CD LO OD CD Ço 5 OO Sity of ' ' ' tº tº S. Univer yº . º , UCC-S. ºs T \\, , , , , ) ". VV º ºr ' '. , & "Nº c. "º. 2 - 2/24%. - . * * * "A ſº ſºvº -> <- sº SS-JOJ." º * ſ * L → iV ... " s ºv : º L- S. - slº/ Tº wº sºF-> vº - * * , º, 㺠A º º tº º ºr N / º º | IAI . . “ w * | ſ - * * * * * º W º v-, ſi ... ." - U. - w ! º - - º f º V - w ſ º ºf . . . * * º'. A A. ºw LIBRARYº E-HTH −2. * ++------ Éf TTTTTTTTTT. § Nº-ººº…A #TTTTTTTTTTTT id º (2 ! . :--> . . . s=y s gº ; <\º E Y ARTE. Sºlº// | i *-º-º: , /." >4. S i N. : . . . . . . º, Nº º ºſ NNNN-N-Nº! \ \, : , . . . * . - . Nº ºvºº's yº . . . / º º “”º. º º º L. M * ------ º º # * : tº ! - ** * ~ É. H- £º Vº w. # %ź i: i B#-f-p- sº º E tº- E C- E C L- [- E- E * * * *. **** - f =} D O C TH E G IFT OF º º - * . - Z.' ..." - L. : - - - " sº º º . *N* * º º -- sº * * * * º ,, . . . ºº's § SS Nºssº sº; º; sº Yºº SPS-2 *. º - º * * S- . NS-4 tº rºs . . -- º VA; ; * . . . N. &Q - - º y & Y & *\ * .. - * , ~ - U → ; */ J , \, \; \; \ C. - V tº º Nº. y’s * ... . º * Jºss \º- ‘. . . . ) Sº, Sº N w J- - fºss. N ºw- N - 2.2 cS P. s. Sº, - s\º R ſº *. jºy . . . . . . Jºſ S. º . . . . y .* , , , J. N. . . - A - º º: ſ º * * º *_º º - , , º º , , ; U , . " ſ º º ." - ". . . . § º • * • ". " y Nº. ºss º º º |- º º º THE ELEVATION OF THE CROSS, RUBENS. C- PICTURES BY GREAT MASTERS OF THE FRENCH, DUTCH, AND FLEMISH SCHOOLS WITH HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL DESCRIPTIONS BY 5AMES DAFFORVE LONDON HOULSTON AND SONS, PATERNOSTER SQUARE (, 's \ ; : - sº-Tº ** s © - e m º e o sº HERE is that in the biography of a great man, which, if the narration goes no further than a simple statement of facts connected with his history, becomes acceptable to every intelligent reader who would know how he who is honoured among men lived and moved in the world around him. To render such history really useful and valuable, it should show less of the skill of the writer in giving his materials the most attractive form, §º \% © than of his intention to invest them with truthfulness and simplicity; otherwise the subject is lost amid the superabundance of literary labour, and the author takes the place of his hero in the mind, if not in the estimation, of the reader. It is not, however, meant to be implied that biographical writing should be free from comment; the task of the biographer is to make his subject a guide or a warning to others; he is, or assumes to be, an instructor, and should therefore be allowed free scope for the indulgence of such observations as may be deduced from the lives and actions he records: having studied to make himself acquainted with the philosophy of the human mind, as manifested in its development and working, he is permitted—indeed is required—to give to others the benefit of his knowledge, that they also may learn from his teachings. There are few men of note whose history has not been written over and over again; if they moved as stars of the first magnitude among their fellow-men, an entire volume, or even more, has not been considered too much for a record of their lives; if of secondary importance, whatever is related of them forms only a portion of large and costly publications; so that, in either case, such biographies are placed beyond the reach of the great mass of the public. This is more especially the case with painters and other followers of Art; it is therefore thought that a series of brief sketches of some of the “Great Masters” of bygone times, accompanied by pictorial illustrations, may not be unacceptable to all who feel interested in the works of genius. In carrying out this plan, I shall not affect to offer anything new to those who have already studied the histories of such men as come under notice; I shall rather address myself to those who have had no opportunity of So doing, and, B •T). " . ." § 3 ; “. . . …t-4-3-3. ii * IWTRODUCTION. consequently, shall endeavour to make the sketches acceptable to them in particular. The history of some painters offers little for the biographer to narrate beyond a chronological state- ment of their birth, parentage, preceptors, and a list of their works; the tale is soon told. It is not so, however, with all; kings and princes have shared with some the companionship of the studio: they have held constant communion with the great and the powerful, and have played their parts boldly and openly in the battle of life. But it is not such who exclusively afford the most interesting or profitable subject-matter to the writer; there is much to be gleaned from the history of many whose world lay within their own painting-rooms; who knew little beyond, and cared for less; who felt that, while other men were working their way to fame and fortune amid the tumult and bustle of political life, they were earning an immor- tality as proud and as imperishable in the quiet, hallowed pursuits of their own avocations. There is a glory that awaits the scholar, the indefatigable labourer in the fields of literature, and the patient yet enthusiastic artist, which the most mighty conqueror never has and never will achieve: it is won, perhaps, in solitude and obscurity—sometimes, amid trial and distress; but it is a glory that brings no affliction upon others, and that leaves no sorrow behind it; and each of such men may, without presumption, say concerning himself— “Some, when they die, die all; their mouldering clay Is but an emblem of their memories; The space quite closes up through which they passed. That I have lived, I leave a mark behind Shall pluck the shining age from vulgar time, And give it whole to late posterity.” YOUNG. CONTENTS. & DUTCH AND FLEMISH PAINTERS. RUBENS, SIR PETER PAUL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . " REMBRANDT WAN RYN, PAUL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . , 33 POTTER, PAUL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45 TENIERS, THE YOUNGER, DAVID . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 BOTH, JOHN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61 OSTADE, ADRIAN VAN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69 BERCHEM, NICHOLAS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 RUYSDAEL, JACOB . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 KALF, WILLIAM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91 METZU, GABRIEL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95 VELDE, ADRIAN VAN DE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . IO7 BEGA, CORNELIUS . & ſº w g g tº e & º tº g gº tº º ſº tº . I I 3 WOUWERMAN, PHILIP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 HUYSMAN, CORNELIUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125 JARDIN, KAREL DU . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I29 STEENWICK, HENRY WAN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137 FR EN CH PAINTERS. POUSSIN, NICHOLAS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143 LORRAINE, CLAUDE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I 53 SUEUR, EUSTACE LE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I 59 WATTEAU, ANTHONY , , , . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171 JOUVENET, JOHN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175 GÉRICAULT, THEODORE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181 FRAGONARD, JOHN HONORIUS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 189 MONNOYER, JOHN BAPTISTE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197 ROBERT, HUBERT tº te * * * ſº {* & e te º y º e © & tº . 2 O3 DESPORTES, ALEXANDER FRANCIS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205 LANTARA, SIMON-MATURIN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 13 º- Nº. * - º º P. º º - º º É. º º º % = | * - - -º * 2.ºº * à * - º º - N º -- - N º - % - § N ( º: º | º º | | | º º º Nº = Sº)= º º - Fº (2 Willllllllllllllll #ºse # I, | *N º 1. º Till, | º - "| SIR PETER PAUL RUBENS. * - His series of biographical sketches of Great Masters of Art to whom the º Low Countries, as Holland and Flanders were called with the chief of the Flemish School, Rubens, =º gave birth, begins “the consummate painter, the enlightened scholar, the skilful diplomatist, and the accomplished man of the world,”—characters that have rarely been combined in any other individual, and which seem in some respects to be inconsistent with each uch as the busy world of an artist often extends but a short distance from his own studio, and the immediate circle around him. C 6 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. Peter Paul Rubens was born at Cologne on the 29th of June, 1577, the feast of St. Peter and St. Paul, on which account he was baptized in the names of those apostles. The parents of the great painter were John Rubens and Mary Pipelings, both descended from distinguished families of the city of Antwerp, where his father filled the office of €chewin, or magistrate; but in consequence of the civil wars which prevailed in the Low Countries about 1570, he was compelled to take refuge at Cologne, where he died in 1587. His widow shortly afterwards took advantage of the restoration of Flanders to the Spanish rule, and returned to Antwerp. With every means at command for receiving the benefits of a sound and liberal education, the mind and intellect of her youthful son, at an early age, were cultivated with great care and attention, while his natural disposition was of that quick yet docile character that it imbibed instruction with more than ordinary facility. In his sixteenth A WILLAGE FETE. year young Rubens was appointed page in the household of the Countess of Lalaing, but the occupation was unsuited to his tastes, and he soon returned home. He had a great desire to become a painter, and having made known his wishes to his mother, she placed him under Tobias Verhaegt, a landscape painter of some celebrity, whom, however, he shortly quitted to study under Adrian Van Oort, a painter of history, and distinguished as a good colourist, the bent of Rubens's genius inclining him more to the latter class of art. But the private character of Van Oort was calculated to disgust the mind of one for whom vice and folly had no attractions; so that his pupil soon exchanged his preceptor for Otho Van Veen, or, as he is commonly called, Otho Venius, at that time considered one of the most accomplished artists of the Italian school, and who had been appointed Court Painter to the Infanta Isabella and the Archduke Albert. Venius was a person of polished manners, and had received a liberal education — qualifications which rendered SIR PETER PA UL RUBAEAV.S. 7 his society and instruction doubly valuable to the young student, whose natural disposition and early education had taught him how to estimate them. Rubens remained till his twenty-third year with this painter, when the latter assured VENUS NOURISHING THE LOWES. him that his lessons could be of no further use, and recommended him to visit Italy. In fact, Rubens was already thoroughly conversant with all the technical and general knowledge which would ensure his reaping ample benefit from such a journey, and he had painted several - pictures with considerable success. Accordingly he proceeded first to Venice, passing some 8 GA'EA 7" J/ASTERS OF ART. little time there, and thence to Mantua, where his letters of introduction from the Archduke gained him a cordial welcome from the Duke Vincenzio Gonzaga, who offered him the post of Gentleman of the Chamber. This was the more acceptable, as it afforded him the best ºzzº º, /* … THE DESCENT FROM THE CROSS. opportunities for studying the works of Giulio Romano, an artist whose frescoes especially were held in high estimation by Rubens. Two years after he had taken up his residence in Mantua, Rubens obtained permission from the Duke to revisit Venice, that he might get a SIR PETER PA UL RUBEWS. 9 better insight into the colouring of Paul Veronese and Titian than his former visit had enabled him to do. It has been said that, by studying the best principles of colouring at the fountain-head, he acquired that splendid style which is so greatly admired in his works, and on his return to Mantua he evinced how much he had profited by his studies in Venice, in the three magnificent pictures painted for the Church of the Jesuits, which may be regarded as among his finest works. The Archduke Albert about this time commissioned Rubens to paint three pictures for the Church of St. Croce in Gerusalemme, in Rome, representing “The Finding of the Cross by St. Helena,” “ Christ bearing his Cross,” and “The Cruci- fixion;” he accordingly repaired to the ancient city for that purpose, and while there copied A FEI E CHAMPET RE. some famous pictures for his other patron, the Duke of Mantua; among them three of * Titian's great works, “Venus and Adonis,” “Diana and Actaeon,” and “The Rape of Europa.” The painter was now, however, about to appear in the character of an ambassador. In 1605, Gonzaga having occasion to send an envoy to the Court of Spain, directed Rubens to return from Rome and prepare himself for the mission. He set out for Madrid, carrying with him costly presents for Philip III, and the Duke of Lerma, the King's favourite minister; after executing the object of his embassy with entire satisfaction to all parties, and painting portraits of the King and his courtiers, he returned to Mantua. Shortly after this, Rubens visited Rome for the second time, where he was joined by his elder brother Philip, having received a commission to ornament the tribune of S. Maria in Vallicella, in which he painted three pictures after the manner of Paul Veronese. On leaving D IO GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. Rome, in 1607, he passed through Milan to Genoa, whither his reputation had long since preceded him : here he executed several pictures, the most remarkable of which were two in the Church of the Jesuits, the subjects being “The Circumcision,” and “St. Ignatius working a Miracle.” Van Hasselt—who published in 1840, at Brussels, a life of the painter—says that he also paid visits to Florence and Bologna on this journey; and that he went to the latter city to see the works of the Carracci. A circumstance now arose which recalled Rubens to his native country, from which he had been absent eight years. In 1608 he received tidings of his mother's illness; and though he hastened to Antwerp with all possible speed, he did not arrive in time to find her alive. There being no special inducement for him to remain in the Low Countries, he would have returned to Italy, had not the earnestly expressed wishes of the Infanta and the Archduke induced him to abandon his project and remain in Antwerp. Here he built himself a magnificent house, with a saloon in the form of a rotunda, and enriched it with a choice º/7- ſº/º ſº COUNTRY RESIDENCE OF RUBENS AT STEIN. selection of antiques and works of art; and in this house many of his finest pictures were executed. I have in my possession an old engraving of the mansion, which seems a fitting abode for the Archduke himself. A portion of it still exists. In this residence Rubens passed several years in the quiet pursuit of his profession; and the fruits of his labours at that period may still be seen in the various edifices of the Low Countries which are decorated with his numerous pictures. He had also a country mansion at Stein, a small village between Malines and Vilvorde; a view of it is here given. The house still exists, though it is rapidly going to decay. Rubens often introduced it, with the surrounding scenery, into his landscapes. One of the upper rooms is shown as his studio, but he could have painted there none but small pictures, as the apartment is small. One is greatly inclined to wonder from what sources Rubens acquired the vast amount and variety of subjects that his works exhibit, though he drew largely upon the mythology of classic writers and the narratives of the sacred historians, without reference to other SIR PETER P4 UL RUBAE.W.S. I I productions which may be termed purely ideal: but this astonishment ceases when we know that he never painted without having read to him some passage of history or poetry; and that the works of ancient and modern writers were equally familiar to him, for he perfectly understood, and spoke with fluency, seven different languages. The fact is, Rubens was not only a great artist, but his mind was stored with an immense stock of general information, acquired by extensive reading, by observation, and by intercourse with the “wise men’’ of his time. This accumulation of knowledge enriched the mind of the painter with inexhaustible resources. I must not pass by, however, an event in his life, which happened shortly after his settlement in Antwerp ; this was his marriage with Isabella Brandt, the daughter of a THE RAINBOW. rich senator of that city. Several portraits of this lady are still in existence, the finest of which, perhaps, is that in the Royal Gallery of Munich; the picture represents Rubens and his wife seated in a garden. There are few men who have risen to eminence by their genius that have not thereby become the subjects of jealousy and malevolence, and Rubens was no exception to the number. The favourable impression he made on all who had his acquaintance, the admiration with which every one spoke of him, the high favour he enjoyed at Court, and his elevated position, all contributed to excite the ill-feelings and envy of his contemporaries. Among those whose reputations were likely to be overshadowed by the greater glories of Rubens were Jansens and Koeberger, artists of undoubted talent, but far below the standard of the 12 G/& EA 7" J/ASTERS OF A R7. º - ST. JOHN AND THE HOLY WOMEN. other. The former had the boldness to challenge Rubens to a trial of strength, by painting in competition a picture from a given subject, to be submitted to the best judges in the country. Rubens, instead of accepting the invitation, simply replied- * For a long time my pictures have been subjected to every possible criticism, both in Italy and Spain, where they are still exhibited, nor have I yet received any tidings of their condemnation; when you have submitted yours to the same judg- ment, I shall be ready to accept your challenge.” Theodore Rombouts mani- fested no less animosity towards him ; Rubens replied to his sarcasms by exhi- biting his famous “Descent from the Cross :” and Cornelius Schut, another painter of no mean talent, accused him of poverty of invention; the latter was him- self at that period out of an engagement, and Rubens returned his injustice by find- ing him more profitable employment than that of vilifying his brother artist. The first great work he produced after his return from Italy,–and it is in some respects the most important of Rubens's pictures,-is the “ELEVATION OF THE CRoss.” It was originally painted, in 1610, for the church of St. Walburg, in Antwerp, but it now constitutes the altar- piece of the north transept of the cathedral. The composition of this splendid painting, which, with the wings, contains three dis- tinct subjects, is so varied and full of detail, that a brief description, such as we can give, must be necessarily imperfect. The central compartment shows the body of Christ fastened by huge nails to the cross, which several men, whose attitudes and strong muscular action show the power S//& P/EZTEA’ ". . U/ / / /?/2.W.S. they exert, are endeavouring to raise and fix in the ground. Kugler says, “In the colossal picture of . The Elevation of the Cross,’ Rubens stands forth in all his Titanic greatness as the painter of violent and agitated scenes: the effect is over- powering.” Reynolds speaks of it with great admiration, and especially notices the resigned expression of the crucified Saviour, in contrast with the animation and vigour of the other figures. “The invention of throwing the cross obliquely from one corner of the picture to the other is finely conceived—something in the manner of Tintoret; it gives a new and uncommon air to his subject, and we may justly add that it is uncommonly beautiful.” It is said that Rubens retouched the picture in 1627, and added to it the Newfoundland dog in the left corner. Whenever intro- duced, the animal is a blot on the canvas, as an object calculated to destroy the so- lemnity of the scene. On the right wing of this central picture is a group of the Holy Woy EN who followed Christ to Calvary. One of them, the nearest to the spectator, with an infant in her arms, throws herself backwards in an attitude of terror; standing behind is St. John, endeavouring to console the Virgin. On the opposite wing are some ROMAN SOLDIERs, one of whom is without his helmet, and is stretching forth his hand as if issuing orders concerning the two malefactors driven forward by their Roman guards. On the exterior sides of these wings, or doors, is respectively painted a fine regal-looking figure of ST. CATHERINE, holding in her right hand a sword, in her left a palm-branch ; and a figure, supposed to represent ELIAs, in the richest sacerdotal robes; each has a companion of the oppo. - - ROMAN SOLI)|ER -. G/& EA 7" J/1,S7"E.R.S OF AA’7”. º ELIAS. site sex, and in both cases the male figure holds a crozier in his hand, while cherubs are descending to place mitres on their heads. jects are introduced here. Engravings from these four sub- At the commencement of the eighteenth century, Marshal Villeroy offered a very large sum of money for this picture, at the request of Louis XIV., but was unable to obtain it. A copy was, however, made by the Dutch painter, Van Opstal, in 1704. When the French, under Marshal Gérard, bombarded Antwerp, in 1832, strict orders were given to the attacking troops that no firing should be directed against the cathe- dral, for fear of damaging this and other famous pictures by the great Fleming. Among these must be pointed out “The Assumption of the Virgin,” which hangs The principal figure is surrounded by a number over the high altar of the choir. of angels; and below are the apostles and numerous other personages. But far surpassing this, and generally regarded as his che/-d'aºre, is the “DE- SCENT FROM THE CRoss,’’ placed in the south transept of the cathedral : an en- graving of it will be found on a preceding page. The traditional history of the origin of this work has been thus recorded by G. P. Mensaert, a contemporary of the artist: “Rubens painted it in recompense for the corner of a garden belonging to the Society, or Serment des /ºi/si/iers, of whom St. Chris- topher was considered the patron saint. The piece of land was given to Rubens to enlarge the grounds of the house he was then building. When the picture was about being finished, he received a visit from the c/e/-doyens, or stewards of the Society, to S7R PETER PA U/ RUBEWS. view it; and as the zo/e/s, or wings, stood opened, they expressed surprise at the omission of their patron-saint. Rubens observed their disappointment, and told them he would explain how he had treated the story. Christopherus,’ he said, ‘signi- fies Christ/m/erre, or carrying of Christ; the figures in the picture, who are assisting to lower the body from the cross, are carrying Christ. St. Simeon, on one of the zo/e/s, who carries the infant Christ in his arms, is therefore a Christopherus. The Virgin emcenſe also carries Christ.” He was about to continue, when he observed, by the dis- appointment in their countenances, that they wished for something else than metaphors. Then gently closing the zo/eſs on the other side, they saw to their great joy a St. Chris- topher painted of gigantic stature. Their delight was so excessive, that without fur- ther examination they quitted the painter, and left him in astonishment at their stupid ignorance. He instantly added to the pic- ture of St. Christopher an owl flying and a turbot in the water, to express his opinion of such connoisseurs, where they still exist.” The central composition contains nine figures; in the middle is the dead body of Christ detached from the cross, over the transverse piece of which two men mounted on ladders are standing ; one of them holds the corner of the “clean white linen cloth '' in his mouth, and both are gently lowering the corpse. Half way up the ladders are Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea assist- ing; and at the base stands St. John, clad in a scarlet robe, receiving the body in his arms. On the left, Mary Magdalen, and Salome, the mother of James, kneel, and extend their arms to assist the descent; the former is dressed in a vestment of deep ST. CATHER IN E. 16 GREA 7 J/ASTERS OF AR7. green, the latter in one of purple. Behind them is the Virgin Mary, wearing a blue mantle, her attitude and expression signi- ficant of the greatest disquietude. The time is night. The crowd of spectators who witnessed the agony on the cross is dis- persed, except those faithful followers who have again assembled to perform the last solemn duties for their Lord and Master. For that power of representing deep tenderness, love, and reverence, which may be effected by action as much as, if not more than, by the expression of the human face, this picture has scarcely a parallel– it is manifest in each one of the figures, all being apparently actuated by an intense desire to “deal gently ’’ with the lifeless form of Him whom they have lost. Raffaelle would have given more pathos and sweet- ness to their countenances, but he could not have thrown greater dramatic power into the grouping. Referring to an idea which pre- vailed before his time, that the composition was borrowed” Reynolds says, “Its greatest peculiarity is the contrivance of the white sheet on which the body of Jesus lies: this circumstance was probably what induced Rubens to adopt the composition. He well knew what effect white linen opposed to flesh must have with his powers of colouring —a circumstance which was not likely to enter into the mind of an Italian painter, who probably would have been afraid of the linen hurting the colouring of the flesh, and have kept it down by a low tint. And the truth is, that none but great colourists) can venture to paint pure white linen near flesh ; but such know the advantage of it; * From Dorigny's engraving of Daniel di Volterra's picture of the same subject, destroyed by the French in the last century. ST. CHRISTOPHER. SIR PETER PA UL RU/3/2M.S. so that, probably, what was stolen by Ru- bens, the possessor knew not how to value, and, certainly, no person knew so well as Rubens how to use. I could wish to see this print, if there is one, to ascertain how far Rubens was indebted to it for his Christ, which I consider as one of the finest figures that ever was invented ; it is most correctly drawn, and, I apprehend, in an attitude of the utmost difficulty to execute. The hang- ing of the head on his shoulder, and the falling of the body on one side, gives it such an appearance of the heaviness of death, that nothing can exceed it.” On the exterior of the zo/ets, or folding- doors, of this grand picture are respectively painted the “ST. CHRISTOPHER,” of which mention has just been made, and a “ HER- MIT’’ carrying a lantern to light the saint over the river. On the interior of the doors, respectively, is an exceedingly fine compo- sition : one, the “PRESENTATION IN THE 5. TEMPLE ;” the other, the “VISITATION.” The former is almost as fresh as when first painted; but the latter has become greatly deteriorated. Engravings from all thes pictures are given. As an intermediate subject in point of time, between the two large pictures just described, Rubens executed at a later date his famous “Crucifixion.” In this, Christ is represented as suspended on the Cross between the two thieves. The picture was painted, in 1620, for the artist's friend, the Burgomaster Nicholas Rockox, who pre- sented it for an altar-piece to the Church of the Recollets; it is now in the Museum of Antwerp. The composition is one of infinite power, and presents more distinctive marks of individual character than, perhaps, either of the others we have spoken of THE HERMIT. G/&AEA 7" ..]/ASTERS OF A R7. mºtiºn º - THE VISITATION. y The time is after “the sixth hour,” for there is darkness over the sky and earth, and Christ has “given up the ghost.” A Roman soldier on horseback approaches, and thrusts his spear with impetuous vio- lence into the Saviour's side; while the Magdalen, who kneels at the foot of the Cross, looks at the horseman with an ex- pression between horror and entreaty. Her face is in profile, and Reynolds calls it “by far the most beautiful profile I ever saw, of Rubens, or, I think, of any other painter.” In the immediate foreground are the Virgin, St. John, and Mary the wife of Cleophas, with the centurion, who leans forward, his hands resting on the mane of his horse, and his gaze earnestly fixed on the placid, lifeless face of Christ. The two thieves are represented according to what we read of them in the sacred narrative— the one struggling in intense anguish, his body writhing with pain; one leg, which he has torn from the nail, drawn up, his coun- tenance wild, distorted, and hideous; the other malefactor, tortured and suffering as he is, bears his agony with meek resignation, and seems as if only waiting in comparative calmness for death to release him. A sol- dier has ascended the ladder resting against the cross on which the impenitent thief hangs, for the purpose, as it seems, of breaking the legs of the latter. There is grand dramatic character in the whole of this composition ; it is bold and original in conception, and, as Reynolds justly re- marks, “conducted with consummate art.” Another great work by Rubens, in the same gallery, is “The Adoration of the Magi; ” a fine poetical design, instinct with a genius claiming “kindred with that which glows upon the pages of Milton and S/A PETER P4 UL RUBEVS. Dante.” There is here no beauty of form to captivate the eye, nor expression of cha- racter to excite the feelings of the heart, but a rich and gorgeous display of Eastern wealth and magnificence mingled with the homely attributes of the lowly stable in Bethlehem. Some notice must now be taken of the pictures that form the subjects of the re- maining engravings introduced into these pages. The Louvre of Paris. “ VILLAGE FETE '' adorns the It is one of the very few works of this class which Rubens painted, and bears, consequently, a proportionate value. This was estimated at the French Restora- tion, according to M. Silvestre, in the “Vies des Peintres,” at one hundred thousand francs, or about four thousand pounds. It is a wonderful composition, full of life, energy, and joyous merriment; more free from vulgarity, and more inspiriting than any by the elder Teniers or Ostade. I have searched various authorities to endeavour to ascertain where now exists the picture of “VENUs Nou RISHING THE LovEs,” but without success. Van Hasselt speaks of it, but only as engraved by Galle and by Surrugue: he also mentions a print, by Watelet, in aqua /or/is, of this subject, engraved from a drawing by Rubens, which was sold in Paris, in 1775, with the collec- tion of M. Mariette. The composition is very graceful; but the Venus, like most which Rubens painted, is a Flemish Venus, —not one of Titian's glorious conceptions. The picture entitled “A FETE-CHAM- PETRE’ is in the Imperial Gallery of Vienna. In the centre of the composition is a château surrounded with water; to the right is a group of trees upon a slightly - ſº | º | || º! . | º | | | | || | | | || | - | ||||| || || | | | | | || || | | | - | | | - 3. | | | | || || . - --- º º ** - | | - i. - º - - º - I - º . | | - *Sº - --- | AN : º tº: º - -º- - J. --". - º - º º º º K? - - sº- º, sº = | || tº - s sºs | | º | º N º - - º: N | º Sºs § s | º §§§ - --- º º § { | º º Sº | || º º º | º º º § - | | || º - - º M. - - º - - § - º & º | | º | - = | | º | º - º º | | - | | | |- | | THE PRESENTATION IN THE TEMPLE. 2O GRE.17 J/1,STERS OF A R7. rising ground, whose banks are traversed by a winding stream. The foreground is occupied by a rustic bridge, and by a company of dames and cavaliers enjoying the beauties and amusements of a lovely summer's evening. The small picture of “SILENUs,” a theme the artist treated variously on several occasions, is in the Royal Gallery of Munich. In this version the old votary of Bacchus is being dragged along and supported, in a state of inebriation, by a negro and a satyr: it is a powerfully drawn group. - The Louvre in Paris contains the picture with “THE RAINBow’’ introduced. It is a sweet representation of Flemish pastoral life, treated with wonderful breadth, and showing the utmost transparency of colour. It has been valued at upwards of fifteen hundred guineas. At the commencement of the year 1620, Maria de Medici, the widow of Henry IV. of France, having, at Angoulºme, become reconciled to her son, Louis XIII., returned to Paris; and being desirous of decorating the grand gallery of the Luxembourg Palace, where she resided, she gave the commission for the work to Rubens. He accordingly went to Paris, and received instructions for a series of twenty-four subjects, illustrating some of the principal events in the life of the royal lady. The sketches being completed, Rubens returned to Antwerp, and, with the assistance of his numerous pupils, finished the task, with the exception of two, in the short space of about three years. The two omitted were painted in Paris when the artist revisited that city to arrange the gallery. And, while speaking of his pupils, I may as well mention the names of some who owe the high position they have attained to the instructions received in the school of Rubens. The most distinguished are Van Dyck, Van Egmont, Snyders, Schut, Jordaens, Van Mol, Van Uden, John Van Hoeck, Diepenbeck, De Vos, &c. The original sketches for the Luxembourg pictures are now in the Munich Gallery: many of them are certainly far superior to the finished works. It is almost like crowding the events of a great and protracted life into a day, to com- press the biography of such a painter as Rubens into the brief space to which I am necessarily limited; and I am thus compelled to pass over much that is interesting in his history, though not essential; and still can only glance at a few of the most remarkable facts we find con- nected with it. During the last visit of Rubens to Paris, he was introduced to the Duke of Buckingham, then staying in that city for the purpose, it is supposed, of negotiating the marriage between Charles I. and Henrietta Maria of France. Buckingham so far ingratiated himself with the artist as to induce him to part with the collection of pictures he had got together at Antwerp for about ten thousand pounds, as we are informed by Walpole. SIR PETER PA U/ RUBAEAVS. 2 I In 1626 Rubens lost his first wife; and he shortly afterwards made a tour through Holland, visiting the principal Dutch artists of that time. The favour with which the Archduke regarded Rubens continued to be exercised towards him by the Infanta when she became a widow. On her return from the siege of Breda, in company with Spinola, in 1625, she visited the painter at his own residence; and in 1627, when Charles I. declared war against France, Rubens was entrusted to negotiate with Gerbier, Charles's agent at the Hague. In the autumn of the same year he was sent on a mission to Madrid; and during his stay there he executed several important pictures, gaining the esteem of Philip IV. In 1629 he was sent by the Infanta on an embassy to England; here also his success as a diplomatist was once more achieved, and his merits THE TRIUMPH OF SILENU.S. in procuring Charles's acquiescence in the peace were recognised by the Court of Spain. The English monarch, a man of unquestionable taste, and an ardent admirer of the Fine Arts, felt great interest in the artist-ambassador, who speedily won the monarch’s favour, and painted for him the allegorical picture of “Peace and War,” now in our National Gallery. “The Apotheosis of James I.,” painted for the ceiling of the banqueting hall, since converted into the chapel, of Whitehall, was also designed by Rubens while in England, but was painted in Antwerp at a later period: he is reported to have received three thousand pounds for the work, which Cipriani repaired in 1780. The King bestowed the honour of knighthood on the painter, presenting him at the same time with a splendid sword and a costly collar of G. 22 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. diamonds. Upon the dispersion of Charles's collection, the “Peace and War” was trans- ferred to Geneva, but was purchased during the first French Revolution from the Doria family, and thus found its way back to this country. An anecdote is told of the artist, that while he was employed one day at his easel, an English nobleman of high rank accosted him with the sarcastic remark, “And so the repre- sentative of his Catholic Majesty sometimes amuses himself with painting !” “Truly,” replied Rubens, “and sometimes the painter amuses himself by playing the ambassador.” In 1631 Rubens married his second wife, a lovely girl of sixteen, named Helena Forman, or Fourment, whose portrait appears both singly and in some of the groups in his pictures. He was again employed in a diplomatic character in 1633, by being sent to Holland; and in the end of the same year he lost his friend and patroness, the Infanta Isabella. In 1635 he became subject to gout in his hands, which disabled him from painting on a large Scale; still, at the request of the authorities of Antwerp, he executed sketches for the decora- tion of the arches to be erected in honour of the entry of the new Regent of the Low Countries, Don Ferdinand. But the disease under which he had been long suffering was hastening on his end; he died on the 30th of May, 1640, in the sixty-third year of his age, and was buried in the Church of St. James, at Antwerp. - A few more of the pictures here engraved have yet to be noticed. - “THE TRIUMPH of SILENUs” is in the Peel collection in the National Gallery; the work is remarkable for its powerful expression of intoxicated pleasure, for the depth and cleverness of its colouring, and especially, as Dr. Waagen observes, “for the beauty of a nymph painted with the most fascinating freshness and fulness of the bright golden tone.” It was sold in 1642 to Cardinal Richelieu ; and, having passed through the hands of Lucien Buonaparte, came into the possession of the late Sir R. Peel at the price of eleven hundred pounds. By an inadvertence on the part of the engraver, our print, which was executed in France, shows the picture the reversed way; the figures should be looking to the left side, and not to the right, as they are here seen. “THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT'' ornaments the Louvre in Paris: the picture exhibits a moon- light effect; the figure of Mary is evidently painted from a Dutch model; it is coarse and ungainly ; but the remainder of the group is finely composed, and the whole shows the artist’s admirable arrangement of chiaroscuro. The engraving which bears the title of “ HENRY IV. '' is from one of the series of pictures formerly in the Medici Gallery, in the Luxembourg of Paris, to which allusion has already been made: these productions are now in the Louvre. I cannot precisely fix the historical event to which this picture refers; it is, however, evidently an interview between Henry IV. and his consort, Maria de Medici; possibly that, treated somewhat allegorically, wherein he confides to her the government during one of his warlike expeditions. The picture of “THE Two ELDEST Soxs of RUBENs” is in the Royal Gallery of Dresden; the younger is amusing himself with a bird attached to a string, in the manner of a falconer; the elder holds a book, and has thrown his left arm over the shoulder of his brother. There is a fine effect of light cast on the faces of the two boys, who are grouped with the skill of a S/A PETER PA UL RUBAEM.S. 23 master. A rep/ica of this picture is in the Lichtenstein Gallery, Vienna. Rubens painted numerous portraits of himself, his two wives, his children, and other members of his numerous family. “THE VISITATION’’ appears to be an enlarged version of one of the laterals or wings placed by the side of “The Descent from the Cross,” in Antwerp Cathedral, as previously explained. The serenity and happiness expressed in this scene present a striking contrast to THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT. the intense anguish and physical action displayed in the central compartment. Great skill is exhibited in the grouping and arrangement of the five figures in the upper Part of the picture, which is in the Borghese Palace, Rome. “THE Conclusion of PEACE" is another of the series of pictures painted for Maria de Medici, to which reference has already been made. It is probably an allegorical allusion to one of those historical events which happened during the troubled reign of her husband, 24 GREAT MASZTERS OF AR7. Henry IV.; possibly intended to signify the entrance of the royal lady herself into a place of safety to escape the evils which war, symbolised by the Furies behind, threaten to bring upon her. The subject, however construed, is treated in a most masterly manner. * It is quite impossible to believe that the immense number of pictures ascribed to Rubens are the works of his own hands, though it is most probable that the majority were designed, and perhaps touched upon, by him. Smith, in his “Catalogue Raisonné,” enumerates about eighteen hundred; and as many of these were altar-pieces and gallery-pictures, it would be an absurdity to suppose that Rubens actually painted them all, even “presuming he had passed his whole life in his studio. Van Hasselt, who has appended to his life of the painter a catalogue of his works, mentions only thirteen hundred and seventy; but even this is a very large number. It is, therefore, unquestionable that Rubens was greatly assisted by his numerous scholars; and that, in fact, a considerable number of pictures were painted by them, which the master himself finished. And it should not be forgotten also that there were several eminent Flemish painters of the period who adopted his style, yet were not his pupils, such as Martin Pepin, Gerard Seghers, and Gaspar de Crayer. The versatility of the genius of Rubens is one of its most remarkable characteristics. He painted historical subjects of every description, landscapes, animals, portraits, fruit, and flowers, with equal excellence, so that it would be difficult to determine in what particular department his strength lay, were it not that to history must be awarded the highest position in art. His early education, acquired in a school which prior to his time showed, in comparison with others, very limited elevation of character, and his introduction to the masters of Italian art, operated most powerfully to refine his ideas, while they enlarged his conceptions till they reached the sublime. The proof of this is evidenced in “The Descent from the Cross,” and in several other large pictures still existing in Antwerp, in which it may be seen that the painter had now reached a point where the poetry of his art, so to speak, became manifest, and the grossness of material things gave place to more spiritual thoughts and expression; while the three grand elements of high art—composition, form, and colour—were united to elevation of idea and grandeur of design. But in speaking of expression, it must not be supposed we would assimilate that of Rubens to what is found in the works of Raffaelle, Da Vinci, Guido, and some few others of the Italian schools, in whom grace and beauty predominate over power and energy. Both Rubens and Rembrandt were “animated with that poetic fire that displays itself in effects which astonish and delight.” On taking a survey, in chronological order, of the different productions of the various European schools, at different periods of time, we find that every school at the same epoch had each a certain type or style, a predilection for certain forms and fancies, or features; which predilection had its origin in the intellectual tendency of the times as much as in the models by which each was surrounded; and though these types were sometimes modified and altered by the study of the works of others, or by enlarged ideas gained by foreign travel, it seemed almost impossible wholly to get rid of them. Thus Rubens could rarely lose sight of his Flemish models, though the female beauties and the graceful forms of the English, French, Italian, and Spanish Courts had been revealed to him. I am not speaking of his portraits, S/R PETER PA UL RUBA.M.S. 25 but of his imaginative works. “It must not be denied,” says Bryan, “that he preferred brilliancy of effect to beauty of form, and too frequently sacrificed correctness of design to the magic of his colouring.” In those parts of his art which act immediately on the senses, Rubens was, without º | . . . º | ill ill º | | | | || || - || || |\ | - | | | || |\\ º, | | | | | || || || | º º | | || - º M HENRY THE FOURTH. doubt, a great master. He understood the perfect management of light and shade, of com- position and colour. If his merits are disputed, it is only with reference to the subjects he painted, and to his mode of treating them—not to his technical skill. His qualifications were not of a nature to fit him for the representation of what is called “Christian Art.” H 26 - - - GREAT MASTERS OF AFT. but they were not the less eminently characteristic of a great painter. Notwithstanding these deficiencies, as is observed by Dr. Waagen in his “Life” of the painter, “the stronger human passions and actions have an intense interest for mankind. The animal energy of man, and the physical development of his senses, are a part of that complex whole which we call human nature, although they are not the most elevated part. If art is to represent man as he is, these elements cannot be wholly overlooked. The Greek drama displayed them too glaringly in the olden comedy, and Greek sculpture embodied them in its fauns and satyrs. An acute sense of beauty indeed generally softened the most disgusting features; and we might wish that Rubens had been oftener touched with the same scruples. We must take him, however, as he is—with all his technical excellence, and with all the incom- parable energy and heartiness which animate his best works.” - Before proceeding to the consideration of other masters of the Low Countries' schools, it may not be uninteresting to point out where very many of the works of Rubens are to be found. - - Italy contains comparatively few of his pictures; there are numerous portraits by him Scattered through the various galleries of the country, but the principal pictures he painted while there were executed for, or have since passed into the hands of, other than Italian patrons. I will take a rapid glance at the chief works, including a few portraits, that Italy can still show from the pencil of this great Flemish painter. Among the cities visited by him was Genoa, and in the Church of Sant' Ambrogio, some- times also called the Church di Gesù, are two paintings, one of the “Circumcision,” which forms the altar-piece; the other, “St. Ignatius healing a Demoniac.” The former is said to have been executed before he went to Genoa, but being ignorant of the exact place it was intended to occupy in the church, as regards space and light, the picture is not seen to advantage: the latter was painted in Genoa, so that he was able to arrange and treat the subject as the locality required. Hence the different appearance each respectively presents to the spectator in its general effect. In the public library of Mantua is a finely-painted group of four figures—his patron, the Duke Vincenza I., the Duchess, and two other persons, wor- shipping the Virgin glorified. The heads are admirable in character, and the disposition and execution most masterly. Brescia contained a few years ago, and probably still possesses, in the Fenaroli Gallery, a picture of “Hercules Strangling the Nemean Lion,” a bold, spirited composition, but rather coarsely painted. In the Imperial gallery of Florence are portraits of Rubens's two wives, Elizabeth Brandt and the pretty young Helena Fourment; the former is by far the better picture of the two. The Pitti Palace in this city has several notable examples of this master: a “Holy Family;” a group of portraits, consisting of the artist himself, his brother, and the two distinguished men of science, Lipsius and Grotius, “one of those dark and fine pictures in which this master most nearly approached to Van Dyck;” and “St. Francis in the Attitude of Prayer.” Here are also two magnificent land- scapes, in one of which is introduced the story of Ulysses discovered by Nausicaa and her attendants, Minerva appearing in the clouds above. The time is early morning, the rays of which light up brilliantly the centre of the composition. The breaking clouds, the leaping S//& PETER PA U/ RU/? E.W.S. 27 cataract with its misty spray, the upland meadows, and the palace partly tinged by the slanting rays of the rising sun, are all splendidly rendered. With reference to this and some other pictures, by Rubens, a writer has justly remarked, “ that the painter's power of conception and his striking pictorial effects are conspicuous: combined with the most daring composition, he here displays a glow of light which approaches Rembrandt, and a mastery of handling which approaches bravado.” The other landscape, equally fine as a pic- ture, is a pastoral scene, with peasants returning at eventide from their daily labour. In the gallery of the Capitol of Rome is a picture representing “ Romulus and Remus with the Wolf discovered by the Shepherd and Shepherdess :” it was pro- bably painted while Rubens was in Italy, for it bears the appear- "Wºº ance of being a comparatively º: º - º |||| - º ºº: º º early work. The twins are plump, º, º º sº ºf ºf tº º- º - º - - - i. - | rosy-cheeked children; and the elder pair are vigorously drawn and coloured, more after the style of Giulio Romano than of any other contemporary Italian artist. In the Borghese Palace is the * * “Visitation,” already spoken of Naples possesses two or three of his pictures demanding notice. In the Fondi Palace is “Diana and Calisto,” a subject which the artist repeated once or twice: this one is a good specimen of his style of composition, and, doubtless, was in years gone by rich in colour, but it has now become dark. In tº two mos, osso, ºss. the Palace Miranda are two alle- gorical subjects, the “Banquet of the Gods,” and the “Triumph of Beauty,” both of which manifest in an eminent degree Rubens's luxurious imaginative conceptions. In England, as already intimated, Rubens designed the decorations of the ceiling at Whitehall, which comprise nine pictures, the ceiling being divided into as many compartments, of which the central one is largest and is oval-shaped: the subject is the “Apotheosis of James I.” At 28 - GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. each end of it respectively is a representation