. 2380, the Little Town
of Zons on the Lower Rhine.
Stealthily, and with a soft creeping feline mo
tion, the lion and lioness await their prey in the pic
ture by Richard Friese, called Desert Marauders.
There is an atmosphere of hush, of low-lying an
ticipation, and a golden glow on the g^ay of the
desert, which must be watched for a few minutes
before it is clearly apprehended in its full signifi
cance.

HERMANN PRELL.  JUDAS ISCARIOT BRIBED BY THE PHARISEES

/Robern German /Rasters 441
It would not be fair to pass over Gustav Schon-
leber's Low Tide at Flushing; the texture is very
charming, and the atmosphere vapourous and trem
bling. The graceful figures of eight girls, by Hans
Makart, in a picture called Summer, attracts our
attention in the thirty-eighth room. The young
women with two children are diverting themselves
in a summer-house, passing the time in listening
to the plash of a cooling fountain during the heat
of the day. Hans Makart was born in 1840 at
Salzburg. He was a great costumer and property
man in his art, a good colourist, in fact, the first
of the nineteenth-century men to employ strong
decorative schemes in the popular sense; he was
theatrical, he set splendid scenes, and made his
people up in true enamelled style, their complex
ions being suggestive of the use of the customary
greenroom commodities, while their shimmering
hair has frequently been blondined and " ondulee,"
and shows a faithful application of what are usually
advertised as "restorers."
His maidens smile like advertisements for tooth-
powder, and all his nymphs must have learned the
value of the Teutonic equivalent for Pears' Soap.
StiU although all these qualities may be distin
guished in his numerous works, it must also be
admitted that for stage setting, make-up, and up-

442 XCbe Hrt of tbe Dresben Galler?
holstery, he stands supreme, and holds a unique
position. Makart was a master of pageantry, and
he was, in his own day, a pioneer in this line, for
theatrical effects in costume and properties had not
yet come into the realm of German art. He had
so many tame followers, and we are so tired of
their amiable conceits, that we are liable to con
found the master with the pupils, and class them
all together. But, in his way, so far as he went,
with a splendid surface masking the pasteboard,
lathes, and nettings of his intellectual g^asp, he is
original and striking.
Hans Makart was a property man in private life
as well. He was a famous collector of antiques,
from Chinese idols to Gobelin tapestries, from
mediaeval armour to Japanese vases. His studio
was filled with brilliant curiosities, and in the midst
of them the artist's keen black eyes roved about
and made selection of such material as seemed to
him suitable to embellish his gorgeous productions
on canvas. Makart was an Academy professor
at Vienna, where he died in 1884.
After a survey of the Dresden Gallery, one is
particularly struck with the opportunity to compare
the new and the old, — the quaint, the beautiful,
and the progressive. There is hardly another single
gallery which has so large a collection of modern
painters added to its possessions. The Gallery is

/Robern German /Rasters 443
very German in essentials, but it is also typical of
the broad interests and vital cosmopolitan relations
of the great nation in which it has its local hab
itation.

THE END.

BibllOQtapb^

Alexandre, Arsene. — Histoire Populaire de la Peinture.
Atkinson, Beavington. — Adolphe Menzel.
Atkinson, Beavington. — History of Modern Art in Ger
many.
Bayliss, Wyke. — The Enchanted Island.
Bell, Malcolm. — Rembrandt.
Berenson, B. — Lorenzo Lotto.
Berenson, B. — Venetian Painters of the Renaissance.
Berenson, B. — Study and Criticism of Italian Art.
Buxton and Poynter. — German, Flemish and Dutch
Painters.
Clausen, G. — Six Lectures on Painting.
Cox, Kenyon. — Old Masters and New.
Crowe and Cavalcaselle. — Early Flemish Painters.
CusT, Lionel. — Van Dyck.
Davies, Gerald. — Frans Hals.
Dilke, Lady. — French Painters of the i8th Century.
Eastlake. — Materials for a History of Oil-Painting.
FouLKES. — Italian Schools in Dresden Gallery.
Fromentin. — Les Maitres d' Autrefois.
Fromentin. — Old Masters of Belgium and Holland.
Gilbert, Josiah. — Landscape in Art.
GowER. — Figure Painters of Holland.
Grahame, George. — Claude Lorrain.
Journal de Rosalba Carriera.
Kugler. — Handbook of Italian Painting.
La Farge, j. — Considerations on Painting.
La Farge, J. — Great Masters.
Lanzl — Painting in Italy.
LtfBKE. — Outline History of Art.
445

446 JBtbliograpb?
Malvasia. — Guido Reni.
Martin, W. — Gerard Dou.
Maxwell, Stirling. — Annals of the Artists of Spaia
Michel, E. — Rubens's Life and Times.
Moore, T. Sturges. — Albert Durer.
Moreau, Adrien. — Antonio Canal.
Morelll — Italian Art in Munich and Dresden.
Morgan, Lady. — Life and Times of Salvator Rosa.
Mother, Richard. — History of Modern Painting.
Owen, M. C. — Art Schools of Mediaeval Christendom.
Passavant. — Raphael of Urbino.
Rea, Hope. — Peter Paul Rubens.
RiAT, Georges. — Ruysdael.
Rica, CoRRADO. — Antonio AUegri da Corregpo.
Rod, E. — Nouvelles fitudes.
Rose, G. B. — Renaissance Masters.
Rossetti, W. M. — Guido Reni.
SoLVAY, LuciAN. — L'Art E^pagnol.
Stanley, George. — Painters of the Dutch and Flemish
Schools.
Stearns. — Four Great Venetians.
Stearns. — Midsummer of Italian Art.
Stevenson, R. A. M. — Velasquez.
Sturgis, R. — Appreciation of Pictures.
Symonds, J. A. — Renaissance in Italy.
Symonds, J. A. — Sketches and Studies in Italy and Greece.
Van Rensselaer, M. S. — Six Portraits.
Vasari. — Lives of the Painters.
Walpole, Horace. — Anecdotes of Painting.
Weale, Frances. — Hubert and Jan Van Eyck.
Wedmore, F. — Masters of Genre Painting.
Wilkins, W. N. — Art Impressions.
Williamson, G. C. — Gties of Northern Italy.
Williamson, G. C. — The Anomino.
Woermann, R. W. — History of Painting.
Woltmann, Alfred. — Holbein und Seine Zeit.
Woltmann and Woermann. — History of Painting.

Ifnbei

About, E., 384
Achenbach, A., 381.
Adam, F., 396.
Aelst, W. von, 314
Affo, 26.
Albani, 2; Galatea, 82; Cu
pids, 83, 427.
Albani, Cardinal, 173.
Albert of Saxony, 414.
Algarotti, 180.
Angel, P., 338.
Angelico, Fra, 6.
Anguisola, S., 280.
Antonello da Messina, 25.
Aretino, Pietro, 26, 51, 53, S7-
Atkinson, Beavington, 371.
Augustus (Elector), i, 2, 24,
203.
August III., I, 4, 147, 149,
168, 171, 178, 190.
August the Strong, i, 2, 148,
igo.
Averscamp, 234.
Bahr, C, 414.
Baldauf (Mile.), i8a
Balen, H. von, 231, 235, 277.
Bantzer, C, 438.
Barbari, J. de', 44.
Bassano, 60.
Battoni, P., 187.
Baum, P., 416.
Bega, C, 360.
Belcamp, 247.