of somewhat similar character. At the angles are four allegorical subjects; and the two long sides are ornamented with friezes of young genii loading cars drawn by lions, bears, and other animals, with corn and fruit, emblematical of Plenty. The colossal proportions of these designs may be estimated from the fact that the genii measure nine feet in length. As pictures they possess little intrinsic worth beyond a boldness and luxuriance of conception such as we find in almost all the works of Rubens; and it is more than probable that he had little more to do with them than to give his pupils the designs, leaving the execution of the works to them. Dr. Waagen, in his “Art-Treasures in Great Britain,” describes nearly one hundred and fifty pictures, assumed to be by Rubens, which are in this country; and in his supplement to that work, published three years later, in 1857, he speaks of very many more, probably fifty or sixty. The largest number in any single gallery is at Blenheim, which contains twenty; the National Gallery comes next with thirteen ; Windsor Castle possesses eleven; the Grosvenor Gallery has eight, and Buckingham Palace seven. The remainder are dispersed in different collections over the country. The “Blenheim '' pictures by Rubens are, perhaps, unsurpassed as a whole by any collection in Europe. They include subjects from sacred and mythological history, and several noble portraits. “The Return of the Holy Family from Egypt” belongs to his best period; it is what may be termed a quiet, sedate-looking composition, with a feeling of sanctity appropriate to the subject, and a subdued though effective tone of colour. “Suffer Little Children to come unto Me”—a group of half-length figures—introduces portraits of some of the artist’s contemporaries, both adults and children, in Flemish costume; their appearance arrayed thus seems incongruous, but there is such lifelike and natural expression in the faces, so much simplicity and truth, and such freshness of colour throughout, that one almost forgets the anachronism of which the painter is guilty, in the masterly and agreeable manner in which the subject is placed on the canvas. “Lot, with his Wife and Daughters, conducted by the Angels out of Sodom,” was a present to the great Duke of Marlborough from the city of Antwerp ; it is a picture that, from its truly pathetic character, amounting to solemnity, ought to exonerate Rubens from the sweeping censures bestowed on him by some of his critics: So, too, ought the “Roman Charity.” Of the mythological subjects the most remarkable are—“Venus and Cupid dissuading Adonis from going to the Chase,” a large picture presented to the first Duke by the Emperor of Germany, “a grand work of the master's middle period,” the figures finely modelled, and very rich in colour; a “Bacchanalian Procession,” evidently based on the style of Giulio Romano, too free and coarse in con- ception to be pleasant, but wonderful in power of execution and depth of tone combined with brilliancy. Of the portraits, that of his second wife, Helena Fourment, and another of a group consisting of himself, the same lady, and a little child, walking in a garden, are noble examples of Rubens's pencil: the latter, a gift from the Corporation of Brussels to the Duke of Marlborough, is quite a masterpiece of portraiture. In the Grosvenor Gallery are four colossal works; the canvases of each measure fourteen feet in height, and vary from fourteen to nineteen feet in width. The subjects represented S/A PETER PA UL RUAE ENS. 29 on them are—“The Israelites gathering Manna,” “Abraham receiving Bread and Wine from Melchizedek,” a “Procession of the Four Evangelists,” and a “Procession of the IFour Latin Fathers of the Church—St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, St. Gregory, and St. Jerome—and of St. Thomas, St. Norbert, and St. Clara,” the last bearing the host. “These pictures,” says Waagen, “belong to a series of nine, which, till the year 1808, were in the Carmelite Convent of Loeches, about eighteen miles from Madrid, founded by the Duke d'Olivarez, to whom they THE VISITATION. were presented by his sovereign, Philip IV. In the year 1808 these four were sold by the French to M. de Bourke, at that time Danish Minister at the Court of Madrid, who brought them to England, and sold them to the late Marquis” (of Westminster) “for £ 10,000.” Two others, “The Triumph of the Christian Religion,” and “Elijah in the Wilderness, fed by the Angel,” are in the gallery of the Louvre. Another, “The Triumph of Charity,” was, in 1830, in the possession of Mr. Joshua Taylor; “The Triumph of the Catholic Religion,” and “The Victory of Christianity over Paganism,” seem to have remained at Loeches. These compositions were I 30 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. evidently intended as designs for tapestries, for at the upper ends are angels engaged in hanging them up to a cornice between pillars: but whatever was the object for which they were originally designed, it is quite clear that as pictures they come infinitely short of Rubens's genius in every quality; they have neither form, arrangement, expression, nor colour to commend them; and we only point them out here because they have borne, and still bear in the estimation of some, a high reputation, as may be supposed from the large sum paid for the four in the Grosvenor Gallery. Three other pictures in the same collection are “Pausias and Glycera,” “Sarah dismissing Hagar,” and “Ixion embracing the Cloud,” of which the first, a very beautiful work, is unquestionably the best: a little cabinet landscape is a perfect gem. - Of the eleven pictures at Windsor Castle, contained in what is called the “Rubens Room,” stands prominently “St. Martin dividing his Cloak with a Beggar.” It is a composition showing great power of design and expression; the colour, too, is rich and luminous: it is the opinion of some modern critics that Van Dyck painted a large portion of this work; for example, the horse, women, and children. The “Virgin with the Infant Christ” has considerable dignity of character, united with more of religious sentiment than is usually found in the compositions of this painter. The Buckingham Palace Rubenses are varied in subject; under the head of historical pictures may be classed “Pythagoras Teaching his Pupils the Properties of Fruit,” the fruit is painted by Snyders. “Pan Pursuing Syrinx” is a small allegorical work very carefully executed. A portrait of the Bishop of Antwerp, and another of a man with a falcon on his hand, are excellent examples of Rubens's firm and free style of pencilling. Here also is the celebrated landscape, “The Farm at Lacken.” - Though the Peel collection, now transferred to the National Gallery, is rich in the works of the Flemish and Dutch painters, it has only two by Rubens, but they are of the highest order; one is the famous portrait of a female, known as the “Chapeau de Paille;” the artist is said to have esteemed it so highly that he would not part with it, and it was accordingly enumerated in the catalogue of his pictures left in his possession at his death. After the death of the widow of Rubens, it passed into the hands of the Lunden family, of Antwerp : the portrait represents a lady of this family; it remained in their possession till the year 1817, when M. Van Haveren, a descendant, sold it to another branch of the family for £2,400 : on the death of the last owner, in 1822, it was sold by public auction in Antwerp, where it attracted the utmost competition, and was ultimately knocked down to M. Nieuwenhuys— Van Hasselt says to Mr. Smith—for about 43,000, including the duty. It was then brought over to this country, and after being offered to the King, George IV., who declined the purchase, it was sold to the late Sir Robert Peel for the large sum of 43,500, it is said. A picture so well known needs no comment here. The second painting in the Peel collection is “The Triumph of Silenus;” it is engraved on a preceding page. The other eleven pictures in the National Gallery have been so long there, and, it may be Presumed, have consequently become so familiar to thousands, that it seems needless to refer to them. S//& PETER PA UL RUB/AWS. 3 I Sir Richard Wallace, M.P., who inherited the noble collection of the late Marquis of Hertford, is the owner of two small but exceedingly valuable pictures of sacred subjects, and a glorious landscape, among a few other works, by Rubens. “Christ giving the Keys to St. Peter,” a comparatively small picture of five three-quarter length figures, is remark- able for the elevated character of the heads and the rich tone of colour throughout. It was tº TT ſº THE CONCLUSION OF PEACE. bought at the sale of the late King of Holland's private collection for the sum of seven hundred guineas. A still more noble example, perhaps, of the qualities of expression and colour, is a “Holy Family,” representing the Virgin holding the infant St. John, Elizabeth, and Joseph, painted not long after the return of Rubens to the Low Countries, for the private chapel of the Archduke Albert; at a subsequent period it ornamented the Imperial Gallery at Vienna, and in 1784 was presented by the Emperor Joseph to M. Burtin, of Brussels, a well- 32 - GREAT MASTERS OF ART. known collector and writer upon Art. The Marquis of Hertford paid three thousand guineas for it. The landscape alluded to is a “Rainbow” picture, from a rainbow being introduced , into it: this work is undoubtedly among the finest of its class Rubens painted. The com- position differs from the “Rainbow” picture in the Louvre, of which an engraving appears in an earlier page. . . . Very many more pictures deserving of notice might be selected from the various collec- tions throughout the country, but they would occupy too much space. Belgium, it scarcely need be said, is full of them: even to enumerate these is out of the question here. To Rubens must be ascribed the glory of restoring the arts of his country to the pre- eminence they had reached under John and Hubert Van Eyck, though his excellence was of another kind. Between these two periods, painting in the Low Countries had descended to crude and affected imitations of the Italian masters, as exemplified in the works of Mabuse and Van Orlay. Rubens revivified the lifeless manner of his predecessors and contemporaries, and showed there was a living and expressive principle in painting more worthy of genius than the inanimate nonentities then put forth, whatever amount of technical skill might have been expended on them. Art is nothing if there be not breathed into it the spirit of life, and those impulses which invest it with the attributes of our material existence. (). T. sº Gº!, 4t A/ "..., wayſ *" néſzó, ºfº PAUL REMBRANDT WAN RYN. º AUL REMBRANDT, another great master of the Dutch school, was the son of a miller, named Herman Gerretsz, and surnamed Van Ryn, that is, of the Æhine, because his mill was situated upon a branch of that river— as seen in the engraving on the next page—near Leyden, between the villages of Leyderdorp and Koukerck. He was born on the 15th of June, * tº: 1606, and was christened in the name which has since become so famous, - that of Rembrandt. His father, a man of easy circumstances, determined to give him a classical education, in order to qualify him for one of the learned professions, and he sent the lad to the University of Leyden, then in high repute; but by some means or other, which can only be accounted for by an inborn genius that will always develop itself under any circumstances, a love of painting had taken fast hold of his mind; and to practise this was a far higher charm than the study of the dead languages and legal authorities. According to Sandrart, his contemporary, who wrote a “History of Painters,” young K 34 GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. Rembrandt passed much time with Van Swanenburg, an engraver of Leyden, from whom he received his first lessons in that art for which he subsequently became so distinguished. Bryan, in his “Dictionary of Painters and Engravers,” says—“Rembrandt's father placed him as a disciple with Jacob van Zwaanenberg, at Amsterdam, under whom he studied three years, and his progress in that time was the astonishment of his master.” Of these two statements the former appears to be the more probable, as the youth would, doubtless, be more disposed to remain in Leyden than to be removed farther from home; moreover, Bryan's list contains no account of the painter of Amsterdam, while he makes mention of the engraver of Leyden, whom he calls Swanenburg. The similarity of the names of both painter and engraver would lead to the inference that they were one and the same person. Mr. Wornum, in his “Epochs of Painting,” remarks—“Of Van Swanenburg's career the chief fact known seems to be that he was the master of Rembrandt; but he is recorded to have studied some years in Italy, and was, though unknown to fame, no doubt one of the best painters in Leyden.” According to the same authority, Rembrandt was three years with Van Swanenburg, then worked for a short time under Lastman, and finally under Pinas. Houbracken differs from all THE MILL. these writers; for he says Rembrandt’s first master was Peter Lastman, with whom he studied six months at Amsterdam, and then quitted him to enter the study of Jacob Pinas, of Haarlem. This seems to be the most correct statement, for we may see in the works of Pinas and of Lastman the germs of that manner which has given immortality to their pupil. But, inasmuch as seven cities of Greece contended for the birthplace of Homer, so numerous writers have striven to place the illustrious painter with some favourite master, as if the genius of the scholar were reflected back upon that of the instructor. It is thus that Leewen assigns to him another master still, G. Schooten, of Leyden. These matters are, however, of little importance, for he was a follower of no one predecessor, nor did he form a style from a combination of what had been done before; he had his own peculiar views of art; he saw the world around him, animate and inanimate, with his own eyes; and stamped his works with an originality that cannot be mistaken for anything but the result of a free and unbiassed mind. Rembrandt has left us many examples of his personal appearance, from the freshness of comparative youth to the period when time, and labour, and penuriousness indicated advancing age. On his return to his father's mill, he was about twenty years old, healthy and vigorous; his forehead, capacious and slightly projecting, exhibited those developments PA UL REMEAAAWD 7" VAAW RPM. 35 which announce the existence of thought and imagination; his eyes were small and deep-set, yet lively, intelligent, and full of fire; his hair, growing in rich abundance, was of a dark auburn colour, and curled naturally over his shoulders, as we see in the Portrait here engraved: his nose, thick, flat, and rubicund, marked his countenance with an air of extreme vulgarity, which, however, was somewhat relieved by a well-formed mouth and the bright expression of his eyes. An artist so fashioned could scarcely be otherwise than original and independent in all his ideas. Thus, when he set himself to study from nature, he brought to the task less of the THE NIGHT-GUARD. native Wom/ommie which is the distinctive trait of so many of the Dutch painters, than of a desire that everything should be marked with his own individuality; he mingled his own caprices and fancies with an attentive observation of realities. Of all the phenomena of nature, that which most puzzles us is light; of all the difficulties that beset a painter, that which he first labours to overcome is, or should be, expression; these two powerful qualities we see in the early prints of Rembrandt; and if we follow him, from the first rough sketches which he essayed in oil, to those masterly and fine engravings, the fruits of his matured experience, we still find him working with these objects in view, though his model may have been no other than the grotesque figure of a Dutch boor, or the equally inelegant form of a buxom servant-maid in the village ale-house where he went to study. 36 GREA 7' M/.4SZTERS OF AP 7. It is marvellous how a mind so constituted could ever entertain the idea of painting such a subject as “The Descent from the Cross,” one in all respects so foreign to his ordinary course of thought and conception, and so diametrically opposed to those studies which formed his chief delight. The same observation applies, but not with equal force, to his other Scriptural pictures. But it is the mark of high genius to be capricious, and to show its powers in a diversity of ways; moreover, he had the example of other great painters before him to serve as precedents. Yet the classic artists of Italy and Spain, and even his own fellow-countryman, Rubens, brought to bear on these sacred subjects ideas and feelings in harmony with them. Not so Rembrandt; the magic of his chiar'-oscuro, and the glowing beauty of his colour, cannot atone for the hideous vulgarity of his figures, their masqueradish costumes, and their inappropriate appearance on the scene of action. Is it possible to discover in the picture just referred to a single figure characterised by elegance or dignity?—and one can scarcely suppress a smile, even at so solemn a scene as is there represented, to see a kind of burly Dutch burgomaster, turbaned and embroidered, standing in an attitude of indifference before the Cross, with a walking-stick in his hand. Surely a more absurd anachronism was never before nor since perpetrated on canvas, except by Rembrandt himself. It may reasonably be doubted whether, with such an organisation of faculty as he evinced,—even had he possessed the advantages of a refined artistic education,--he could ever have availed himself of them to produce works of a more elevated sentiment. That he was not without some knowledge of the Italian Schools of art—some writers go So far as to state that he visited Venice, but there are no sufficient grounds for such assertion—is evident in the remarks to be found in M. Nieuwenhuys’s “Review of the Lives and Works of the most Eminent Painters,” who says—“Although some have pretended that he ought to have studied the antique, it is not less true that he was by no means deficient in this point; for it is known that he purchased, at a high price, casts from antique marbles, paintings, drawings, and engravings, by the most excellent Italian masters, to assist him in his studies, and which are mentioned in the inventory of his goods when seized for debt.” We find included in this inventory a large number of engravings and drawings from the works of Raffaelle, the Carraccis, and Guido, so that, as it has been justly observed, “whatever was his practice, he certainly knew their value, and availed himself of their beauties in his compositions, though he neglected them in his forms;” he admired all, but imitated none. It is the attribute of a great mind to be in all things self-dependent. Once more returned to the miller's home, Rembrandt for some time was occupied with admiring and studying the beauties of nature, not at all dreaming that he had himself become an object of attraction. Holland was at this time the resort of many amateurs of the arts, both native and foreign ; and it was scarcely possible that a sketch or an etching from such a hand as his could get into circulation without obtaining notice. A people of quiet and reflective habits, like the Dutch, were not slow in estimating at its true value the genius of the young painter who had sprung up among them, especially as his works were of a class they could easily comprehend. One of his first pictures having attracted the attention of some who could estimate its merits, he was advised to carry it to the Hague, PA UL REMERAM/07 VAW RPAW. 37 and submit it to a wealthy amateur there. The artist and his performance met with a cordial reception, and to the great astonishment of the former, he received a hundred florins for the picture. Decamps says of this incident—“This sum of a hundred florins well-nigh turned the head of the young painter. He had undertaken the journey to the Hague on foot, but, that he might make greater speed to acquaint his father with his good fortune, he ordered a post-chaise, and flung himself into it. When the carriage arrived at the inn where travellers on this journey were accustomed to dine, the host and his servants, as a matter of course, went forward to see who might be its occupants. Rem- brandt would not alight; he thought only of his treasure; and fearing he might, by so doing, expose it to danger, he would not allow the ostler to detach the horses from the -- wº º º ºl. º!. Nº º ºn º §§§º º - - tww. WNW Riº - § §§§ Willº ſº ſº. º §§ § N- º º sº \\º ºº THE THREE TREES. vehicle, but merely to bring them some oats in a movable trough. This repast finished, he again started forward for Leyden, where he arrived without interruption; and, jumping hastily from the carriage, hurried homewards with the riches he had acquired.” But perhaps this success, great and unexpected as it was, would never have drawn Rembrandt from the solitude he kept on the banks of the Rhine, if a new feeling had not, with it, crept into his heart—that of acquiring wealth. Accordingly, at about the age of twenty-one, he established himself in a house at Amsterdam. Whether from personal vanity, or the desire to make himself known among his new fellow-citizens, he immediately com- menced painting and engraving his own portrait in a variety of ways; sometimes covered with a rich mantle and wearing a velvet cap, as in the engraving which heads this notice, L 38 GREAT MASTERS or AR7. and which is known by the name of Rembrandt appuye; sometimes carrying a bird of prey, or a naked sabre. Others represent him with frills and ruffs of plaited lace; and others again, bareheaded, his hair rough and uncombed, taking all manner of eccentric curvatures. As soon as his reputation became sufficiently established, he opened a school, dividing it into separate studios, so that every pupil might work by himself from his own model, which was the living figure, the master being apprehensive that, if working together in one common atelier, they would be copyists of each other, and each would lose his own individuality of thought and feeling. It is said that Rembrandt was as anxious for originality in his pupils as he was jealous of his own. That the painters whom he instructed differed widely in their styles, is perfectly true; but it is equally true that each reflected some of the light they had derived from their master: witness Gerard Dou, Van der Eckhout F. Bol, and others. - Into the school which Rembrandt had established, he gathered, with his accustomed eccentricity, all kinds of fanciful and bizarre materials for his art—a huge collection of turbans, fringed scarfs, old spangled stuffs, ancient armour, rusty swords, halberds, and daggers; these he used to exhibit to his friends and visitors as his antigues. He now also looked around him for a wife, and found one in the person of a lady, named Saskia Uilenburg, belonging to a burgher family of wealth and importance, with whose hand he received considerable property; nor was he slow in introducing his wife's portrait to the world, by the side of his own, in an engraving, where the lady is represented smiling, and dressed up in the most extravagant female attire, holding a glass in her hand. This print is regarded as one of the most valuable of the portraits of himself, twenty-seven in number, which he left behind him. It is but justice to this great but singular artist to record, that if he acquired the love of amassing wealth, his heart was not steeled against a feeling of gratitude. When he first settled in Amsterdam, one of his earliest patrons was a physician named Tulp, professor of anatomy in the surgical school of that city; two years afterwards, when Rembrandt had become famous, he painted a picture of the professor surrounded by his pupils, which he presented to him; it is now in the Museum at the Hague, and is known by the title of “La Leçon d’Anatomie.” - - But to pass on to notice the subjects which are here engraved. The “PORTRAIT * of the painter has been already referred to ; it is a work of wonderful power, and shows that even at the early age when it was painted he had gained an extraordinary command over his pencil, and a thorough insight into the principles which would produce the most effective treatment of chiar'-oscuro. His ideas on this point are said to have been suggested by watching the play of light on certain objects that received its rays through an aperture or small window in the roof of his father's mill, and the graduated shadows by which they were surrounded. “THE NIGHT-GUARD" is one of Rembrandt's most singular compositions. This picture is in the Museum of Amsterdam. The apparent mystery hanging over the subject is such that it is almost impossible to divine the painter's intentions. His heroes here are burgomasters, arquebusiers, halberdiers, drummers, children, &c.; but their action is so uncertain, their gesture and action so extraordinary, that one is at a loss to conceive whether the groups are PA UL REMB/8ANDT WAN RPM. 39 --- marshalling for the watch or preparing for a nocturnal revel; whether they are actually turning out for a sacred duty, or whether the whole affair is not a mere masquerade. It is equally difficult to determine whence the light comes which is thrown over the picture; it is certainly an out-door scene, but it has neither the brightness of the sun, nor of the moon, nor is it THE DESCENT FROM THE CROSS. torch-light; “it is the light of the genius of Rembrandt,” says a critic who writes of this Whatever were the painter's ideas as to the nature of his subject, whether it be a work. dream of his imagination, or borrowed from some incident of which he was eyewitness, it is a picture of marvellous power, full of character marked and original; its component parts 40 G/& EA 7" MASTERS OF A R7. are put together so as to form a most attractive whole, and each individual in it is engaged in a scene of bustle and activity partaking more of the comic than of tragedy. Biographers state that he established an epoch in the art of etching beyond that of any other master; and choice impressions of these apparently slight but well-studied effusions of his genius sell, even to this day, at an enormous price. During Rembrandt’s lifetime, and while º THE RAISING OF LAZARUS. he was at the plenitude of his fame, connoisseurs came from the cities of Italy to offer the finest specimens of Marc Antonio's engravings in exchange for the Dutchman's rare proofs; who, shut up in the solitude of his studio, which he pertinaciously kept closed against all visitors, made the world believe he was in possession of some marvellous secret whereby he was enabled to work out such wonderful results. Many anecdotes are related of the various PA UL REMBAAAWD 7" VAW RPAW. 4 I methods he adopted to induce collectors to become purchasers, by altering, in some slight degree, his plates of the same subject, so that buyers might be tempted to procure a specimen of each. The occasional visits paid by Rembrandt, after he had settled at Amsterdam, to the country residence of his friend and patron the Burgomaster Six, were the means of reviving the taste of his earlier years for landscape portraiture. He carried into the studio of nature that gloomy yet poetical feeling which seemed to attach itself to him on every occasion; his delight was to deal with the wind and the tempest; he covered the heavens with dark and ºš º s º: ºil ||||| | - § º | #sº JESUS CLEARING THE TEMPLE, ominous thunder-clouds, between which the sunlight breaks with strange and supernatural brilliancy; or he brought forward heavy masses of foliage and deeply-shadowed foregrounds to tell against the brightness of an evening sunset. We have an example of the latter method of treatment in the etching so well known to collectors under the title of “THE THREE TREES,” which ranks among the most famous of this class of his works. Yet, as if it were impossible for him to produce anything without some touches of his eccentric genius, we find, to the left of the picture, a strange introduction of something which we can only liken to the rigging of a ship, or ropes of divers thicknesses, but which may be intended either for rain or the rays of the sun : one would be puzzled to apply to them a definite term. M 42 - . GREAT MASTERS OF AR7. “THE DESCENT FROM THE CRoss,” notwithstanding the objections which have been already adverted to, is a noble composition, and in many parts is nobly treated. The pyra- midal form given to the principal group, whereby the eye embraces at once the whole of the subject, shows how positive the mind of Rembrandt was as to the necessity of fixing the ideas upon the matter of his pictures, and also his knowledge of the means by which this could be attained. The poetry of the work consists in the masterly concentration of light upon the figures in the centre, produced by the sun’s rays shooting downwards, as if they had suddenly pierced the clouds to shed a glory upon the last public scene of this great tragedy. There is that, too, in the method adopted to lower the body which evinces the utmost delicacy and respect towards it, far beyond what would be observed towards an ordinary malefactor, and unquestionably showing that if they who are thus occupied may be Supposed to lack faith in Him who has been crucified, they are not without some feeling of veneration. The contrast between the proud and richly apparelled Jew who, unmoved, stands by to witness the accomplishment of the end, and the distress and humility of the despised followers of Christ, is most forcibly rendered. It is such points in the composition as these which exhibit the genius of the artist in dealing with an event of history; they show that the mind has been at work as well as the hand. “THE RAISING OF LAZARUs '' is another of his engravings held in high repute; so much so, that an early impression has been valued at upwards of one hundred and eighty pounds: these impressions are exceedingly rare, and are distinguished from those taken subsequently, by the figure in the act of running away alarmed having his head uncovered; in the prints of the second state he wears a cap, as seen in our cut. There is also a smaller etching of the same subject. Slight as the artist’s treatment of this stupendous miracle is, the con- ception is grand; instead of bringing forth the dead man from the chamber of the grave with all the horrors naturally incidental to such a scene, a sudden light breaks forth at the Sound of the life-giving words, and the cavern is illumined with a blaze of glory. But here again the anachronisms of the painter disturb the mind and draw away the thoughts from their proper associations; the curtains, the turban, the Sword, and other accessories depending, as it were, from the roof of the tomb, give the work a motley appearance, reminding us of some outré theatrical representation. It is impossible to say whether Rembrandt’s singular method of treating sacred subjects arose from his own particular religious tenets or from his determination to be original in all that he undertook. According to the historian Baldinucci, Rembrandt was an Anabaptist, a sect at that time extensively spread over Holland; this explains his friendship for the celebrated minister of that persuasion, Rainier Anslo, whose portrait, including that of the preacher's mother, is one of the finest of Rembrandt’s works of this class; it was offered for sale at Christie and Manson’s in 1850 with the Earl of Ashburnham’s collection, and was bought in at the price of four thousand guineas. However the painter's mind might or might not be affected by his creed, he certainly had a method of dealing with Scripture that generally displayed more of the ludicrous than of the devotional. Look, for example, at the engraving of “CHRIST DRIVING THE MONEY-CHANGERS OUT OF THE TEMPLE ;” is it PA UL REMBRANDT WAAV RPN. 43 possible to conceive anything more absurd than such a scene as is here represented? Had the painter intended to design a caricature, he could scarcely have improved upon what he has set forth. Any attempt to analyse the picture must be provocative of mirth, for there is not a point in it calculated to draw forth a single feeling in harmony with the narrative on which it is founded. But if we can divest the mind of the associations naturally arising from an acquaintance with the event as described by the sacred writers, and view the picture merely as a work of art, what a field it presents for admiration ; what fertility of invention, and variety of form, and masterly drawing, and energy of action; with what profound knowledge of effect are the lights and shadows balanced, and how skilfully arranged is the whole agroupement. § - Hogarth has severely satirised the eccentricities of Rembrandt’s style and composition in a print well known to collectors of humorous engravings; it is entitled “Paul before Felix.” Rembrandt soon amassed considerable wealth, for his studio was filled with scholars in- troduced to him by the principal citizens of Amsterdam. It is related that his pupils, who were fully cognisant of their preceptor's assumed love of money, once employed themselves with painting circular pieces of card in imitation of gold coin, which they dropped on the ground where he could not fail to discover them, and then amused themselves at the expense of the master's disappointment. - - But whatever riches he acquired in the earlier part of his career were not destined to remain with him. His union with Saskia Uilenburg lasted but eight years, for she died in 1642, and the property he had with her passed, at her death, to their only surviving son, Titus. The loss of his wife, apart from that of the money that went away from him by this event, doubtless caused Some embarrassment in the management of his domestic affairs; and it is said he associated afterwards with persons in a lower grade of life than those with whom he had been accustomed to mix, passing much time in their society that might have been profitably employed. Moreover, it is well known that he spent large sums in the purchase of works of art, curiosities, and other kindred objects. As a result of these combined circum- stances, his affairs towards the year 1653 became involved, and three years later the painter was declared a bankrupt, and the whole of his effects were sold for the benefit of his creditors. Such, however, was the depressed condition of Holland at the time, arising from the great scarcity of money and the impoverishment of many families in consequence of the war with France, that all his property, including the valuable collection of works he had bought, and more than sixty pictures by his own hand, besides drawings and etchings, realised less than 5,000 guilders, about 4.427. With reference to this costly sacrifice, Sandrart, as quoted by Waagen, says:–“How Rembrandt must have suffered at the public sale which knocked down his entire collection for such a miserable sum I leave the reader to imagine. It shows, however, no common moral force, and rare energy of artistic genius, that the works executed soon after this terrible blow evince no trace of its influence upon him, but are of the same excellence as those preceding it.” * Neither did his financial difficulties deter the painter from contracting a second marriage, and not very long after his bankruptcy. Who she was has never been definitely ascertained, 44 - • GAZEAT MASTERS OF ART. but she is presumed to be the peasant-girl of Ransdorp mentioned by Houbraken. By her he had two children, but whether sons or daughters is not known. Titus, his son by his first wife, is said to have inherited some of his father's genius in art, but he died at a comparatively early age, leaving, so far as is known, nothing to testify to any talent he may have possessed. The death of Rembrandt occurred in October, 1669, and he was buried, on the 8th of that month, in the cemetery of the Westerkerke, Amsterdam. - In the National Gallery, among several others by Rembrandt, is a small picture, * The Woman taken in Adultery,” which may be accepted as peculiarly characteristic of this artist's manner. It was painted, in 1644, for Jan Six, Rembrandt’s patron, and afterwards passed into the possession of Burgomaster Six, in whose family it remained, and was most carefully preserved in a cabinet of which the owner kept the key, till 1734. Afterwards it was bought by M. la Fontaine, a picture-dealer of Paris, who, being unable to sell it in France, brought it to London, and sold it to the late Mr. Angerstein for, it is said, five thousand pounds. In 1824 it was purchased, with the rest of this gentleman's collection, for the nation. Hazlitt has concentrated, in a few striking sentences, almost all that could, or need, be said about it:-" A picture prodigious in colouring, in light and shade, in pencilling, in solemn effect—but that is nearly all— ‘ of outward show Elaborate, of inward less exact.” Nevertheless, it is worth any money. The Christ has considerable seriousness and dignity of aspect. The marble pavement, of which the light is even dazzling; the figures of the two rabbis to the right, radiant with crimson, green, and azure; the background, which seems like Some rich oil-colour Smeared over a golden ground, and where the eye staggers on from one abyss of obscurity to another—place this picture in the first rank of Rembrandt’s wonderful performances. If this extraordinary genius was the most literal and vulgar of draughtsmen, he was the most ideal of colourists.” As a portrait-painter, Rembrandt may be placed in the very highest rank for truthfulness, power of expression, and vigour of handling: his own two portraits, those of a Jewish rabbi, of a man in a furred coat with his hands clasped before him, while seated at a table; and of an old lady in black, with white cap and ruff—all in the National Gallery—may be cited as representative examples. PAUL POTTER. º º) IFE, as to its real value, must not be estimated by length of days, but by the غ º § s” ſº amount of substantial and profitable labour which it yields. No man º § º º º: can be said to have died young, however short his period of existence, º º - - - -- §). Sº § who leaves behind him an honourable and abiding name; he may have %lºš - - - - § ſº % been cut off before his powers had ripened into maturity, so that the º/º º Aºſ. - - - tº * world remains ignorant of what his future years would have produced; º º ºgº or his premature death may have greatly abridged the benefits to mankind & arising from a prolonged term of life, and thereby have contracted the sphere of its operations; yet his mission is fulfilled to the extent of his opportunities; his reward is certain, for he “ hath done what he could.” The oft-repeated maxim, “Life is short, and Art is long,” was never more truly verified than in the history of Paul Potter. He died, it may be said, almost before he had reached manhood ; but the fame of his art will endure long after the brilliancy of the tints has vanished from his pictures, and the destroying moth has found its way to the canvas. A stranger to much of European art would naturally inquire what noble and exciting themes had engaged the pencil of a painter whose name stands so prominently forward in its annals ; and when told that he had no higher ambition than to portray the domestic beasts of the field, the flocks and herds that feed upon green pastures, and, N 46 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. occasionally, to represent the teams of the ploughman, the querist might, perchance, think that a great reputation founded upon so insignificant a basis was incompatible with the claim : he might understand the claims of a Raffaelle, a Titian, a Rembrandt, and even a Teniers, had he chanced to hear what subjects they painted; but that a painter of sheep and oxen should be classed with those whose genius has astonished or delighted a civilised world is scarcely to be comprehended. The actions and passions of his fellow-men may not seem unworthy of being commemorated; these are, as it were, in unison with his own ; a common sympathy of thought and feeling links them together; but the case is far different when the genius of a man is brought to bear only upon objects which are the study and the pride of the cowherd. This train of reasoning would be natural, but is perfectly fallacious; admitting the superior merit of him who attempts to delineate the higher order of intelligences—those to whom the brute creation was made subject—still the comparatively subordinate rank decreed to the mere animal-painter must not exclude him from re- ceiving the same honours in a lower scale of art. Rubens would have been regarded as a great painter had he never used his pencil for aught besides his inimitable “boar-hunts;” and to come down to our own age and country, Sir Edwin Landseer, as an animal-painter, has earned a reputation unsurpassed by any artist, native or foreign, of any time, what- ever style the latter may have adopted. Paul Potter was born at Enkhuysen in Holland, EVENING. in the year 1625; he received the rudiments of his art from his father, Peter Potter, an artist of mediocre talent, and his only instructor, who, soon after the birth of Paul, went to reside at Amsterdam. Such was the progress of the young painter under his father's guidance, and the advantages derived from studying the numerous fine pictures in the Dutch capital, that at the age of fifteen he was held in the highest estimation, and was already considered one of the most promising artists of his time. He then quitted Amsterdam for the Hague, and fixed his abode at the house of an eminent architect named Balkanende, who had a daughter gifted with great personal attractions. Paul soon found he was not proof against such dangerous companionship, nor was the young lady herself insensible to the attentions paid her; in due time, therefore, pro- posals were made to the father for her hand ; but the only answer received from the indignant architect was the contemptuous reply that he could not think of giving his daughter to “a painter of beasts.” Paul was not, however, discouraged by the refusal; he worked hard ; his atelier was visited by the magnates of the land, princes, nobles, and wealthy burgomasters, who eagerly bought his pictures; so that Balkanende began to think that, all things con- sidered, cattle-painting was not quite so degrading a profession as he had presumed it to be; and that Paul Potter, after all, would not prove so very unsuitable a match for his daughter, and he consented to their union: the artist was then in his twenty-fifth year. He PAUL POTTER. 47 now took a fine house at the Hague, removed into it with his young wife, and pursued his practice with renewed energy; his popularity as an artist being much increased by his agree. able manners and general intelligence, added to a ready turn for conversation. These qualities combined made his residence a pleasant resort for the cognoscent of the day; among whom was frequently to be seen Maurice, Prince of Orange, one of Potter's most liberal patrons. “It was about this period,” says Smith, in his “Catalogue Raisonné,” “that the Princess Emily of Solms desired a picture by his hand. Pleased with the honour of such a command, the artist determined to make it one of his best works, and spared no pains to * * attain that object;” but, unfortunately, an injudicious introduction, scarcely consistent with delicacy of feeling, a fault, by the way, in which both the Dutch and Flemish painters were THE DRINKING-TROUGH. too apt to indulge, caused its rejection by the Princess. This picture, which is small, is one of the painter's most admired productions; it was removed by the French, during the great wars of the Revolution, from the gallery of the Prince of Hesse Cassel, and became the property of the Empress Josephine, at Malmaison; at the peace of 1815 it was purchased by the Emperor of Russia for four thousand guineas, and is now in the Imperial collection at the Hermitage, St. Petersburg. Another of Paul Potter's liberal patrons was the Burgomaster Tulp, of Amsterdam, related by marriage to the celebrated Burgomaster Six, the friend and patron of Rembrandt. Potter painted a life-size portrait of Tulp, who was a young man, dressed in the military costume of a civic knight of that period, and mounted on a noble mottled grey charger. It is the only work of the kind the artist ever undertook, and is regarded, therefore, with high esti- 48 GREAT MASTERS OF AAT. mation. It is still, I believe, at Amsterdam, in the possession of a collateral descendant of Six. “Whether,” says Smith, “it was in compliance with the pressing invitations of Tulp, or to avoid the jealous and malicious persecutions of other artists, which he is said to have experienced, Potter quitted the Hague in 1652, and went to reside at Amsterdam. He was now under the protection of his friend and patron, for whom he was indefatigable, com- mencing his labours at day-break, and continuing them until sunset. His evenings were also devoted to objects connected with his art, either in making drawings or in etching. MILRING TIME. Such a painter as Paul Potter would never have attained eminence in a country where the subjects of his pencil were not of national interest. Popularity of the matter portrayed is always essential to the popularity of an artist, irrespective of the talent with which it is brought forward. The Italian would care little for the Dutchman's sheep and oxen, however exquisitely delineated; nor would the Dutchman esteem the saints and martyrs of Italy as they are there estimated; chacun d son gout. The dairy-farms of Holland, their herds of kine PAUL POTTER. 49 and flocks of sheep feeding upon broad and verdant pasturage, are the pride and boast of Dutchmen; and we English entertain a kindred feeling to theirs. It was no wonder, then, they took especial interest in the labours of one who represented these scenes with such extraordinary beauty and truth. Nature was at all times the model of Paul Potter, and it may safely be affirmed that every animal introduced into his pictures is an exact portrait, A PASTORAL SCENE. and that he never “designed '' even a cow. Day after day he might be seen in the green meadows that surround the royal “village” of the Hague, sketching with unwearied assiduity and care the cattle, singly or in groups, that browsed therein, copying with the utmost minuteness every peculiarity of form and expression, the varieties of colour and texture of skin, the broad, muscular development of the bull, and the placid rotundity of the sheep. “The Dutch,” writes M. Charles Blanc, “is the first nation to whom must be awarded the O 50 GA'EAT MASTERS OF A RT. honour of elevating the inferior orders of nature;” and it must be allowed that the pictures of Paul Potter have greatly tended to keep alive the interest in them. The landscapes of this artist must be looked upon as comparatively subordinate parts of his subjects, though they are represented with much talent and picturesque effect. The localities to which he resorted for study gave him little or no opportunity of indulging in the sublimities of nature; but had it been otherwise, it may still be doubted whether he would not have sacrificed the occasion to his more favourite objects. Whatever he did, however, was done effectually; and the days which he passed, from early morning to the setting sun, in the damp marsh-lands of Holland, were not lost upon the laborious painter who knew so well how to depict, with unprecedented truth, the varied aspects of time and place. THE MEADOW. The unremitting and laborious application of Potter in his studio, joined with his frequent exposure to the damp atmosphere when sketching in the open air, laid the foundation of a disorder which terminated his life in the year 1654, ere he had reached his twenty-ninth year; and now we see the truth of the remark made at the outset of this notice, that “Life is short, and Art is long,” for the pictures of this artist have vastly increased in value during the two centuries, and longer, since they were painted. And it is astonishing what large sums are, and have been, paid for a few square inches of his painted canvas, beautiful as they are with animated transcripts of living nature; but good specimens of his pencil are rarely brought into the market, and are eagerly purchased when offered for sale. They are distinguished by the most clear and luminous colouring, firm and masterly execution, and a wonderful knowledge of the anatomy of the animal races, as evinced in his accurate drawing of the ox, sheep, &c.; his horses are, perhaps, less correct. He painted with a remarkable full and flowing pencil, yet finished his pictures with the greatest delicacy: they are, for the most part, small in size. PA UL PO7'7"E.R. 51 Proceeding to remark upon the pictures engraved here, there is in that valuable dictionary of the Dutch and Flemish painters, Smith’s “Catalogue Raisonné,” much interesting descriptive matter concerning them, with the exception of the first engraving, a small one, entitled * “Eve NING:” it represents two cows in a meadow beside a river, painted under the influence of a bright evening sun. “THE DRINKING-TROUGH '' stands No. 94 in Smith’s “Catalogue.” Two old horses are placed by the side of an empty trough near a cottage; at a little distance a man is approaching with a pail of water, to replenish the trough, and is followed by his dog; the city of Leyden is represented in the background. The picture is now in the Louvre, and was valued, several years ago, at three hundred and twenty pounds; its size is nine inches by ten. THE YOUNG BULL. “MILKING TIME,” No. 30 in the Catalogue, was, some years ago, in the possession of M. Six Van Hillegom, of Amsterdam, and probably is now in the same family; it was formerly in the Choiseul Gallery. It is a charming example of the master, and has been valued at seven hundred guineas, though it measures only about sixteen inches by fifteen. The picture entitled “A PAstoRAL SCENE * is in the collection of the Queen, and is estimated to be worth a thousand guineas; it stands No. 70 in Smith’s “ Catalogue.” In a rich pasture are two cows and a young bull; the latter standing, in strong relief against the sky, near an old pollard-willow, whose jagged head fills up a space on the canvas which to have left vacant would have been a detriment to the composition. This is a very fine work. * * “THE MEADow,” another very beautiful example of the artist, is in the Louvre; its size, according to Smith (No. 17), is two feet six inches by three feet eight inches. There is little in the composition beyond the animals, but these are admirably portrayed in the brightness 52 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. of a warm summer evening's sun. In the year 1767 this picture was sold from the collection of M. Julienne for one hundred and ninety-six pounds; it is now valued at one thousand guineas. But the cheſ-d'oeuvre of Paul Potter is unquestionably “THE YouNG BULL," painted in 1647, when the artist was only twenty-two years of age. The animals and figure are life-size, the canvas measuring eight feet by twelve feet. Smith says, “it is painted with such extra- DUTCH OXEN. ordinary firmness and precision, both in the drawing and handling, and with such a full em/asſo of colour, that many of the details appear to be rather modelled than painted; for the very texture of the hair, horns, and other parts are delineated with inconceivable fidelity. But that which claims the highest admiration is its wonderful approximation to reality; the animals appear to live and breathe; they stand upon earth, and are surrounded by air; such, in fact, is the magical illusion of this picture, that it may fairly be concluded the painter PA UL POTTER. 53 has approached as near perfection as the art will ever attain.” It must be acknowledged, however, that the landscape-portion of the work is inferior to the other parts. It was sold, in 1749, from the collection of M. Fabricius, of Haarlem, for ſifty-seven pounds, and is now valued at ſºve thousand guineas. The French, when they took possession of the Low Countries during the war, transferred “The Young Bull” and his companions to the Louvre; but the Allies, at the peace in 1816, restored them to their previous place of occupancy, the Museum of the Hague. & The last of the illustrations, “DUTCH OXEN,” exhibits four of these animals in a piece of pasture land peculiar to Holland, some farmhouses being visible among the distant trees. The original picture is very small, scarcely exceeding twelve inches by fourteen. It was sold, in 1812, from the collection of M. Solirene, for three hundred and twenty pounds. The foregoing remarks will enable the reader to form some idea of the monetary value attached to the pictures of Paul Potter; it is, however, curious to note the fluctuations in price attached to some of his works. A small one, representing “Cattle quitting their Shed,” was sold at Leyden, in 1780, for 4.495; at Paris, in 1804, for £1,344; again at Paris, in 181 I, for £800 ; and, Subsequently, to a Viennese nobleman, for 4, 1,480. “Two Cows and a Bull in a Meadow” was sold from the collection of M. Braamcamp, in 1771, for 4, 186; was afterwards sold twice in Amsterdam for the respective sums of £324 and 4,749; in 1823, from the collection of Mr. G. W. Taylor, for 1, 2 IO guineas; in 1832, for 750 guineas; and was bought in, in 1833, from the sale of M. Nieuwenhuys's collection, for 1, 105 guineas; it is now in the possession of Mr. Walter, M.P. This is a work of the very highest class. “Great as were my expectations,” says Waagen, “regarding this celebrated picture, they were, which is rarely the case, surpassed. Without seeing the picture no idea can be formed of the plastic rendering of the forms; and while, at a certain distance, the effect of the animals is that of life itself, the carefulness of the execution with a ſat “ brush is such—for instance, in the ear of the light-coloured cow—that, the delusion of reality is increased on the closest inspection. What a painter was this, who, at twenty-two years of age, had already attained such perfection 1’’ A few words about some other pictures by this painter which are in England. It is a somewhat singular fact that, till the purchase of the collection of the late Sir Robert Peel, our National Gallery contained not a single example of his works: this, it may be presumed, can only be attributed to their rarity, and the very high prices they realise when offered for sale. Among the Peel collection is one picture by Potter, which stands in Mr. Wornum's 5 Catalogue of the National Gallery as No. 849, “Landscape with Cattle :” it is thus described:— “In a meadow, near some farm-buildings among trees, are a man, four cows, a horse, and some sheep; one of the cows, white and spotted, is lying chewing the cud, and looking at the spectator. On the left, near the open door of a shed, are a horse and cart, with two men and a dog. In the background is a corn-field, with some cut sheaves of wheat. Signed, Paulus Potter, ſt. 1651.” It is a small picture, but one of excellent quality; and is the more valuable to the nation as being the only specimen we have as public property. * Fat; a technicality, signifying a brush well-primed with colour. P 54 GREAT MASTERS OF AFT. Besides the work already mentioned in the possession of the Queen, there are three others at Buckingham Palace; but Waagen expresses a doubt of one of them, representing two pigs lying down, with their legs tied together; and, certainly, the subject is not a usual one from the pencil of this artist. Another, a very fine example, shows the front of a stable, where are two horses, and a boy with some puppies in his arms, the mother of which holds the youngster fast by the tail of his short coat, to his great alarm : near the stable are two cows, one being milked: cattle are grazing in the meadows beyond. Some houses and trees com- plete the composition. The fourth picture represents two horsemen, with dogs, halting before a farm-house, a man is fastening the stirrup of one of them : a woman stands at the door of the farm, and an old man is seated near her, wiping his forehead: the heat of the day is unmistakeably shown by the glow which pervades the canvas. Among the fine collection of Dutch and Flemish pictures in the possession of Mr. T. H. Hope are three capital specimens of Paul Potter. One shows a young bull standing near a black cow, which is lying down. In the middle distance are two sheep and a cow near some trees: a ray of sunshine, falling from an opening cloud, lights up the animals and a portion of the landscape. A similar treatment is apparent in the companion-picture, which represents a barn, men, a woman, and horses, &c.; all in the foreground; in the distance is a meadow with cows. The third example shows five cows standing on a hill, backed by a village: this picture is very bright in colour: all three are painted on Small panels. A single picture which enriches the collection of the Marquis of Westminster must not be omitted from this brief list, for it ranks with the painter's most famous works. The leading feature in the composition is a farm-house, skirted by a row of willow-trees, and in the front are cattle and a few sheep : on the other side of the trees a man and woman are seen walking in a field where numerous cows are grazing ; a warm afternoon sun illumines every object. It was painted in 1647; and though but covering a few inches of panel—about fifteen by eighteen—it was bought in at a sale in London, in 1806, for no less a sum than A 1,552. Subsequently it was purchased by the Marquis at a somewhat lower price. Paul Potter was accustomed, as already remarked, to employ some of his time, especially the long winter evenings, in etching. There are but few of his prints, however, which have come down to us; they exhibit admirable freedom and spirit. His drawings, also, are highly esteemed, and sell for very large sums. N - º/ - " N N N | - N 2. N N ‘’’.… . . . W.W - ſºz) - - - DAVID . TENIERs. Fº DAVID TENIERS, THE YOUNGER. ſºs ºBTWEEN the refinement of Metsu and Mieris and the general vulgarity of §§ Ostade and Brouwer, must be placed the majority of pictures painted by David Teniers, the Younger, an artist whose works are deservedly held in the highest estimation, and which, from their number, are to be found in every collection worthy of being so called: “to display all my - * * pictures, he is reported to have said, “would require a gallery two leagues in length.” Teniers must have spoken this jocularly; and yet, when we remember with what rapidity he painted, and how industriously he worked : for more than half a century, during a life prolonged to fourscore years—some of his biographers say to eighty-four—the remark may not be considered as altogether preposterous. Mr. Smith, in his brief notice of the life of Teniers, prefixed to the catalogue of the artist's works, observes, in allusion to the meagre biographical accounts left us of the Dutch and Flemish artists, that “the occupation of painting, when confined to easel-pictures, almost precludes the possibility of much variety of incident, sufficient to interest by relation. The painter, confined to his studies, pursues the noiseless tenor of his way; and the occurrences of one year, generally speaking, are an epitome of the whole course of his life. That he may be rich or poor, industrious or indolent, are accidents that attach to all professions, and only interest when a moral may be adduced from a man of genius, who, by persevering 56 GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. industry, raises himself from a lowly condition to distinction; or, on the contrary, debases himself, by indolence and vicious habits, from the rank his talents would entitle him to hold.” The lives of most other distinguished men, in whatever pursuit or profession they have become eminent, are those of action and association; their histories are interwoven, so to speak, with the histories of other men; with great political events; with deeds and matters - - - - --Tº- . " º - - - . - Wi. - -l | º º | | | THE TEMPTATION OF ST. ANTHON.Y. that interest nations and communities; or with discoveries that affect the great sum of human happiness. Even the literary man has, in this respect, an advantage over the artist; for, as a general rule, he mixes far more with society at large, and his “sayings and doings” become linked with those of his friends and companions: but the artist's life is one of almost solitary seclusion; he must be self-dependent; none can aid him in his work, except with advice; he requires nothing but what his own eye sees, and his own hand can help him to DA V/D TEN/ERS, THE POUVGER. 57 carry out; he is in the world, yet scarcely of it, but as an observer of nature, men, and manners, of which he makes himself the silent chronicler; while, as the authority just referred to appropriately remarks, “his pictures are the faithful mirrors of his own prevailing tastes and indulgences.” Are we then to infer that because David Teniers chose to paint Flemish boors carousing at an ale-house door, or a group of monkeys playing at cards, with their glasses before them, that he was an associate of the toper? By no means: but we are rather inclined to think that his natural disposition inclined him to the gay and humorous, whether in high or low life. Teniers was, without doubt, a gentleman in the true sense of the word; his countenance indicates this; besides, he was a man of wealth, mixed in good society, as his THE PRODIGAL SON. biographers relate; attended the village-feasts with his wife and children, a proof of his domestic habits, and kept an establishment which was the constant resort of company of distinction. And if in his pictures we sometimes see what would offend our notions of pro- priety, we must recollect the times in which he lived, and the people among whom he dwelt; taste and manners have since grown more refined, if less natural and unaffected. He was born at Antwerp in 1610; his father was an artist who had acquired a position exceeded only by the son at a subsequent period; consequently, the latter could not have commenced his career under more favourable auspices. It has been said that he was also instructed by Brouwer and Rubens; but the best authorities consider this statement as very doubtful; inasmuch as Brouwer was only two years his elder, and Rubens was the master of his father; it is, however, probable that, as Rubens and the elder Teniers were very intimate, the former may sometimes have assisted the youth with his advice, and that the latter may occasionally have been admitted into the studio of the great Flemish painter. Q 58 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. It is not always that the son of an eminent artist, who follows in the precise steps of his father, attains to the same position; he is generally looked upon as a mere copyist, and takes rank accordingly. Whether or no this militated against the success of the younger Teniers we do not pretend to determine, but it is quite certain that for a considerable time he met with very little encouragement in comparison with some of his contemporaries, as Artois, the landscape-painter, and the elder Tilburg, who painted subjects similar to those of Teniers. At length the Archduke Leopold William, of Austria, who was then governor of the Low Countries, having seen and admired some of his pictures, gave him a commission to paint several for his collection, appointed him director of his gallery, and entrusted him with the task of purchasing such works of the Italian and Dutch schools as might be deemed worthy of being placed therein. Many of these pictures Teniers copied so successfully that he A village ºf E. acquired the appellation of the Proteus of painting. He also published, and dedicated to his patron, a folio volume of two hundred engravings from these copies, which is partially known by the title of “Theatrum Pictorium,” and by some as the “Teniers' Gallery. * > In reference y to this work, M. Charles Blanc, in his “Vies des Peintres,” says:–“ It was first published in 1685, by Abraham Teniers, the brother of David, who was a printseller at Antwerp. But the engravings having appeared in the first instance separately, the successor of Abraham issued a collected edition, with the title of ‘Théâtre des Peintures de David Teniers,’ appending to it a preface, of which some copies were in French, others in Spanish, and a large number in Latin. Subsequently, the pictures belonging to the Archduke having been sent to Vienna, there was inserted in later editions an engraving of a perspective view of the Imperial Gallery, with the pictures ranged in it. The last edition was issued in 1755.” I am at a loss to DA V/D TEN/ERS, THE POUVGER. 59 reconcile the above statement with that of other writers; Bryan, whose authority has not been questioned among us, says this book was first published in 1660, at Brussels, and the time agrees with what M. Blanc himself says in a foot-note to the paragraph just quoted, in allusion to the Latin title, which bears the imprint of Antwerp, and was published by ºntrºl º \ \ º AN UN WELCOME VISITOR. H. Ametsens. But I never heard that Abraham Teniers was a printseller: he was a painter of Flemish festivals, &c., in the style of his brother, but far inferior to those of the latter. And again, it is scarcely to be supposed that the publication of this book in a collected form was delayed till within five years of the death of Teniers. Teniers's powers of imitation were carried yet further in the production of a variety of 60 - GA’EAT MASTERS OF .4/'7". pictures called pasticci; they were his own compositions, but executed so much in the style of Titian, Tintoretto, Bassano, Rubens, and others, as scam cely to be mistaken at that period for the original works of those artists. The Archduke was so pleased with the services of Teniers, that he presented him with his portrait and a chain of gold; while his reputation had now spread far and wide. He executed several pictures for Christina, Queen of Sweden, who sent him her medal, her portrait, and a chain of gold; and the King of Spain is said to have been so greatly pleased with his works that he built a gallery expressly for their reception. Another of his royal patrons was the Elector Palatine, of whose estimation of Teniers the gallery of Munich is evidence; in short, he was in universal favour, accumulating wealth and honours. “His residence was at the village of Perck, between Malines and Vilvorde; it was in this neighbourhood that he studied his village feasts and fairs, and it was here that he painted the greater number of his best works. It was also at this place that Prince John of Austria condescended to lay aside the punctilious etiquette of the German court, to become his scholar, and live with him on terms of the utmost familiarity. The pursuit of his art was rendered, by long practice, an agreeable amusement, which he could follow with the same freedom and success in the midst of company as when alone.” After a long life passed industriously and honourably, Teniers died at Brussels, in 1694, at the age of eighty-four years. The works of this highly esteemed painter are so well known as scarcely to require descrip- tion: village fairs, festivals, and rustic sports; interiors and exteriors of alehouses, with peasants gambling, quarrelling, smoking, and drinking: ideal subjects of diablerie; guard-rooms, &c., were his principal themes: he frequently painted landscapes, and sometimes mytho- logical history, such as “The Death of Leander,” “The Triumph of Venus,” &c. The number of his pictures, assumed to be genuine works, exceed, perhaps, those of any other painter; Smith's Catalogue and Supplement describe nine hundred, of which about twenty in the latter volume may be deducted as repetitions of the writer's former references. Add to these about one hundred in the galleries at Schleissheim and Munich, sixty-five mentioned by Cumberland as being in the royal collection at Madrid, and nineteen spoken of by Descamps,f and we find a total of 1,064. Stanley considers that there are at least five hundred pictures ascribed to Teniers in existence, which are copies, or the works of other hands: many are, unquestionably, by his pupils. His pictures vary as much in size as in subject, from a few inches to many feet; the largest, we believe, is his “Christ Betrayed,” measuring fourteen feet by eleven feet: it was once in the collection of Benjamin West, and was bought by the author of the Catalogue referred to. * The early style of Teniers was founded on that of his father, inclining to a somewhat monotonous brown tone; this he soon exchanged, however, for one more silvery and sparkling: his touch is remarkably free and vigorous, yet his pictures, generally, are by no means destitute of finish, though there are many which are exceedingly slight. * Smith’s “Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of Dutch, Flemish, and French Painters,” Part III. . # Stanley's Edition of “Bryan's Dictionary of Painters and Engravers.” JOHN BOTH. is sometimes inclined to wonder what the old Dutch landscape-painters, journeying as some occasionally did from their own “cloud-capped '' land into the south, thought of the sunny region of Italy; how they must have rejoiced in its blue skies, and transparent atmosphere, and clustering masses of foliage, and solemn ruins of ancient grandeur, and the more modern but equally graceful structures erected by the Medici, the Colonni, the Orsini, the Frangipani, and the many other distinguished nobles of that country. What a contrast must all these materials for their art have afforded to such as they left behind,-flat yet verdant fields, an atmosphere not often penetrated by bright rays of sunlight, and formal odd-shaped dwellings, presenting neither beauty of form nor harmony of proportion. It was only when they had quitted such scenes that their senses could have imbibed the true poetry of Nature, and their minds have become impressed by her magic powers; and then only could they gain a right perception of those extraneous influences which had been at work on the pencils of the great Italian painters, giving to this one the brilliancy of colour, to another the elegance of composition, to a third the power of expression, and to a fourth the union or combination of all these qualities. Nature not only creates the artist, but she instructs him also ; endowing him first with genius, R. 62 GA'EAT MASTERS OF AR7. and afterwards surrounding him with such studies as are best suited to its development, and of which, in most cases, she offers him the unrestricted use; he is seldom required, like the Egyptians of old, to make bricks without straw. John Both, whose name is rarely appended to a picture without being associated with that of his brother Andrew, who painted the figures which animate it, was born at Utrecht, in 1610. Their father, a painter on glass, first instructed them in the rudiments of design, and then placed them both under Abraham Bloemart, the historical painter, with whom they studied for a considerable time. But neither of the youths appeared to possess a taste inclining to history; and John, especially, having resolved to become a landscape-painter, they both set out for Italy, and arrived in Rome. Claude was at this period in the zenith of his fame, and his works were so highly esteemed by John Both, that he immediately adopted them for his model, and laboured diligently in the pursuit of his object. M. Blanc, in his “Lives of the Painters,” says that Both was a pupil of Claude, but this opinion is not, so far as I can ascertain, confirmed by other biographers. It is, however, quite certain that he studied his style of composition and colouring very closely, retaining at the same time much of that feeling in his subjects which he had derived from the country of his birth; so that it has been well observed of him that his pictures occupy an intermediate place between the rusticity of Ruysdael and the historical style of landscape, so to speak, which Claude and Poussin painted. The life of a mere landscape-painter generally has in it little of stirring or exciting incident; he is a wanderer by the wayside, or in green fields, or up the verdant hills, or by quiet streams; and when his sketch-book is well ITALIAN TRAVELLERS. - - stored, he returns to his studio and works out his subjects undisturbed: hence he seldom leaves to his biographer such materials as, to use an artistic phrase, would make up into a pleasant and interesting picture. Now and then we read of some little anecdote that breaks the thread of his monotonous history, and gives variety to the few facts concerning it. Thus Houbraken, the biographer of the Dutch artists, and a most excellent painter, relates the following concerning John Both. M. Vander Hulk, burgomaster of Dordrecht, challenged Both and Berchem to paint a picture; each of the competitors was to receive eight hundred florins for his work, but he whose picture was considered to be superior, was, in addition, to receive a magnificent present. Berchem produced a painting which all who saw it pronounced to be his cheſ-d'oeuvre; it was a PaSSage of mountainous scenery, in which flocks and herds of various kinds were admirably introduced: every one thought the prize would undoubtedly be awarded to him. But then Both's was no less excellent in his peculiar style; the judge felt himself in the same position as Virgil's Palaemon when called upon to pronounce between the two rival shepherds:–ez // dºgnºs e //c. The generous burgomaster did not, nevertheless, as many would have done, make his difficulty : JOHN BOTH. * 63 a reason for withholding the gift from either: on the contrary, his decision is worthy of being 2 recorded in the history of Art. “Gentlemen,” he said, “you have not left me the liberty of a choice; each of you well deserves the present I had designed for the most successful, since you have both attained so high a degree of perfection.” And he munificently rewarded both the painters. * On arriving in Italy, Andrew Both applied himself to study the figures of Peter de Laer, commonly called Bamboccio, a Dutch painter who settled in Rome and distinguished himself greatly by his pictures of rural festivals, fairs, masquerades, and subjects of this description. Andrew, by these means, acquired a remarkable facility in the composition of appropriate groups for his brother's landscapes, and the work of the two is so completely in concord, that it is difficult to believe the whole is not by the same hand, Nor was the harmony existing between them confined to their professional labours: “the Sympathy of their affections blended itself with the exertion of their talents.” At Rome their house was the resort of all the great artists of the time; Claude, the two Poussins, Bamboccio, Herman Swanevelt, and Elzheimer, by whom they were held in the greatest esteem for their genius and excellent mental qualities. Having, however, removed for a time to Venice, for the purpose, it is thought, of seeing the pictures of Titian, an unfortunate accident severed the tie by which they were united, and deprived the world of the combination of their powers. Returning home one evening from an entertainment, Andrew unfortunately fell into one of the numerous canals in Venice, and perished before assistance could be rendered him. From the hour of the funeral, a residence in Italy seemed insupportable to the survivor, he therefore determined to return to his native country, and settle himself in Utrecht. There he found his countryman Poelemburg, or Poelenburg, who had been like himself, but at an earlier date, a pupil of Bloemart; and he procured his assistance to supply, in Some degree, the place of his brother as a coadjutor in his labours. But the painter of sylvan goddesses and ancient dryads was not quite the artist to embellish the bold scenery of John Both ; the delicacy of Poelemburg’s figures did not harmonise so happily with the stately trees and bristling thickets of Both’s landscapes, as did the rough muleteers of his brother. Berchem, too, showed a right feeling towards the artist whom he could not excel, and whom he would not envy, by Sometimes embellishing his works with groups of cattle and figures. But the void in his heart occasioned by his brother's loss was not so easily supplied: spirit and health finally gave way under the bereavement, and he died at Utrecht in 1650, at the age of forty, surviving Andrew about five years. The landscapes of this painter ordinarily represent a mountainous country, upland districts with tortuous paths broken up by the floods, or cut through rocks. Along these ways, which have some resemblance to the chain of the Apennines, we see groups of travellers, peasants, and muleteers, both mounted and on foot, the animals with their tinkling bells bearing the produce of the vintages to the neighbouring towns and villages for sale. “THE MOUNTAIN- PAss,” one of the illustrations introduced, is an example of this class of Subject. In other pictures we have an open champaign stretching along, the sunlight on the green pasturage broken by the shadows of high banks and clustering foliage; or else the scene, full of natural 64 GA’EAT MASTERS OF AA’7”. accessories that appear accidental, terminating suddenly in the distance by a line of water, similar to a lake, and as tranquil. Everything is indicative of Italy, not so much of its classical allusions as of its picturesque rusticity—if one can associate such an idea with a land whose very name seems to give a denial to the fact that rusticity, even in the most refined degree, could have an abode in it. There is perhaps no European country which, in thought, is less connected with all that is supposed to belong to such a characteristic; we read of Italy, and we talk of it too, as the treasure-house of all that is beautiful and refined, and rare and costly, both of God's creation and of man's work, and seem to forget that even there the peasant “goes forth to his labour till the evening,” and when his task is done, hastens home to sing and dance merrily in the greenwood shade. But after all, the principal personages in Both's pictures are neither the peasants, nor THE MULETEERS. their mules, nor the goatherd keeping watch over his flocks; these sink into comparative insignificance before his stately trees—stately, yet light and elegant withal. And herein his compositions differ in a marked degree from those of Claude, whose trees are usually clothed with thick masses of foliage, through which no sunbeam appears able to penetrate. Both's, on the contrary, are broken up into a variety of graceful branches, through which the light streams and falls in rich tints upon the ground beneath, or on other objects that come within the range of their influence. Another striking quality in his works is the fidelity with which he delineated the different hours of the day; so truthful is the expression thus given, that one who examines his pictures attentively for a few minutes can almost determine, if he is acquainted with the peculiarity of an Italian atmosphere, the precise time at which in all probability the sketch was made. One of this painter's finest pictures is here engraved: it is in the gallery of the Louvre, - JOHN BOTH. 65 in Paris, where it bears the title of a “VIEW IN ITALY AT SUNSET; ” a subject he frequently repeated with some variation of the figures by his brother. A boatman is about to land cattle from his flat-bottomed ferry-boat, which has already touched the bank of the river; a cavalier seems to be waiting the disembarkation to take his turn across; a range of hills rises a little beyond the group of figures to the left and almost overhangs the water; while two distinct masses of trees are placed in the foreground, dividing the light which falls upon the latter. In the distance, abutting from the promontory that terminates the lofty hills, is a portion of a bridge, broken, perhaps, by some overflowing of the winding stream. To the left, in a broad half-shadow that is tinged with the golden rays of the evening sun, a peasant is leading his mule; two or three fleecy clouds complete the right of the composition. The whole scene is perfectly tranquil, yet brilliant with light; and all the laws which regulate landscape-painting have been observed by the artist in his work with the utmost exactitude. VIEW IN ITALY AT SUNSET. For his selection of the most picturesque subjects, for the rarity and fulness of his designs, and for the truth and vigour with which he worked them out, “Both of Italy,” as he is - generally known among the cognoscent in art, is a model that may be studied with advantage by the young landscape-painter; and if his works exhibit less of the grandeur of Poussin, and of the classic elegance of Claude, they possess sufficient of both these admirable qualities to please the most refined taste—if not to satisfy it. Both's only pupils were Henry Verschuring and William de Heusch; the former became a painter of battle-pieces and attacks of banditti; but the latter followed the style of his preceptor very closely, so that the pictures of the pupil have occasionally been mistaken for those of the master by some who have not closely studied the beauties and peculiarities of Both's pencil—its extreme freedom yet delicacy of handling, and its highly luminous colouring. S 66 GA EA 7" MASTERS OF A R7. The value attached to the best works of this painter has been, in every country where they are known, commensurate with their merits, and there are few of the galleries of Europe of any celebrity that do not possess some examples of his genius: the finest are perhaps in this country, and in Italy. The Munich gallery contains several excellent specimens; others of scarcely less interest are at Dresden, Berlin, and Copenhagen: the museum of the Louvre, --- F- º - º-º-º- º §sº THE MOUNTAIN-PASS. in Paris, shows only two, yet they are of the highest quality; France was at one time very rich in the possession of his works, but they have been dispersed at different periods, and found their way into other countries and other hands. It may be interesting to the curious to know something of the price paid in France, at different periods, for Both's pictures; in England we know that a really good and genuine production is only to be acquired at a large cost. In 1745, at the sale of the pictures belonging to the Chevalier de la Roque, a pair, by JOHN BOTH. 67 Both, one entitled “The Couriers,” the other “Winter,” were sold for 124 livres, about 4. Io of our money: in 1777, at the sale of the gallery of the Prince de Conte, a landscape of fine quality fetched only £50; another, at the same period, belonging to M. Poullain, realised nearly the same price, but seven years afterwards, it was resold for about 84 guineas. In 1817, when the gallery of M. Talleyrand Perigord was dispersed, “A View in a Mountainous Country” realised £390; and in the same year another work of similar character, painted on copper, was sold in the collection of M. de Laperrière, for £460; and in 1823, the same amateur disposed of “A View in the Apennines,” for £680. At the sale of the Duke de Berri's gallery, in 1832, two pictures by this artist were disposed of, one “A View in the Apennines,” with figures by Berchem, fetched 4,383; and the second, with figures by A. Both, about A 133. “A View in Italy” was sold from the collection of M. Heris, of Brussels, in 1841, for about £620; but the highest price realised by one of Both’s pictures, so far as our infor- mation extends to continental sales, was at the dispersion of the “Perregaux’’ gallery in 1841, when a landscape, entitled the “Setting Sun,” reached the sum of £880. The works of this painter are much prized in England, and are eagerly sought after when offered for sale. Among the collections, both public and private, which contain examples, the following may be noted. In the National Gallery are two, thus entitled and described in Mr. Wornum’s Catalogue: “‘Landscape; a Party of Muleteers, with Laden Mules—Morning.’ Mountain scenery; a dark, picturesque, rocky foreground, with a lake in the middle-ground, and blue mountains in the distance, contrasting forcibly with the foreground.” The other, “‘Landscape, with Figures.’ A rocky and woody landscape, with figures by Cornelius Poelen- burg, representing the Judgment of Paris.” Her Majesty possesses one in Buckingham Palace, “a scene where nature appears in all her splendour and magnificence, in vast mountains, lofty trees, and a fine river, in the warm light of the evening sun, with St. Philip baptizing the Chamberlain of Queen Candace. An admirable impasto is here combined with great delicacy of execution. The warm, misty light is masterly, and at the same time subdued.” A single picture is in the Dulwich Gallery—one of Both's usual compositions; a rocky landscape, with some travellers crossing a ford in the evening. The Duke of Sutherland has two at Bridgewater House; one represents a cavern in a rock occupying the foreground, the landscape stretching into the distance. “Three travellers and some cattle, by A. Both, animate this beautiful cabinet picture, which has the warm mellow tone of a fine southern summer evening.”f The other shows a mountainous landscape, with four figures, by Poelenburg, bathing in a pool of clear water that reflects the serene warm evening sky. Among Lord Ashburton's fine collection of Dutch and Flemish paintings is one by J. Both : it represents a chain of rugged hills on one side, and on the other, a view over a rich distance traversed by a river. The landscape is enlivened by numerous figures and cattle, introduced by his brother Andrew. This, again, is an evening scene. Mr. H. A. J. Munro possesses a very valuable collection of pictures by artists of the Low Countries; it includes two examples of J. Both : a mountainous landscape, with a waterfall resembling the famous cascade of Tivoli; a cavalcade of five horsemen occupies * Waagen’s “Art Treasures in Great Britain.” f /dom. 68 GREAT MASTERS or AR7. the foreground: the second is a small landscape, with figures and cattle under a tree. In the Grosvenor Gallery this artist is represented by a richly-wooded mountainous scene, brightly illumined by the morning sun; in a river several youths are bathing, and elsewhere a traveller is in conversation with a herdsman : this is a very fine example of the master. Mr. Holford possesses a large and important work, which may be entitled “Philip baptizing the Eunuch,” a somewhat similar subject to that belonging to the Queen: in Mr. Holford's picture the rite is performed in a stream which flows between rocks thickly covered with trees; it is very rich in detail, and is “carefully executed in the most transparent golden tones of evening light.” If only for the rarity of such a subject by Both, mention must be made of a work belonging to the Marquis of Lansdowne, at Bowood; it represents a group of buildings, with men playing at ninepins, a donkey-driver, and cattle. The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, has a remarkably fine specimen; it is a veritable Italian scene, showing the Tiber winding its way through a hilly and wooded country, with Mount Soracte in the distance ; a waterfall rushes between rocks, and travellers and various kinds of cattle, by A. Both, traverse a road. The composition is admirable, the colouring brilliant, and the chiaz’-oscuro most effective. These are but a few of the pictures by this master in England which might be pointed out. If one may judge from the number of pictures accredited to him—about one hundred and fifty are mentioned in Smith's Catalogue—John Both must have laboured most assiduously; he must also have attained proficiency at a very early age, for he died in the prime of life, and at a period when many artists are only commencing a career of success. A D R I A N VAN O S T A D E. HE late W. Hazlitt says, “We have a great respect for high art, and an anxiety for its advancement and cultivation, but we have a greater still for the advancement and encouragement of true art. That is the first and last step. The knowledge of what is contained in nature is the only foundation of legitimate art; and the perception of beauty and power, of whatever objects, or in whatever degree, they subsist, is the test of real genius. The principle is the same in painting an archangel's or a butterfly's wing ; and the very finest picture in the finest collection may be one of a very common subject. We think and speak of Rembrandt as Rembrandt, of Raffaelle as Raffaelle, not of the one as a portrait, of the other as a history painter. Portrait may become history, or history portrait, as the one or the other gives the soul or the mark of the face. 7%at is true history,” said an eminent critic, on seeing Titian's picture of Pope Julius II. and his two nephews. He who should set down Claude as a mere landscape painter, must know nothing of what Claude was in himself; and those who class Hogarth as a painter of low life, only show their ignorance of human nature. High art does not consist in high or epic subjects, but in the manner of treating those subjects.” These remarks of one of the most able and discriminating art-critics of some years ago contain so much of truth upon the subject of what is usually called high art, that no apology is T 7O GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. needed for making them the text of a few observations on the works of one who ranks among the greatest painters of what is generally considered ſow art. We live in an age when attempts are being made, both with pen and pencil, to carry art back to its primitive state of semi-barbarism, and to hold this up as the standard of perfection, and the only pure condition of art. But if this view be a correct one, and the arguments by which it is supported be sound, why should not the principle be extended to other matters also If we are to retrograde four or five centuries in painting, a similar step might, with equal reason, be made in poetry and many of the sciences. According to the theory of those who regard Cimabue, Giotto, and Perugino greater artists than Raffaelle, Correggio, and Titian ; Shakspeare and Milton must be considered poets inferior to Ben Jonson and Chaucer, and the philosophy of Roger Bacon of a higher order than that of Newton. It must be admitted that in architecture we are compelled to revert for examples to the edifices of long past ages, simply because no better styles have since then been established; but it is evident if the architects of later times had succeeded in creating a style more worthy and better suited to our requirements than its antecedents, it would have been universally adopted: neither the simple beauty of the Grecian edifice, the richness of the Roman, nor the elaborate grandeur of the decorated Gothic, would have moved the more modern builder to imitate them. Now the painters who flourished prior to the time of Raffaelle are regarded by this new school of ours, and its favourers, as the only disciples of genuine art, by which, of course, they mean /g/ art, in the ordinary acceptation of the term, whereas we would contend that the majority of those who succeeded the “ Glory of Urbino’’ have a greater claim to the distinction, because they approached nearer the dignity, T - grandeur, and poetry of nature, and were not mere servile and crude imitators. De Quincy, in his work “On Imita- tion in the Fine Arts,” says:–“What are these paintings of the early stages of the renovation of art? Portraits, doubtless faithful ones, of the men of that period. Physiognomy, attitudes, attire, character, form, and expression, in all; the exact image of the personages then existing, after the manner that they really were, the fashion of the habiliments, costumes, and accessories of the times. Well! those paintings had not, for contemporaries, and still have not for us (setting aside the interest imparted to them by antiquity), any other value than that appertaining to the repetition of what one sees; they make no other impression than that of a portrait. Nothing more can be expected, and the most lively imagination would in vain seek for any other pleasure from them. Even subjects of history, either ancient or drawn from a foreign country, personages to whatever age or nation they may be supposed to belong, when subjected to the same local costume, the same reality of portraiture, are insufficient to carry the spectator beyond this limited point of view; and, whatever lessons the artist may derive from them, such works leave us devoid of ideas, impressions, images, feelings, and desires. “Pass we to the next century, and the works of art when fully developed. What a different ADRYA/V VAN OSTADE. 7 I world do Raffaelle and the grand masters of his time open up to us? How many ideas and images that would have been unknown to us, had not imitation attained its aim 2 What another kind of truth, and in what a different sphere is it revealed to the artist | By how new a manner of viewing nature is her realm enlarged How much additional food for the imagination, how many new objects for the mind to observe and become acquainted with, and fruitful subjects for taste to criticise ! What an unfailing source of pleasure for the understanding and the sentiments In short, what creations for the existence of which we are indebted to imitation; not that which is limited to showing us what is real, but that which, by the aid of what is, shows us what has no real existence l’’ It may be asked, perhaps, what has all this to do with the biography of Ostade, and a critical notice of his works P. Its object is to show what is in truth high art, and who the men are by whom it has been, and is, practised. If the ancient pre-Raffaellites and their modern imitators be its only expounders, then all who differ from them, whatever class of painting they followed, are little else than empirics, or, at best, heterodox disciples of art; and this must be especially the case with the majority of the Dutch and Flemish schools, in which originated the domestic and genre styles of painting. It must be borne in mind that at the period of the revival of art, and for a long time subsequently, religious feeling amounted almost to enthusiasm ; it pervaded every rank and condition of life, entering more or less into all its concerns, and imbuing everything with its own Sanctimonious — the term is not used con- temptuously—character. Churches, and monasteries, and religious houses increased on all sides, which, with those already erected, were made the depositories of the artist’s labours; consequently his works reflected the taste and feeling of the day. Now it would be folly to expect from the painters of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries any of those qualities of art which distinguish the productions of later times; there was nothing in their mental constitutions, nor in the world around them, to justify such expectations. They followed nature so far as their limited capacities enabled them to do, limited, that is, to the extent of what they saw, aided only by a fancy that seemed frequently to have no foundation in nature; they were copyists to the extent of their ability and education; they would imitate by mere mechanical drawing the human figure as a whole and in its several parts, but the life and soul of the noblest of created works, mind, character, passion, and sentiment, are rarely to be found prior to the appearance of Taffaelle. “But,” says Reynolds, “the great and chief ends of painting are to raise and improve nature, and to communicate ideas; not only those which we may receive otherwise, but such as without this art could not possibly be communicated, whereby mankind is advanced higher in the rational state, and made better, and that in a way easy, expeditious, and delightful. The business of painting is not only to represent nature, and to make the best choice of it, but to raise and improve it from what is commonly or even rarely seen, to what never was, or will be, in fact, though we may easily conceive it might be.” w It will not do for those who proclaim the superiority of the pre-Raffaellite system, to urge against its opponents that the latter are incapable of appreciating what they consider the me fºſus w/tra of art. It requires not a practical knowledge of painting to determine the merits of a picture, though it does to enable us to form an adequate idea of the difficulties with which the 2 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. artist had to contend in perfecting his work. The beauty and magnificence of a noble edifice is not lost upon the rude clown because he cannot explain the principles upon which it was constructed; his mind may not comprehend the matter before him ; but he surveys the goodly pile—its vast yet harmonious proportions, the symmetry of its different parts, and the delicacy or boldness of its ornaments, and his mind receives an impression that he acknowledges but cannot ITINERANT MUSICIANS. - explain. Neither does the antiquity of a work of art preclude the enjoyment of its beauties, provided it commends itself to our taste and judgment: this of course is indispensable to its appreciation by the mind, and must depend altogether upon what the understanding can imbibe, and not upon any education which the intellect may have received; the conditions of the enjoyment being only that we recognise truth and beauty in what is before us. In the case of sculpture, for instance, we can discern neither of these qualities in the labours of the Egyptian sculptors, but much to admire A D/E/AAW WAAV OSTADE. 