Bellini, G., 380.
Belotto, see Canaletto.
Bendemann, E., 401.
Berchem, 320, 326.
Berenson, B., 41.
Bevilacqua, A., 17.
Biscaino, B., 83.
Bismarck, 423.
Bles, H., 229.
Bios, Carl, 416.
Bocklin, A., 373, 383, 398,
419, 429-436.
Bode, Dr., 268.
Bokelman, C. L., 387.
Bol, F., 289, 29s, 332.
Bol, H., 201.
Bonifazio, 59.
Boons, Vinck, 233.
Bordone, P., 59.
Botticelli, 5, 6 ; Virgin, 6 ; St.
Zenobius, 7, 218, 419, 431.
Bouguereau, 313.
Bouveret, D., 421.
Brandt, I., 258, 264, 271.
Bray, S. de, 241.
Breu, Jorg, 227.
Bronzino, A., 230.
Brouwer, A., 233, 244, 249,
349, 386.
Brueghel, "Hell," 242, 243.
Brueghel, Peter, 230.
Brueghel, "Velvet," 231, 236,
242, 250, 267, 277.
Briihl, Graf von, 2.

447

448

Inbex

Brun, C. le, 141, 148.
Bunsen, 370.
Biirger, W., 301.
Cagnacci, 98.
Calame, A., 404.
Calvaert, D., 27.
Calverley, C. S., 320.
Camerarius, J., 210. '
Canal, A., i88.
Canaletto, 182, 188, 189.
Cano, A., 1 19-123.
Cantarini, S., 82.
Capitana, Donna M., 172.
Capponi, R., 18.
Caravaggio, 89, 114, 139, 397.
Carducho, V., 113.
Carleton, Sir D., 267.
Carlyle, T., 148-150, 155, 156,
390.
Carpi, G. da, 16, 30, 34.
Carracci, The, 3, 124.
Carracci, Agostino, 78.
Carracci, Anibale, Fame, 75;
Madonna, 76; Lute Player,
76; Christ, yT.
Carracci, Ludovico, 74.
Carriera, Rosalba, 164-175 ;
Portrait of Herself, 165;
Journal, 166; Louis XV.,
167; Apollo and Daphne,
169, 178.
Castiglione, B., 91.
Catacuzene, Princess, 412.
Catena, V., 54.
Cavazzola, 17.
Cervantes, 391.
Channing, Dr., 359.
Charles I., 247, 280, 283, 297.
Charles V., 47, 49.
Chavannes, P. de, 408-413.
Christian, Elector, 178.
Cignani, C, 82, 176.
Cima da Conegliano, 2, 10,
12.
Claude Lorrain, 137, 141-
14s; Acis and Galatea, 144;
Flight into Egypt, 144, 189.

Clausen, G., 400.
Clerk, J., 160.
Clouet, F., 138.
Codde, P., 335.
Colonna, V., 412.
Conca, 98.
Constable, 401, 426.
Cornelis van Haarlem, 203.
Comelius, P. de, 366, 367,
371.
Correggio, v, 3, 13-iS; Mag
dalen, 34-42; Madonna of
St. Francis, 34, 35, 40;
Madonna of St. Roch, 35;
Holy Night, 36; Madonna
of St. George, 38, 170, 173,
261.
Cosimo, P. de, 28.
Cossa, F., 9, II.
Costa, 34, 35, 41.
Courtois, J., 147.
Cowley, A., 285.
Cranach, L., 202, 226, 228.
Cranach the Younger, 203,
229.
Credi, L. di, 7.
Crespi, G. M., 85.
Crivelli, 9.
Cuyp, A., 238.
Dahl. S., 415-
Damiani, C. F., 4.
Dante, 391.
Darmstadt, 216, 220.
David-Nillet. G., 420.
Defregger, F, 384, 402-
Delacroix. 276.
Denner, B., 183.
De Piles. 339.
" Dialogos de la Pintura,"
11,^
Dieffenbacher, A., 399.
Diethe, 415.
Dietrich, C, 184.
Dietrichstein, Count, 180.
Diez, W., 386.
Dill, L., 387.
Dinglinger, S., 181.