73 in the friezes of the Parthenon, and in the fragments of Greek art which have come down to us, simply because we find in them art following nature. And if we can see and can admire the excellence of sculpture, what is there in painting to prevent the same feelings extending to this also But there seems something that approaches to the absurd in awarding to the earlier masters—those who laboured in the twilight of art, as it were—merits which are refused to such as worked when it had reached its meridian; or in other words, to prefer Giotto, Fra Angelico, Perugino, &c., to the beauty of Raffaelle, the grandeur of Michelangelo, the solemnity of the Caracci, and the glorious colouring of Titian and Giorgione. Painting, like all other arts, has progressed with civilisation; and, according to the taste or fashion of different epochs and of various countries, so we recognise in it the respective characters of all ; we allude more especially to historical painting, and that which is in some THE WILLAGE ALE-HOUSE. measure allied with it—domestic, or genre painting. Pictures are, in fact, not merely a history of art, but they form, in a great measure, a tolerably certain index to the taste, feelings, and pursuits of the people among whom they originate, and this without reference to the quality of these productions viewed critically. We recognise this truth in the sacred and legendary art of the Italian and Spanish schools, even to this day—in the marine-views, flower-pieces, landscapes, and familiar scenes of the Dutch and Flemish painters—in the various works, some religious, some gay and cheerful, and some warlike, of the French school—and in the peculiar character of our own, which it is unnecessary to particularise—as well as in the half mystical and dreamy compositions of some modern Germans. The man who cannot find examples of high U 74 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. art in a large number of the pictures emanating from these schools respectively, would confine them all within his own narrow circle of comprehension, and endeavour to persuade the rest of mankind that all wisdom dwells with him. There are people who, because they do not see at once in a great work of art all that they believe should be there, at once settle it in their own minds that no such greatness exists; self-esteem and self-opinion blinding their under- standing or perverting the judgment. The position we would assume is neither more nor less than this, that all art is capable of being made high art, not, as Hazlitt remarks, because it “consists in lofty or epic subjects,” but by the treatment those subjects receive—and further still, by the manner in which any subject is rendered. It by no means follows, that if a painter selects a grand and ambitious theme, he necessarily is entitled to be called a great artist, for it may so happen that he treats it in a way to show how low are his conceptions, and how utterly unworthy they are of his subject; and again, one may choose a very ordinary and unimportant theme, and, by the powers of his genius, invest it with a fidelity of character and a beauty of execution that elevate it at once to the dignity of a great work. Excellence is not a comparative term, it has a substantive meaning, to whatever applied, and can no more be withheld from the pictures of Teniers, Ostade, and others of their class, than from those of Raffaelle, Correggio, and Guido. It must not be supposed that by this observation it is intended to place these painters on the same level; that would be an absurdity which must only excite ridicule; all that we are contending for is, that a “Village Fair,” by either of the former is, in degree, as much a work of high art as a “Nativity,” or a “Martyrdom,” by any of the latter. Adrian Van Ostade belonged to a generation of painters who, in the Seventeenth century, migrated from Germany to Holland, which latter country at this period seemed to be almost exclusively the nursery of art. He was born at Lubeck, in 16Io, but we have no record con- cerning his family that would lead us to infer who or what they were. At an early age he went to Haarlem, and studied under Francis Hals, who was then in high repute as a portrait-painter, and in whose studio he made the acquaintance of Brouwer. Hals, unfortunately, possessed a mean and avaricious disposition ; he kept Brouwer closely at his easel, painting Small pictures of peasants regaling, and ale-house scenes, which were much admired, and for which large prices were paid to his master, while the young painter was scarcely allowed a sufficiency of food. Ostade soon found how matters stood between the pupil and his tyrannical preceptor, and although the former was separated from his companions, Adrian contrived to communicate with him, and urged him to escape from his servile employment, which he soon managed to effect. Still Ostade had seen enough of Brouwer's style to excite his admiration, and he determined to follow it. It is uncertain how long Ostade remained with Hals, but on quitting his atelier, he settled in Haarlem, and, it is said, began to imitate Rembrandt, who, though but four years older than himself, had already acquired high distinction. Adrian, however, had sufficient discernment to find out that his own genius had little in common with that of this great master of art; nothing of the wonderful vigour of that extraordinary mind which could work out, amid all its apparent inconsistencies, so much that was really grand. And here I cannot avoid remarking how little reliance Ostade always placed upon his own natural genius; A DRIAAV VAM OSTA/DE. - 75 he appears always to be in search of some one whom he might follow. Brouwer, at this period, had become a master, establishing a school of his own, and among his pupils was the younger Teniers, whose works seem to have found so great favour with Ostade that he referred to them as examples of the style he desired to reach; and in the ale-houses, kitchens, and play-grounds of the villages round about Haarlem, and adjacent parts of the country, he found abundant materials for subjects for his pencil. . Here he continued to work with great assiduity, and with still greater distinction, till about 1662, when the approach of the French troops, who were then carrying on hostilities against the Low Countries, so much alarmed him that he sold his pictures and effects, with the deter- mination of returning to his native country. He reached Amsterdam, intending to embark there for Lubeck, but was prevailed upon by many of his brother-artists, whom he found quietly pursuing their professional course notwithstanding the war that threatened to interrupt their pursuits, to abandon the idea of leaving Holland, and to continue among them in Amsterdam, more especially as his fame had long preceded him thither, and his works were sought for with avidity by the picture-collectors of that place. He remained there till his death, in 1685. His life, which was prolonged till the age of seventy-five years, offers little or nothing in the way of interesting biography beyond what is associated with his works. & The pictures of this admirable painter exhibit two styles; his earlier productions, such as those he executed when residing with Francis Hals, are distinguished by a bolder and less finished manner than those he subsequently painted, which have a smoothness of surface and an elaborateness of manipulation, that cause them to look as if painted on porcelain, so high is the polish he gave them. At the same time his colouring is rich, clear, harmonious, and glowing, and the touch of his pencil exceedingly light and delicate, while he seems to have caught some of Rembrandt’s inspiration in the judicious and effective management of chiar'-oscuro. There is undoubtedly a vulgarity in his subjects, but that is inseparable from the scenes he selected ; still that vulgarity is not so offensive nor so disagreeable as we see it in the works of Brouwer and some others of the same school, while the truth of his representations is unquestionable. In variety and expression of character, and in picturesque grouping of his figures with reference to the scenes in which they are engaged, he had no superior among his contemporaries. Fuseli was a severe critic wherever he evinced dislike, and most certainly Ostade was no favourite with him, yet the latter scarcely deserved so sweeping a censure as the Anglo-Swiss artist has applied to the subjects that Ostade painted. “Adrian Von Ostade,” writes Fuseli, “more properly than any other Dutch, Flemish, or German artist, may be said to have raised flowers from a dunghill. He has contented himself to trace the line which just discriminated the animal from the brute, and stamps his actors with instinct rather than passions. He has personified the dress of vulgarity without recommending it by the most evanescent feature of taste, and yet decoys our curiosity to dive with him into the habitation of filth, beguiles our eye to dwell on the loathsome inmates and contents, and surprises our judgment into implicit admiration by a truth of character and energy of effect, a breadth and geniality of finish, which leave no room for censure. If he is less silvery, less airy than Teniers, he is far more vigorous and gleaming ; if his forms be more squat and brutal, they are less 6 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. fantastic and more natural; if he groups with less amenity, he far excels the Fleming in depth and real composition.” Notwithstanding Fuseli's animadversion upon particular parts of Ostade's pictures, no artist who had not attained a point that may justly be called high art would be entitled to such praise as is here bestowed on him. On referring to Smith’s “Catalogue Raisonné of the Dutch and Flemish Painters,” published in 1829, we find descriptions of two hundred and forty-eight pictures by Ostade, with the estimated value of each, and the names of the then possessors, as far as the latter could be THE WIOLIN-PLAYER. obtained. In the “Supplement” to the above work, published in 1842, one hundred and thirty- seven other pictures are similarly noticed, making a total of nearly four hundred—a large number for one artist to produce even through an extended life-time; and especially when we look at the high finish he gave to his pictures. This fact justifies the presumption that Ostade must have continued to labour up to a very late period, if not to the close, of his life. Besides, it is only fair to suppose that there must be many pictures in existence of which Smith had never heard; and it is well known, as the same writer observes, that Ostade painted “a considerable number of drawings in semi-opaque water-colours, finished with great delicacy and care, and ADRIAAW VAW OSTADE. 77 with a brilliancy and effect little short of his pictures; these are so highly esteemed by his countrymen, and also by the refined connoisseur in this class of art, that they bring prices equal to some of his pictures;” one of these was, at the period when Smith wrote, in the possession of the Messrs. Woodburn, the well-known dealers, and was valued at one hundred and thirty guineas. In Mr. Wornum’s Catalogue of the National Gallery it is stated,—“In the memoir of Ostade by Dr. Gaedertz, one hundred and four works are noticed, ranging between 1640 and 1678 inclusive, the largest number of any one year being seven.” Ostade's etchings are about fifty in number: they are accurately described in Bartzsch's “Le Peintre Graveur.” These works are executed with great boldness, and without the assist- ance of the graver. With reference to the engravings from his pictures here introduced, it may be said that The “ITINERANT MUSICIANS” is a small picture painted on panel; the composition consists of six half-length figures standing at the door of a cottage; the central one is a boy playing on a violin accompanied by an old man with a hurdy-gurdy; four children are standing by, listening to the music: there is a striking effect of light thrown on the faces of the group, which exhibit more character than beauty. This picture was in the collection of the Baron Nagel in 1795, when it was valued at one hundred and five guineas. “THE VILLAGE ALE-HOUSE'' is marked No. 62 in Smith's Catalogue; it represents a view in the back court of a cabaret, with peasants playing the game of galet, under a shed; a lad is seated in the foreground, smoking, and two children are playing beside him; a company of boors. variously occupied, are in the background. The picture is engraved in the Choiseul Gallery, and it appears, from Smith's observations, to have passed from the Choiseul Collection, in 1772, through five different hands till it came into the possession of the Duke of Wellington in 1817; the prices it has realised have varied from 4 IO8 to £240. It is a small work, painted on panel. 2 “THE VIOLIN-PLAYER'' is taken from one of Ostade's etchings; the view represents the exterior of a rustic cottage, or, perhaps, of an alehouse, as a signboard is attached to it; beyond this building is a draw-well, and, further still, appears the top of a turreted edifice, the whole forming a most picturesque composition. One of Ostade's most celebrated works is known by the title of “Le Ménage Hollandois;” the picture is small,—about thirteen inches by eleven inches, but, as Smith observes,— “It is impossible to speak too highly of this gem; in luminous effect and brilliancy of colour and finish, it has never been surpassed.” The subject is the interior of a cottage, with a peasant-family, who appear to have just finished their repast ; the father of the family is still seated at the table, looking towards a child who is amused with a pepper-box which its mother holds up. There are other figures in the composition variously employed, and an old cradle, a flax-winder, and numerous household objects, are distributed throughout the room. It is signed, and dated 1661. The picture has been engraved at various times by Le Bas, Bond, and Fittler; it is mentioned by Descamps in his second volume, and Smith speaks of it as having been in the collection of M. Wassenaur, in 1760; in the Praslin Gallery, in 1793, when it was sold for £400; in the collection of M. Durney, who gave 4, 285 for it, in DX 78 GREAT MASTERS OF AR7. 1797; in that of M. Montaleau, in 1802, when its value was increased to 4340. It afterwards passed into the hands of the late Mr. Harman, of Woodford, and at the sale of this gentleman’s collection, by Christie and Manson, in 1844, it was bought by Mr. Buchanan for 1,320 guineas; such is the fluctuation in the monetary value of works of art. Till the recent purchase of the Peel Collection our National Gallery contained no example of this master, and now it shows only one, “The Alchymist,” a small picture, painted on canvas ; the composition exhibits several figures; the old chemist blowing the bellows of his furnace, and surrounded by the usual “furniture” of a laboratory, while his wife and two children are seen in the background. “Under a three-legged, stool is a paper on which is written a warning of the vanity of his labour—Oleum et operam perdis. Signed on a shovel hanging against the wall, A. v Ostade, 1661.” In the Royal Collection at Buckingham Palace are as many as eight pictures by Ostade, of varied subjects; the Bridgwater Gallery includes six, one of which shows an unusual composition for this artist—a lawyer reading a paper, and a man standing beside him with a present of game. Waagen calls it a “little jewel.” Lord Ashburton's collection also contains six examples, all of a high quality; and there are many more distributed over the private galleries of this country. Adrian’s younger brother and pupil, Isaac van Ostade, who died prematurely, painted some excellent pictures in Adrian's manner; there are two by him in the National Gallery, purchased with the Peel Collection. One of them is a “Frost Scene,” showing but very little of the influence of his brother's teaching. Isaac’s works are highly esteemed in England, where the largest number, and the best, are to be found. NICHOLAS BERCHEM. ICHOLAS BERCHEM, or Berghem, for he signed his name both Ways, was born at Haarlem, in 1624. It seems strange, while thinking over the long list of glorious painters forming the ... º. Dutch and Flemish Schools, T. that a country and a people so constitutionally opposed to all that is poetical and imaginative, qualities indispensable to the great artist,-should yet have pro- duced so many that are entitled to rank as such. Dutch poets and musical composers, of any distinction, are rarely to be found, neither have Dutch sculptors and architects CROSSING THE STREAM. rendered themselves, at any period, eminently con- spicuous; it is, therefore, most singular that of another sister-art, so large a number of followers, and of such high merit, should have flourished among the dykes and mists of that fertile but unseductive land. The fact appears to set at defiance the theory of those who 8o GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. argue that certain natural gifts are dependent upon climate, situation, and other local peculiarities. Berchem's real name is supposed to have been Van Haarlem, his father being Peter Van Haarlem, a painter of no great merit; and an anecdote is related by Karel de Moor, a Dutch writer, which accounts for the name of Berchem. The young Nicholas's first master was John Van Goyen, and the father being one day angry with the youth for some real or fancied irregularity of conduct, pursued him, for the purpose of chastising him, into the house of Van Goyen, who, desirous of shielding his pupil from punishment, called out to his other scholars “Aerg-hem,” the Dutch for “hide him,” and from this circumstance he acquired the name by which he is known, and which he always used. Other writers, however, state that the name of both father and son was Berchem, and that the former was called Van Haarlem from ANCIENT PORT OF GENOA. being born in the town of Haarlem (a practice which has repeatedly been applied to artists), and that De Moor's story is little else than a fable. - “No one,” says M. Charles Blanc, “ had more masters than Berchem, and no one perhaps had less need of them. He learned the rudiments of his art in the studio of his father, a painter of sweetmeats, fish, confectionery, and desserts; Van Goyen taught him marine-painting; Peter Grebber, a painter of history and portraits, instructed him how to group his figures and give them expression; Nicholas Moyaert and John Wils (whose daughter he married) taught him landscape-painting ; and the example of his uncle, John Baptist Weenix, inspired him with a taste for representing sea-port towns, with all the bustle and excitement of loading and unloading ships, with their freights of rich merchandise.” In the preceding notice of John Both, allusion was made to the contest between him and NICHOLAS BERCA/EM. 8 I Berchem for the prize offered by the burgomaster of Dordrecht, which terminated in the two artists being equally rewarded, as it would seem neither could claim superiority in the opinion of the judges. The fact, however, is strong evidence of Berchem's talents as a landscape-painter. THE TRAVELLERS. The architectural ruins and picturesque groups of cattle with which Berchem enriched his scenes, form, very frequently, the most attractive parts of his compositions; these compositions are evidently made up of materials selected at different times and from various sources, but they MILKING-TIME. are so skilfully put together, and with such an air of truth, as to have all the appearance of being actual copies of nature. There is a beautiful luminous quality in most of his pictures, especially in those seen under an early morning or warm evening aspect, and this quality is recognisable Y 82 - GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. throughout every portion of the work, of whatever materials composed. It has been well observed of this master, “ that he had an executive power which rarely missed its aim ; his touch is equally free and discriminating, whether expressing the breadth and richness of masses of foliage, the lightness and buoyancy of clouds, the solidity of rocks and buildings, or the transparency of water; and his distances are graduated, both in relation to lines and tints, with admirable truth of perspective.” - - His colouring is rich and brilliant, but harmonious, the depth and brilliancy being attained rather by broad masses of shadow than by positive tints. He is said to have painted with wonderful rapidity, yet his pictures betray no sign of negligence or want of finish; while his industry was such that he was accustomed to sit at his easel, even during the summer-months, from sunrise to sunset; and yet, with all his labour, he was unable to Supply the demands for his works. He died in 1683, at the age of fifty-nine. His pictures are much esteemed in this country, and are rather numerous here. The National Gallery contains two, “Crossing the Ford,” bequeathed to the National Gallery, in 1854, by Lord Colborne, and a “Landscape with Ruin,” purchased with the Peel Collection. Both are small. * - JACOB RUYSDAEL. HE kingdom of Holland has produced no greater landscape-painter than Jacob Ruysdael, or Ruisdael, as he frequently signed his name, and none whose works are more highly valued in our own country. The great secret of our estimation of his pictures we believe to be that his landscapes in many respects bear a strong resem- & blance to the main features of English scenery; some, indeed, one might almost fancy, had been sketched by our streams, and in our woods and valleys, such as some of the subjects introduced into these pages. The forest oaks of Holland are unequal in grandeur and massiveness of form to the British oak; we miss our broad, gnarled trunks, and huge, grotesquely-shaped THE STREAMI. arms, and wide-spreading branches, and feel that their place is not satisfactorily sup- plied by the comparatively stunted yet picturesque ensemble that make up the pictures of Ruysdael, who, however, it is generally believed, chose his finest subjects, not in his own 84 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. native country, but on the borders of Germany. Hobbema, the contemporary of Ruysdael, gave a bolder character to his forest-scenes, and seems to have borrowed his models from the vast forests of Westphalia; otherwise there is great similarity in the subjects painted by these THE ENTRANCE TO A FOREST. two inimitable artists. Where the latter found his grand and rushing “cascades” is not very clear, as they do not abound in the localities which he is supposed to have visited, while there is no proof for presuming, as some biographers state, that he ever visited Norway, the country THE WILLAGE ROAD. assigned as the locality of these pictures. It is more than probable that the majority of his waterfalls are “compositions,” altered and enlarged from some of the views he may have met with on the German frontiers. JACOB RUPSDA EZ. 85 There has been, and still is, considerable diversity of opinion as to the date of the birth of Ruysdael, but the best authorities fix it at about 1625; there is, at least, one picture by him signed and dated 1645-6, and this only makes him about twenty years of age when the work was painted. The place of his nativity was Haarlem, a city that has produced several of the most distinguished Dutch painters. His father is said to have been a cabinet-maker, and to have educated his son for the profession of a surgeon; and, according to a statement made by Immerzeel, in his “Life and Works of the Dutch Artists,” published at Amsterdam in 1843, as we find it in a note appended to the biography of Ruysdael, in C. Blanc’s “Vies des Peintres,” there appears in the catalogue of certain pictures sold at Dort, in 1720, “a very fine landscape º º wº-y - - --- - º:...º.º. A RIVER-SCENE. with a waterfall, by /Joctor Jacob Ruysdael.” It is evident, as before observed, that he began to paint at a very early age, but the precise time when he altogether exchanged the surgeon's instruments for the pencil and palette, if indeed, he ever used the former, has not been determined with any degree of accuracy. It does not appear that he studied under any particular master, but being on intimate terms with Nicholas Berchem, who was a few years his senior, and whom he used frequently to visit in his studio, there is no doubt he acquired from that eminent painter not only a taste for art, but considerable knowledge of its principles and practice. These principles, directed by his own inherent genius, founded a school of landscape- painters in his own country which includes many names held in the highest estimation. Accuracy in statement of facts is absolutely essential to biographical notices; but when two or three centuries have passed away since the lifetime of the individual to whom such biography refers, it is frequently very difficult to determine what is, and what is not, truth. Now it would Z 86 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. seem a matter of very little importance to know whether an artist had ever visited such and such a locality for the purpose of sketching its scenery; but it is not so insignificant a matter as many suppose, inasmuch as the school of a painter, whether it be of Nature or of some artist, influences his works. The mountainous landscapes and the cascades of Ruysdael are among his most esteemed productions; and the question of their sources has been the subject of much discussion with his biographers. The probability, as already suggested, is, that they were, for the most part, “ compositions” borrowed from the wild districts of the German borders; for THE TRAVELLERS. it is scarcely to be supposed that, had he visited Norway, the fact would not have had the certain affirmation of earlier writers. I have not at hand the biographical work of Houbraken, the contemporary of Ruysdael, but have no recollection of his stating positively that the latter ever visited Norway, though he infers it. Yet this is not actual proof; while Descamps, who writes considerably later, says: “Ruysdael and Berghem drew only in the environs of Amsterdam, 7 and never left their native country;” a statement that one can scarcely credit who knows the pictures of Ruysdael. Modern writers are equally divided in their opinions. Smith, in his “Catalogue,” says: “The bold mountainous country in Norway, with her rocky glens and JACOB RUPSDAEL. 87 waterfalls, were his chosen subjects.” And, again, when alluding to his enlarged acquaintance with art, as manifested in his later productions, he adds, “This advance is strikingly manifest in his wild Norwegian views, where cataracts are seen rushing through chasms of stupendous rocks, rolling in foaming masses amidst huge stones and fallen trees, and gurgling in eddying mazes along the rugged bottom. * * * Of this class is a picture in the Luton Collection.” In opposition to such opinion, Stanley, in his notes to Bryan’s “Dictionary of Painters,” remarks: “Those who wish to increase the wealth of Ruysdael by robbing Everdingen, have made him a student of the wild scenery of Norway; but where is the authority? They find it in the frowning rocks, Norwegian pines piercing the clouds, and foaming cascades tumbling precipi- A COAST-SCENE. tously over the debris caused by many a furious northern tempest. But it is known that Albert van Everdingen spent much of his life in depicting that scenery; and it would be difficult to point out a picture by him of an entirely placid character. A large landscape of this class, which is in the magnificent collection at Luton” (the same picture, we presume, to which Smith alludes), “bears the impress of Everdingen's mind and pencil in every part; and there are others by him in this country equally misappropriated.” Neither can one come to any more satisfactory conclusion from the observations of modern foreign writers; the author of the “Vies des Peintres” says: “It is evident to us that Ruysdael, like Everdingen, visited Norway and Westphalia. It is there he learned to paint Nature so rugged and chaotic, that vegetation so perpetually borne down, of which the sight brings sadness to the heart. It is there that, as 88 GA'EA 7 J/ASTERS OF AA-7. Houbraken remarks, he became the most unique painter of his class.” And yet, in a spirit altogether contradictory to this, we find the same writer asking in a former passage of his biography—“Can we doubt that he also studied the works of that Albert van Everdingen, whose pictures are so easily confounded with those of Ruysdael, if one may be allowed to form a judgment from the striking resemblance they show in the choice and disposition of subjects, THE CASCADE. as well as in their method of treating them?” And thus we must leave the disputed point still undecided. The versatility of Ruysdael’s pencil, in landscape, is one of its most remarkable and charming features. Corn-fields and meadows, the vicinity of towns and hamlets, the quiet brook and the roaring torrent, the mighty ocean rippling on the low, dingy shores of Holland, or breaking JACOB RUPSDAEL. 89 tumultuously over their wooden embankments in heavy surges, are delineated by him with equal fidelity and beauty, both in Sunshine and storm. It is this personal or subjective character of the painter's works, which essentially constitutes the originality of his genius, and which entitles him to take the same rank in rural or rustic landscape-painting as Claude holds in classic, or, as it has not unaptly been called, heroic landscape. In the majority of his pictures, it is true, we are conducted into scenes that impress the mind with the solemnity and the grandeur of nature;—wild localities that skirt almost impenetrable woods, “where,” as a French writer, M. Tailasson, observes, “man, separated from his fellow, and apart from the ambition and the turmoil of life, in silence and repose listens to and respects the voice of the visible world around him. He loves to paint the corners of forests mysteriously illumined, and favourable to holy and philosophic thought, where one may retire with a book, which, however, would most probably soon be cast aside, that the mind may revel in the feelings that so much of natural beauty calls forth.” In his marine-views Ruysdael shows himself in no way inferior to any of the most distinguished masters in this class of art; for if we do not discern in them the fury and the terrible “noise of waters,” such as Backhuysen and Van der Velde painted, it is only because he did not study, as they did, on the broad ocean, but on the sea-shore; yet here he caught the spirit of the waves, and the sound of the coming storm, and the heavy rushing of the billows, and he depicted them as they were presented to his eye. It has been objected to many of the pictures by this painter that they are too particular, or, in other words, too much detailed or elaborated in their several parts; but I cannot think so, and hold it to be an axiom in true painting that Nature should everywhere be as closely followed as is consistent with those general laws to which art is subservient. An artist should never sacrifice the unity of a picture to the undue expression, or even the perfect manipulation, of certain portions of it; neither should his time be wasted in elaborating the whole of his materials unless some most decided advantage is to be gained by it. Now, although the works of this master are beautifully wrought, there is a broad and masterly effect diffused over them. The number of pictures by Ruysdael, which have been referred to by writers, is about four hundred and forty, but the whole are not considered to be by his hand; indeed, no critic would presume to pronounce a decided opinion who knows the works of Everdingen, of Van Kessel, and De Vries; especially too, when there is taken into account the difficulty of distinguishing between them now that many of the pictures by Jacob Ruysdael have become So dark with age. The engravings introduced as illustrations of his compositions need but little comment. “THE STREAM '' is a reproduction of one of the few etchings that Ruysdael executed with so much dexterity and lightness of hand. The next subject, entitled the “ENTRANCE TO A FoREST,” was originally in the Choiseul Gallery; it afterwards was brought over to this country, and eventually came into the possession of W. Theobald, Esq. - “THE VILLAGE-ROAD '' is a charming little bit of rustic scenery which might have been sketched in one of our rural hamlets: the work exhibits a fine effect of chiar'-oscuro. So also does the “CoAST SCENE ''; a view of the long shores skirting the Dutch coast and bounded A A 90 GA’EAT MASTERS OF ART. inland by lofty sand-hills. The beach is enlivened by numerous figures variously employed. The view is represented under the effect of clouds, which are, nevertheless, highly luminous, allowing the whole extent of the horizon to be clearly seen. “A RIVER SCENE * is a light and very elegant composition; its principal features are two decayed trees, on one of which a boy is sitting with his fishing-rod in his hand. Both in this and the preceding work it will be noticed that though the forms of the trees are far from picturesque in themselves, they are so skilfully grouped as to produce a most agreeable combination. A magnificent picture in size and character is that to which the title of “THE TRAVELLERs '' is appended; it is in the Louvre of Paris, and is valued, according to Smith, at 4, 1,600. The beech, the oak, and the elm, are among the fine groups of trees on each side, diversifying the scene with the variety of their tints and forms. The figures are painted by Berchem, who, with Adrian Van der Velde, the two Wouvermans, and others, lent their aid to Ruysdael for this purpose, as he never could manage figures to his own satisfaction. “THE CASCADE'' is one of those grand subjects, said to have been sketched in Norway; wherever it came from it is a magnificent scene, nobly rendered; the motion, form, and liquid quality of the torrent could scarcely be more powerfully represented. Jacob Ruysdael died at Hamburg in 1681. to whom the title of “Great Masters of Art” is with propriety applied, should appear the name of one whose range of subject never extended beyond the butler's pantry or the furniture and appurtenances of a Dutch kitchen. But it has been remarked with considerable truth that, “if one would desire to give a just definition of art it will be found to prevail as much in the cuisines of Kalf, as in the truly heroic compositions of Gaspar Poussin. Art may be really present in a copper-pan, burnished and glittering with light, or in a silver goblet whose sides exhibit the most delicate and beautiful chasings, as in those nobler subjects which history and philosophy have furnished to the painter. This appears so singular as almost to amount to a paradox; but has not he as great a right to be considered an artist who can make a valuable picture from an upturned kettle and a bunch of leeks, as one brought up in the bosom of academies, and capable of treating appropriately, for example, such a subject as the “Continence of Scipio 2''' The merit is entirely one of degree; each is great in his respective department, yet, inasmuch as there is a wide difference between these departments, it necessarily follows that the genius of the one must rank higher in the scale of intelligence than that of the other. England has produced many 92 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. poets, in the true sense of the word—poets whose writings will have an immortality of fame; but she has given birth only to one Shakespeare and one Milton. It would be idle not to affirm that a lesson in painting, of no common order, may be learned from the study of one of Kalf’s simple interiors; we mean not merely of painting in its general acceptation, of truth and beauty of colour and exquisite finish, but of those laws of composition and chiar'-oscuro which should regulate every subject, however trivial in itself. Let us refer to the engraving here introduced, and see of what materials the picture is made up, and how they are put together. The principal figure, which may not inappropriately be called the hero of the scene, is a large copper-cauldron, that reflects back from its sides the rays of the Sun in a variety of brilliant golden tints. Immediately behind this is a cask whose age seems almost coeval with the building that contains it; it is undoubtedly a venerable inhabitant of the place, a sort of heir-loom which has, perhaps, served several generations; its whole appearance betokens years of active duty; the staves are somewhat displaced; the thick, Solid, iron hoops are eaten up by the rust, the green damp is making way through the sides, and the cankerworm is feeding on the moistened and decaying wood; its life of usefulness, as originally formed, is gone. Grouped together with these are a noble cabbage, whose bright green leaves harmonise excellently with the surrounding objects, a red earthen pan, a bunch of Onions, one of CarrotS, plates, an old basket, a broom, with sundry other utensils, the names of which our ignorance of the particulars of kitchen-furniture does not enable us to supply. A study of this picture of still-life confirms the fact that in it the essential laws of painting have been rigorously observed. The work is abundantly rich in details, but it is not over- charged; the light is judiciously made to fall obliquely on the mass of objects, from a high window, or more probably from a trap-door in an upper room, many of the houses in Holland being so constructed. The deep shadow into which the recess at the back is thrown gives additional value to the light cast on the more prominent objects, while the living figures seated therein,_the cook and her dog, vivify the scene in a way that makes it something more than a representation of “still-life,” and divides the interest with the more humble but prominent matters that occupy the foreground. If the artist had reversed this order of arrangement he would have given his work a totally different character; it might probably have gained something in sentiment, but it would unquestionably have lost much of the varied brilliancy of colouring that now distinguishes it. The exact year of Kalf’s birth is uncertain, but he was born at Amsterdam somewhere about the year 1630. He had for his master Henry Pot, a good painter of history and portraits, in whose study he remained some years. The writers upon the Dutch school of Art say very little of what he did during this period, nor of the progress he made in the style which his master practised ; we only know that, when he quitted the atelier of Pot, he also relinquished his manner, and gave up the facts of history and the stories of fiction, to make acquaintance with flowers, fruits and vegetables, brass-kettles, and sometimes with vases of precious metals. Houbraken relates that he would sit for entire days before a melon, a fine orange, the handle of a knife made of agate or mother-of-pearl, to study its various tints. The ships of the Dutch merchants never brought from distant regions a single shell whose unique form and brilliant colours he did not WILLIAM ATALF. 93 essay to copy. It was this close application to, and study of the minutiae of objects that enabled him to represent them with so much exactitude, yet one cannot help thinking that the same amount of attention bestowed upon worthier themes would have placed the artist in a higher rank than that he now enjoys. Still, whatever a painter undertakes, if he throws his whole mind into his work, he deserves both credit and success, and will undoubtedly attain both. Thus, in the reproduction of the most common-place subjects, the interiors of kitchens, of cellars, and rustic apartments, with their furniture and all the appurtenances belonging to them, Kalf excelled | º | Nº. ºù | º º º | - º | - in intº º - | º | º | | º | º | º | º: | º: º | INTERIOR OF A KITCHEN. every painter of his day; each object under his firm but light pencil acquired the most brilliant tone and finish, so that his pictures are worthy to be classed among those of the greatest colourists, inasmuch as they afford a thorough acquaintance with the great principles of harmony and light, and shadow, Lebrun says—“This master has always been highly estimated by amateurs; there are few collections in Paris where we do not meet with some of his works; ” and other writers have compared them with the finest of A. Van Ostade. The death of this painter happened on the 31st of May, 1693, it was the result of an unfortunate accident. Houbraken and Weyerman state that he went one day to call upon a B B 94 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. dealer in works of art, named Cornelius Hellemans, to whom he had offered to sell a number of engravings; the two arranged to meet at the residence of Kalf the next day. The bargain concluded and the entire matter settled, Hellemans wished the painter to return home with him to receive the price of his prints; this was declined, and on the following day a letter announced the death of the artist. On returning from the house of a friend, he accidentally fell over the bridge of Bantem, and received a terrible shock; he was immediately taken home, where he expired in a few hours. The poet Van der Hoeven wrote an epitaph for his tomb, which has come down to us. It is highly eulogistic of his talents, and says that “William Kalf knew well how to paint golden vases and cups of silver, and the treasures of wealth, but that no treasure could repay his genius, - for it never had an equal.” - If we except the museum of the Louvre, which possesses an admirable picture by Kalf, those of Amsterdam, Dresden, and Copenhagen, all of which contain paintings of “still-life,” by his hand, the vases and cauldrons of this great colourist do not glitter in any other royal collection. Artists and amateurs, however, have amply compensated for royal and national neglect, by giving them a distinguished place among their collections. In the time of Descamps they abounded in Holland and Flanders; but Le Brun states that a large number ascribed to him are merely copies, painted with great skill, but rarely with that delicacy of touch which gives to the originals their highest charm. The pictures of Kalf are generally of a middle size, and are sometimes painted on canvas, but more frequently on panel. - Notwithstanding the estimation in which this master is held, by a contradiction that seems quite inexplicable, his pictures rarely fetch high prices. Le Brun valued one of his best works, in 1791, at about 80 guineas. At the sale of Cardinal Fesch’s galley, at Rome, in 1845, two small pictures were sold for less than 450 the pair, but at the sale of the collection of M. Randon de Boisset, in 1777, “a Kitchen,” by Kalf, realised nearly £600, and a second picture of a similar subject, about £450. In our time (we speak rather of the Continent, than of our own country, for the works of this painter are little known here”) their value in the market is subject to great variation when they are brought forward, and that is but seldom; there is the same desire on the part of amateurs to possess them, but the same unwillingness to bid largely for their acquisition. They who are best acquainted with the works of this painter assert that he never signed his name to his pictures; and this opinion is confirmed by Brulliot, the author of the “Dictionary of Monograms,” who has introduced into his work the signature here engraved, as that of Kalf. There are, however, catalogues in existence showing that he inserted on the foot of his pictures both the name and the date when they were painted. * Waagen, in his “Art-Treasures of Great Britain,” speaks only of one—a flower-piece in the Hampton Court Palace collection, which is there attributed to De Heem. Waagen, however, assigns it to Kalf. --º º º NE GABRIEL METSU. UTCH and Flemish art was in a flourishing condition in the seventeenth century: the Netherlands had, in a great measure, thrown off the yoke to which the power of Spain, for a long time, had subjected them; and now, having free scope for commercial enterprise, their wealth and their national strength increased in proportion to the means at command for developing the resources of the country. Their ships brought home rich argosies from all parts of the world; their armed squadrons maintained for a considerable period almost the entire mastery of the seas; for although the fleets of the English which Cromwell and his parliament sent forth under Blake to chastise the “insolence of those Dutch pedlars” effectually obeyed the command, the “pedlars” afterwards contrived to work their way into the Thames, and carry dismay into the courtly throng of our second Charles. With the increase of political power and individual wealth is always associated a demand for the luxuries of life, and inasmuch as demand almost invariably generates a supply, a host of artists of all kinds arose in almost every province and town of the Low Countries to answer the call. It cannot have escaped the observation of those who study philosophically the history of mankind, 96 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. how much of character and talent lie hid until circumstances require their manifestation; if opportunities do not create genius, they certainly develop it when, otherwise, it might never have appeared; the “coming man” is generally to be found when the hour demands his presence, whatever the object may be he is to aid in carrying out as a leader or follower. It is so in political matters, nor less in those of seemingly minor import: but, except in some few instances, to be met with both in nations and individuals, it would appear to be an inherent principle of our nature to wait for time and circumstances rather than to forestal them. This is a wise ordination, THE PIAN ISTE. which prevents the unnecessary expenditure of man's best faculties, and the wearing out of mind and body prematurely: he who lives before his time is as much to be pitied as he who lives after it, when he labours to produce fruit from plants growing in unprepared ground. The biographies of distinguished names furnish us with many examples of the non-adaptation of events to time and place. Take, for example, the case of the painter, Haydon; had he been born in Italy three hundred years since, he would probably have risen to be a “Great Master; ” the soil and the period would have suited his genius: it would have ripened into maturity under the favourable GAARIEL //ETSU. - 97 influences that there and then surrounded him on all sides. Had he commenced his career, even in our own country, some fifty years later, he would have found more sympathy with the principles he enunciated, and his art would have been far more highly appreciated: he was at least half a century before his time; people did not understand him, because there was no congeniality of feeling between them and his productions, independent of the means he adopted, which, to say the least, were unwise and impolitic, to enforce conviction. But we have since then made some advance in a knowledge of art, and if we do not see all that he required us to recognise in his | º | . THE LETTER-WRITER. “Judgment of Solomon,” his “Entry into Jerusalem,” his “Crucifixion,” &c., we can at least- give him the credit, as we do, of endeavouring to raise the character of the English school of painting by exhibiting to the world something that approximates to the highest standard of art. I have said that the seventeenth century formed a remarkable era in the arts of the Low Countries; each department, recognised as essentially belonging to the Dutch and Flemish Schools, counted then in its ranks many of its most distinguished followers. A classification of some of the principal will prove the fact. Historical painting then could boast of Rubens, Van Dyck, C C 9S . * GAZEAT MASTERS OF ART. Rembrandt, Jordaens, and Janssens; genre-painting, as it is called,—that is, familiar and domestic scenes, of Gerard Dou, Netscher, Mieris, Metsu, and Terburg; humorous and low-life scenes, of the Ostades, the two Teniers, Brauwer and Van Maes; landscape, of Ruysdael, Hobbema, Ronthout, Vander Neer, and Everdingen; animal-painting, of Cuyp, Paul Potter, Berchem, Wouwerman, Snyders, and Seghers, nor must Rubens be omitted from the list; sea-views of the Van de Veldes, and Backhuysen ; interiors, of Steenwyck and P. Neefs; fruits and flowers, of Huysum, Mignon, and Vander Bosch; nor must it be forgotten that many of these artists excelled no less in other branches than in those with which we have especially identified them. What the Teniers and the Ostades, and those with whom they are here associated, were as illustrators of Dutch low-life, Metsu, Terburg, and others did to represent the more polished society of Holland. The latter introduce us into the mansions of the wealthy bourgeois, which the extended commerce of the country had enriched with the luxuries gathered from all parts of the world, and had embellished with all that money could purchase, and taste, of a peculiar order, however, it must be added,—could create. “The remotest parts of the earth,” says M. Charles Blanc, “sent to him whatever could delight his domestic life, and charm away the melancholy with which the gloomy nature of his climate and its long winters infected him. Asia contributed her silks, her spices, and her diamonds; the icebergs of the poles furnished him with the costly fur which ornamented the velvet jacket that his wife or his eldest daughter had assisted him to don in the chamber of his dwelling-house. Birds, insects, shells, and minerals, all of the rarest and most costly kinds, filled his cabinets, methodically arranged under glass of the purest crystal.” To this it may be added that his gardens were laid out with almost geometrical precision, kept in the trimmest order, and garnished with the most beautiful flowers and the choicest plants that would thrive in that humid but not ungenial atmosphere. The decorations and furniture of his house were in harmony with its external appearance: panels quaintly but delicately carved in wood of oak and walnut lined the walls of his room; the floors, polished to the brightness of a mirror, reflected the forms of chairs, tables, and cabinets, of the same woods, with others of a more costly description, on which the art of the sculptor was equally well displayed; the canopy of his bedstead was supported by pillars of ebony, enveloped in rich damasks, while heavy, party-coloured tapestries on the walls assisted to exclude the damp air that would more or less find its way into the apartment; and from the centre of the ceiling the burnished chandelier with its not inelegantly twisted branches, glittered again in the mirror of Venetian glass, placed above the lofty chimney-piece. Metsu's picture of the “Lover's Visit” shows the ordinary appearance of a wealthy Dutchman’s chamber at the period when he lived ; ..and answering to the above description was the general character of his home which, kept with the greatest care and with the incessant labour of his domestics, was transmitted from father to son through generations, without undergoing those transformations that caprice and fashion in other countries seemed to render inevitable. But it is not only as an illustrator of the domestic economy, so to speak, of the Dutch, that the pictures of Metsu are to be admired : they give us also a clear insight into the manners and customs that prevailed among the people. We are apt to consider them as a cold, phlegmatic GABR/EZ METSU. 99 race, almost insensible to the feelings that ordinarily predominate in civilised society elsewhere; rarely moved to passion unless under the influence of potations “Deep as the rolling Zuyder Zee.” A Dutchman assuming the airs of a gallant or a courtier almost appears to us to be an absurdity; but Gabriel Metsu has shown he can do both, and with a grace and affectation worthy of a Frenchman of the ancien régime. A striking example of such refinement of manner will be found in the picture of the “Lover's Visit” just referred to ; and also in another entitled “The Military Gallant,” in the Louvre. This work represents a young Dutch cavalier in the richest costume of the period, with his plumed bonnet in his hand, introducing himself into the private apartment of a youthful lady, who, by the way, is very far from a beauty; she holds in her hand a glass which a page has just presented her on a waiter and has retired behind her chair; looking somewhat suspiciously on the visitor is the maiden's lap-dog decorated with a collar of lace or some such material. This is a very remarkable picture in the respective qualities of composition and execution; it is exquisitely finished, and exhibits a wonderful breadth of chiar'-oscuro ; the highest light and the deepest shadow are concentrated in the dress of the female, who is seated; a robe of dark velvet, gathered up above the knees, discovers under it a white satin skirt falling in long folds over the feet; on her shoulders a white kerchief is tied, and her head is covered with a loose white cap; an embroidered cloth carelessly thrown across a table most effectively aids the richness of the picture.