fnbei

449

Dolci, C, 40, 88, i8s, 213,
313-
Domenichino, ^^.
Dossi, Dosso, 3, 16, 30, 32.
Dou, Gerard, 2, 234, 289, 315,
333. 336-345; "Vanitas,"
337; Hermit, 337; Self,
337; Violin-player, 339;
Schoolmaster, 339, 345 ;
Wine Cellar, 341, 345;
Rembrandt's Mother, 344 ;
Girl Gathering Grapes, 345 ;
Doctor, 345.
Dresden Gallery, v, 1-6, 73,
363, 365.
Duck, J., 360.
Dudley, Earl of, 130.
Dughet, G., 139, 141.
Diirer, Albrecht, 47, 194, 206-
214; Dresden Altar, 210;
Crucifixion, 213 ; Proces
sion to Calvary, 214, 221,
223, 230, 239, 369, 380, 386,
390, 391, 420.
Dutch painters, peculiarities
of, 307-309-
Eastlake, Sir C, 12.
Eclectics, The, 74, 89, 213.
Eeckhout, G. Van, 289, 332.
Eismann, J., 235.
Eldin, see Clerk.
Elizabeth, Empress, 170.
Elliger, O., 248.
Elsheimer, A., 269.
Erasmus, 215.
Evelyn's Diary, 289, 309, 342-
Everdingen, C., 237, 326.
Fabritius, 302.
Feuerbach, A., 373. 430.
Filarete, 195.
Flinck, G., 289, 294.
Floris, see Vriendt.
Fontana, L., 85.
Ford, R., 130, 132-
Fortuny, 152, 393, 428.

Fourment, H., 240, 257, 260,
261, 272, 275, 276.
Francesco III. of Modena, 3,
34
Francia, F., 23, 28, 40.
Francia, G., 9.
Franciabigio, 12.
Francken, F., 231.
Frederick IV. of Denmark,
173-
Frederick August of Saxony,
414
Frederick the Great, 148, 149,
388, 390, 393. 418.
Friese, R., 440.
Fromentin, E., 238, 256, 277,
322, 329.
Furich, 366.
Furini, F., 91.
Fyt, J., 297.
Garofalo, 3, 26, 30; Minerva
and Neptune, 32, 34; St.
Peter and St. Bernard, 32;
Venus and Mars, 33; Vir
gin and Saints, 33.
Gebhardt, E. von, 416.
Gebler, O., 383.
Gerard, F. B., 407.
George of Saxony, 414
Gessi, F., 87.
Gey, L., 372.
Geysels, P., 246.
Gherardo, see Honthorst.
Ghislandi, Fra V., 98.
Giovannini, C, 3.
Girolamo da Sta. Croce, 44
Giordano, L., 97.
Giorgione, 2, 10; Venus, 53,
56, 171, 186.
Goethe, 369, 389-
Goncourt, De, 153.
Gongora, L. de, 72.
Goya, 70, 136.
Goyen, Van, 346.
Gozzolo, B., 6.
Graff, A., 182.
Grahl Collection, 181.

4SO

Inbex

Grethe, C, 415.
Greuze, J. B., 157, 251.
Gries, 365.
Griffier, J., 232.
Grimou, A., 149.
Griitzner, 381.
Gude, H., 404.
Guercino, 78-81 ; Semiramis,
78 ; St. Francis, 78 ; Adonis,
78; Painting and Drawing,
78 ; Silvio and Dorinda, 79 ;
Venus and Adonis, 79;
Cephalus and Procris, 79;
Evangelists, 80, 81.
Gurlitt, L., 401.
Haagen, T., 440.
Haensbergen, J. van, 314.
Hahn-Hahn, Mme., 108.
Hals, F., 234, 244, 310, 321-
325, 349. 360, 408.
Hals, F., the Younger, 323.
Hamerton, P. G., 421.
Harrison, A., 428.
Haug, R., 416.
Heem, C. de, 248, 319.
Heist, Van der, 241, 295, 296.
Hendrickje, 286, 293.
Hermann, H., 416.
Herrara, F., iii, 126.
Herterich, L., 436.
Heyse, P., 398, 431.
Hitchcock, G., 428.
Hobbema, M., 326, 332.
Hoff, K., 413-
Hofmann, J. M., 399.
Hogarth, 310.
Holbein, H., v, 3, 15, 180,
204; Gonsalve, 205, 214-
224; Meyer Madonna, 216;
Morette, 222; George Gyze,
222; Jane Seymour, 222,
390, 392, 430
Hondecoeter, M., 359.
Honthorst, G., 297.
Hooch, P. de, 252, 301, 305,
310, 386.
Hood, T., 227.