* I am however talking about the pictures of Metsu, but have hitherto said nothing of the artist himself, and it must honestly be confessed there is no story to tell of him; like many other great painters whose names and works only are known, there is extant no record of his life; his pictures are his biography. All that historians have written by way of information is that he was born in 1615, at Leyden, a city which, with its immediate vicinity, produced not a few of the most distinguished Dutch painters and engravers—E. W. and J. Van de Velde, Van Goyen, Rembrandt, Lievens, Gerard Dou, F. Mieris, the elder and the younger, Jan Steen, De Voys, Neveu, De Moor, J. Mieris, W. Mieris, and others. Metsu's father and mother are said to have been artists, but biographers have been unable to ascertain under what master he studied, or when he removed to Amsterdam, where he acquired a great reputation at an early age, and where he died, according to Houbraken, in 1658, a date which is followed also by D'Argenville. But there are pictures by him bearing his own signature, and the period when they were painted, of years posterior to this ; for instance, the “Poulterer,” in the Dresden Gallery, is dated 1662 : the “Vegetable Market at Amsterdam,” in the Louvre, bears a still later date—1664, and his * This picture is thus described in Smith's “Catalogue of Dutch and Flemish Painters;” it is numbered 79 in the list of Metsu's works, and is entitled “The Morning Visitor”:—“The interior of a handsome room, in which are a cavalier, a lady, and a page; the lady, dressed in a brown gown and a white Satin skirt, is seated near the middle, holding a glass of wine in her right hand, and directing her attention to an officer, who appears to have just entered the apartment, and, with his hat in his hand, is bowing respectfully to the lady: his dress, which is singularly elegant, consists of a buff jerkin with yellow silk sleeves braided with silver, a steel breast-plate, a scarlet sash, and a belt embossed with gold, grey hose, and buff boots. On his left is placed a table covered with a Turkey carpet, by the side of which stands a chair covered with blue velvet. The page, habited in a blue dress, is behind the lady, with a silver Salver in his hand, and a brown spaniel is by the side of its mistress. This picture is remarkably brilliant in colour, and powerful in its effect. Engraved in the Musée ºis, Valued in 1816 at £1,000.” : ; ; ; ; ; ; ; IOO GAEA 7' MASTERS OF A R7. “Les Propos Galants,” also in the Dresden Gallery, is marked 1667. The probability is that his death took place in 1669, but whenever it occurred it was somewhat premature, and arose from a surgical operation of a painful nature. * D'Argenville states, but without giving his authority, that Metsu was a friend of Jan Steen, and he adds that he took great interest in the works of his young fellow-townsman, whose studio he would frequently visit after dinner, and amuse himself by touching on the pictures which Steen had on his easel at the time. But the Dutch biographer, Houbraken, who enters at considerable length on the history of the latter, and says much on the intimacy subsisting between him and the elder Mieris, and who must have known both, is silent on the matter to which D’Argenville alludes. As M. Charles Blanc very justly observes, “nothing could be more probable than that two contemporaneous artists, natives of the same city, should form a friendship for each other; but may we not presume that D’Argenville has here confounded Metsu with Mieris P. When we recollect the life Jan Steen led, that he was seldom or never in a state of Sobriety, and that more ardently to indulge his vicious propensity he became a tavern-keeper, it is difficult to suppose he would have for an intimate friend this same Metsu, the painter of fashion, and who is always represented as a man of elegant manners and of refined taste; and more especially difficult is it to credit the assertion, if the remark has any truth in it, that an artist paints himself in his works, or, in other words, that his pictures are an index of his mind, and a tolerably certain guide whereby to determine his associations. One cannot readily imagine that the same man could frequent, at least willingly and pleasurably, the smoking-rooms of Steen, and the elegantly appointed and well-kept saloons of the wealthy bourgeoisie, where the indulgences of a similar nature were not unfrequent, but so veiled by courtesies and manners as to half lose the appearance of vice.” nº With such slight material—in truth we may say with none—for a biographical sketch of this artist, one can only speak of his works generally, and give a detailed description of Some few. Yet even here the subject necessarily limits itself within a very small compass, comparatively. Had an author to write of the compositions of some great historical painter, the records of whose life were as scanty as those of Metsu, there would still, in all probability, be ample themes for discussion in the events he commemorates, and in his manner of illustrating them; but conversation-pieces, where a lady is pleasantly occupied in listening to her lover, a lady in her boudoir or at her toilet, or playing on a musical instrument, offer little Scope for one to descant upon who would not draw too prodigally on his imaginative faculties. Neither do other subjects in which he occasionally indulged, such as fish-stalls, women selling vegetables, fruit, and game, afford more instructive and interesting materials for descriptive writing. But if the matter of Metsu's pictures be thus barren of amusing and edifying incident, his method of treating it and his wonderful execution, are worthy of the closest study by every artist and amateur. None of his rivals in the same class of art excelled him in the effective manage- ment of light and shade, in accuracy of drawing, and in chasteness and harmony of colour. His style was less laboured than that of Terburg, of Francis Mieris, and of Gerard Dou, though his pictures are as carefully finished, and show as great regard to the minutest detail. He was no määnerieſ;his touch is free and vigorous, and invariably adapted to the particular object he would tº , g º e • * o © o GABR/EZ METSU. IOI represent. “Metsu,” says an anonymous modern critic, “perhaps attained perfection in his style, and carried painting as a mere imitative art to its highest degree of excellence. The tone of his pictures is complete nature, every tint is perfectly true, and every object is accordingly in its proper place, for his drawing and linear perspective were equal to his light, and shade, and colour. | Tºll " "Nº. º | THE LOVER'S VISIT. Beyond this he did not go; his works exhibit nothing choice or extraordinary either in subject or arrangement, and the faithful representation of familiar life appears to have been the end of his art, not for the sake of the scenes, but for the imitation's sake. He was essentially a materialist in art, and this is the distinguishing characteristic of the Dutch painters generally.” Bryan, in D D I O2 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. his “Dictionary of Painters and Engravers,” remarks when referring to this painter, “though he painted on so small a scale, his style may be compared to that of Van Dyck, in the correct drawings of the heads and hands, the delicacy of his carnations, and the breadth and facility of his pencil. The attitudes of his figures are easy and natural, and there is a truth and naiveté in the expression of his heads which may be said to be peculiar to him. The works of Metsu may perhaps be justly proposed as models of perfection in the particular branch of art in which he excelled, as combining freedom with finish, and as exhibiting a transparence and purity of colouring, which is disturbed and destroyed by the torment of extreme and laborious polishing.” And, while bringing forward the opinions of other critics on the works of this master, that of Mr. Smith, perhaps one of those connoisseurs most learned in the pictures of the Dutch and Flemish painters, ought not to be omitted; it forms a portion of his introductory remarks to the list of Metsu's pictures, in the “Catalogue’’ to which reference has already been made. “But whatever his picture may represent, there will ever be found in it a tasteful selection of objects, disposed in the most pleasing manner, and rendered interesting and effective by a judicious choice of colouring, and a skilful management of light and shade. The superiority of Metsu over every artist in the Dutch school is chiefly observable in the chaste and beautiful drawing of his figures, accompanied by a peculiar refinement of character, and, where necessary, great elegance of manner. The dresses of his figures, whether composed of satin, silk, or meaner materials, are disposed with taste, and their various qualities accurately denoted. The handling, or execution, is at all times broad, free, and appropriate.” Of the engravings here introduced as serving to show the style of this master's compositions, the first is from a picture entitled “THE PLANISTE’’; it exhibits a lady playing on a pianoforte. M. Charles Blanc, in his “Vies des Peintres,” says, “It formed part of the collection of M. Randon de Boisset, and was valued at the sale of this amateur’s gallery, in 1777, at 4,999 livres, 19 Sous. It subsequently figured in the collections of MM. Beaujon, Le Brun, Greffier, Fagel, and several others; at length it passed into the hands of M. Delahaute, who disposed of it to the museum of the Louvre, where it now is.” The next engraving is from Metsu's celebrated picture of “THE LETTER-WRITER,” in the fine collection of Mr. Hope, of London. It represents a young gentleman in a black silk dress with a broad white collar round his neck, that tells as a relief to the sombre hue of his costume: he is seated at a table covered with richly embroidered tapestry; a silver inkstand and a wafer stamp are on the table. A picture of cattle, in a richly carved frame, hangs against the wall, and the flooring is of black and white marble. The room is brilliantly illuminated from the open casement. The individual thus represented is said to be a portrait of Paul Potter, a supposition in some degree borne out by the cattle-picture, which, it may be presumed, was introduced out of compliment to the great artist of such subjects. “The Letter-Writer” has been engraved by Mr. John Burnet, who refers to it in one of his published works on art as an admirable example of skilful composition, and of effective arrangement of chiar'-oscuro. Smith speaks of it as “a production of the rarest excellence and beauty;” we also learn from him the prices it realised during a century of years, for it was sold in 1724 from the collection of M. Bruyn, at Amsterdam, for 474; from that of M. Braamcamp, in 1771, for £468; while it was valued, by GABRIEE METSU. IO3 the same writer, at 500 guineas. “THE LovER's Visit,” which was formerly in the Choiseul collection, and more recently in that of the Duchess de Berri (neither M. Blanc nor Mr. Smith informs us where it now is), is, according to the latter authority, a picture of larger dimensions than Metsu generally painted, its size being thirty-one inches by twenty-five inches. Mr. Smith describes it as representing “a lady, elegantly dressed in a white satin robe, bordered with gold lace, a red corset, and a white neckerchief, standing up, washing her hands in a silver basin,” &c., &c. It was sold from the collection of M. Randon de Boisset, in 1777, for £399; and from that of M. Robit, in 1801, for £180 only. The picture of “THE VEGETABLE MARKET AT AMSTERDAM’’ is in the Louvre of Paris; the subject is almost universally known among amateurs from the prints by David, and in that fine collection of engraved works, entitled the “Musée Française.” It is thus described by Mr. Smith in his “Catalogue:” “The picture exhibits a view on one of the grachts of that city, the quay of which is occupied by a number of market-people, with their commodities. Those nearest the spectator consist of three women and a man; one of the former, standing with her arms akimbo, seems, by the agitation of her countenance, to be venting her fury in words upon a portly woman, who sits very composedly upon the handle of a barrow containing vegetables: the amount of payment for having wheeled the said barrow to market is probably the subject of dispute. The third female is young, and of an interesting appearance; she has a brass pail on her arm, and her head is turned, as if she were listening to the gallantry of a youth behind her, who by his gesture is offering to carry her pail. More towards the side is a fine spaniel, looking wistfully at a cock perched on a basket; near these are a tub of garden-stuff, and a fowl on the ground. A large tree rises on the opposite side, the branches of which overshadow most of the persons in the second distance. A small vessel is on the canal, beyond which the view is bounded by houses.” In a brief comment on this work, the same writer says:— “This capital picture has had the reputation of being the chef d'auvre of the master, and the large prices for which it has been sold go far to confirm that opinion.” Mr. Smith, however, does not think so, for he remarks there are several described in his book that possess much higher claims to the admiration of the connoisseur. It may here be observed that, with the exception of two other pictures, the “Woman taken in Adultery,” which is also in the Louvre, and the only historical work, it is presumed, Metsu ever painted, and an equestrian “Portrait of the young Prince of Orange, with Attendants,” mentioned by Smith as in the collection of a French officer, General Verdier, “The Vegetable Market” is the largest painting which the artist is known to have produced, its size being three feet by two feet seven inches. It was sold from the collection of M. Blondel de Gagny, in 1776, for 4 1,032 ; subsequently, in 1783, it realised only £752; but was valued by the French authorities at the Museum, in 1816, at 4, 1,600 Beyond those qualities of careful execution, harmonious colouring, and generally effective treatment, which are characteristic of Metsu's style of painting, the “Vegetable Market at Amsterdam ” presents nothing to render, it attractive. Pictures of low life, as such subjects are usually denominated, are not always devoid of interest, but the ugly, wrangling old woman, although a type of her class, as it exists everywhere, exhibits nature too much in its infirmity to render such a representation pleasing. IO4 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. The last illustration, called “THE GALLANT's ToAst,” corresponds with No. 111 in Smith's “Catalogue,” there entitled “Interior of a Cabaret;” it represents a juvenile cavalier, attired in the rich and elegant costume of the period, with his arm round the neck of a young female seated by his side, with a dish of strawberries in her lap. A silver jug, some dried fish, and a roll, are on the adjoining table, while the hostess of the cabaret is marking sundry figures THE WEGETABLE MARKET AT AMSTERDAM. in her “day-book,” which the “gallant” will probably hear of in the shape of a reckoning to pay. This picture is in the Dresden Gallery; Smith values it at 4350, and describes it as painted in the artist’s “free and most fascinating manner.” The composition of the two principal figures is undoubtedly very graceful and natural, the perfect abandom of the cavalier and his look of joyous merriment are admirable; equalled only by Hogarth in his “ Rake's Progress.” GABR/EZ METSU. IO5 The number of pictures by Metsu described by Smith in his “Catalogue” is one hundred and twenty, to which must be added about twenty more mentioned by the same writer in his “Appendix" to the first published work. These are scattered through most of the chief public and private galleries of Europe, the Louvre and the Royal Gallery at Dresden possessing, each, the larger number; in the former collection, besides the “Vegetable Market at Amsterdam,” are the “Pianiste,” the “Woman taken in Adultery,” the “Morning Visitor,” a “Portrait of Vº Ø º | THE GALLANT'S To AST. Admiral Van Tromp,” the “ Chemist,” and “La Peleuse des Pommes.” The eight pictures in the Royal Gallery of Dresden are all excellent examples of this esteemed master; they consist of the “Gallant's Toast;” the “Poultry and Game Dealer;” the “Poultry Woman " " An Old Man offering a Fowl for Sale to a Lady;” the “Smoker;” the “Manufacturer of Artificial Teeth;” a “Young Lady Reading a Letter,” and “Portraits of a Gentleman, his Wife, and four Children, grouped.” The Museum of Amsterdam contains only two pictures by Metsu, and that of the Hague but three ; there are several, however, to be found among the best private E. E. IO6 GREAT MASTERS OF AFT. collections in Holland. The Emperor of Russia’s private gallery at the Hermitage, St. Peters- burg, is enriched with three or four of the works of this painter. In our own country they are chiefly to be seen in private hands, but the Queen possesses the “Violoncello Player;” the “Fruit and Vegetable Girl;” and a “Portrait of the Artist.” The Bridgewater Gallery has the “Favourite Spaniel,” a “Cavalier on Horseback,” and a “Woman selling Herrings.”* An exquisite work, “Le Corset Bleu,” is, or was, in the hands of Mr. Joseph Neeld; a pendant to it, “Le Corset Rouge,” in those of Sir Simon Clarke. The “Letter-Writer,” engraved here, and three other pictures, one of a lady writing to the dictation of a gentleman; another, a lady reading a letter, a servant also present; and the third, a lady holding a miniature, while a page pours water into a silver basin, are in the possession of Mr. H. Hope; “Preparing for a Duet,” and the “Music Lesson,” formerly in the collection of Sir R. Peel, are now in the National Gallery; till the acquisition of these works in 1871, the Gallery contained no examples of this painter; the “Female Artist,” and a “Woman Reading at a Window,” are in the collection of Lord Ashburton; and Mr. Labouchere is the owner of “A Woman Weighing Money.” There are a few pictures scattered elsewhere in private galleries of the country; but Metsu's principal works are already enumerated. * Dr. Waagen, in his “Art-Treasures in Great Britain,” makes a curious mistake in his description of this picture. He calls it—“A Woman selling Earrings in a Shop.” ADRIAN VAN DE VELDE. MONG the Dutch painters there is no name more familiar than Van de Velde. There were three Van de Veldes, but whether Adrian, whom we have now under consideration, was related to the other two, father and son, has never been clearly ascertained. Houbraken speaks of him as son and brother, respectively, to the William Van de Veldes; but Bryan rather inclines to a different opinion ; the matter, however, is of little importance except as a biographical fact. Adrian Van de Velde was born at Amsterdam, in 1639; he early exhibited a taste for the fine arts by sketching, when not more than six years of age, animals and other objects, on the walls of his father's house. If we follow Houbraken's history, we learn from it that the elder William Van de Velde was most unwilling his son should follow the arts as a profession, but finding it impossible to withstand the youth's strong predilections, he at length yielded to his wishes, and placed him under John Wynants, who was then in great reputation as a landscape-painter at Haarlem. This distinguished painter expressed his admiration of the sketches which Adrian showed him, and Houbraken tells us that when the wife of Wynants saw them, she said to her husband, “Now, Wynants, you have found your master.” IoS GREAT MASTERS OF AFT. Wynants was a constant and close student of nature; he impressed on the mind of his pupil the importance of following the same practice; and accordingly much of this period of his life -- º º º: * - º, Tºº EARLY MORNING. was passed in fields and meadows, sketching whatever he found in the animal and vegetable worlds that deserved his attention. In the studio he did not neglect the human form; he CROSSING THE RIVER, frequently made drawings from the living model, and would doubtless have become a clever historical painter, had he entirely devoted himself to this branch of art. This supposition is A DRIAAW P.A.W DE VEL/D E. IO9 founded on the excellence of an altar-piece he painted for the Roman Catholic church at Amsterdam, the subject of which was the “Descent from the Cross; ” whether this picture exists at present, or not, I cannot say—no mention is made of it in any work to which I have access— but early biographers speak of it as worthy of admiration for correctness of drawing and beauty of colour. He also painted for the same church several other scriptural subjects which have been very highly spoken of Dr. Waagen speaks very highly of an historical picture, “The Flight of Jacob,” by A. Van de Velde, in the collection of the late Marquis of Hertford. Wynants, though an admirable landscape-painter, was unable to draw the figure, and previously to Adrian's residence with him, he used to employ Wouwerman or Lingelback to embellish his pictures with A WINTER SCENE. living objects, but he soon found as able an assistant in his young pupil. Some of Wynants' best pictures have the figures and animals put in by the hand of Van de Velde; so also have those of several of the Dutch contemporaneous landscape-painters, Hobbema, Ruysdael, Vander Heyden, Verboom, Hackaert, &c., &c. This highly esteemed painter died at Amsterdam in 1672; his pictures are much sought after, and are eagerly caught up when chance brings them before the public, but these occasions are rare. The following just and discriminating criticism on the works of this highly esteemed painter appears in Mr. Smith’s “Catalogue.” After alluding to Van de Velde's constant and careful studying from nature, the writer observes, “By these means, aided by a lively genius, he arrived F F I IO GA'EAT MASTERS OF AR7, at a degree of perfection in the delineation of the several kinds of pastoral animals that no artist has ever attained. If Paul Potter surpassed him in portraying the sturdy bull, and equalled him in that of the cow, he was decidedly superior to that artist in every other animal; being more correct and elegant in the just articulation of all the parts. His handling is delightfully free and spirited; yet the general effect is singularly melting and tender, requiring to be viewed near (or even with a magnifying glass), in order to discover the exquisite delicacy of the eyes, and other minute parts of the animals. The views which he most frequently represented were an enclosed meadow, or a sequestered woody scene, enlivened by a stream of water, and occasionally varied by a hovel or a neatherd's cottage. Sometimes he would break into the open country, and animate the landscape with a party of ladies and gentlemen, accompanied by huntsmen and dogs, enjoying the sports of the field. Again, he would represent a similar party departing from, or THE HAY FIELD. arriving at, the court or park of some noble mansion. Whatever chance placed before him, whether it were the ‘Shore of Schevening,” the ‘Harvest Field,” or the ‘Frozen Canal,” his hand gave beauty and interest to the scene.” Considering the comparatively short life of Adrian Van de Velde (for he was only thirty- three years old at his death, in 1672), and the number and character of his works, he must have laboured most assiduously; Smith describes one hundred and fifty-eight in his “Catalogue,” y and about twenty in his “Supplement; ” it must not be forgotten, moreover, how much of the artist's time was occupied in working on the pictures of other painters. The first engraving * now in the Louvre, in Paris; introduced here is from a beautiful picture, “EARLY MORNING,” it represents a river-scene with cattle and figures, and was valued by the Æaſer's du //usée, in 1816, as we learn from the above authority, at 4, 1,200. I cannot find any description in the A D/E/AM WAIV DE WELDE. I I I “Catalogue” exactly answering to the picture, “CRossING THE River ;” but the composition of the subject is excellent, and it is treated in a bright and sparkling manner. The “Winter y SCENE’’ is from a painting now in the Royal Gallery of Dresden; it is a picture held in much repute for the fidelity and delicacy of its colouring. “THE HAYFIELD '' is one of the gems of Lord Ashburton's collection ; it is a small picture, measuring only fourteen inches by twelve; -- - W - - - ſº - - º - - % % w º ſ ...” º º/ . *… *"...º. - - lºw Tºº-º-º-º-º-º: % º º Wºº-->~ THE PASTURE. Mr. Smith says, “it is impossible to commend too highly this excellent production of art; whether the eye be directed to the composition, the expression, the drawing of the figures, the II 2 GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. colouring, or execution, each will be found to possess a degree of perfection rarely attained.” This picture was formerly in the possession of Prince Talleyrand. * The two engravings on the page immediately preceding, which, it will be perceived, are totally different in style from the others, are taken from two of several admirable etchings which Van de Velde produced; they are executed in a free, bold, and masterly manner, and are noteworthy for the accurate drawing of the animals, and their life-like character. There are few collections of any repute in northern Europe which do not contain one or more examples of this painter: Her Majesty possesses eight or nine; there are several in the Louvre; Munich has five or six; while Amsterdam and the Hague have lower numbers in their public galleries. Our own National Gallery shows three, all of them purchased with the Peel Collection :-a “Farm-yard and Cottage;” “The Ford,” a man and two women, with cattle and sheep, crossing a stream ; and a “Frost Scene,” a frozen river, with numerous figures skating or in sledges, while some are playing the game of hockey. These pictures are all excellent examples of the master. CORNELIUS BEGA. LMOST every great school of art, to whatever country or period it belongs, has a multitude of men associated with it who are not unworthy of sharing its honours, because, though lower in the scale of merit, they have assisted in maintaining and extending the fame of their superiors. Like the rank and file of a victorious army, they helped to win the battle; and, if not entitled to wear the jewelled decorations that are the reward of those who planned the movements of the campaign and led the forces into action, the laurel-leaf should, at least, be offered them. It too frequently happens, however, that, dazzled by the brilliant exploits of the leaders, whether in arts or arms, we are apt to underrate, or entirely to overlook, the deeds of their more humble followers, and thus we confine our laudations within a much narrower circle than justice demands. This total, or even comparative, neglect of worth especially applies to many works of the old painters; one may often see inferior pictures by artists of high reputation purchased at almost incredible prices, while better works by men of less note have realised insignificant sums. A portrait by Ferdinand Bol, for instance, would not excite half the competition that another would from the pencil of his master, Rembrandt, though it might exhibit so much of the excellence of the latter, as to deceive any but the most accomplished connoisseur; nor would one of Giles Backereel's historical compositions be deemed equal in pecuniary value to one of Van Dyck's, though, when the artists were living, contemporaneously, the reputation of both is said to have been nearly on a par. The fact is, in apportioning the relative awards of honour, we are too G. G. II.4. GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. much inclined to defer our judgment to the authority of great names whose ſame overshadows the brightness of such as have not attained their lofty eminence in public estimation. The schools of the Low Countries during the seventeenth century, then perhaps in their most flourishing condition, had in them a host of clever artists, with talent in all respects, except originality, far little inferior to those with whose names we have become familiar. But it is because of this absence of originality that the world regards them as stars of minor magnitude; in composition, in colour, and as manipulators, they may take rank with those of the highest degree, but their ideas they owe to others, and therefore are clearly unentitled to the honours rightfully belonging to genius, which is only another term for original thought. “Masters,” says M. Charles Blanc, “who imitate no one, have themselves a host of imitators.” We see this even among ourselves; a painter who strikes into a new and untrodden path, provided it leads to popular favour, is certain of having a train of followers more or less numerous, according to the difficulties that beset their progress. Some of these perchance may overtake, possibly outstrip, their leader, but the majority are tolerably certain of never reaching the goal of expectation, where “Fame on her throne of majesty doth sit, To crown the victor.” No illusive recommendations should be held forth to young artists to become experimentalists in their profession; yet it is well to see that their thoughts are their own, and not borrowed from others; they thus stand a far better chance of gaining attention, and very frequently, if pursuing a right path, of making themselves distinguished. Cornelius Bega was born at Haarlem about 1620, a THE FISH-SELLER. period when art in Holland had almost, if not quite, reached its zenith. He must have inherited a taste for it, for his father was a wood-engraver, named Begeyn, and his mother is said to have been a daughter of an excellent historical painter, Cornelius Cornelisz, better known by the name of Van Haarlem. Houbraken says that young Begeyn changed his name for that of Bega, because his father, on account of certain irregularities of conduct, had driven him from his home and disowned him. Descamps, however, who wrote after Houbraken, denies the statement of Bega's misconduct, and attributes his change of name to a desire on the part of the father that he should do so, though no reason is assigned for a wish that appears contrary to the ordinary feelings of nature, unless it were prompted by some especial motive. It has been too much the custom with ourselves, and with some of their neighbours on the continent, to stigmatise the inhabitants of the Low Countries as a dull, plodding race, wholly absorbed in mercantile pursuits; but any nation might be challenged to produce a list of painters, flourishing within half a century of time, in every way comparable to those of Holland and the Netherlands who were contemporary with Bega. History, genre, landscape, portraiture, had their representatives, and of the highest order in every quality, except that mens divinior which CORAVEL/US BEGA. - II 5 seems to belong exclusively to the Italian schools. Nor is painting the only art for which the Dutch and Flemings have evinced a more than usual degree of aptitude; engraving has been practised by them with great success; sculpture, in its most elevated character, is, it is true, almost unknown to them ; but in ornamental works, whether of wood or stone, they have had few rivals; their ancient dwelling-houses and civic halls abound with examples of this description of art, distinguished by unquestionable taste in design, and by the most skilful, elaborate, and delicate execution. A people by and for whom such works are wrought are certainly not THE DANCE IN THE ALEHOUSE- amenable to the charge that has frequently been brought against them, even had they done nothing to advance the progress of science and literature, which the records of their bibliopolists prove they have. All nations are not alike endowed with the same gifts, but there are none which have attained civilisation that have not contributed something towards the happiness of the great human family. The materials for supplying a biographical sketch of Bega are even more scanty than those of many other painters. Neither Houbraken nor Descamps relates anything concerning him 16 GA EA 7" J/A.STERS OF AA’ſ. that throws a light upon his career, but that he entered the studio of Adrian Van Ostade, and became one of his most distinguished scholars; having for his associates there the brother of his master, Isaac Ostade, Anthony Goebauw, Michael van Musscher, and Cornelius Dusart. Houbraken, however, mentions the circumstances of his death, which, if truly related, offer a strong contrast to the alleged improprieties of his early life. Holland, in the year 1644, was visited by that terrible calamity the plague, and a young female, to whom the artist was much THE WIOLIN PLAYER. attached, fell sick with the disease, and was abandoned, through fear of the contagion, by all her relatives and friends, Bega only excepted, who continued to the last the most assiduous attentions to her, and became the victim of his fidelity, dying a few days only after her to whom he had shown such true devotedness. This event occurred in his forty-fourth year. The observation made in the opening remarks upon this painter, to the effect that, when an CORAWEZ/US AEGA. I 17 artist begins by being a copyist, or ceases to be original, he loses all chance of becoming an authority, and must ever be content to find himself in a secondary position, applies with much force to Cornelius Bega. Confining himself through his whole practice to what he had learned in the school of Ostade, his reputation is absorbed in the superior talent of his master; or, it might perhaps be more properly said, is eclipsed by it. The younger Teniers and Ostade often painted similar scenes, but the style in which each treated them differed so much from that of the other, that neither can be justly called an imitator; whereas Bega, with certainly no less of vulgarism than Ostade, and with more vigour, is yet his true disciple in the principal characteristics of his painting. If one were to form an opinion of the Dutch peasantry from the physiognomic representations bequeathed to us by the old Dutch artists, we should assuredly place them in the lowest scale of civilised beings, even if we did not exclude them altogether. Take, for instance—and it is only one out of the large majority of pictures emanating from this school—the entire group listening to “THE VIOLIN-PLAYER; ” there is scarcely a countenance among them that indicates rationality, and yet they are amusing, and full of character of a certain order. But there is some skilful drawing in the whole of these figures, especially in that of the man seated in front, while the management of light and shade in the work shows Bega to have been a {master of chiar’-oscuro, notwithstanding Waagen’s strictures, quoted on the next page. The “DANCE IN THE ALE-HOUSE,” a picture in the Dresden Gallery, is humorously vulgar. We find here the same repulsive features and unsightly forms carried even to an extent far more disagreeable, while the drawing and the chiar'-osciuro are again excellent. The majority of the figures are types of almost the lowest scale of humanity among the frequenters of the village ale-house, as personified by the naturalism of the Dutch and Flemish painters; looking at such a scene as this, one seems at a loss to understand how an artist of reputable character could select such themes for the exercise of his genius. They point no moral, like the majority of Hogarth’s compositions. Bega could have painted very few pictures, or they must have found their way into places where the world hears nothing of them. All that I can authoritatively ascertain to be in England are one in Bridgwater House, spoken of by Waagen, but without title or description ; one at Luton House, a seat of the Marquis of Bute; it represents a man and his wife; one, a peasant-woman in a room, into which a girl carrying a basket is entering, in the possession of Mr. Henderson, Russell Square; and another, peasants in a room, belonging to the Duke of Northumberland, at Zion House. I class this among the works of Bega on the authority of Waagen: in the Duke's catalogue it is called a Brouwer. The continental collections, not excepting the Museum of Amsterdam, in his own country, are scarcely richer than our own. There is one in the Louvre, representing “The Interior of a Cottage; ” another, “A Company of Four Peasants in a Cottage,” in the Belvidere Gallery at Vienna; at Munich is a “Company of Boors in an Ale-house; ” at Dresden, in addition to “THE DANCE,” is “THE FISH-SELLER,” both of which are among our illustrations; and in the Museum of Amsterdam are “An Old Man 2 in his Work-room,” and a “Rustic Divertissement.” O e º º & e “Bega,” writes Waagen, in his “Handbook of Painting—the German, Dutch, and Flemish H. H. II 8 GREAT MASTERS OF AZZ". Schools,” “treated the same class of subjects as his master, but different from him in manner of conception, as in most other respects. He was a better draughtsman, and had more sense of beauty; but, on the other hand, he was far inferior in feeling for colour and chiar'-oscuro. His flesh-tints are generally cool and reddish, and the rest of his colours have a heavy tone. He used but few glazing tints, and his execution is smoother than his master’s.” If the German critic means to apply the word “beauty” to personal appearance—and it is not clear in what other sense he uses it—one cannot but smile : there is no comparison to be made between things that are alike, and to draw any distinction between the features of Bega's pictures and those of Ostade would only be to remark that the latter's are, perhaps, a little less coarse than the former's: certainly no one would look for a Venus or an Adonis in the pictures of either artist. As the works of this artist come so rarely (it might almost be said they now never come), into the market, it is impossible to form any correct idea of their present monetary value. I have no recollection of a single picture by him being publicly offered for sale in this country. Bega etched a number of plates, about thirty-seven, executed rather coarsely. N WN N N - w w NN W N º º N \ º W \ | - º º W º º PHILIP WOUWERMAN. HERE are few of the old Dutch painters, or, indeed, of any of the ancient foreign schools, whose works are better known or more highly appreciated in England, than those of Philip Wouwerman, or, as he is generally called, Wouvermans; recent researches, however, have determined the former method of spelling his name to be the correct one. His cavalry halts and skirmishes, his landscapes embellished with groups of spirited figures, and his interiors similarly enlivened, are to be found in every collection, of any note, throughout the kingdom. The subjects he usually painted are of a class to ensure popularity in a country where the horse, Wouwerman's favourite animal, is no less a favourite with all ranks and conditions. “History,” says a modern French writer, “does not inform us whether the artist was himself one of those stout cavaliers who knew how to manage their chargers with so much grace and dexterity, but he certainly drew more horses on his canvas than he reckoned among his stud. How closely must he have studied in the academy of the stable, by the side of the farrier's forge, and in the courtyards of hostelries, watching the various movements of the animal, and rapidly sketching his form in all its diversified attitudes.” It is thus only that an artist can become a proficient in any department to which he aspires; an animal-painter would acquire nothing of the knowledge he wishes to attain among the classic models of the human figure to be seen in the best schools, nor would a painter of history, except for particular purposes, learn anything from the companionship of grooms and stable-boys; and yet principles of art-education as absurd as these have been advocated by grave and sensible men, who would base all teaching on one unvarying law which, like that of the Medes, must never be changed. I 20 GREAT MASTERS OF AA’T. Philip Wouwerman was born at Haarlem in 1620; his father, Paul Wouwerman, was a historical painter of little celebrity, but possessing sufficient capacity to constitute him an excellent tutor to his son, in the early years of the latter. From the period when the father's preceptorship terminated till the reputation of the son had become firmly established, much obscurity prevails as to his subsequent masters and studies. Most biographical writers have followed Houbraken’s history, published upwards of fifty years after the death of Wouwerman, and which is exceedingly vague, contradictory, and founded on mere hearsay. Recent authorities, particularly Mr. C. J. Nieuwenhuys, and Mr. Stanley in his revised edition of “Bryan's Dictionary of Painters and Engravers,” have, however, cleared up many of the inconsistencies that appear in the writings of previous authors. Houbraken states that Wouwerman became the pupil of John Wynants, and by the instruction THE DONKEY. of that excellent landscape-painter his progress was so rapid that it surprised his master, whose pictures he frequently embellished with figures and animals. Waagen also calls him Wynants' scholar. Now, although there cannot be a doubt that Wouwerman sometimes imitated Wynants and even Peter Van Laer, commonly called Bamboccio, it is not so clear that he entered the studio of the former artist as a pupil. On this point Mr. Stanley says:– “ For what purpose did he enter the school of that master? certainly not to learn to paint animals and figures, for Mr. Nieuwenhuys has shown that the landscapes in which he has, in some measure, imitated Wynants, are not his earliest works. The frequency of his painting animals and figures in that master's landscapes would naturally induce an occasional imitation, especially when the subject required sandy hillocks and broken roads; but this is no proof that he was ever the pupil of Wynants. There is more likelihood that he was instructed both in landscape and animal- PHILIP WOU WERMAN. I 2 I painting by Peter Verbeek, of Haarlem, to whose landscapes and hunting-pieces his earlier pictures bear a resemblance; and that his connexion with Wynants was rather that of a coadjutor than as a pupil.” It is generally supposed that Wouwerman was first brought into notice by John de Wet, the painter and picture-dealer of Haarlem ; the circumstances are thus related: De wet had commissioned Bamboccio to paint him a picture of cavalry halting, for which the artist required AN EN CAMPMENT. two hundred florins; this sum being considered too large, and Bamboccio refusing to execute the work for less, Wouwerman, whose merits were not entirely unknown, was applied to for a similar subject at the same price, and he consented to paint one of his very best pictures for the dealer; and he did so. De Wet made considerable stir about the great talent he had discovered in a comparatively unknown artist, more for the purpose, it is said, of annoying Bamboccio, than for attaching credit to his own discernment. He invited all the connoisseurs of the place to see the I I I 2.2 GA’EA Z' MASTERS OF AA’7”. chef-d'oeuvre, and thus the reputation of the painter became firmly established. Another version of this story is, that the commission was given simultaneously to the two artists, to prove that a painter who had studied in Rome, as Bamboccio had, was not necessarily a greater painter than he who had not; the connoisseurs of that day invariably giving a preference to the works of the former. Houbraken says that the slight thus put upon Bamboccio so affected his mind as to hasten his death; but, as Mr. Stanley observes, “the mortification must have been a long time operating, for Wouwerman had been in his grave five years when Bamboccio committed suicide.” ON THF. ROAD. Another subject of discussion among the biographers of this artist refers to the patronage his works met with during his life-time. Bryan, who, we suppose, followed Houbraken's history, says:-‘‘To supply the wants of a numerous family, he was obliged to work without relaxation; but such was his love for his art that the most urgent necessity could never induce him to leave any of his works in a neglected or unfinished state. The pictures of Peter de Laer, called Bamboccio, at that time engrossed the admiration of the Dutch collectors, and the charming productions of Wouwerman were suffered to remain unnoticed and unknown. The PHILIP WOUWERMAAV. I 23 disappointment and chagrin at finding his works so much neglected, is supposed to have impaired his health,” &c. Mr. Stanley combats this notion so forcibly, that we cannot do better than bring forward his observations on the matter:-" As to his merits being overlooked, and his pictures neglected or undervalued, during his life, the assertion can hardly require refutation. Would all the most eminent landscape-painters of his country and time solicit an artist, whose abilities were not esteemed, to embellish their works 2 Would an artist whose productions were neglected or undervalued continue to paint picture after picture, bestowing BY THE SEASIDE. the greatest care and diligence in perfecting the beauty of all, to the number of nearly eight hundred known, independent of his illustrations of the works of others It may rather be concluded that the good payment he received was a stimulus to exertion. But if he did not sell his pictures, how comes it so many hundreds are so carefully preserved in all parts of Europe? and that they have been found in collections and in families, where they have been from so early a period that the record of their acquisition is lost. Examine the subjects of his pictures—do they, in any way, betray poverty of circumstances on the part of the painter P Gentlemen and ladies of rank going out hawking and hunting, or returning from I 24 GREA 7" /ASTERS OF AA-7. their sports, gallantly attired and attended, all joyous as the day; no incident omitted that could add interest to the scene; all indicating that the artist himself was a frequent partaker of such sports, and fully acquainted with the polished manners of the higher order of society.” Such, and many arguments of a similar nature, are adduced in denial of Wouwerman's want of patronage, and they seem sufficiently satisfactory, although it must be acknowledged there are too many examples to prove that painters will persevere in a peculiar style of work, notwithstanding every discouragement attending their labours. Mr. Wornum, in his “Epochs of - Painting,” says, “Although a painter of extraordinary powers, he was not appreciated in his lifetime, and he lived and died poor; he appears to have wanted the ability of making friends.” Wouwerman died in 1668. Tradition says that before his death he ordered all his studies, sketches, and drawings to be burned, lest any of his children should follow a profession THE FARM-SHED. which had proved so unprofitable to him. It need scarcely be said that this report, like others of a similar nature, is not founded on fact; his sketches are certainly very rarely to be met with, but this may be accounted for on the presumption, by no means an improbable one, that during the latter part of his life especially, from constant occupation in his ate/ier, he made but few ; and that his earlier studies were destroyed when they had served his immediate purpose, because he did not think them worth preserving. The pictures of this fine painter are finished with scrupulous delicacy, yet with great breadth of effect; his colouring is rich and luminous, and his management of light and shade most masterly. The truth and beauty of his mountainous scenery is a contradiction to the rumour that he never travelled out of his native country, for such representations could not have been painted from description, and he was no copyist of other artists. * - sº, ſ/ º Nº. § sº CORNELIUS HUYSMAN. N º -- Yº. º º º Nº º \ º ORNELIUS HUYSMAN, or, as he is sometimes called in England, House- ...