Hoogstraeten, 333.
Houbraken, 327.
Hiibner, J., 4, 54, 374
Hughtenburgh, J., 234
Hunt, Wm., 192.
Hutten, U. von, 436.
Huysum, J., 359.
Innocent X., 135.
Isabella, Queen, no.
Ivan the Terrible, 414
Joinville, Sire de, 139.
Jordan, R., 379.
Jordaens, H., 233.
Jordaens, J., 2, 88, 245, 298.
Josephus, 10.
Juan of Austria, 251.
Juanes, J. de, 137.
Kalkreuth, Count, 422.
Kalmorgen, 415.
Kauffman, A., 182.
Kaulbach, F. A., 386.
Kerrincx, A., 234.
Kessel, J. van, 248.
Keyser, T. de, 331.
Kiessling, P., 381.
Klinger, M., 436.
Knaus, L., 384.
Kneller, Sir G., 158.
Knupfer, N., 335.
Koninck, P., 289.
Koninck, S., 296.
Krohg, C, 421.
Kuehl, G., 427.
Kugelgen, G., 4I3-
Kugler, 109.
Kummer. R., 378.
Kuntz, G., 378, 417.
Lairesse, G., 145, 401.
Lancret, N., 151, 152, 154
188.
Langiani, P., 60.
Laocoon, 364.
La Tour, Q. M., 166-176.

Inbex

45'

Leendertsz, L., 296.
Lely, Sir P., 283.
Lemon, M., 284.
Lenbach, F. von, 398, 422-
425.
Leo XIII., 424.
Leopold William, 251.
Le Page, B., 421.
Lessing, C. F., 400.
Leyden, L. van, 231.
Leypold, C, 379.
Liberi, P., 85.
Liebermann, M., 418.
Lieven, J., 360.
Liotard, J. E., 179-
Lippi, F., 6, 8.
London National Gallery, 7,
21, 140, 251, 272.
Longhetti, 176.
Longhi, 188.
Looten, J., 234.
Lorrain, see Claude.
Lo Spada, see Marascalco.
Lotto, L., s6; Madonna, 58;
St. Sebastian, 59, 186.
Louis, Saint, 139.
Louis XIV., 247.
Louis XV., 166-168.
Ludwig of Bavaria, 368.
Lunders, G., 234.
Luther, M., 202, 437.

Maes, N., 352.
Magnasco, 187.
Makart, H., 441.
Mancini, 53.
Maiiora, 127.
Mantegna, A., 6, 11, 35.
Marascalco, 186.
Maratti, C, 90.
Mariette, 170, 172, 174.
Master of Death of the Vir
gin, 204.
Master of Liesborn, 204.
Master of Lyversberg Pas
sion, ^04.
Matthai, J. F., 4

Maurice de Saxe, 155, 176,
203.
Max, G., 393.
Maximilian, 437.
Maxwell, Stirling, 136.
Mazzolini, 11.
Medici, M. de, 270.
Meissonnier, 335, 392, 393.
Melchers, G., 429.
Memlinc, H., 198, 200.
Mengs, I., 178, 179.
Mengs, R., 14, 177, 183.
Mengs, T. C, 178.
Menzel, A., 388-393, 418.
Metastasio, Abbe, 173.
Metsu, G., 2, 354.
Meulen, Van der, 247.
Meyer, Burgomaster, 215,
216.
Meyer,, C, 386.
Michel, E., 269.
Michelangelo, 22; Leda, 27,
SO, ig6, 239, 261, 368, 392,
412.
Mierevelt, M., 236.
Mieris, F., 315, 342.
Mieris, W., 316.
Mignon, A., 319.
Millet, F., 146.
Minghetti, M., 422.
Miniatures, 99, 164.
Modena, Princesses of, 172.
Monet, C, 416.
Moore, Dr. J., 273.
Mor, A., 203, 204, 230, 299.
Morales, L. de, 105.
Morando, 17.
More, Sir T., 216, 219.
Morelli, 6, 7, 9, 13-1S. 4i.
299.
Morland, G., 350.
Moroni, D., 17.
Morville, Count de, 171.
Mostaert, J., 203.
Moya, P. de, 123.
Miiller, H., 399.
Miiller, M., 381.
Munkacsy, M., 394-398, 426.