-- £3 º man—generally known by the name of Huysman of Malines, from his º º residence in that city, and to distinguish him from another painter, James § -- Huysman—was born at Antwerp in 1648. His father was an architect, º -- :* - who had destined him for his own profession; but having lost both his º º § * parents while yet a child, the education of the young orphan was entrusted º º º to an uncle, who placed him in the school of Gaspar de Wit, a landscape- º painter. After a short residence with this artist, he had an opportunity " of seeing some of the pictures of James Van Artois, at that time in the meridian of his fame, and was so charmed with their beauty, that he immediately set out for Brussels, where Van Artois lived, and presented himself before him. Van Artois was a man of pleasing and gentle manners; he received the youth with kindness, took him into his house, and, ascertaining his aptitude for sketching from nature, set him to make drawings of the finest trees he could find, and the most sparkling rivulets; for the master excelled in his delineation of such objects especially. There is no doubt the latter found these studies of great use to himself, but they equally profited the pupil, by laying the foundation of those beautiful compositions and elegant natural forms which he afterwards introduced into his own works. It was not very long before the reputation of Huysman became even greater than that of his preceptor, whom he quitted, after a residence of some time in his house, and established himself at Malines, where he continued till his death. With the exception of the country round about Liége, and the hilly districts of Namur, K. K. I 26 - GREAT MASTERS OF AR7. Belgium shows few striking features of landscape, and, to a great extent, is very monotonous: it possesses much that is pleasing to a lover of the simple scenes of nature, but little that would call forth the feeling which a grand landscape invariably produces. A Belgian artist sketching in the vicinity of Antwerp or of Malines, may, without doubt, return to his study with some pleasing bits of natural scenery; he may be able to invest cottages and rustic bridges with a certain degree of interest, may render picturesque the knarled trunk of some old tree hanging over a pond of stagnant water, but he would find it extremely difficult to develop the majesty of nature, as it is presented in “dim old woods” with their vast shadows, in the movement and disruptions of the soil, in upheaved rocks, and in dark and deep ravines, without coming in contact with such. And yet, contrary to what might reasonably be expected, Huysman, living in the midst of a flat, ungenial country, composed such pictures as we have just described; they are what the French would call d’une grande nature. The most striking effect produced by the landscapes of Huysman is the feeling of grandeur they impose on the spectator; contrary to the Dutch artists, although they are such near neighbours, the Belgian painter requires not to see Italy to gain a style, or at least a kind of inspiration which will serve in its stead. His trees shoot upwards to the sky, and stretch their broad limbs across the canvas, as if they would break through the slender frame-work that surrounds them. There is this difference, however, between them and the Italian painters, or, at least, between them and Claude, that the heavens occupy but a small place in the compositions of the former. The white fleecy clouds, the “bits” of blue sky, are sparingly introduced, especially in the landscapes of Huysman, and then only to serve the purpose of relieving or detaching the masses of foliage from each other. The various atmospheric effects which distinguish the different hours of the day are little cared for by this painter. On the contrary, he leads us into shaded spots, where it would be almost impossible to determine the hour; but we know the Sun is shining somewhere, for we see it here and there on tufts of grass, and on the large wild plants that fill a conspicuous place in the foreground; he carries * us with him into thickets, and we walk over huge trunks of trees felled by the woodman’s axe, and so onwards to some Sandy hillock, broken into furrows by the rain and tempest, and perhaps lighted up by a single gleam of sunshine: an inch or two of distance closes in the scene. One of the characteristics of this painter’s works—one, perhaps, which distinguishes him from most of the old landscape-painters, is, that beneath his noble trees, which seem to stand only to offer their shades to gods and goddesses, he introduces only the most common-place figures, herdsmen leading their cattle to drink from “THE Rivulet,” or labourers, half-stripped, employed in lopping the oak just felled to the ground; so that the excellence and purity of his style is more manifest in his landscapes than in the figures which enliven them. The presence of these rude denizens of the field and forest gives to his pictures, notwithstanding his fine delineation of natural objects, a peculiarly rustic appearance. They resemble neither the Smiling pastorals of Berchem, nor the sober grandeur of Ruysdael, nor the grace, somewhat rude indeed, which we meet with in the works of Both. At first sight, one expects to find among those majestic trees some ancient temple, or that the priests of heathen mythology are celebrating beneath their deep and ominous shadows the mystic rites of their wonder-working religion; CORNELIUS HUPSMAAW. I 27 or, at least, that the nymphs of another Arcadia had come down to bathe in the secluded streams; but we encounter no colonnades, nor classic porches, nor the fountain which invited to repose the fair train of Diana; only, we perchance have a glimpse, in the twilight, of the roof of some cottage, the rendezvous of a gang of poachers, or of a family of neatherds. The figures of Huysman are drawn so naturally, are so well placed, and put in with so much ease and freedom, that the landscape-painters of his country frequently availed themselves of his pencil to people their solitary places. Van der Meulen, when once on a journey to Brussels, his native place, sought an introduction to Huysman, and entertained so high an opinion of him from what he saw at the interview, that Van Meulen, who had been invited to Paris, and kept there by the offers of Colbert, the minister, and by the patronage and pensions of Louis XIV., wished THE RIVULET. to present him to the French monarch. A sight of the landscapes of Huysman induced the belief that such an artist would be greatly appreciated by the court of Versailles, and that some of the fine trees growing in the forest of Soignies would be of infinite service on the canvases of Van der Meulen, who painted only encampments, sieges, and the pompous cavalcades of Louis XIV, including the carriages which conducted Madame Montespan to the seat of war as to a ſºte. But the artist, whose delight was to roam through the beauties of nature, and to woo her in her most quiet and secluded spots, could not be prevailed upon to quit Malines; he pleaded as his excuse that he was ignorant of the French language, and loved no other than that of his own country. However, at the solicitation of Van der Meulen, he painted for him, with wonderful freedom of pencil and powerful colouring, topographical views of Luxembourg and of Dinants, and the I 28 - GREAT MASTERS OF AR7. environs of these two strongly-fortified places. Taken from an elevated point, these views are most clearly developed, but the correctness of the representation is nothing in comparison with their charming artistic treatment. The pictures have long hung in the Louvre for the admiration of all; and it is difficult to suppose that every portion of them has not proceeded from the same hand, so well do the troops of Van der Meulen harmonise with the landscapes of Huysman, the former having put in the figures. It would be unjust to form an estimate of the genius of this artist by what we now see of his pictures, so dark have the majority of them become from the unfortunate habit he had of painting them on canvas primed with a sort of red, the consequence of which is they have a deep reddish- brown appearance. Still enough may be discerned to show that he was worthy of being called a “master” of his Art; and when we do by accident light upon a work in tolerably good pre- servation, a high value attaches to it. His treatment of light and shade resembles that of Rembrandt ; his touch is vigorous and broad, yet not deficient in delicacy; and his compositions, though grand in conception, are still true to nature. He lived to a good old age in Malines, the place of his adoption, dying in 1727, after an active and well-spent life extending to nearly eighty years. Lebrun, the celebrated amateur, says that he was one of the Flemish landscape- painters who threw most spirit and power into their works. The gallery of the Louvre, in Paris, contains several pictures by this artist; in that of Munich is “A Seaport; ” the museum of Brussels also contains a fine landscape enriched with several figures. Other public galleries and edifices of Europe exhibit none of his works, but they are frequently found in private collections in Holland and Belgium. - The only examples I hear of in our own country are one at Bridgewater House; one in the National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh; and two in the collection of Sir John Gage Sebright, at his mansion near Boxmoor. - K:D v. Aftinje. KAREL DU JARDIN. ºf MONG the painters of the seventeenth century whose works have ºf contributed to the glory of the Dutch school, one of the most eminent in the respective departments of landscape and domestic animals is Karel du Jardin, or Jardyn, as he sometimes signed his pictures. Descamps gives his birth in the year 1640, but as there are some etchings by him dated 1652, it is almost self-evident that it must have taken place earlier. Bartzsch, indeed, fixes it in 1635, and Smith, in a note appended to a list of the works of Du Jardin in his “Catalogue,” says, “It is impossible that the former date (1640) can be correct, as several excellent pictures by his hand are marked 1656, which would make him but sixteen years of age, and if the portrait of him in the Louvre be a faithful likeness, his birth may be dated about the year 1630.” This is the probable date given by Mr. Wornum, but Waagen puts it five years earlier. Du Jardin was a native of Amsterdam. The question as to who was his master seems to be as much a matter of doubt as the * L I 3O GREAT MASTERS OF AR7. period of his birth; Berchem and Paul Potter have each had the merit of inducting him into the mysteries of Art, but some of his pictures bear a closer resemblance in colour and effect to those of the latter painter than to Berchem’s. It was, however, in Italy that Du Jardin formed his style, which we may designate as a Dutch artist's feeling for art founded on Italian models. His landscapes certainly are almost entirely borrowed from the south, and his figures, generally, are the peasants and the cattle of the same sunny country. | * . . . . .x. In . - THE STREAM. Finding himself at liberty at a comparatively early age, and knowing that a considerable number of his countrymen were already located in Rome for the purposes of study, he determined upon joining them. Arrived there, his naturally gay and lively disposition soon KARE/ DV /ARD/V. I3 I commended him to the favourable notice of his brother-artists, who introduced him as a suitable member of the Bentvogel Society, an academical club styled Za Band. %yeuse ; a fraternity, it may be supposed, whose object was little in accordance with the spirit and profession of art. According to the laws of this society, every member bore some distinguishing cognomen, and Du Jardin obtained the appellation of Barºe de Bouc, or Goat's Beard." His social qualities, and his great talent for painting, for he found abundance of time amid his pleasurable pursuits to apply himself sedulously to his labours, soon made him very popular in Rome, especially with the -class of patrons who admired the humorous works of his fellow-countryman, Peter de Laer. And thus, possessing three elements generally STUDY OF SHEEP. considered essential to the enjoyment of existence—youth, high spirits, and pecuniary means- he contrived to pass some years of his life in a manner very agreeable to himself, except when his extravagances outran his purse, and then he set heartily to work to replenish it. How long Du Jardin remained in Rome on his first visit is uncertain ; in fact, the known incidents of his career are few, and such as tend little or nothing to uphold his character beyond his art. Having made up his mind to return to Holland, he set forward and reached Lyons, where he was induced to stop for a time, mainly at the instigation of some convivial companions, with whom he chanced unfortunately to fall in. His love of pleasure still remained with him, and the consequent inconveniences he had formerly incurred by following its dictates had * Smith's “Catalogue.” I 32 GA EA 7" /ASTERS OF AA-7. not yet taught him wisdom, so that he once more plunged into the dissipations of the city, contracting debts which even his labours at the easel did not enable him to discharge. On his first arrival at Lyons, he had become an inmate in the house of an elderly woman possessed of some little property; and at length, seeing that his difficulties increased so much as to render his future residence in the place somewhat insecure, and finding the old lady entertained a more than ordinary regard for her gay lodger, he made her an offer of his hand, was accepted, and married. But the match, as might be expected, produced no other advantage THE MULETEER OF ITALY. to the painter than the payment of his debts; his wife's temper was not of the most amiable character, and perpetual bickerings between the two were of constant occurrence, so that the life of the artist was rendered miserable, and his mind became proportionately unhinged. However, having settled all his affairs at Lyons, he proceeded on his journey to Amsterdam, of course accompanied by his wife. There his fame had already anticipated him, and had he remained single, it is not improbable but that he might have settled down quietly in his studio, for his pictures were in great requisition among Dutch amateurs, but the irascible disposition of his wife made his home insupportable. A near neighbour of Du Jardin was the Sieur Jean Reinst, who had long desired to visit Italy. The artist thought this a favourable KAREL DU /ARDIN. I 33 opportunity for escaping, at least for a time, from his domestic disquietudes; he accordingly left home, ostensibly for the purpose of seeing his friend embark on the Texel. Having RESTING BY THE WAYSIDE. reached the place from which it was intended to sail, he wrote to his wife, acquainting her with his intention of again visiting Italy, and, although unprovided with funds, embarked $ Sº § - * Nº ºxº … nº º ºl- - -- º ºSº Nº. § § - - - *-wºº. º º - º Nº. º N --- º § § º º y == = == tº ſt NSN Nº. - NMNAwuw N º§§ N SEs - --- - - LE GOUJAT ET LES DEUX ÄNEs. with Reinst for Leghorn, and thence proceeded to Rome. Here he continued for some time painting and spending his earnings as fast as he received them, in the most prodigal manner. M. M. I 34 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. A desire to see Venice induced him to make a journey to the “City of the Sea,” where he met with a fellow-countryman, a picture-dealer, who persuaded Du Jardin to share his residence, in the expectation, it is presumed, of employing the talents of his lodger to his own profit. However this may be, but little opportunity was afforded for benefiting by the speculation, as Du Jardin soon after his arrival was attacked by illness, which terminated his life, in the year 1678, at the age of forty-eight, supposing his birth to have taken place in 1630. The general A COOL MORNING. character of his works may be inferred from the engravings here introduced—which must not, however, be accepted as manifesting the style of his most important pictures; for, in fact, some of these illustrations are copied from his beautiful etchings, of which he executed a considerable number in a remarkably spirited style. It will, however, be readily seen from these examples that his compositions are more associated with Italian than with Dutch art; such was likely to be the consequence of his KAREZ DV /ARDIN. I 35 long residence in Italy, which moulded his taste in conformity with those objects that constantly surrounded him. Independently of the class of subjects to which allusion has been made as showing the general style of the productions of this painter, he occasionally, but very rarely, departed from it to exercise his talent on history. In the Louvre is a picture by him, executed on copper, about three feet by three and a half feet. It is intended to represent “The Crucifixion,” and although there are parts in it to which exception may be taken, as deficient in the solemn dignity of the occasion, it is as a whole a fine composition. In the collection of the Marquis of Bute, at Luton, was a small and highly-finished picture of “Tobias and the Angel,” and among his other works of a similar class may be mentioned “Hagar and Ishmael,” “The º º - - -- ----- -- ~ º 'º-º †-sº THE QUACK DOCTOR. Flight of the Holy Family,” “Paul Healing the Impotent Man: ” the “Battle of the Centaurs and Lapithae” is another figure-subject. His reputation, however, rests upon his landscapes enriched with peasantry, banditti, muleteers, sportsmen, wandering musicians, &c. The first four engravings are fac-similes of his etchings, of which Bartsch and other writers have authenticated fifty-two as executed by him; the second and third indicate a decided difference of style, the one more finished than the other, but both equally spirited. The “MULETEER OF ITALY” is in the same style as the four sheep. “RESTING BY THE WAYSIDE'' is from a small picture, formerly in the “Choiseul Gallery,” and is engraved in the publication of this name. When Mr. Smith compiled his “Catalogue,” in 1834, he states it to be then in the possession of M. Steengracht, at the Hague. It is a charming little work. I36 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. “A Cool MoRNING” is from another beautiful picture of small dimensions. I find, on referring to Smith's work, that the original painting was sold by Christie, in 1831, from the Maitland collection, for £326. In 1852 it belonged to Mr. Edmund Foster, who exhibited the work that year, at the British Institution, among the pictures by the “old masters.” The title appended by Le Bas seems wonderfully to be borne out, even when we see the subject without the advantage of colour: the freshness and sparkle of the morning are not lost in the translation into black and white, while the light of the rising sun catches the water and figures in the foreground in a most brilliant manner, and the edges of the clouds that are rolling away before it. “LE GOUJAT ET LEs DEUx ANEs’’ is from an etching known among collectors by this name: it is a composition of Italian scenery, with a strong daylight effect. The foliage of the trees is remarkably bold and truthful. The last engraving is from one of the most distinguished of this artist’s pictures; and, as Mr. Smith justly observes, the date upon it, 1657, and the skill and masterly execution displayed in it, are convincing proofs of the errors into which biographers have fallen who give the year 1640 as the date of Du Jardin’s birth. This would make him only seventeen years of age at the period when the picture was painted. But even presuming him to be twenty-five, which is most probable, it is an extraordinary production for so comparatively young a painter. The 9 3 picture is entitled “THE CHARLATAN, OR QUACK DOCTOR: ” this interesting personage is mounted on a temporary platform erected in front of a house, and is haranguing a mixed assembly upon the virtues of his nostrums. At his feet sits a figure in a mask playing upon a guitar, and behind him, peering through an opening in the “curtain,” is the head of some other performer in the comic Scene. Among his auditory stands a woman with a child at her back, counting money in her hand, no doubt to pay the empiric—half mountebank, half leech— the price of some compound his eloquence has induced her to purchase. The other characters in the composition are not so easily determinable, mere idlers probably attracted by the music and the show. A monkey, perched at the end of a pole, to which a full-length portrait of some other apparent quack is attached, gives the finishing touch to the absurdities of the scene. This picture is, in its class, one of the gems of the Louvre. Its size is about sixteen inches by eighteen, and, though so small, it is valued at a very high price. In 1776 it sold for £684, in 1783 for £732, and in 1816 it was considered by French connoisseurs to be worth 4, 1,200. It was engraved by Boisseau and Garreau for the “Musée Français.” The works of Du Jardin are comparatively few ; this, as well as their excellence, makes them much sought after, and bring high prices when offered for sale, which is but seldom. The National Gallery acquired three Small but good examples with the Peel Collection. STE) NWICK H. V. STEIN, 1642. HENRY VAN STEEN WICK. HERE were two painters of this name, father and son, whose works, from a similarity of subject and style, are often confounded with each other. The portrait here introduced is that of the younger Steenwick, or Steinwick, as he sometimes wrote his name, and it is copied from a picture by his friend Van Dyck, engraved by Paul Pontius. In the “Vies des Peintres,” M. Charles Blanc, the editor, says that this artist was born at Frankfort, in 1589, and died in London in 1638; while at the end of the memoir appears the auto- graph of the painter, dated 1642, which we have copied above; the date of his death is, therefore, obviously an error. Bryan’s “Dictionary of Painters ” says he was born at Antwerp in 1589, and Mr. Stanley, the editor of the last and revised edition of that work, says Steenwick CLOISTERS OF A CHURCH. “was living in 1642, as appears by that date on a picture in the Museum of Berlin.” Waagen makes no mention whatever of the younger Steenwick in his “Handbook of the Dutch and Flemish Schools,” though he speaks of the father. N. N. 138 GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. The younger Steenwick was a pupil of his father. The pictures of both represent the interiors of churches, cathedrals, and other edifices of an important character, both public and private; but the son painted generally on a larger scale than his father. They are executed with great care as to finish, with a consummate knowledge of architectural perspective, and with a most effective management of light and shade; but we miss in them that grandeur of representation which the bold pencils of our Roberts and Prout gave to similar subjects, and the picturesque and well-studied groups of figures seen in the works of our English painters. Steenwick, like many artists of his country, frequently indulged in gross anachronisms; there is a striking example of this in the picture engraved on this page, where Martha and Mary appear as the occupants of a Dutch dwelling-house of the seventeenth century. On the recommendation of Van Dyck, Steenwick was invited to England by Charles I. ; and | ſº Z Z/º … - - - - Ž/ - - - - - - CHRIST IN THE HOUSE OF MARTHA AND MARY. it is said that he painted the background to many of that artist's portraits of the English monarch and his family, now in Windsor Castle. After his death in London, his widow, according to Mr. Wornum, returned to Holland, settled in Amsterdam, and there maintained herself by architectural painting. There are a few pictures, in private collections in this country, which bear the name of Steenwick, but whether painted by father or son is not clearly apparent; Her Majesty has one, “The Interior of a Prison,” at Windsor Castle; one is in the Bridgewater Gallery, another is in the possession of the Duke of Devonshire; Waagen speaks of two in the collection of Mr. Blundell Weld, at Ince, near Liverpool; of two in that of the Earl of Caledon, at Carlton House Terrace, both of which he ascribes to the elder Steenwick; of one, “Interior of a Prison by Torchlight,” in the possession of Sir John Nelthorpe, Scawby, Lincolnshire; and two at Welbeck Abbey, the seat of the Duke of Portland; one of these shows the interior of a room, with St. Jerome AIEWRP VAW STEEN WICA. I39 and his lion; the other “The Deliverance of St. Peter.” There is a version of this latter subject in the Gallery of Vienna; it is by the son, as is most probably that at Welbeck Abbey. The pictures painted by the younger Steenwick before he came to England are stated to have had the figures introduced by Breughel, Van Thulden, and other artists. Yet this does not seem very probable, for Steenwick himself was a good figure-painter. It is on record that the catalogue of James II. contained a list of ten of the principal works of this master. If this were a fact, one naturally asks, what has become of them 2 Undoubtedly the royal collections now contain only the single example to which reference has just been made—“The Interior of a Prison,” at Windsor Castle. "S:ºf $3 S3 c) §§§ FRENCH PAINTERS - % º % Z % % % Ż º % % º % NICHOLAS POUSSIN. RANCE has a just right to point with pride to Nicholas Poussin as one - -- who established a claim to rank high among the greatest Masters of Art. There are few out of the Italian schools to be compared with him, and not many within them who surpassed him in pure classic composition ; his style is founded upon the best models of Italian art, and has little in common with that of the country which gave him birth. In truth, he became a Roman by adoption, and made the Roman school of painting that of his own; while France, in fact, can scarcely be said ever to have had a school of historic painting distinct from that of Italy. Even the latest of them, David, Ingres, and Delacroix, developed no other ideas than those derived from the classic painters of the Italian Schools. Nicholas Poussin was a native of Anderlys, in Normandy; the year of his birth, 1594. THE MASK. His family, an ancient one of repute, had become impoverished by the part they had taken on the side of royalty during the civil wars. It is said that the father of Poussin felt little desire to encourage the youth's natural taste for painting, yet he permitted I44 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. him to make the acquaintance of an artist named Quentin Varin, of Beauvais, who gave him such instruction as his own limited knowledge could offer, till, at the age of eighteen, his father consented to allow him to visit Paris, with a view of duly qualifying himself for the profession to which he seemed devotedly attached. French art at this period had made but little progress, and its best exponents were too much occupied with their own immediate undertakings to find leisure for directing the studies of pupils in the department of historical painting ; the young Norman, therefore, sought the assistance of Ferdinand Elle, a Flemish portrait-painter, with whom he studied only a short time, as he found him totally incapable of teaching what he desired to learn—the highest and most noble class of art to which the attention of the student can be directed. M. Charles Blanc speaks of Poussin as being with G. Lalle- ment, a designer for tapestries, &c.; but I know not of any authority which confirms this HI. m - I THE MEETING of ABRAHAM's servant AND REBFKAH. statement, and it seems scarcely probable that one whose aspirations were so elevated should have thus connected himself. Another circumstance, related by the same writer, carries with it a far greater semblance of truth; that Poussin, having gained the friendship of a young gentleman of Poitou, an amateur, artist, had the purse of the latter placed at his disposal, and was introduced by him to a person in the royal household, who possessed a choice collection of original designs by Raffaelle and Giulio Romano, and a large number of the engravings of Marc Antonio. These he was permitted to study, and he applied himself diligently to his work, varying his labours by drawing from casts of the best antique sculptures. Poussin was not exempt from the difficulties that so frequently beset the young and ardent mind which has not experience to direct it, nor the means of rendering it independent of cir- cumstances. His friend and companion returned to the country, leaving him to fight out MICHOLAS POUSS/AW. I45 the battle of early life as successfully as he could : history does not tell us what he had to undergo, but the result is evident from the fact of his returning to his native place, in 1623, to re-establish his health, worn down by fatigue and privations. The author of the “Epochs of Painting” says, “He worked a short time in Paris as the assistant of Nicholas Duchesne, at the Luxembourg.” His first essays in painting were some pictures in the church of the Capuchins, at Blois, and some Bacchanalian subjects for the château of Chiverny. An intimacy, formed on his return to Paris the same year, with the Cavalier Marini, a distinguished Italian poet, materially affected the future prospects of Poussin. Marini was well- read in ancient mythology, and possessing a lively, communicative disposition, he would ARCADIAN SHEPHERDS. frequently amuse the young painter with some of the fabulous tales to be found in the old classic writers, and suggest them as subjects for pictures. Acting upon this recommendation, Poussin painted his “Venus and Adonis,” the first work, it is assumed, of this imaginative class he attempted. But the friendship of the poet led to other and more important results; Marini endeavoured to prevail upon Poussin to accompany him to Rome, which city the artist had long desired to visit; he was, however, compelled at that time to decline the invitation, as he was at work upon a picture, the “Death of the Virgin,” for the guild of jewellers of Paris, to be placed by them in the church of Notre Dame; but he promised to follow his friend into Italy as soon as he had completed his task. Accordingly, in the year 1624 he set out for Rome, where he was most cordially welcomed by Marini. The intimacy of the two P P 146 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. sons of genius was unfortunately of short duration; circumstances or ill health, possibly both, compelled the poet to leave Rome for Naples, where he soon after died ; having, however, before his departure from the former city, introduced the artist to Cardinal Barberini. But the introduction was of little service to Poussin; Barberini was sent out by the Papal government on an embassy to France and Spain, leaving him whom he would gladly have patronised, poor and friendless in a strange land, where he was too glad to sell his productions for sums barely sufficient to maintain existence; sometimes, it is said, for little more than the cost of his canvas and colours; so unappreciated then was his genius. Notwithstanding the unpromising appearance of Poussin's prospects at this time, he was neither daunted nor discouraged. He had made the acquaintance of the Flemish sculptor, THE MISSION OF THE APOSTLES. Français Du Quesnoy, called by the Italians, // /º/ammingo, the appellation by which he has ever since been best known. Poussin and the Fleming, who then was but little known, lived in the same house, and it might almost be said that they shared the same poverty. The painter assisted the sculptor in modelling figures from the antique, which they sold ; and while Poussin derived some pecuniary advantages from these labours, he was acquiring such a knowledge of the human form as turned to good account when he sat at his easel. Bellori, who has written the life of this painter, says, “The remains of antiquity afforded him instruction which he could not expect from masters. He studied the beautiful in the Greek statues, and from the ‘Mercury,’ in the Vatican, he derived his rules of proportions. Arches, columns, antique vases, and arms, were rendered tributary to the decoration of his pictures. As a model of composition he attached himself to the ‘Aldobrandini Marriage;’ and from that, and from 'assi-re/iezi, he acquired MICA/OLAS POUSS/AW. I47 that elegant contrast, that propriety of attitude, and that fear of crowding his pictures, for which he was so remarkable; being accustomed to say, that a half-figure more than requisite was sufficient to destroy the harmony of a whole composition.” The works of Raffaelle, however, were the greatest attraction of this master, and he studied them with the most enthusiastic devotion, though it is said that he attended the schools of Domenichino and Andrea Sacchi. | | | THE ASCENSION OF ST. PAUL. Fortunately for the success of Poussin, the Cardinal Barberini was not long absent from Rome; and soon after his return, he sent for the artist and gave him a commission for “The Death of Germanicus,” now in the Barberini palace. He also painted for his patron another fine picture, “The Capture of Jerusalem by Titus;” this work is in the imperial gallery at Vienna. It was followed by “The Philistines attacked by the Plague at Ashdod,” a com- position that shows how much grandeur of design the artist could combine with the appalling 148 GA’EAT MASTERS OF AA’7. incidents of so repulsive a subject. It is now in the gallery of the Louvre, Paris; but a re//ica decorates our National Gallery. This was formerly in the Colonna Palace at Rome, and was presented to the National Gallery, in 1838, by the late Duke of Northumberland. The reputation of Poussin began now to spread itself abroad; through his patron the Cardinal, he had been introduced to another liberal amateur, the Cavaliere Del Pozzo, for whom he painted a large picture of “The Martyrdom of St. Erasmus,” for St. Peter's, at Rome. Some years since this picture was in the pontifical palace of Monte Cavello; it is now, I believe, in the Dresden Gallery. For the same patron he painted his first series of “The Seven Sacraments of the Church of Rome;” these works were subsequently brought to England, and are now, THE JOURNEY OF THE FAUNS AND SATYRS. with the exception of one destroyed by the fire which took place, in 1816, at Belvoir Castle, in the possession of the Duke of Rutland. He also painted a second series, or rather a repetition of the first, with variations, several years afterwards, for M. de Chantelon, chamberlain to the King of France; this set was for a long time among the principal ornaments of the Orleans Gallery, having been purchased by the Regent, Philip Duke of Orleans, for 45,000; they are now in the Bridgewater Gallery, the late Duke of Bridgewater having acquired them, at the sale of the Orleans collection, for 44,900. These works still further advanced the ſame of the artist, so much so as to induce Cardinal Richelieu, a generous patron of the fine arts, to urge his return to Paris, promising him on the NICHOLAS POUSS/M. I49 part of his royal master, Louis XIII., the post of principal painter to the king, with a liberal salary, and apartments in the Louvre. It was some time, however, before he could be prevailed on to remove from Italy. He had become naturalised in Rome; had found there a wife in the sister of Gaspar Dughet (who acquired from this alliance the name by which he is best known to us, that of Gaspar Poussin), and he was now living happily, surrounded by the objects he venerated—the sculptures of antiquity and the works of Raffaelle. Nevertheless, after about a year's hesitation, he arrived in Paris in 1640, and immediately received a commission to paint an altar-piece for the chapel of St. Germain-en-Laye, the result of which was his “Last Supper,” a picture of extraordinary power, though deficient in those qualities of pathos and refinement that shine so conspicuously in Leonardo da Vinci's representation of the same subject. Having AMALTHEA. NURSING THE YOUNG JUPITER, received the appointment of principal painter to the king, the office gave him the general superintendence of all works relating to the decoration of the royal palaces, and he was also engaged to embellish the gallery of the Louvre, for which he had prepared designs and cartoons representing the “Labours of Hercules.” The architect Lemercier, and the painters Simon Vouet and Fouquières, had hitherto been employed upon these public edifices, and they could ill brook the interference of one who was unquestionably far their superior, and therefore every opportunity was sought after to throw impediments in his way. Poussin, on the other hand, cared not to subject himself to the petty annoyances of his jealous rivals, and, under the pretence of having to settle some private matters in Rome, he departed from Paris, in November, 1642, with a determination never to return to it—a resolution he faithfully adhered to. There are two fine pictures now in the Louvre at Paris, which Poussin painted before he left Q Q I5O GREAT MASTERS OF AFT. that city; one, “St. Francis Xavier,” executed for the Society of Jesuits; and the other, “The Triumph of Truth.” Although Poussin lived twenty-three years after his return to Rome, the history of this period may be told in a very few words, for he passed the time in the strictest retirement, living most unostentatiously, and working with all diligence. The number of pictures he left behind, many of them large and full of subject, are evidences of his unremitting labours. Naturally of secluded habits and ardently devoted to his profession, the only enjoyment he sought out of his studio was to perambulate the vicinity of Rome with his sketch-book in his hand, to make studies of such scenery and objects as took his fancy. Several attempts were made by influential persons in Paris, after the death of Louis XIII., and of Cardinal Richelieu, to induce him to return to France, but they were unavailing. Towards the close of his life he suffered much from a painful internal disorder, which, in 1665, brought him to his grave, in the seventy-first year of his age. DIOGENES. The works of this great painter have engaged the attention of some of the ablest writers upon art, whose opinions, being of far greater value than any I could presume to offer, may well stand * in the place of my own. Sir Joshua Reynolds, in his fifth “Discourse,” institutes a brief com- parison of the compositions of Rubens and Poussin, and designates the style of the former as “florid, careless, loose, and inaccurate, opposed to which that of the simple, careful, pure, and correct style of the latter, seems to be a complete contrast. Yet, however opposite their characters, in one thing they agreed: both of them always preserving a perfect correspondence between all the parts of their respective manners; insomuch that it may be doubted whether any alteration of what is considered as defective in either, would not destroy the effect of the whole. Poussin lived and conversed with the ancient statues so long, that he may be said to have been better acquainted with them than with the people who were about him. . . No AVICHOLAS POUSS/AW. I5 I works of any modern have so much of the air of antique painting as those of Poussin. His best performances have a remarkable dryness of manner, which, though by no means to be recommended for imitation, yet seem perfectly correspondent to that ancient simplicity which distinguishes his style. Like Polidoro, he studied the ancients so much that he acquired a habit of thinking in their way, and seemed to know perfectly the actions and gestures they would use on every occasion.” Fuseli was a more severe critic than Reynolds, but he had strong prejudices, and with all his genius, which is indisputable, he certainly did not possess the qualities of mind suited to one who would sit in judgment upon an artist so simple in his grandeur as Poussin; and yet he estimated him most highly. “Though Poussin,” he says, “abstracted the theory of his proportions from POLYPHEMU.S. the antique, he is seldom uniform and pure in his style of design; ideal only in parts, and oftener so in female than in male characters, he supplies, like Pietro Sesta, antique heads and torsos with limbs and extremities supplied from the model. As a colourist he was extremely unequal. Into the ‘Deluge,’ and the “Plague of the Philistines, he transfused the very hues of the elements whose ravages he represented, whilst numbers of his other pictures are deformed by crudity and patches. The excellence of Poussin in landscape is universally allowed, and when it is the chief object of his picture, precludes all censure; but considered as the scene or background of an historical subject, the care with which he executed it, the predilection he had for it, often made him give it an importance which it ought not to have ; it divides our attention, and from an accessory, becomes a principal part.” There is much truth in these observations. I52 GA EA 77 J/ASTERS OF A R7. The illustrations appended to this brief notice of “the Raffaelle of the French school,” as Lanzi designates Poussin, who died in Rome in 1665, evidence the versatility of his genius no less than its character, but they offer no proof of the extensive nature of his labours. This, however, is supplied by referring to Smith’s “Catalogue of the Works of the eminent Dutch, Flemish, and French Painters.” The diligent author of this useful and well-digested publication enumerates upwards of 34o pictures in existence, presumed to be undoubtedly from the pencil of Nicholas Poussin. They are scattered over the principal public and private galleries throughout Europe; the Louvre in Paris, possessing, as seems its national right, more than any other. In addition to “The Philistines attacked by the Plague at Ashdod,” already mentioned, our National Gallery contains six other works of this master: there were, until within the last few §§ - - | y 1777, N in- a s EUDEMIDAS DIC [ATING HIS WILL. years, eight in all, but one, “Phineus and his Followers turned into Stone at the sight of the Gorgon's Head,” has been taken away. The other six are, “The Nursing of Bacchus,” by the nymphs and fauns of Euboea, a finely-composed landscape, with figures, one of whom, a man washing his feet at a fountain, is supposed to represent Phocion, the act indicating the simplicity and purity of his life; a “Bacchanalian Festival,” a wild, ecstatic revelry of these sylvan divinities; another somewhat similar composition, a “Dance of Bacchanals in Honour of Pan;” “Cephalus and Aurora;” and “A Nymph Sleeping,” with Cupid by her side, and satyrs standing by. The Dulwich Gallery contains no fewer than fifteen pictures attributed to Poussin, besides a copy of his “Education of Bacchus.” I use the word “attributed" because two, “The Angels appearing to Abraham,” and “Children in a Landscape,” are considered doubtful. º - - §Sº sº º W / clºtt dwo /* CLAUDE LORRAINE. HERE are two artists, one belonging to the Italian school, the other to the French, whose names stand forth, like stars of the first magnitude, over the realm of landscape-painting; the one, Gaspar Poussin, grand and majestic, revelling in the sublimities of Nature, the other, Claude Lorraine, graceful and brilliant, dipping his pencil in the golden hues of the sunshine, as he stretched himself on some green knoll to watch the passing clouds. No two painters ever differed more in their styles than these, and yet each may, in a great measure, be said to have trodden the same path in search of the beautiful, though they travelled not in company. Though Claude was a Frenchman, as is claimed by his countrymen as their own, he learned his art in Italy; and every inch of canvas he covered is rich with the glories of Italian scenery. Claude Gellée, usually called Claude Lorraine, was born at Champagne, in Lorraine, in 1600, and was the third of five sons. His parents were in comparatively indigent circumstances, and apprenticed their son to a pastry-cook; according to some authorities he went subsequently to Rome to find employment there in that capacity. There is, however, considerable uncertainty about the early life of this painter. Baldinucci says that Claude, being left an orphan when twelve years of age, sought out his eldest brother, who was a carver in wood, at Fribourg. After remaining there about a year, occupied in designing grotesques and arabesques, for which R. R. I54 GREAT MASTERS OF AR7. he seemed to have had a peculiar aptitude, a relative, who was a travelling dealer in lace, and had noticed the youth's taste for art, persuaded the brother to allow Claude to accompany him to Rome, whither he was about to go. Arriving safely in that city, he took lodgings not far from the Rotunda, but how he employed himself for three or four years, or under whom he studied, has not been made clear by his biographers; we are only told that he put in practice the lessons of economy taught him by his brother, by living upon the small resources he had taken with him, or with which he was occasionally furnished by his generous relative. The person who persuaded him to visit Rome seems to have left him to do the best he could for himself. About the termina- tion of the period just referred to, the “Thirty Years’ ” war broke out, which cut off all individual communication between the two sides of the Alps. His somewhat scanty resources thus closed against him, Claude found it necessary to seek out some new channel from which º rºº º-E= º == º -- º THE WATERING-PLACE OF THE HERD. his necessities might be supplied; he therefore, though only eighteen years of age, quitted Rome and travelled to Naples, where he was received into the atelier of Godfrey Waiss, or Weis, an artist of Cologne, with whom he remained two years, and during this time acquired a thorough theoretical knowledge of architecture and perspective, sciences which he subsequently applied with so much skill and effect to his immortal landscapes. He returned to Rome, at the expira- tion of this period, with his mind well stored, but his purse so scantily furnished that he WalS compelled, according to Sandrart, his friend and companion, to enter the house of Agostino Tassi less as a pupil than a domestic. It was his duty to prepare his master's meals and to grind his colours. Tassi had been a pupil of Paul Bril, and at the time Claude entered into his service was much afflicted with gout and other complaints incidental to advancing years; but he possessed a gaiety and elasticity of spirit that rendered his society very agreeable. Popular as an artist, C/A UDE LORAA/AWE. I55 his company much sought after, and overwhelmed with commissions, he maintained a suitable establishment, and received at his residence the most distinguished personages of Rome. At this period he was engaged in decorating the Lancellotti and Quirinal palaces with architectural ornaments, perspective views, sea-pieces, and landscapes; but his age and infirmities required that while so occupied, he should have some one who would confidentially superintend the affairs of his household, look after his horses, and attend to numerous other matters connected with his professional and private engagements. Claude was just the individual to suit his purpose, and he accordingly took up his abode with Tassi, where he continued till 1625, doubtless gaining much useful knowledge during his residence there, both in his art and on general subjects, the latter of which his defective education made especially valuable; but of his artistic practice during this period of his life no records remain to supply reliable information. | | º 3. - | THE PORT OF ANCIENT MESSINA. In 1625 he departed from Rome to return to his native country; and passing through upper Italy, he visited Loretto and Venice, traversed the Tyrol, stopped some time in Bavaria, where he painted two views of the environs of Munich, gained the Souabe, was attacked by banditti and robbed, and at length reached the banks of the Moselle, which he had not seen for twelve years. Of his stay there nothing is known, but it is stated that after settling some family affairs, he returned to Rome in 1627, stopping a short time at Nancy, Lyons, and Marseilles. Nicholas Poussin was then exercising considerable influence over the artists established in the Italian capital, and Claude was not long in seeking out his distinguished countryman, and settling himself in his immediate vicinity; and there is no doubt that the landscapes of Poussin contributed in no slight degree to give a style to those of his contemporary. The genius of Claude, which had hitherto been hidden like some precious gem in “a dusky I56 GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. mine,” now became manifest, and his reputation soon gained a wide-spread popularity. “It rose,” says one of his biographers, “as a bright morning sun, illuminating the whole of Italy, travelling over mountains and seas, reaching into France, and finding its way to the court of the Spanish monarch; sovereigns, princes, cardinals, and even the pope himself, eagerly purchasing the works of this great master of art.” Baldinucci has left on record the names of many of his patrons, and the prices given for his pictures. But even at that time there was no lack of imitations nor of forgers; the large sums received by Claude offered a strong inducement for other artists to copy his style and endeavour to impose upon strangers and the ignorant, by disposing of them as genuine productions; falsehood and imposture are the same in all ages. The injury thus done to the artist reaches farther than the amount of money fraudulently drawn away from him; his genius is calumniated by the mediocre performances that are circulated AN ITALIAN LANDSCAPE. in his name, and his reputation suffers accordingly. Claude soon became aware of this, and in order to put an effectual check upon the practice, he resolved to keep a record of the sketches of his pictures, which he might show to his patrons and enable them to identify any of his works wherever purchased ; on the back of each drawing he wrote its number, with his cipher, the place for which the picture was painted, sometimes the name of the party who purchased or commissioned it, and the date. This book he termed the Ziffer lºrifaſis, or “Book of Truth.” The Duke of Devonshire possesses the original sketches, but the work is well known to most persons associated with the art of landscape-painting and to amateurs, by the fac-simile engravings which were made of them by Earlom. But the Ziſer Verifaſis was not always sufficient to protect Claude from professional injury, nor those who were desirous of acquiring his works from imposition; even his studio was invaded CLAUDE LORFAIAWE. I57 by the spoiler, his sketches were seen by envious eyes, and pictures made from them by dishonest hands; so that it was not a very uncommon thing, at one period of his practice, to see two pictures of the same subject and as much like each other as they could be under the circumstances, issue forth simultaneously from different quarters. The artist was thus compelled to shut his studio against all visitors, except his most intimate friends and patrons. Age too by this time TOBIT AND THE ANGEL. had likewise crept upon him, he had become afflicted with gout, and was unable to take his favourite stroll by the picturesque cascades of Tivoli. There is, I believe, a drawing by Claude in the collection of Her Majesty, bearing the date 1682 ; the artist must then have been eighty-two years old, and still he is said to have painted vigorously and well. But in December of that year his strength gave way, and he sank under the weight of years; he was buried in the church of La Trinità-du-Mont, Rome. In the month of July, 1840, the remains of Claude Lorraine were transferred from the church S S 158 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. in which they were first interred to that of St. Louis des Français, and were placed in a tomb erected for him by order of the French Minister of the Interior. The tomb bears the following inscription —“Za nation Française n'ou're Passes en/ants cºlºres même (orszu'i's sonſ d 4 'étranger.” It seems quite superfluous to attempt any criticism on the works of this great master of landscape-painting, whose genius is still held in such high admiration, and whose name is a watchword to all who would follow in the path he chose. Whether his subject be a simple pastoral scene, a rich and extensive view, or a glorious combination of architecture and * his pencil exhibits equal grace and tenderness, and the richest, most powerful, and brilliant colouring. His tints are as diversified as Nature herself, his aerial perspective is delicious, - -- - - - --- -º-º: º *... THE DANCE BY THE RIVER SIDE. and his foregrounds stand out in the full blaze of an Italian sunshine; broad masses of light stretch over them, while his distances recede far and wide till the blue hills and the blue sky melt into each other. In his figures only do we discern anything that betokens weakness and incapacity; they are very indifferent in drawing, and oftentimes deficient in motive. This, Claude unhesitatingly admitted ; he used to say that he “sold his landscapes and gave away his figures;” a trait of modesty that accords with his amiable character. It may be stated that the figures in many of his pictures were introduced by other hands: at most times they are very secondary portions of the work, and seem frequently to be inserted as much for the sake of giving a title to the composition as for any other purpose, except that of enlivening the canvas. EUSTACE LE SUEUR. ZOOKING at the variety and universal development of the art, it must, we think, be admitted that the seventeenth century was the great epoch of painting. In * =aQ making such a remark, it is not forgotten that, prior to this period, the º {{ º Italian schools had shone forth in all their glory in the pencils of º/ º Nº. º Raffaelle and Titian, Correggio and Da Vinci, Tintoretto, Giorgione, and == º Parmegiano; Germany had produced Dürer and Holbein; and the Low º Countries, Hemling and Matsys, to bring forward no other names: but these seem % only to have been the heralds of a more numerous army following those brilliant i; leaders—some of them at no great distance—but all stimulated by the examples they ! set forth. It will only be necessary to glance over a list of some of the distinguished men that flourished in that century to prove the truth here asserted. At its commence- ment we find, of the Italian schools, the family of the Caracci (with the exception of Agustino, who died in 1601) still in all their vigour, contemporaneous with whom, or as their successors, were Guido, Carlo Maratti, Salvator Rosa, Cignani, Cortona, Domenichino, Castiglione, Giordano, Guercino, Lanfranco, Mola, Sacchi; of the Spanish school were Murillo, Velasquez, the two Herreras, Spagnoletto, Pacheco, Pereda, Zurbaran; the Flemish and Dutch schools have been previously referred to ; and of the French, the two Poussins, Du Fresnoy, Claude, Jouvenet, Le Brun, and Le Sueur; although the Poussins and I6o GREAT MASTERS OF ART. Claude are claimed by the Italians, as having learned and practised their art among them, rather than in the country which was theirs by birth. Such an array of great names in every department of painting—and it could easily have been made considerably longer–spread over the European continent, is, we think, without a parallel during any epoch; weighed by quantity as well as by quality, it seems to have been the veritable golden age of art. Nor would it be very difficult to account for so general a diffusion of its practice and of its elevated position. It is curious to observe how much the course of politics and the march of conquering armies, which one would naturally expect to have a contrary tendency, frequently are the means of extending the influence of art, and advancing its progress. If war carries ruin and desolation in its train, it often opens out a path for science and civilisation to follow ; if at one time it is the scourge of society, at another it may be looked upon as a benefactor, though one would infinitely prefer to see the same end attained by more peaceful agency. When the Romans had become masters of Western Europe, the sculptors, architects, and painters of Greece flocked to the imperial city, carrying with them the arts, which they practised to the advantage of their conquerors; while the stern and almost inhuman character of the Roman was subdued and changed into comparative gentleness, by the kindly nature and joyous disposition of the Greek citizen, “ qualities,” says Winckelmann, “that contributed as much to the beautiful and lovely images which they designed, as Nature did to the production of their forms.” There is implanted in man’s heart so great an aspiration after things “pleasant to the eye,” and goodly in themselves, and such an instinctive feeling of sympathy with those who would allure us to enjoyment by their smiles and openness of purpose, that none but the veriest savage or the most malignant being can withstand their benign and softening influences; so that, where these prevail, we find the wilderness becoming a fruitful field, and the desert blossoming as a rose. Thus, without carrying imagination beyond the bounds of probability, we seem to see—when art had become, during the middle ages, worthy of its high destiny— the people assuming an elevation of character—mingled, as it undoubtedly was, with super- stition—which they in nowise exhibited previously; they admired and venerated what they could not appreciate at its true worth ; and the mind, vaguely impressed with the spirit of beauty, acknowledged its power, and bowed submissively, yet in ignorance, to the types which the religious painters of that period set before them. Art, then, most unquestionably was the agent that purified human nature from much of its grossness and pernicious habits, though it could not, and never will, transform men into saints. Now, it must seem somewhat singular to attribute the diffusion of art, at the period to which reference is made, to the state of European politics, but so it undoubtedly was. During EUSTA CE L E SUEUR. 