452

fnbex

Murillo, E., V, 124 125-131;
Madonna of the Napkin,
128; Two Girls, 130; St.
Clara, 130; Madonna, 131;
St. Rodriguez, 131, 309.
Napoleon, 407.
Nattier, J. M., 155.
" Nazarenes, The," 366.
Neer, Van der, 317.
Netscher, C, 317.
Niebuhr, 370.
Niobe, 364.
Nogari, G., 187.
Noort, A. van, 256.
Ochtervelt, J., 361.
Oer, T. von, 379.
Olde, H., 422.
Olivares, Duke of, 131, 132.
Orbetto, L', 90.
Orley, B. van, 205.
Orrente, P., 108.
Ostade, A. van, 249, 346, 349-
352; The Artist, 350;
Habitues of an Inn, 351 ;
Two Peasants, 351 ; Peas
ants at an Inn, 35T, 360.
Ostade, I. van, 334.
Oury, J. L., 419.
Overbeck, 366.
Ovid, 151, 339.
Pacheco, 106, 107, 129, 133,
134. 186.
Palma Vecchio, 53 ; Venus,
55; Three Sisters, 56; Vir
gin, 56; Jacob and Rachel,
56.
Palomino, 106, 123, 195.
Parmegiannino, Judith, 16 ;
Madonna della Rosa, 26;
Cupid, 27.
Passeri, 78.
Pastel as an art, 99, 163.
Pater, J. B. J., 151, 152.
Paudiss, C, 237.
Periera, V., 137, 185.

Perugino, P., 29.
Peschel, C, 378.
Pesne, A., 149.
Pforr, 366.
Philip III., vi, 47, 107.
Philip IV., 112, 118, 132, 134,
240, 251, 276.
Philip the Good, 194 200.
Piazetta, 190.
Piloty, 387, 403.
Pinturicchio, 8.
Piombo, S. del, 27.
Pirkheimer, W., 207.
Pisseleu, J. de, 138.
Poel, Van der, 336.
Pohle, L., 414.
Polenburgh, C. van, 314, 319.
Ponte, see Bassano.
Pordenone, 12.
Pot, H., 360.
Potter, P., 332, 422.
Pourbus, F., 203.
Poussin, N., 139; Venus,
140; Adoration, 140; Pan,
140; Narcissus, 140; King
dom of Flora, 140, 171.
Prell, H., 439-
Preller, F., 378.
Preti, M., 98.
Preuss Collection, 181.
Procaccini, 84
Raebum, Sir H., 159-162.
Raphael, v. 3, 5, 18-25; Sis
tine Madonna, 18, 23;
Copies, 27, 41, 178, 218,
320. 333, 368.
Reitzenstein, L. C, 181.
Rembrandt, v, 98, 124, 226,
232, 238, 242, 254, 286-294;
Rembrandt and Saskia,
286, 290; Saskia, 287, 291;
Gan3miede, 288, 290; Sacri
fice of Manoah, 288, 291 ;
Night Watch, 290; Burg
graef, 289 ; Samson, 291 ;
Bittern Shooter, 291 ; Old
Woman Weighing Go\A,

¦ffnbei

4S3

292; Old Man, 292; Young
Warrior, 292; Entomb
ment, 292; Self, 292; Man
with Pearls, 293; Death,
293, 304, 332, 336, 353. 386,
426.
Reni, Guido, 3, 38, 85;
Venus, 86; St. Jerome,
87; Christ, 87; Bacchus,
87, 124, 176, 213.
Rethel, 372.
Reynolds, Sir J., 159, 241,
322, 342, 361, 425.
Ribalta, J. de, 112.
Ribera, see Spagnoletto.
Richter, L., 375.
Ridolfi, 54, 64
Riedel, J. A., 4.
Riefstahl, W., 413.
Rigaud, H., 147, 169.
Rinaldo of Modena, 172.
Ritscher, 378.
Roberti, E., 11.
Robusti, see Tintoretto.
Roelas, J. de las, 107, 1.18.
Romano, G., 28.
Roos, J. H., 236.
Roos, P. P., 235.
Rosa, S., 92-97, 124, 139, 147,
187.
Rose, G. B., 15.
Rotermund, J., 401.
Roting, J., 414
Rottenhammer, J., 235.
Roymerswale, M. von, 201.
Rubens, J., 258.
Rubens, P., 261.
Rubens, Peter Paul, v, 2, 3,
27, 68, 88, 124, 171, 176,
226, 232; Woman with
Braids, 239; Bishop, 239;
Garden of Love, 240, 242;
Judgment of Paris, 244,
254. 25s - 277 ; Drunken
Hercules, 263 ; Champion
of Virtue, 263; Adoration
of Magi, 264; Elevation
and Descent from Cross,

265; St. Jerome, 265; Lion
Hunt, 266; Portraits, 268;
Boar Hunt, 269; Old
Woman with Brazier, 269;
Vulcan's Forge, 269; Ata
lanta, 273; Diana, 274;
Argus, 274; Neptune, 274;
Bacchante, 274; Diana and
Nymphs, 275, 280, 281, 294,
297.
Ruskin, J., 145.
Ruthven, Mary, 284.
Ruysch, R., 359.
Ruysdael, J., 232, 325-331;
Monastery, 327, 329; Jew
ish Burial Ground, 328;
The Ford, 328; The Chase,
328; Castle Bentheim, 328;
Waterfalls, 329.
Ryckaert, D., 245.
Saftleven, H., 314.
Salvator, see Rosa.
Sandrart, 338.
Sarto, A. del, 3, 12, 29, 54,
171.
Sartori, F., 174, 176.
Saskia, 286, 289.
Sassoferrato, 40, 185.
Savery, R., 231.
Scanelli, 47.
Scarsella, I., 16.
Schalcken, G., 333.
Schadow, 366.
Schack, Count, 431.
Schiavone, 60.
Schnorr, J., 4, 366, 367, 371-
Schelling, 365,
Schlegel, A. W., 365.
Schlegel, W., 365.
Schonbroeck, P., 244.
Schonfeldt, H., 235.
Schonleber, G., 441.
Schwartz, C, 235.
Schwind, 372.
Scorel, J., 203, 230.
Seemann, E., 159.
Seibold, C, 184.

454

fnbex

Seghers, D., 248.
Shakespeare, 369, 407.
Signorelli, L., 28.
Silvestre, L. de, 148, 178.
Skarbina, F., 417.
Skreta, C, 235.
Slingelandt, P. C, 352.
Snayers, P., 246.
Snellincz, 277.
Snyders, 300.
Solimena, 87, 186.
Solvay, L., 125.
Spagnoletto, no, 112, 113;
St. Bartholomew, 115;
Diogenes, 116; Peter in
Prison, 116; St. Law
rence, 117; St. Francis,
117; St. Agnes, 117, 397-
Spanish art galleries, 108.
Spanish legends, 100-105, nO-
Sperling, 314.
Spitzweg, C, 382.
Stearns, F. P., 15, 25.
Steen, J., 249, 310, 313. 315.
335> 345-349; Marriage at
Cana, 347; Expulsion of
Hagar, 348; Mother and
Child, 348.
Steenwyck, H., 246.
Steinle, 366.
Strozzi, B., 83.
Sturgis, R., 218.
Subleyras, P., 154.
Sustermans, 277.
Swanenburch, 288.
Symonds, J. A., 42.
Tacitus, 325, 349.
Tamm, F., 235.
Teniers, D., 2, 233, 246, 349-
254; Smokers in Inn, 249;
Bleaching Ground, 250;
Inn by River, 250; Com
pany of Smokers, 251 ;
Deliverance of St. Peter,
251 ; Chalking up the
Score, 25a; Page, 25a;
Alchemist, 252; St. An