16. I the sixteenth century, the various Italian states, Germany, France, and Spain, had been engaged in a constant succession of international wars. “The Popes, the Kings of Naples, the Dukes of Milan, and the republics of Venice and Florence, were the principal powers that shared among them the dominion of Italy towards the end of the fifteenth century. The continual wars which these states waged with each other, added to the weakness of the º º THE DEATH OF ST. BRUNO. German Emperors, encouraged foreign powers to form plans of aggrandisement and conquest over these countries. The Kings of France—Charles VIII., Louis XII., and Francis I.-led away by a mania for conquest, undertook several expeditions into Italy for enforcing their claims either on the kingdom of Naples or the duchy of Milan. They were thwarted in their schemes by the kings of Spain, who, being already masters of Sicily and Sardinia, T T I62 GREAT MASTERS OF AFT. thought it incumbent upon them to extend their views to the continent of Italy. Ferdinand of Spain deprived the French of the kingdom of Naples in 1500. His successor, Charles V., expelled them from the Milanese territories, and obliged Francis I., by successive treaties, to yield up his pretensions in Naples and Milan. From this period the Spaniards were the pre- dominating power in Italy for more than a hundred years.”” But amid the din of battle, and the strife of hostile potentates, the arts spread widely and successfully; men who overthrew empires and revolutionised kingdoms found time and opportunity for advancing objects of a more peaceful character. Thus Charles V. invited Titian into Spain, and thought it not derogatory to his kingly dignity to stoop to pick up the venerable painter's pencil when it dropped, accidentally, from the hand. Francis. I. introduced into France the Italian Rosso, Andrea del Sarto, Primaticcio, and Leonardo da Vinci, and felt honoured, as it is said, by supporting the dying head which conceived the grand picture of “The Last Supper.” The Netherlands, under Spanish dominion, gave birth to Rubens, who, after visiting Italy, taught Van Dyck and Jordaens. The style of Claude, imbibed under the sunny atmosphere of the South, reacted upon the landscape-painters of the Low Countries; and in this manner the diffusion of artistic knowledge seems to have proceeded part passu, with the march of armies, and the occupation, by strangers, of distant countries. And it is not unworthy of remark how little the artists of the periods to which allusion has been made were imbued with the warlike spirit of the age, So far as their works are to be considered as an indication of their mind; a holier and more elevated influence animated their pencils than the demon of war could exercise; for it is a rare thing to meet with a picture by the great Italian and Spanish painters, down to the end of the sixteenth century, which commemorates any notable achievement of arms, although they occasionally had recourse to the fables of classic history. The rejection of such subjects might in a great measure, perhaps, be attributed to the religious feeling, real or professed, that actuated them; or still more, to the commissions received from ecclesiastical communities to decorate their churches, monasteries, and nunneries: nor do we find that the chivalrous conquerors of the day, the patrons of these painters, employed them in the celebration of their victories. The transmission of their fame and heroic deeds was left to the historian and the poet, while the painter was free to render homage to saints and martyrs who were assumed to have lived and died for the benefit of man- kind. But as men were released from the bondage of Superstition and religious vows, the character of art, generally, became changed, and took a far wider range. The writings of Calvin and the preaching of Luther did something more than shake the foundations of the Romish Church; they opened a new field of art, affording ampler scope for the exercise of genius. Effects may sometimes be seen when the causes that produce them are not so clearly evident, except upon close examination; and thus it may be found that, without advancing any irrational or even improbable argument, the Reformation produced results where they were not looked for, and upon which that great religious and political movement would seem to have had not the slightest bearing. And thus it scarcely admits of argument that both religion and politics have exercised a mighty influence upon art, in all countries and at every period. * Koch’s “History of Europe.” EU.STACE L E SUEUR. I63 Many, if not most, of the pictures by Eustace Le Sueur carry the spectator back to the age of “Saint-worship,” or, as it has not inaptly been called, the age of “Christian Art,” in which Italy stood pre-eminent, as the works of her painters testify to this day. Deeply º 7". - ºn º | # 2–º - QS º - ELEMREF- THE MARTYRDOM OF ST. LAWRENCE. imbued with their spirit, and inferior in talent only to a few of them, was this ornament of the French school; a man of an elevated mind and of refined taste, not undeserving of the title of the “French Raffaelle,” bestowed upon him by his countrymen. It is much to 164 G/& EA 7" J/ASTERS OF A R7. be regretted that our information concerning him is scanty, for although he died in the very prime of life, there is doubtless much concerning so excellent a painter that would have furnished valuable matter for the biographer. France, however, has done little in giving to the world a history of her artists; no one has hitherto appeared to do for them what Vasari has written of the men of Italy. Their works are, in most instances, their history; we see the results of thoughts and labours, the growth and progress of which are, in a great measure, hidden from us. Le Sueur was born at Paris in 1617, and at an early age was placed by his father, a sculptor of little repute, in the school of Simon Vouet, at that period held in high estimation. Vouet resided many years at Rome, under the patronage of Pope Urban VIII., and his nephew, the Cardinal, by whom he was engaged in the decorations of St. Peter's, and on several pictures for the Barberini Palace, which rank among his best works; in 1624 he was elected President of the Academy of St. Luke. Returning to France in 1627, Louis XIII., who had allowed Vouet a pension during his residence in Italy, appointed him his principal painter, and employed him in decorating the palaces of the Louvre, Luxembourg, and St. Germains, and on other edifices. In the studio of Vouet Le Sueur had for his fellow-pupils, among others less distinguished, Le Brun, Mignard, Testelin, and Dufresnoy; and it was there that the rivalry between Le Sueur and Le Brun commenced, which terminated only with the death of the former. In a short time the precocious talent of Le Sueur, and his free, graceful execution, caused him to be selected by his master to assist in º | ". - -- - - - | | |- _ - - - | **º- the works ordered by Cardinal Richelieu. Among |- - |- - these were the designs for the royal tapestries, and it ST. BRUNO AT PRAYER. was on account of Vouet that his pupil undertook eight Romanesque compositions borrowed from the “Dream of Poliphilius.” This singular poem, by a Dominican monk, Francis Colonna, had distinguished its author in the fifteenth century; and, as often happens, the less it was understood the more interest it excited ; for it was so obscure, so little intelligible, that no one presumed to know exactly in what language it was written. In the time of Le Sueur it had become most popular through a new edition by Berou!de of Berville, and several painters, among whom Nicholas Poussin was conspicuous, were induced to refer to that extraordinary, but not very delicate, book for some of their subjects. Le Sueur followed their example, performing his task with much elegance and discrimination, and without any sacrifice of the dignity and proper feeling which were manifested in his subsequent religious pictures. About this period Louis XIII., having paid a visit to Mølle. de la Fayette at the Convent of the Visitation, left behind him a considerable sum of money for the purpose of decorating the EUSTACE ZE SUEUR. I65 Chapel of St. Maria. The court-painter, Vouet, was too much occupied with his labours at St. Germains, Fontainebleau, and elsewhere, and with his pupils, among whom he reckoned the monarch himself, to undertake the task, and he therefore engaged Le Sueur to paint a picture of the “Assumption” to occupy the centre of the chapel. While employed upon this work, as the story is related by M. Saintine, he fell violently in love with a beautiful young nun, who had been permitted to sit to him for the figure of the Virgin. The unfortunate attachment is said to have cast a gloom over the remainder of his life; for, unlike Filippo Lippi, who was placed in similar circumstances, the young French painter did not attempt to gain by force or fraud what the laws of his religion withheld from him. - - When he had finished the picture, as well as the decorations over the arches of the chapel, and the medallions, he was commissioned to ornament with mythological figures a pavilion in the Château de Conflans, then belonging to the President Le Jay, and subsequently occupied by the Archbishop of Paris. On the completion of his labours here he set out for Lyons, whither his fame had already preceded him. But it must not be supposed that Le Sueur owed his popularity solely to the success which had attended his studies under Vouet, for he very soon exchanged the style of that master for the more simple, severe, and graceful one acquired by close study of the antique, and more especially of the works of Raffaelle as he found them in Marc Antonio's engravings, and in the few pictures by the great painter himself which came under Le Sueur’s observation. It was during his stay at Lyons that the genius of Le Sueur developed itself in an extraordinary degree after seeing some of Raffaelle’s works. Filled with enthusiasm at these sublime conceptions, he immediately sketched out his picture of “St. Paul laying hands on the Sick,” which attracted the attention of Nicholas Poussin, and was presented by the artist to the Academy of St. Luke in Rome, of which he had been elected a member. According to M. Blanc, Le Sueur, acting upon the advice of Poussin, sought to modify the style acquired under Vouet, by studying the great Italian masters, of whose works, either original or copied, but few examples then existed in Paris; and the same writer remarks, upon authority which, however, he does not name, that “Poussin, with that nobility of character which distinguished him, actually copied himself some of the finest pictures in Rome and sent them to Le Sueur—an act of generosity which, if not positively true, is at least in accordance with the known liberal feeling and conduct of Nicholas Poussin.” In 1642 Le Sueur married, but too poor to proceed to Rome as he desired, and too simple-minded to intrude himself upon the great, he lived upon such resources as his labour supplied him with, by making designs for books and by other chance work, till he was at length summoned to Paris to decorate the cloisters of the Carthusian Priory, or La Chartreuse, in that city. From this point in the life of the artist must we date his greatness; he had now, for the first time, a fair opportunity of exhibiting to the world the power and extent of his faculties as a painter, not subjected to especial restrictions, except as to his theme, which was of course a particular one, bearing, as was usual in similar cases, reference to the patron saint of the religious brotherhood. As the illustrations introduced here include some of the works Le Sueur executed on this occasion, a few remarks on the personage whose history is partly recorded in these pictures cannot be out of place. 166 GA EA 7" MASTERS OF A R7. St. Bruno, founder of the order of the Carthusians, one of the most strict and self-denying religious communities, was born at Cologne, in 1051; and, after studying at Paris, became a canon of Rheims, and director of the ecclesiastical seminary of that diocese. He, however, felt so great a disgust with the misconduct and vexatious proceedings of the Archbishop, Manasses, that he resolved to quit the society of the world, and retire into solitude. He first of all repaired to Suisse Fontaine, in the diocese of Langres, and subsequently to a mountain near Grenoble, .--º -- º-|- - - - - º Tº 1. | | | º - =- . →º - º - LILTH | - - º - - | l - º: º | - | | - ºf- == º P º | - º |- ſº -- E- - - - sº º * - - - ſº - - – - º - | Tºs sº wº º 4% i ST. PAUL PREACHING AT EPHESU.S. where, being joined by several other congenial minds, he built an oratory and seven cells, separate from each other, in imitation of the early hermits of Palestine and Egypt. Bruno and his monks cultivated the ground in the neighbourhood of their residence, living upon what it produced, and upon the presents supplied to them by the charitably disposed. This was the origin of the Carthusian order, and of the magnificent convent built on the spot, which is called La Grande Chartreuse. In England we had once nine houses of this order, whose original name was EUS7A CE L E SUE UR. 167 corrupted into Charter-house; the last of these is, or rather was, that in London. Pope Urban II., who had studied under Bruno at Rheims, invited him to Rome, upon the plea of requiring his advice; and it was here, as may be presumed, although there appears to be no historical record of the fact, he was most probably offered the mitre which he declined to accept: this incident the artist made the subject of one of his pictures. After a time Bruno, becoming weary of the papal court, retired to another solitary spot in Calabria, where he founded a second convent of the same order; and there he died in I IoI. He was canonised in 1514. Le Sueur had not attained his thirtieth year when the important work alluded to was entrusted to his hands. In the space of three years, assisted only by his brother-in-law and pupil, Goussé or Goulai, in the figures, and by Patel in the landscapes, he executed a serie, of twenty-four pictures—which, nevertheless, the modesty of the painter induced him to charac- THE MUSES. terize as “sketches”—illustrative of events in the life of St. Bruno. They were originally painted on wood, but in 1766 they were transferred to canvas, and are now in the Louvre, and generally rank among the most distinguished works of the French school. Of this series, the pictures numbered one to thirteen are perhaps not so immediately associated with the history of the saint as are the others, and yet they undoubtedly cannot be detached from it; as, for instance, that which is considered the finest among these thirteen, “Raymond, a canon of Notre Dame, preaching in the presence of St. Bruno,” when the latter was still a young man. The actual life of the founder of the Chartreuse commences in the fourteenth picture, which represents * “St. BRUNO AT PRAYER,” the subject of one of the engravings here introduced. He is on his knees before a crucifix, dressed in a long white robe, but not the habit of the Carthusians; the order had not yet been established. In the distance are two men lowering a dead body into 168 - - GREAT MASTERS OF AR7. an open grave. M. Blanc considers the body to be that of the aforesaid Canon Raymond. Others of the latter portion of the series which deserve especial mention are “St. Bruno seated in a Chair, surrounded by his Disciples,” to whom he appears to be addressing solemn words of warning; “St. Bruno visited in his sleep by three Angels,” who, it is presumed, are urging him to renounce the world; “St. Bruno on Horseback,” traversing the Alps with Some com- panions to seek a suitable locality for his intended community. “ST. BRUNO REFUSING THE MITRE,” another of the illustrations introduced here, is a fine composition, but with some affectation in the attitude of the principal figure: “THE DEATH OF ST. BRUNo,” also engraved here, is a skilfully-arranged group, but the subject is disagreeable, and is not treated in a manner to make it otherwise. “The Pope presiding at a Chapter of Cardinals for the approval of the foundation of the Chartreuse,” is another work in which the elevated character of the religious painters of Italy evidently pervaded the mind of the artist. Speaking of this series generally, it may be remarked that many of them are admirable in character and composition, but they are exceedingly monotonous in colour, and want the expression which a better arrangement of chiar’oscuro would have given them. At the restoration of the Bourbons, in 1816, they were valued by the authorities of the Louvre at about £41,900, a sum infinitely beyond their real worth. A custom formerly prevailed among the guild, or company, of goldsmiths of Paris to present annually to the Church of Notre Dame a picture painted by one of the most distinguished French artists. The offering being made on the 1st of May, it received the name of the “May picture.” In 1649 the commission for this work was given to Le Sueur, who produced on the Occasion his “St. PAUL PREACHING AT EPHESUs,” not only one of his finest pictures, but one that has not been excelled by any artist of the French School. Our illustration will convey a very adequate idea of this admirable composition, which, for its simple grandeur, may be compared favourably with some of the best of the Italian masters; it bears, in fact, indisputable evidence of the artist whom Le Sueur adopted for his model in many of his pictures; the heads and draperies showing so much of the style of Raffaelle. The apostle stands near “the temple of the great goddess Diana,” which is placed on the right of the picture; he is holding forth with the zeal and animation of one who feels he has an important message to deliver; and the power of his eloquence is manifested in the conduct of the Gentile hearers, who bring their “books of curious arts,” and “burn them before all men.” The picture bears the name of the artist and the date of its execution, 1649. The “MARTYRDOM OF ST. LAwRENCE '' is a most masterly conception of an appalling subject: it was engraved by General Audran, whose print is considered one of the finest works from the ôurin of that eminent engraver. The saint was one of the Seven Deacons of the Church of Rome under Sixtus the bishop, all of whom, including Sixtus himself, suffered martyrdom in the middle of the third century, during the reign of the Emperor Valerian. Tradition says that St. Lawrence was roasted on a kind of gridiron, and the painter in his picture has followed the history as it has been handed down to us. In this composition there is a grandeur of design united with vast power in the representation of the individual impersonations. Among other pictures of this class, by Le Sueur, to which allusion may be made as indicating EUSTA CE L E SUEUR. 169 º º the genius of the painter, is his “Martyrdom of St. Gervaise and St. Protais,” now in the Louvre, but formerly in the Abbey of Marmoſitier les Tours. Sacred history afforded to Le Sueur subjects for several pictures besides those already referred to ; among these are “Christ Scourged,” “ Christ with Mary and Martha,” “The Presentation * y in the Temple,” and the “Descent from the Cross: ” the last-named picture is in the Louvre. But the most extensive works of Le Sueur, and those considered by many connoisseurs as his best, are the mythological paintings in the Hôtel du Châtelet, executed for the President ST. BRUNO REFUSING THE PROFFERED M ITRE. Lambert de Thorigny, and which were removed to the Louvre in 1795. These works were executed jointly by Le Sueur and Le Brun, occupying the former the last nine years of his life. Three apartments in the palace were decorated by him, the “Salon de l'Amour,” the “Cabinet des Muses,” and “L’Appartement des Bains.” In these paintings Le Sueur follows his great model by imitating the style of the celebrated series illustrating the fable of “Cupid and Psyche,” painted by Raffaelle in the Farnesina at Rome. In the first apartment he painted several beautiful compositions from the life of Cupid in the second, “THE MUSEs,” one of which is among the designs here introduced,—and a large composition of many figures illustrating X X 17o GREAT MASTERS OF ART. the story of “Phaëton entreating Apollo for permission to drive the Chariot of the Sun;” and in the third apartment, “Diana surprised by Actaeon,” “Diana and Calisto,” and the “ Triumphs of Neptune and of Amphitrite.” These works, which have been engraved by Picart and others, are universally preferred to Le Brun's ; and they are no less remarkable as showing the versa- tility of the painter’s genius, who could adapt himself with equal success to the sublimity of Scripture, the passions of his fellow-mortals, and the fancies of poetic mythology. These were the last triumphs of Le Sueur’s pencil; he had laboured at them with an energy and perseverance far more than his physical powers could endure, and it is said that the jealousy of Le Brun, who was associated with him in the work, caused him no small amount of vexation and disquietude. An instance of this illiberality of feeling on the part of his rival is on record. Le Brun was one day conducting the nuncio of the pope through the apartments of the Hôtel Lambert, and on passing the pictures painted by Le Sueur, he quickened his pace that they might escape the notice of the visitor, but was stopped by the nuncio with the exclamation, “Ah here are fine pictures 1” There is no doubt that Le Brun feared his brother-artist would supplant him in the favour of Louis XIV., though it could hardly be supposed that one SO ingenuous and simple-minded as Le Sueur would use any artifice to accomplish such a purpose. Le Brun monopolized the patronage of the court, and was soon permitted to enjoy it without apprehension, for Le Sueur died in May, 1655, at the early age of thirty-eight years. Le Brun went to pay him a visit in his last moments, it is said, and when the spirit of the dying painter had quitted its emaciated tenement (for he had been a long time suffering from disease), the survivor could not withhold the exclamation, “Death hath taken a huge thorn out of my foot.” Le Sueur was one of the twelve founders of the French Academy, known by the appellation of the “Twelve Ancients.” The principal pictures of this master are to be found in the Louvre, and some few may be met with in the French provinces; but there must be a considerable number elsewhere, if they have not been destroyed, for in a French work published in 1700 by Florent le Comte, mention is made of eighty-eight paintings, exclusive of those illustrating the “Life of St. Bruno,” and of others which are now in the Louvre. Here also are many sketches and drawings by him, amounting to one hundred and seventy, according to M. Blanc. Out of France, England possesses perhaps, beyond any other country, the greatest number of his pictures; but even these are very scanty. At Devonshire House is his “Queen Sheba at the Court of Solomon:” at Leigh Court, near Bristol, formerly the property of Mr. Miles, was a few years since and probably is now, the “Death of Germanicus,” a noble production in the style of Nicholas Poussin : at Corsham House, Wiltshire, the seat of the Methuen family, is his “Pope Clement blessing St. Denis:” and at Alton Towers, the mansion of the Earl of Shrewsbury, is the “Christ weeping among his Relations at the foot of the Cross.” § N º" } º º 7-|-- |- iº= - -- -!--º y-N- º |- - 21/22// Myczzeeeve, "Yatrú ANTHONY WATTEAU. ſº §§ HERE are some, probably, who may object to the classing of Watteau among historical painters, yet he ought not to be excluded from this category, for his pictures, though not illustrative of great national events, are records of the national manners of a particular period, so that there is much truth in the observation made by a French critic with respect to him, “that he wrote the memoirs of a certain age upon the folding-doors of saloons, on tents and marquees, on the panels of mansions and carriages, as well as on & the numerous canvases which, during his short career, were sent forth from his easel.” In each and all of these we are taken back to the days when the gardens and terraces of Versailles were filled with their gayest flowers, the dames and cavaliers of the times of Louis XIV., or are reminded of our own country, when the heartless but luxurious Charles II. kept his revels on the banks of the Thames, and under the shadows of the thick hedgerows of Whitehall and the lofty trees in St. James's Park. The fashionable world at these periods must have been a very different race from that of the present time; or, at all events, a picnic or a /ēſe champêtre towards the end of the seventeenth century, and at the beginning of the last, was a widely different affair from what now comes under either denomination; while it may reasonably be doubted whether we have done wisely to leave these a/ / esco recreations to be enjoyed chiefly by the honest yet humble groups who I 72 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. throng the slopes of Greenwich and the walks of Hampton Court. The most magnificent saloon is a poor exchange for the variegated hues of Nature, and the perfumes of Arabia, inhaled through the atmosphere of a crowded ball-room, are never half so sweet and healthful as the pure and delicious fragrance of a summer's evening, which the south wind brings from field and flower, welcomed as alike grateful and invigorating. If we have become wiser than our fathers in many things, there are some in which we should do well to follow their example. Watteau was born at Valenciennes in 1684: his father was a man in very humble circumstances, a tiler, carrying on his business in that city. At the commencement of the eighteenth century, the French monarch, Louis XIV., was an old man; his armies had been defeated by Marlborough and Eugene, his great statesmen and best generals were dead, his treasury was exhausted, and he himself broken in health and subdued in spirit. France, or rather Paris, which is France, shared the gloom of her sovereign, had become tired of war and heavy taxation, and seemed only to wait for the death of the monarch to start upon a new career of pleasure and dissipation. But the patience of the Parisians could not hold out till the anticipated event took place; they could not exist long without their fêtes and concerts, and especially without their opera, but the opera required re-decorating. About this time there went from Valenciennes to Paris a decorator who took with him a young assistant, Anthony Watteau, whose ambition it was to emulate his master in the art of painting fairies and god- desses in halls and staircases, and stage-scenery. For some time he was thus occupied in a subordinate capacity, but his master quitting Paris after a comparatively short residence there, Watteau was compelled to seek out another employer; he found one in the house of a M. Métayer, a picture manufacturer, an artistic pirate, who had gathered into his afe/ier a dozen young professional assistants, whom he THE MINUET. employed to copy pictures for merchandise,_monks, virgins, infants, flowers, landscape, all the angels of Paradise, and all the saints of legend. The school was a corrupt one, but it was not without advantage to Watteau, more for the diversity of subject he was at first obliged to paint, which enlarged his practice, than for any great pecuniary gain it brought him; for, though he soon showed himself the most skilful workman in the factory, he received no more than three ſizres a week, about half-a-crown of our money. The head of the establishment, who appears to have had sufficient discrimination to employ the talents of the young artist to the best use, put him to paint pictures for churches, and at length charged him with copying pictures of St. Nicholas extensively—this saint being in especial demand at that period; so that Watteau was manufacturing St. Nicholases all the day long and every day, till, wearied with his occupation, he threw his brush into the vessel of holy water and took to flight, leaving Métayer and his factory of saints to take care of themselves. - But Louis was now dead, and, when the country had discarded its garb of mourning, the opera re-opened in all its glory: Watteau had been engaged in embellishing it; his long-desired wishes were at last accomplished. He had well qualified himself for this A.VTHOWP WATTEA U. I73 work by his studies since he quitted the house of Métayer. Claude Gillot, an artist of some ability, having perceived his peculiar talent, took him into his employ, and permitted him to assist in his own works, which consisted of landscapes, wherein grotesque figures, fauns, satyrs, and the like, are introduced ; thus confirming the pupil in the style which seemed most natural to him. But the scholar soon surpassed the master, and, unfortunately, their dispositions were very similar; and, inasmuch as it has been observed that nothing is less favourable to the sympathy of humour than that which conforms to it, the two artists quarrelled, and were at length as well pleased to part as they had formerly been to meet. Watteau now entered upon the labours of his profession as his own master, exchanging the yards of canvas which adorned the opera-stage, and the broad panels of the aristo- cratic mansion, for some three or four feet of the former in his own quiet atelier; but he brought to his new occupation the spirit and the resources that had carried him so success- A GARDEN-PARTY. fully through his previous duties; the genius of theatrical decoration still hovered over him, infusing itself into all his future pictures. The age in which he lived was one of most fanciful, almost masqueradish, costumes; an age of powder, and patches, and spangles; of vermilion on the cheeks and vermilion on the heels; of long-pointed waists, full robes, and lofty head-dresses; and the painter made a free use of the fashions which he placed on his figures, frequently beyond their actual existence, so that his pictures must not be regarded as indicating the exact costume of the period, though approaching very closely to it. These gay, glittering personages are dancing on the green turf, or listening to music under broad trees and beside mimic cascades, whose waters the fountains throw up in sparkles over drooping branches, lulling to sleep the naiads who live below; or are conversing listlessly as they walk through green alleys and wide gravelly walks, where statues of white marble stand silent watchers of the festive scene. He grouped his figures with exceeding taste, gave them the most graceful and Y Y 174 GA’EAZ' MASTERS OF AFT. living movements, and dressed them in the richest and brightest colours, united in perfect harmony. Life, as he painted it, knew neither sadness nor disappointment; it was one eternal round of pleasure—a &al masqué–under green arbours, beneath everlasting Sunshine; dulness overshadowed not its pastimes, and age stood aloof from its revels. Watteau's style of colouring was much improved by his studying the works of Rubens in the gallery of the Luxembourg, in Paris; this is, perhaps, more clearly perceptible in the few pictures he painted of troops on the march and halts of cavalry, than in the subjects we have more especially noticed, notwithstanding the brilliancy of the latter. Walpole, than whom none was better able to criticize the works of such a painter, says of him :—“The genius of Watteau resembled that of his countryman, D'Urfé; the one drew and the other wrote of imaginary nymphs and swains, and described a kind of impossible pastoral or rural life, led by those opposites of rural simplicity, people of fashion and rank. Watteau’s. shepherdesses, nay, his very sheep, are coquet, yet he avoided the glare and clinquant of his countrymen; and, though he fell short of the dignified grace of the Italians, there is an easy air in his figures, and that more familiar species of the graceful which we call genteel. His nymphs are as much below the forbidding majesty of goddesses as they are above the hoyden awkwardness of country-girls. In his halts and marches of armies, the careless slouch of his soldiers still retains the air of a nation that aspires to be agreeable as well as victorious.” Watteau, like most of our painters, meditated a journey to Italy. Before his departure, however, he had hung two of his pictures in one of the rooms of the Louvre, which served as a passage for the academicians. De la Fosse, the eminent French artist, happening to pass that way, was arrested by a sight of the pictures, and, inquiring who was their author, he perceived Watteau standing by in great anxiety, and, entering into conversation with him, learned his desire to travel. “Ah, my friend,” said De la Fosse, “what should you go to Italy for? you already know more than we; it is not the road over the Alps you ought to take, but the road into the Academy.” Encouraged and surprised, Watteau abandoned his project for the time, remained in Paris, and was received into the Academy under the new title of “Peintre des Fêtes Galantes.” He was also appointed painter to the King under the same appellation. The natural disposition of this artist was restless and irritable; he was timid, and extremely reserved to strangers ; misanthropic, discontented with himself and others; but he very frequently exhibited great kindliness of disposition and benevolence of heart. His infirmities of character were, it is presumed, aggravated by a highly sensitive temperament, and by a delicate constitu- tion arising from pulmonary disease. Tormented with disquietude, and still desirous of visiting foreign countries, Watteau came to England in 1718. Here he stayed a whole year, during which time he only painted two pictures, both of them for Dr. Meade, the eminent physician, whom Walpole says he came to consult. He returned to France with his health still more impaired, and his temper even more gloomy. His last work was a satire on the medical profession: a scene from Molière's comedy of Ze Malade Imaginaire, which concludes by the interment of the sick man in presence of the faculty ranged about the grave in formal costume. When the picture was completed the pencil fell from his hand; he died soon afterwards, in the year 1721, at the age of thirty-seven. JOHN JOUVENET. §ſ HE fact is not a little remarkable that France, with the encouragement - which, through centuries past, has existed in that country for great works of sacred and legendary art, should yet have produced very few worthy of ranking in the highest class. Churches, chapels, monasteries, and religious houses of all kinds abound, or at least till the first great Revolution did abound, in the land, creating an almost universal demand for such works; and still no painter of extraordinary ability arose to answer the call. Francis I., the enlightened patron of literature and art, invited to his court such men as Leonardo da Vinci, Andrea del Sarto, Primaticcio, and others, not less with a view of securing their talents for his own individual purpose, than with the hope that their example might operate favourably upon any latent genius France possessed; but we do not read of any especial good result arising from the monarch's liberality. The first painter having any claim to meritorious notice was Simon Vouet, who flourished about the middle of the seventeenth century; yet his works scarcely reached a second-rate rank. He was followed by Le Brun, an artist of undoubted ability, but deficient in that sublimity of conception which can alone bring forth a grand work; by Eustace Le Sueur, who, as already shown, produced some fine pictures as regards composition, yet devoid of power from the absence of forcible colouring ; and by Peter Mignard, whose reputation belongs rather to Italy than France, though he passed two years 176 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. of his earlier life in the school of Vouet. These are all the names, with the exception of Jouvenet, that have the least pretension to high rank, for Nicholas Poussin must not be placed in the French school, though a Frenchman; he owed all his greatness to his Italian education, not- withstanding he had acquired some popularity ere he went to Rome. To the later artists of France the objection is equally applicable; neither David, nor Gerard, nor Le Gros, nor Girardet, have any pretension to be placed among the greatest masters who practised sacred historical painting. Till within the last few years considerable obscurity prevailed respecting the ancestry of John Jouvenet, a matter which, in itself, is of small importance, if, as is generally admitted, the virtues or vices of a man’s progenitors are not his own. But, in the present instance, the establishment of the fact of Jouvenet's descent is not without interest as showing his origin from a numerous THE MIRACULOUS DRAUGHT OF FISHES. family of artists: this has been recently placed almost beyond dispute by the researches of M. Houel, an advocate of Rouen, in which city Jouvenet was born. About the middle of the sixteenth century a painter and sculptor, John Jouvenet, presumed to have migrated from Italy, settled in Rouen, where he died in 1616. He was the origin of several families of artists; one of his sons, it is said, instructed Nicholas Poussin in his earlier years. This son, whose name was Noel, had himself three sons, each of whom was, in one way or another, connected with art; one married the daughter of a sculptor named Rabon ; another gave his daughter to William Leviel, a clever glass-painter, and the third, Laurence Jouvenet, a painter and sculptor, had five children, of whom, Marie Madeline, married John Restout, an artist of Caen, father and grandfather of the two Restouts, members of the Academy of Paris; another, Francis Jouvenet, was painter in ordinary to the French Court, and a third was John, whose portrait stands at the JOHN /OUVENET. I77 head of this brief notice. So many artists, directly or indirectly, springing from the same Source, form a singular record, so singular that no apology need be offered for dwelling upon it. These facts are stated by M. Charles Blanc, in the “Histoire des Peintres,” to which work I am also indebted for other information concerning the painter. The date of Jouvenet's birth is April, 1644 : having studied for some time under his father, receiving also the instruction of his uncles, he was sent to Paris. Le Brun had already established the Academy of the Fine Arts, with the assistance of a body of artists who had brought from Rome and Bologna some portion of that feeling for art, and a certain amount of the style, which characterized these distinguished Italian schools. Jouvenet was then but seventeen years of age; Mignard and Le Brun were at the head of the French School, and the young artist became the pupil of the latter. So intuitive, however, was his talent, and so well had it been developed under his earlier instructors, that Le Brun immediately employed him to assist in painting the ceilings of the Palace at Versailles, which Louis XIV. had then but recently determined on converting from a comparatively insignificant château into a residence suited to a great monarch. For nearly ten years Jouvenet appears to have been so occupied, and this term may be re- garded as the first period of his practice: during the time, however, he found opportunity for painting his “Winter,” for the series of the “Four Seasons,” at Marly; the ceilings of the hotel Saint-Pouanges, and the “Martyrdom of St. Ovide,” now in the Museum of Grenoble. Until the termination of this period he had not been able to divest himself of those influ- ences that seemed in a great measure to keep down, or, at least, to limit his natural genius; but, in 1672, a decided change was manifest in his style, which became bolder and less mannered, so that in the following year he had attained such proficiency in the higher qualities of art as to carry off the second great prize in the Academy, and in the same year, his age being then only twenty-nine, he painted the “Paralytic Healed,” for what was called the “May picture.” A picture so designated was, till the practice ceased in 1708, annually presented—as stated in the notice of Le Sueur-by the goldsmiths of Paris, on the 1st of May, to the Virgin, in the cathedral of Notre Dame. The picture painted by Jouvenet established the artist's reputation; Vermeulen, the eminent engraver, asked permission to engrave his works, and Le Brun once more invited him to assist in the decorations of Versailles. In 1675 he was admitted into the French Academy, of which he successively became pro- fessor, director, and perpetual president: the subject of his “reception” picture, as it is termed, was “Esther before Ahasuerus.” In 1683, the death of one or two relatives induced him to visit his native city, Rouen, where he was received with much distinction, but the king speedily recalled him to Paris, and gave him apartments in one of the royal palaces. The first work he undertook in his new atelier was one Z Z 178 GREAT MASTERS OF ART. on a grand scale, twenty-eight feet long, by thirteen in height, the subject, “ Christ Healing the Sick.” This picture may be called a résumé of the artist's talents as well as of his defects; his figures are vigorously grouped, full of spirit and movement, but they are not a little vulgarised in expression, and the shadows are not correctly indicated. His next great works, painted in the five or six following years, were “Isaac blessing Jacob,” for the Museum of Rouen; “Nunc Dimittis,” for a college of Jesuits; the “Family of Darius,” and “Louis XIV. touching for the King's Evil.” The death of Le Brun taking place in 1690, Jouvenet became the head of the French School, EXTREME UNCTION. for Mignard, although still living, had reached the advanced age of eighty, and was consequently out of the field of action. “ The Marriage of the Virgin,” and a portrait of the abbot of St. Marthe, were painted about this time, as was in all probability the portrait of himself preserved in the Museum of Rouen. In 1693 he was compelled to seek change of air and to try the medicinal waters of Bourbon, in consequence of an attack of apoplexy. Having after some time regained his wonted health, he returned to his labours in 1696, and was summoned to Rennes to paint the ceiling of the Chamber of Parliament. During his stay in the city he painted, in forty-five days, three ceilings for the registrar-general, in whose house he lodged. Louis XIV., desirous of bestowing on Jouvenet some mark of his favour, granted him a JOHN /OUVEVE7. I79 pension of twelve hundred livres, which sum, at a subsequent period, when the decorations of the palace of Versailles were completed, was increased by five hundred more; he also offered to send him to Italy at the public expense, but Jouvenet, partly from unwillingness to quit France, THE DESCENT FROM THE CROSS, and partly from indisposition, paid little attention to the proposal, and remained quietly in his studio in Paris. French writers upon art congratulate their country on having possessed a great artist who had never seen Italy; perhaps, had he visited the far-famed galleries of the south, they would have had more abundant reason to be proud of their countryman. 18O GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. One of the finest of Jouvenet's pictures is unquestionably “The Descent FROM THE CRoss,” painted, in 1697, for the Convent of the Capuchins, at Paris, but now in the Louvre. To those who know the pictures of this subject by Rembrandt and Rubens, it will at once occur, that if Jouvenet had never travelled out of France, he must have seen engravings or sketches of these works, for his own treatment of the subject seems to be largely borrowed from both ; the upper group, especially, recalling Rubens's composition. Still, the picture is a fine work, most vigorously designed, and showing some admirable drawing ; but it is dramatic. A brilliant effect is produced by the great breadth of light thrown over the work; but it is certainly too strong for the hour of the day—“now, when the even was come”—at which the event is said to have taken place, although the mid-day darkness had long since rolled away. Another of his best works is “The Raising of Lazarus;” in this picture the artist painted his OWn portrait and also those of his daughters, standing among the spectators, to the right, between two columns. “The Money-changers driven from the Temple.” (it is singular that Jouvenet should have again, in both of these, selected subjects already illustrated by Rembrandt) was the first of the series painted by order of the King for the Church of St. Martin des Champs, the last being “THE MIRACULOUS DRAUGHT OF FISHES,” completed in 1702. The others were “Christ in the House of Simon the Pharisee,” and “The Raising of Lazarus.” These four pictures are now in the Louvre. - The picture entitled “Extreme UNCTION,” also in the Louvre, but originally in an apartment of the house of the Provost of St. Germain l'Auxerrois, ranks among Jouvenet's best works, though, as Waagen aptly remarks, the figures of the Virgin and Child “are insignificant and unconcerned with the subject.” It was in the early part of the eighteenth century that Jouvenet executed, in conjunction with Coypel and Poèrson, the frescoes of the Apostles, painted on the dome of the Chapel of the Invalids; these figures stand about fourteen feet in height, and are finely drawn. In 1709, we find the artist, though in his sixty-fifth year, working at Versailles with all the enthusiasm of a young man ; but in four or five years from this date, he lost the entire use of his right side and arm, from an attack of paralysis. Such a calamity would have deterred a less energetic artist—one, too, not necessitated to labour—from any further attempt in his profession; and, for a short time, it had this effect upon Jouvenet; but his studio was filled with his scholars, and he felt that he must do what he could to advance their interests. Amon g these young men was his nephew, Restout, a favourite pupil, who was one day painting a head in a large picture ; the venerable artist was standing by, and took up, with his stricken hand, a pencil, to put a touch or two into the work; but the hand refused to obey his will ; the pencil was then shifted to the other, when, to the surprise of the painter, he found he could use it with almost as much facility as he had been accustomed to use the right. From this time he constantly painted with his left, and among the pictures so produced are “The Death of St. Francis,” the ceiling of one of the chambers in the Parliament House at Rouen, and his last work, “The Visitation of the Virgin,” in the Cathedral of Notre Dame. He died in 1717. Jouvenet was, undoubtedly, an artist of genius; but to place him on the same level with the great Italian masters, as some French writers have essayed to do, is manifestly absurd. 