thony, 253; Himself, 253;
Village Fetes, 253, 386.
Ter Borch, 2, 310, 315, 318,
354, 355-358; Lady in her
Room, 355 ; Lady Wash
ing her Hands, 356; Sol
diers, 356; Lady Playing
Lute, 356; Officer, 357.
Thedy, M., 406.
Theotocopuli, 71.
Thoma, H., 419.
Thore, see Burger.
Tintoretto, D., 64
Tintoretto, J., 60-64; Six
Women with Musical In
struments, 60; Woman and
Dragon, 61 ; Parnassus,
62; The Rescue, 63; Por
traits, 63; Holy Family,
63-
Titian, v, 3, 44-53; Virgin
and Saints, 45; Tribute
Money, 45; Portraits, 48;
Holy Family, 49; Venus,
50; Man with Palm, 51,
53, 54, no, 113. 431-
Trivia, A., 85.
Tura, C, 9, ri, 26.
Turchi, A., go.
Ubertini, 15.
Uden, L. van, 246.
Uhde, F. von, 425.
Valdes, Leal, J. de, 136.
Valentin, Le, 139.
Van Dyck, v, 124, 241, 242,
254, 267, 268, 277-285;
Portraits, 278, 281, 282;
Drunken Silenus, 278; St.
Jerome, 279; Old Man,
280; Old Woman, 380;
Apostles, 241, 281 ; Youth
ful Jesus, 281 ; Com
mander in Armour, 282.
Van Eyck, Jan and Hubert,
v, 191-198, 391-
Van Loo, C, 297.

IFnbex

455

Varotari, 84.
Vasari, 26, 184.
Vautier, B., 384.
Vega, Lope de, 103, 114, 151.
Velasquez, D., 3, 13, 70, 109,
no, 120, 124, 131-136; Oli
vares, 31 ; Philip IV.,
132; Portraits, 132; Flesh
Painting, 133, 265, 271,
294. 392, 408.
Velde, Van de, 232, 331.
Veneto, B., i6.
Veneziano, P., 12.
Verendael, N., 248.
Verkolje, J., 360.
Vermeer of Delft, 18, 300-
306; Girl and Lover,
302; Lady Reading Letter,
320, 344, 361, 386.
Verocchio, 7.
Veronese, B., 53, 60.
Veronese, P., 3, 12, 46, 64-
70; Cuccina Family, 65;
Marriage at Cana, 64, 67;
Christ with Cross, 68;
Moses, 69; Supper at Em
maus, 69; Susannah, 70,
171, 426.
Victors, J., 289.
Vinci, L. da, 7, 8, 16, 35, 209,
2.2,2.
Viti, T., 41.
Vlieger, S. de, 317.
Vogel, C, 183, 414
Vois, A. de, 334

Voltaire, 149, 390.
Vonck, J., 327.
Vos, P. de, 300.
Vouet, S., 138.
Vriendt, F. de, 239.
Wael, J., 277.
Walpole, H., 153, 158, 189,
219, 247, 276, 320.
Watteau, A., 150; Love
Feast, 151 ; Garden Party,
152, 154, 168, 188, 240.
Weenix, J., 299.
Wehme, Z., 204.
Weiser, J., 386.
Werff, Van der, 13, 313.
Weyden, R. van der, 9, 195,
198.
Whistler, 273.
Wilkie, D., 124, 130, 153, 349.
360.
Wilkins, W. N., 185, 227.
William III., 318.
Wittenburg, 202, 217.
Woermann, C, 4.
Wohlgemut, M., 206.
Wolfvoet, v., 233.
Wouwermans, 2, 310-312,
331-
Wynants, J., 312, 331.
Zimmermann, E., 393.
Zuccaro, 109.
Zurbaran, F., 118.