6 (, ſet tº au’s THEODORE GERICAULT. º, CARCELY any artist, either ancient or modern, has attained such an elevated position by a single picture as Théodore Géricault, the painter of the “WRECK OF THE MEDUSA,” a work which at once placed him in the foremost ranks of the modern French school. He was born in 1791, at Rouen, where his father exercised the profession of an advocate; and having, up to the age of fifteen, received a careful and excellent education, he was afterwards sent, for future instruction, to the Lycée, at Paris. But the study of classic literature was ill adapted to the mind of one who sought to be a painter—least of all to one whose ambition it was to paint horses, for horses had been a passion with him almost from childhood. When at the Lycée, his highest pleasure during the hours of holiday was to visit the celebrated riding-school of Franconi, who, in the eyes of young Géricault, was the greatest of mortal men; he would also watch at the gates of the residences of the nobility for their equipages, and if he noticed any horses of a finer description than ordinary, he would follow them on their journey for a long time, as the gamins of Paris follow the drummers through the streets. Such enthusiasm as this in pursuit of a favourite object must, even had there been no innate genius to second it, have produced results commensurate with the energy exhibited. At the age of seventeen, Géricault quitted the Lycée to enter the affe'ier of Charles Vernet, 3. A I82 Grzaz MASTERS of AR7, where he thought to gratify his two ruling predilections for painting and for horses; but the animals of Vernet's studio were not of the kind to please the young painter, they were of too aristocratic a breed; he preferred the broad chests and strong limbs of the Flemish and German animals, to the slender, delicate proportions of the Arabian and the race-horse. So he left Vernet in quiet possession of his stud, and presented himself at the school of Guérin ; but, unfortunately, taking with him all his preconceived ideas of colour, which appeared ridiculous in the eyes of that rigid academician. Géricault had made his earliest studies in the Musée, and, with a hardihood which astounded Guérin, had presumed to copy Rubens to a considerable extent; so that he went, with all the brilliant colours of the great Flemish painter in his eyes, into the sanctuary where sat in solemn dignity academical figures, sculptured models, wise men, heroes, and heathen deities. In the midst of such company the young artist was ill at ease, the atmosphere of the studio was too ungenial and chilling; moreover, he considered himself destined to become one day a great painter, and his master expressed himself of a different opinion; and, therefore, whether the latter really thought so, or whether, which is more probable, he was induced to aid the father of Géricault in preventing his son following the profession, he coun- selled the youth to renounce his intentions. Mortified, but not discouraged, he left Guérin, and completed his literary education by reading the English poets, and by the study of Italian and music; he also continued to copy such masters of painting as best pleased him, in the hope tº º :=º - tº: _* º º º º º º animated them. At the house of Guérin he had formed of acquiring some portion of the genius which had an acquaintance with many of the great artists of his time and country—Cogniet, Eugène Delacroix, the two Scheffers, H. Dupont, and others, whose names are now ALARMED ! quite familiar among us in England; and he was especially intimate with Dedreux Dorcy, the most clever pupil in the school of Guérin ; and who, having, like his fellow-student, ample means at command, was quite disposed to spend them liberally in his company, instead of pursuing with diligence the study of his art. Géricault had now become a fine young man, well-made, and of elegant deportment; he was a great favourite with all his acquaintances, and was already distinguished in the rides on the Champ de Mars. Had he lived in our time, when the pleasures of the turf and the race-course occupy the attention of the Parisians, he would probably have entered the Jockey Club, and have been recognised as one of the heroes of Chantilly and the steeple-chase: yet not so much for the gratification these pursuits might have afforded him, as for the opportunity they would give of observing the various characteristics of the noble animal which it was the artist's pleasure to study, whether on the turf, or harnessed to a chariot or a waggon. But, unfortunately, his father and his family were still so strongly opposed to the idea of his becoming a painter, they would not even make any arrangement to provide him with a studio; he therefore painted sometimes at the house of his friend, M. Dorcy, and sometimes at the residences of other acquaintances. In 1812, however, he hired a temporary apartment on the 7///opoRE GAER/CAwar. 183 Boulevard Montmartre, where he painted a large equestrian portrait of M. Dieudonné, in the uniform of a chasseur of the Imperial Guard, a work full of spirit and living animation. “Where did this come from P' asked David, the great artist of the French school; “I do not recognise that touch.” Nor was it likely that he should, seeing that Géricault was at this time scarcely twenty years of age, yet had already produced a work that vied in power of colour and composi- tion with the best of his contemporaries. Such was the début of Géricault; “Le Chasseur de la Garde” caused as much astonishment as admiration among both artists and the public. In 1814 he exhibited at the saloon of the Louvre, “The Wounded Cuirassier,” as a companion-picture to the foregoing. The dismounted soldier is holding his horse by the bridle, on broken and slippery ground; the subject was evidently suggested by the misfortunes of the French army in the Russian campaign. In the interval between the execution of these works he painted, for THE WAGGON. Lord Seymour, who was, I believe, then residing in Paris, two exceedingly fine studies of groups of horses, or rather of portions of the animals. All at once, however, the young artist abandoned his labours at the easel to enter a corps of musqueteers. On the restoration of the Bourbons, in 1814, a number of young men of the higher classes of society enrolled themselves as a corps d'éſite, to testify their devotion to the restored dynasty; and they provided themselves with a magnificent uniform of scarlet and gold. Géricault had many acquaintances among these young aristocrats, who persuaded him to give up his studious occupations; and, being of a sociable disposition, and easily persuaded, he made no opposition to their requests. He soon, indeed, repented of his weakness, when he perceived how much of pride and vanity was mingled with their loud expressions of devotedness to the monarchy; but loyal, and faithful to his allegiance, he accompanied Louis XVIII. I84 GREAT MASTERS OF AR7. during his one hundred days of exile, and remained under the colours of his corps till its disbandment. - Once more returned to his atelier, the artist resumed his occupations with increased diligence. Filled with admiration for the pictures of Gros, he was accustomed to pass many hours in examining them, and, it is said, paid a thousand francs for permission to copy one of his large pictures. Yet it was not sufficient for him to have studied in France only, he considered it necessary to become a pilgrim at the shrine of ancient art, and accordingly started for Italy in 1817. Arrived in the land endeared to every lover of art by its glorious acquisitions, Géricault felt deeply impressed with all he saw around him, and received a new impulse from the works of the great men whose names have consecrated the genius of their country; in fact, he saw art through a new medium, one that he recognised, but could scarcely understand. The frescoes of Michael Angelo and others seemed to enchant him, and even the pictures which hung in the Italian churches, dim as they were with age and the smoke of innumerable tapers, allured him to imitation. Susceptible and easily wrought upon, that which had hitherto been his highest ambition to reach, and his glory to have attained—colour—he now held in little regard. In truth, on his return to France, he spoke of his former “rose-tones” in terms of irony and disdain; and even his favourite Rubens, who had hitherto been the object of his extreme venera- tion, scarcely escaped the shafts of his satirical criticism. So firmly did this impression, with regard to colour, influence his style at this time, that he did not dare to paint his horses as nature had made them, but chose rather to adopt as models those he had seen in the pictures of Giulio Romano, and in the “Attila” of Raffaelle. His delusion on this subject, if such it may be called, lasted not very long in its full extent; but it had a beneficial influence upon his future works by keeping the colours of his palette within moderate limits; it toned them down, as an artist would say. But the time had come when he was to present himself before the public as a painter of other scenes than those by which he had already made himself popular. He had long meditated the idea of bringing forward for pictorial representation some passage of history which would entitle him to rank among the “great masters of art;” and he selected for his subject “THE 2 WRECK OF THE MEDUSA,” suggested by the appalling shipwreck of this French frigate. This fine picture, terrible by its fidelity, would have been a triumph to an artist of long-matured powers; as the work of one who had scarcely reached his twenty-eighth year, it is almost marvellous. It was exhibited in London in 1820. Those who do not remember the picture, which is now in the Louvre, in Paris, may have seen Reynolds's excellent engraving from it. The circumstances of this appalling calamity were these:–On the 17th of June, 1816, the Medusa, accompanied by three other and smaller French vessels of war, the corvette Z’ Zcho and the brigs Za Zoire and Z'Argus, left port bound for St. Louis, having on board the Governor of Senegal and his suite; the number of the crew and passengers amounted to about four hundred souls. On the 4th of July the frigate grounded on the African coast at Anguin, lying north of Cape Verd. After striving ineffectually during five days to get her afloat, a raft was constructed to which one hundred and forty-nine of the crew betook themselves; the rest of the crew got into the ship's boats, which took the raft in tow. Finding, however, after THAEODORE GAERICAULT. - 185 Some time that they were quite unable to navigate the unwieldy mass, those in the boats cut the ropes, and rowed away, leaving their companions in the midst of the ocean, and almost without food of any kind. Eleven days were thus passed, till the only subsistence to be procured was the flesh of those who died; on the twelfth day the survivors discovered a vessel in the horizon, which proved to be the Argus, sent in search of the raft, from which were taken fifteen men, more dead than alive, and all who were left of the one hundred and forty-nine souls that sought refuge thereon. How vividly that scene on the raft recalls Byron's description of a wreck in his “Don Juan l’”— “'Twas twilight, and the sunless day went down Over the waste of waters ; like a veil * Which, if withdrawn, would but disclose the frown Of one whose hate is mark'd but to assail. Thus to their hopeless eyes the night was shown, And grimly darkled o'er their faces pale, And the dim desolate deep: twelve days had Fear Been their familiar, and now Death was here. “Some trial had been making at a raft, With little hope in such a rolling sea, A sort of thing at which one would have laughed, If any laughter at such times could be,” &c., &c. The appearance of the Argus in the distance is the point chosen by the artist for representation. The composition of the work is very fine, more especially in its general form, while the groups are balanced with great judgment; the most prominent is that which terminates, in a pyramidal shape, with the figure who signalises, to which all the others of the group move in an ascending position. The picture is, undoubtedly, one of the noblest, after its kind, of the modern French school; it is as fine in its execution as the story it tells is striking and terrible; and as vigorous in handling as it is powerful and solid in colouring. The figures are all life-size. - Géricault came to London with his picture of “The Medusa,” the exhibition of which, it is said, with the sum paid for the copyright of the engraving, realised him nearly a thousand pounds. While here he embraced every opportunity of studying the form and character of the English horse, the results of which are clearly perceptible in some of the few pictures he subsequently produced. - On his return to Paris an alteration in his health became perceptible to his acquaintances; his letters were expressive of enmui and melancholy, and he was tormented with extreme restless- ness. Much of this is said to have been attributable to his disappointment at not selling his picture of “The Medusa,” which he had hoped to do either here or in France. And while his attachment to his friends became more intense, suspicions altogether unfounded were entertained by him that they were deserting him : he constantly complained of the rarity of their visits, and that even their letters were few and far between. In short, his mind, for a time, was altogether unhinged. It was the fate of Géricault to become the victim of his own boldness and impetuosity. Riding one day with Horace Vernet on the heights of Montmartre, his horse, a young and exceedingly 3 B I 86 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. spirited animal, shied, and threw him with much force against a heap of stones. The injuries he received were, however, not of so severe a character, but that, with proper management on his own part, he might in time have got over them. Impatient of delay, and weary of confine- ment, he aggravated his maladies by imprudent fatigue. He mounted his horse, and would assist in the races on the Champ de Mars, where he again was injured by coming in contact with another rider: this compelled him once more to submit himself to the care of his friends. Ill, and incapable of moving abroad, he remained about a year at the house of M. Dedreux Dorcy, drawing when he could, and superintending the execution of some lithographs from his works. But his spirit was altogether broken, and his melancholy was increased by certain debts he had incurred, while his illness prevented him from working to discharge them. To THE WRECK OF THE MEDUSA. relieve his mind from this disquietude, his friends, M. Dorcy and Colonel Bro, contrived to dispose of some of his pictures, which they did to great advantage, realising in a very few days 4520. Nothing could have proved more consolatory to poor Géricault, in his then sick condition, than the estimation in which he found his works to be held ; especially after the French government had offered him only 4, 200 for his “Shipwreck of the Medusa.” - This unlooked-for success seemed once more to revive his drooping spirits, and with it some improvement in his health became manifest. He went again to his work with as much alacrity as his enfeebled constitution would allow, and made a series of water-colour drawings of oriental costumes. He also thought seriously of executing two grand compositions he had long meditated, “Slaves Embarking,” and “The Opening of the Doors of the Inquisition.” Already he had made a beginning, when his malady, consumption, returned suddenly, and with increased 7///oporº, Gár/CA U17. 187 violence; and, after long and great suffering, he sank under it on the 18th of January, 1824, in the thirtieth year of his age. - On the death of this painter, M. Dorcy, jealous for the honour of his friend, and with true patriotic feeling, immediately bought the picture of “The Medusa’’ for £240, fearing it might probably pass into the hands of a foreigner. Shortly after the purchase had been made, he was offered for it, by some American gentlemen, more than double that sum, which was at once rejected. At length, M. de Forbin, Director of the Louvre, offered to redeem it at the price M. Dorcy had paid, advancing from his own private purse 440, to add to the government offer of 4, 200. Thus Géricault's great picture found a place in the National Gallery of France, in association with the works of Paul Veronese, Rubens, Poussin, and other famous painters. The HoRSE-DEALER'S STUD. The style of this artist is firm, vigorous, and perfectly distinguishable; without preferring common models, he knew how to accept them, and impart to his representations of them that character of beauty and force which gives nobility. If he saw a cart-horse passing along, he would sketch it, so as to bring out all its powerful action, and make it appear an animal worthy of a painter's study. We have examples of his ability to do this in the two engravings—“THE * WAGGON,” and “THE HORSE-DEALER’s STUD,” wherein the animals, which appear of the breed of Normandy or Flanders, are represented with a spirit and fidelity that have only been equalled among French artists by Géricault's distinguished countrywoman, Mdle. Rosa Bonheur. An anecdote is related of the painter which shows that his love for his favourite animal, the 188 GREAT MASTERS OF AR7. horse, was greater than his apprehension for his own personal safety. Passing one day through a small street leading to the Louvre, he saw a carman beating a horse with extreme severity. Géricault's indignation was roused, and he expostulated with the driver on his cruelty to the poor animal. The man became insolent, and answered his reprover by threats and increased ill-usage; whereupon, the artist, unable further to restrain his indignation, knocked him down under the heels of the animal. The fellow, hurt, but not abashed, raised himself up, and, Scanning the athletic form of his assailant, quietly said to him, “Perhaps, as you are so strong, you will yourself help the horse.” Struck with the sound sense of the remark, Géricault, without hesita- tion, put his shoulder to one wheel, while the carman did the same to the other, and thus the hostile pair assisted the overladen beast through the ill-paved street. Jºgº 1778 fragoy JOHN HONORIUS FRAGONARD. § OTHING could by possibility be more unfavourable for the development of lofty and intellectual art—that art which alone tends to exalt the character of a people—than the state of France during the latter half of the eighteenth century especially. We mark this position of her history in particular, because although the fifty years which preceded it gave un- mistakable evidence of an unhealthy and weakly constitution, adverse to all that is pure and vigorous in public taste and morals, the depth, extent, and virulence of the malady that had secretly, yet surely, affected the whole social system, did not break forth till the period referred to, and little was there then which escaped its deadening influences. The long reign of Louis XIV. that closed in 1715, was distinguished by events which showed the political greatness of the nation, its attainments in science and literature, and its moral weakness. Louis was a brilliant monarch, if his liberal patronage of learned men entitle him to such an epithet; but he had neither education nor judgment to discriminate wisely, nor principles which it would be right to follow. He built palaces, he adorned them profusely with the works of the sculptor, the painter, and the ornamentist; and while we recognise in them a lavish expenditure of wealth, we perceive also a meretricious style of art that seems only worthy to be admired by the La Vallières, the De Montespans, and the De Maintenons of his court, who, in one’s mind, are ever associated with it. This was the period when the mere decorator and scenist were in high favour, and state-balls, masquerades, and /č/es cha/e/res became almost a passion. Hence arose the school of Watteau, 3 C I90 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. whose principal followers were Boucher, Lancret, De la Hire, and Pater, associated with others of kindred feeling but of inferior merit. Art had degenerated from the comparatively noble position in which Le Sueur and Le Brun had left it. The reign of the immediate successor of Louis XIV. advanced considerably into that period of the eighteenth century which I have spoken of as most adverse to the promulgation of art. Faction and discontent at home, and wars abroad, occupied the minds of both prince and people too fully to allow of their giving heed to matters of a contrary tendency; while the corruption of morals and right principles was spreading to a fearful extent among all classes, being encouraged by the materialism and sensual philosophy which were taught by men of rank and of scientific pursuits. Thus was the way being actively prepared for the dark season of anarchy, ruin, and THE HAPPY FAMILY. murder that terminated the last century—a season of civil feuds and religious schisms, of conspiracy, treason, and national dishonour, when they who advocated what was popularly called º “the rights of man,” acted as if wrong were the only right, and licentiousness the only virtue. How could it be expected that what is, or should be, allied with the pure and beautiful, could flourish in an atmosphere so tainted with national immorality France, it is true, had even then her skilful painters—David, Gerard, Girodet, Gros, and Guérin--but though the first of these endeavoured to restore his art to a more healthy state, he succeeded only in a comparatively small degree, nor did his followers effect more: the spirit of the times was upon them all; exaggerated melodramatic expression and academic affectations stood in the place of genuine feeling, elevating thoughts, and the true poetry of Nature. JOHN HONOR/US FRAGONARD. I9 I It may probably be asked why, if such be our estimate of the works of the French school, as then existing, they should be considered worthy of a place in a catalogue of Great Masters of Art 2 The reply is, that while admitting their defects, one cannot be blind to their merits, which are neither few nor small. In case it may be urged that individual or national prejudice has influenced the remarks thus made upon the French school of the last century, I will quote, as in some measure confirmatory of them, the opinion of M. Charles Blanc, to whom I am indebted for the T H E FOUNTAIN OF LOVE. principal facts in the history of Fragonard. He says, writing of him in 1856, “It is now fifty years since that charming painter died, who had so exalted a reputation, who has left hundreds of pictures and thousands of drawings, who was a Member of the Academy, whose works have so often been engraved, who understood so well the taste of the eighteenth century, who exhibited so much of its spirit, so much grace, so much of its copiousness, and, alas ! so much of is /rizo/i/y.” M. Blanc unquestionably gives his countryman a more elevated and expansive reputation than he enjoys, for he is little known out of France, and certainly does not there hold the highest rank; while he is compelled to admit that I92 - GA’EAZ' MASTERS OF AZR 7. Fragonard is amenable to the charge of frivolité—a word not justly applicable to some of this painter’s works. Fragonard was born at Grasse in 1732, about ten years after the death of Watteau. When he had reached his eighteenth year, his family went to Paris for the purpose of carrying on a lawsuit, which terminated in their ruin. This led to the youth being placed in the office of a ..otary; but his love of drawing was stronger than his desire to prove himself a “ready writer,” and, therefore, his mother introduced him to Boucher, who was at that time in the height of his popularity. But this artist would not receive any pupils into his studio who were not tolerably well initiated in the art of painting; he was too much occupied with the danseuses of the opera, with his mistresses and his models, and with the patrons who frequented his painting-room and bought his pictures, to undertake the task of instruction; and so the young man was entrusted to the care of M. Chardin, who at once placed a palette and brushes in his hands, and set him to work. Chardin painted with much freedom, yet finished his works highly; he was also an excellent colourist; and there is little doubt but that Fragonard was indebted for these qualities, which are manifest in most of his works, to the example and instruction he received thus early in the studio of his master. At the expiration of six months Fragonard presented himself again before Boucher, for he was most desirous of entering the studio of that popular painter. The latter was surprised at the progress the young man had made, and at once admitted him without the premium he was accustomed to receive from pupils. In the year 1752 Fragonard gained the first prize in the French Academy, which entitles its possessor to a residence in Italy for a specified time. The subject of the picture which he painted in competition was “Jeroboam sacrificing to the Idols.” Fragonard immediately made preparations for his journey; he called to take leave of his master before starting. Boucher took him aside and whispered in his ear, “My dear Frago” (the abbreviated name by which he usually addressed his favourite pupil, and which is often found on his pictures), “you are going to see in Italy the works of Raffaelle, of Michel Angelo, and their imitators, but if you seriously follow such sort of people, you are a lost child.” Boucher could discover neither grace of form nor beauty of countenance in any one but a lady of the voluptuous French court. Arrived in Rome, Fragonard immediately commenced copying many of the best pictures of the old Italian masters; at first he was discouraged by the grandeur of these famous works, but he soon gained sufficient confidence to study them closely, although it is evident they did not help him to acquire a more elevated style of art than that he had previously practised; they contributed, however, to improve his own. Hubert Robert, a French artist, who painted architectural views with very considerable success, was a fellow-student with him. In 1759 the Abbé de St. Non, a distinguished amateur-engraver, arrived in Rome, and attached himself closely to these two artists; he took them to Naples, Herculaneum, and Pompeii; they ascended Vesuvius together, passed over into Sicily, and visited other parts of Italy lying adjacent, sketching, as they proceeded, the most interesting edifices, ruins, and landscapes, which St. Non, on his return to Paris in 1762, either engraved himself or had engraved, and JOHN HONOR/US FRAGONARD. I93 published in a magnificent folio volume, well known in France and elsewhere under the title of “Voyage Pittoresque des Royaumes de Naples et de Sicile.” Fragonard must have passed twelve years in Italy, for the first picture he painted on his return to Paris was exhibited in the Saſon of 1765; the title of it was “Callirhoe,” a subject taken from classic fabulous history. The work, which is of very large size, at once gained for the painter admittance into the French Academy: it is now in the Louvre, and a copy in tapestry has been made at the national establishment of the Gobelins. The story of Callirhoe— of her who is the subject of Fragonard's picture, for there are several women of this name mentioned by ancient writers—is related by Pausanias; she was a nymph of Boeotia, with whom Coresus, a priest of the temple of Bacchus at Calydon, became enamoured ; but as she refused his overtures, he complained to the deity whom he served, and Bacchus sent a pestilence throughout the country. The people of Calydon were directed by the oracle to sacrifice Callirhoe A STORMY DAY. on the altar of the temple to appease the anger of Bacchus; she was led to the altar for this purpose, but Coresus rather than perform such a sacrifice stabbed himself. Diderot, the French writer, who was contemporary with Fragonard, criticizes this picture rather severely in a little //ocſ/re entitled “L’Antre de Platon,” and yet in his “Essay on Painting" he speaks of it as highly luminous, true, and spirited : “It is a fine work,” he says: “I do not think there is a painter in Europe capable of composing such another.” Fragonard exhibited two other pictures at the same time as the “Callirhoe,” which showed the versatility of his powers; the one was a landscape, the other the interior of a cottage with a group of peasantry; but neither of them seemed to have altogether pleased Diderot, who appears to have had a pique against the artist; for in criticizing a picture by him exhibited in the Saſon of 1707, a “Group of Children in the Heavens,” he writes, “C'est une belle et grande omelette d'enfants. - - - - - - * * 1 - la fricassée d’anges est une singerie de Boucher; " a humorous yet severe verdict. 3 D I94 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. The severity of these criticisms did not, however, have any injurious effect on the painter, for he rose rapidly into public favour, but he did not again exhibit at the Saſon and although a member of the Academy, he was never elected a professor in its schools; in fact, almost as soon as he entered it, he fell into bad odour with his colleagues, but from what cause his biographers have not fully explained. The pictures of Fragonard were soon as much sought after as his master's, Boucher, who had now become almost past the practice of his art. Con- noisseurs and amateurs flocked to the studio of the former; he painted a “Visitation’’ for the THE CRADLE. Duke de Grammont, and numerous pictures, graceful in design, which showed he had now acquired a style of his own. Notwithstanding his success, however, he had still a strong desire once again to visit Italy, which was very frequently the subject of his conversation, and at length he set out for that country in the company of a wealthy individual who was intimate with many of Fragonard's friends and patrons, the person in question undertaking to defray their joint expenses. This time the artist travelled over every part of Italy, and made a large number of sketches. He had the honour, when at Rome, of a private interview with Pope Ganganelli, who received him with distinguishing marks of courtesy and kindness. JOHN HONOR/US FRAGONARD. 195 It seems that the artist's com/agnon de voyage conceived that his self-imposed office of pay- master-general entitled him also to that of receiver-general; at any rate, Fragonard gave the drawings he had made in Italy into his charge. But when the travellers had returned to Paris, the paymaster refused to give them up to their owner, alleging as his ground of refusal, that he retained them to liquidate the expenses he had incurred on the tour. The matter was referred to a court of law, and the holder of the collection was adjudged either to return the works or pay Fragonard for them. He accepted the latter alternative, and handed Love's vow. over to the artist thirty thousand Wives—a very considerable sum, that showed how highly the works of Fragonard were esteemed. In truth, he was then at the zenith of his fame, and there was no painter then living to share with him the honours of the style he and his immediate predecessors had adopted, and which was yet most popular in France. Boucher was now dead; the majority of the young painters of the day, no longer enticed by the seductive charms of the Watteau school, were preparing the way for that revolution in French Art which David was the principal means of accomplishing; Fragonard was thus the ſainter of France. When, in 1772, Louis XV. had erected for the Countess du Barry, whose intrigues and 196* GA-AAZ' MASTERS OF ART. unfortunate end are matters of history, the château of Luciennes, she engaged Fragonard to decorate one of the saloons. He there painted, in his best manner, four large panels, on which he represented, in the centre of various allegorical ornaments, the “Loves of the Shepherds.” M. Charles Blanc relates several anecdotes in connection with the pictures he painted at this time, and also describes some of the works; both the one and the other are abundantly cha- racteristic of the tone and taste prevailing in the higher ranks of French Society a few years prior to the breaking out of the great Revolution, but they are certainly not worth repeating. But the period was rapidly approaching which, for a season at least, was to thrust aside all those gay and festive scenes in which the painter delighted. Already the cloud, at first “no bigger than a man’s hand,” appeared in the horizon, which finally overshadowed the damseuses of the Grand Opéra, the brilliant throngs of Versailles, and the favoured frequenters of Le Pavillon de Luciennes and L’Hotel de Guimard. “That revolution was at hand,” says M. Charles Blanc, “which caused so melancholy a suspension of that joyous little world of the Saloms and the Opera where Fragonard had been so kindly ſéted. The time had come for serious matters and great deeds. Frivolous as he had ever been, the painter of love-Scenes could not all at once surrender his own predilections; yet almost without knowing it, he found himself submitting to another order of things even as the rest. Was it not already a kind of concession made to the new spirit of that epoch, that familiar Scenes might be represented where beauty appeared without spangles, without garments of velvet and of silk | We all know the history of the last years of the reign of Louis XVI. Under the inspiration of Greuze, and of Chardin, the genre painter entered a world assuredly far more grave than that of which Boucher and his pupils had revealed the mysteries. The cottage of the peasant, the workshop of the artisan, had now become the studios of the artist; even rags and tatters had their painters. It was a vast field, a hitherto unexplored way, which opened itself before art. Fragonard attempted it, and not without success. . . Without doubt, his original subjects held the first place in his esteem, but he was not unwilling that his imagination should find a purer source for its exercise. The lives of the poor and the simple, the calm scenes of the natural world, beguiled him in their turn, and it was then he produced the majority of those pictures which the engraver has multiplied,—‘The Happy Mother,’ ‘THE CRADLE,” “The Happy Family,’ and those other compositions where allegory is nothing, and whose sentiment remains ever chaste, and sometimes affecting.” He also painted occasionally some excellent landscapes; an engraving from one of them is among the illustrations here introduced. Fragonard died on the 22nd of August, 1806; the later years of his life were passed in the production of such subjects as these, and in the education of his son, Alexander Fragonard, an eminent painter and Sculptor, pupil of David. º 5. e-2 *-> JOHN BAPTISTE MONNOYER. higher than that of the mere decorator; it is only by comparison, however, that it must be so considered, for in itself it is worthy of unqualified admiration, if the objects which it presents to our view are themselves entitled to our esteem; and are not flowers so 2 It may fairly be pro- - nounced, that whatever the eye recognises as “a thing of beauty” comes within the special province of art; and flowers, with their graceful and varied forms, their brilliant and diversified colours, their soft and delicate pencilling, are objects in every way deserving of the painter's skill. But he who keeps within this range of art must limit his expectation of praise accordingly, for he will only be looked upon, however great his excellence, as a truthful copyist of the most beautiful and the most simple natural productions. There is nothing he does to call forth the loftier intellectual powers; he deals neither with human action nor passion ; he enters not upon that “noblest study of mankind,” which the poet declares to be-man ; his a/e/ier does not exhibit the numerous d’iyecſa memºra of costume, armour, and all the other paraphernalia which make the studio of the historical-painter resemble the property-room 3 E 198 GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. of a theatre; nor need his ideas and his vision expand, like those of the landscape-painter, over the length and breadth of the natural world, where the clouds rest on the mountains, and the sunshine lights up the distant forest. The greenhouse and the garden supply all his wants, and having acquired the art of delineating each single flower as he finds it in nature, he has only to study how he may group them so as to display their forms and colours to the best advantage. Holland appears to be the only country which recognises flower-painting among great works of art; a distinction arising, in all probability, from the intense love, amounting to a passion, that the Dutch have for flowers. Nowhere else in Europe, except perhaps among ourselves, is =% = - ---= --- - - ºccanic Y. DEL: . so great attention paid to their culture. A remarkable evidence of this ardent love of flowers in * Holland is supplied in the history of the “Tulipomania,” as it was called, which agitated the country from one end to the other, between the years 1634 and 1637, both inclusive, and infected all ages and conditions of the people, like our “South Sea Bubble” of a later date. Beckmann, in his “History of Inventions,” says, that during the height of this floral fever, one root of a tulip named the “Viceroy" was exchanged for articles valued at 2,500 florins, about £214; and that 7 for a single bulb of another species, called “Semper Augustus,” 2,000 florins were frequently given. It once happened there were only two roots of this species known to be in existence, one at Amsterdam, the other at Haarlem. The desire to obtain one of these was so great, that a JOHN BAPTISTE MONVOPER. I99 person offered for it 4,600 florins, a new carriage, and a pair of grey horses suitably harnessed; while another person offered to give twelve acres of land for the bulb. In the space of three years, chroniclers inform us, no less than 10,000,000 florins, about £854,166, were expended in this trade in one town only of Holland. - After such a recital it will occasion no surprise to find that the best flower-painters are to be found among the Dutch, for everywhere the class of art flourishes most where there is the greatest demand for it, and a knowledge of true art has been attained. It would be easy enough to append - - º - * | º º - s | =\ A HANANº. Jºº. -- - - - º ºil iſ sº > º º - - º M\ | |nº here a list of some hundred names of artists who have excelled in this particular department; but it will be sufficient for our purpose to mention only Bos, Van Huysum, Fyt, De Heem, A. Breughel, Mignon (a German by birth, but naturalised in Holland, where he studied and practised his art), Seghers, Ruysch, Verendael, Oosterwyck—to whom may be added Rubens. Most of these painters flourished about the period of the “Tulipomania,” and their talents have in no small degree been inherited by their descendant countrymen, for the modern flower-painters of Holland are highly distinguished. : . : : 2OO GREAT MASTERS OF A R/. John Baptiste Monnoyer, though a native of France, acquired in Holland a predilection for that art in which he so distinguished himself. He was born at Lisle, in 1635, and went to Antwerp for the purpose of studying historical-painting; but, finding either that his talent led in another direction, or that it would be more profitably applied, he relinquished his first pursuit in favour of that with which his name has ever been eminently associated. He must have made great progress during his earlier years, for he was yet a young man when he removed to Paris, where he soon worked himself into notice, and was honourably received into the Academy when he had reached his thirtieth year only. “He painted,” writes D'Argenville, “for his reception- picture, a group of flowers and fruit, which, in the saloon of the Academy, still attracts the T - s - | || || ----' ºr rºº ******** || || | | admiration of every one. According to the statutes of the Institution, a mere flower-painter was not eligible to the dignity of a professor; but to mark their sense of his merits, the Academy elected him into the Council in 1679.” About the period when Baptiste, who is better known among connoisseurs by that name than by his surname of Monnoyer, first settled in Paris, Louis XIV. was occupied in the embellish- ment of his palaces at Versailles, Trianon, and Marly. The talents of Baptiste were peculiarly calculated for the works that were then in progress, and they were speedily put into operation for decorating the walls and ceilings. The result of his labours may yet be seen in the Palace of Versailles, and the elegant little maison de //aſsance of Trianon. But notwithstanding the flattering äcºlºgeinent he met with in his own country, and from his own monarch, he was prevailed /OHN BAPTISTE MONVOPER. 2OI upon to accept the invitation of the Duke of Montague, who was then English ambassador at the Court of France. Montague House, which, in the latter years of its existence, was appro- priated to the use of the British Museum, was first built by the Duke in 1671. In 1686 it was unfortunately burnt down, but rebuilt, as it originally stood, by a French architect named Puget; and its owner, desirous of procuring the best artistic aid in his power to adorn it, induced three eminent French painters to come over to England for this purpose. These were Charles de la Fosse, who ornamented the ceilings with historical and allegorical subjects; James Rousseau, to whom were assigned the landscapes; and Baptiste, who undertook the floral decorations. His success in this mansion led to other engagements by the nobility and wealthy in this country; he resided here nearly twenty years, finding constant employment as a decorator, and in painting pictures for the collections of the amateur. The royal palaces of Windsor, Hampton Court, and Kensington, with other residences, contain examples of his pencil. The pictures of this artist are remarkable for their elegance of composition; the annexed engravings testify to the grace with which he arranged his bouquets; it must, however, be left to the reader's fancy to fill in the colouring, for the illustrations scarcely suggest an idea of the beautiful combination of tints these flower-pieces exhibit. His practice as a decorator of walls imparted boldness and vigour to his touch, while it deprived his easel-pictures of that finished execution which we find in those of Van Huysum, Mignon, and others. Baptiste died in London in 1699. The greatest number of his pictures are to be found in France and in England. Those which he painted in the châteaux of Trianon, Marly, and Meudon, ºf * ; : ºf º and for the Ménagerie, amount to sixty. The Louvre also - possesses a considerable number, but M. Charles Blanc complains that under the hands of the cleaner and restorer some of them have lost much of their original beauty. His easel-pictures are rarely to be met with in public sales, inasmuch as they are few in comparison with those he painted as pictures in mansions, which accounts for their scarceness; neither when offered for sale do they realise such high prices as those of the great Dutch flower-painters, because of the absence of that finish to which reference has already been made. Baptiste etched several plates from his own designs, representing groups of flowers, &c. Mrs. Jameson, in her “Handbook to the Public Galleries,” says, with reference to Baptiste and his residence in England:—“He was much patronised as a painter of flowers, in which branch of art Walpole calls him one of the greatest masters who ever appeared. Upon a comparison of his works with those of the celebrated Dutch flower-painters, Van Huysan,” Rachel Ruysch, and Varelst,t we find him inferior in exquisite finish, and the velvety softness of touch; but superior in composition, freedom, and spirit, and a sort of loose, airy grace which he gave to his groups, which are often of a large size. There are nineteen of his * Evidently a misprint for Van Huysum. | This also is a misprint for Verelst. 2O2 & GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. pieces at . Hampton Court, painted for William and Mary. Placed together as they now are, their effect and beauty as pictures are almost destroyed. They would make beautiful panels for a room, their size, vivid colours, and largeness of style, fitting them for the purposes of decoration.” These remarks were made several years ago; but so many alterations have since been made in the arrangements of the pictures at Hampton Court, that Mrs. Jameson's objections to the congregating together of Baptiste’s works may, probably, have no force at present. I have not, however, visited the palace for a long time, and know not, therefore, how the pictures in question are now placed on its walls. . VNº. $º *: 2^* º N § ſº Pºž) º *ś * > views, in the French school, during the latter end of the last century. He was born in Paris, in 1733—according to M. Charles Blanc, but Bryan gives 1741 as the date of his birth—and was educated at the college of Navarre, being intended by his parents for the º priesthood; but, even while pursuing his studies for the ecclesiastical office, it was quite evident that his inclinations were tending in another direction ; the result of which was, that when, at the age of twenty-one, he had completed his terms, he was sent to Rome as the place where he could most profitably study the peculiar department of Art to which his nature disposed him. RUINS IN ROME. It does not appear that Robert at first studied under any master, but his pictures of the magnificent ruins of ancient Rome soon attracted great notice in the city. He afterwards entered the studio of the French artist, Notaire, who imparted to his pupil the free and bold touch which characterizes his own works. 2O4. GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. In the company of Fragonard, and of the Abbé St. Non, who etched many of Robert's designs, the latter, as was remarked in the notice of Fragonard, visited Naples, Sorrento, Herculaneum, and several of the adjacent towns, where the three artists laboured most assiduously in their respective walks of art, enriching their portfolios with a multitude of sketches, gathered from the scenery and objects with which Naples and its neighbourhood abounds. Robert returned to Paris in 1767, taking with him a large number of pictures, which were exhibited in the Saſon at the Louvre. Catherine of Russia tried to persuade him to pay a visit to St. Petersburg, but the artist was too well satisfied with the honours he was reaping at home to desire a change of any kind. He had been elected a member of the Academy, THE TEMPLE OF AGRIPPA AT ROME. and the King nominated him Keeper of the Museum, and Director of the Royal Gardens. Robert died at Paris, in 1808, from an attack of apoplexy. The work presented to the Academy on his election was that engraved on this page; it is now in the Louvre, where it has always been known by the title of “The Port of Rome,” probably from the indications of commerce introduced into the foreground: the composition is well arranged, and striking in effect. His other principal works, distributed over what were formerly the royal palaces of France, are– “View of the Villa Madama, Rome;” “An Antique Gallery;” “The Burning of the Opera- House;” “The Mansion of Prince Mattei, near Rome;” “ The Country of the Sabines,” &c., &c. Among numerous etchings by Robert is a series of ten architectural subjects, called “Les Soirées de Rome.” Several of his pictures were engraved by St. Non and others. ALEXANDER FRANCIS DESPORTES. arºs . - - - - - - - º NE class of subjects yet remains untouched in this series of biographical sketches; a class which, for want of a better name, must be called “ dog-painting: ” I take as examples the works of Alexander Francis Desportes. Pictures of this description are occasionally to be found among the productions of the later Italian painters, with whose names even the public, generally, are unfamiliar; they are, however, frequently to be seen among the works of the Dutch and Flemish schools, of which Rubens and Snyders furnish the most illustrious examples; these two painters portrayed the “passions” of the dog—its mere animal-qualities as distinct from those in which the creature seems to rise above its nature; but it remained for our own Landseer to develop its ennobling characteristics—those which ally the dog to, and make it the inſe//ectual companion of its master. A group of dogs from the pencil of Landseer conveys to our mind almost as perfect an idea of rationality as would a group of human beings; and this it does, not because the artist raises them above the natural limits of their species—endowing them with attributes 3 G 2O6 GREAT MASTERS OF AA’7. they do not possess, but because he brings out those qualities we know them to have: so that we recognise, and confess with them, a community in the affections by which they are moved. He defines and contrasts character, and gives to his art a motive which before his time was not understood as appertaining to it. If this race of animals possessed the gift of language, they would acknowledge him to be their greatest benefactor, for elevating them in the scale of the brute creation, and for eliciting a feeling of kindness, and of generous, social sympathy from the human species, which man, generally, had denied to them, till Landseer showed how much congeniality of disposition—we might even add similarity of character— actually exists between the dog and his master, and that the former is in every way worthy of the regard and friendship of man. Sneyders, or Snyders, to whom reference has just been made, had numerous imitators and pupils; the most distinguished of whom were Peter Boel, Abraham Hondius, Molyn the younger, known as Tempesta, Verheyden, and Paul de Vos; all these were of the Dutch or Flemish schools. The French school, though it had flourished for a period of one hundred and fifty years, had never “condescended,” as M. Charles Blanc remarks, to paint animals as the “prin- cipals” of a picture, prior to the appear- ance of Desportes, a pupil of Nicasius Ber- naert, a Fleming, who had also studied under Snyders, but died before Desportes had made much progress. Amid the din of politics, and the commotions of the long and san- guinary wars which the reign of Louis XIV. witnessed, the arts flourished in a high degree in France, under the patronage of that luxurious monarch ; and as hunting formed one of his HOUND AND DEAD GAME. - - - favourite pastimes, it would be only natural to expect to find among the artists of the time some one whose genius would incline towards the prevailing taste of the king and his court; such a painter has come down to us in the works associated with the name of Desportes. He was born in 1661, at Champigneuille, in Champagne; his father, a wealthy farmer, sent him at the age of twelve years to Paris, placing him with an uncle who was established in business there. Soon after his arrival he was taken ill; and, while recovering, his uncle put into his hands an indifferent engraving, which the boy copied in bed. He succeeded so well with his self-imposed task, that his relatives at once decided on educating him for an artist, and, accordingly, he was introduced to Bernaert, who was then established in Paris, and in good repute as an animal-painter, having acquired from Snyders the bold and firm touch which the latter exhibited in his pictures of lion-hunts, the combats of wild animals, and of attacks on wild boars, and others of a similar description. These, however, were not quite the sort of subjects to which the taste of the young French artist inclined; he acquired the energy and vigour of his master, but turned it into a less wild and a more graceful ALEXANDER FRANCIS DESPORTES. * 2O7 form, contented to portray on his canvas the favourite sporting-dogs of the French nobſesse and their hunting-scenes, instead of the battles of infuriated savage beasts, and the pastimes of men scarcely less savage, which Snyders and Bernaert delighted to paint: they were the Salvator Rosas of their art, who revelled amid the storms and thunder of animated nature. It was only occasionally that Desportes followed the track of his immediate predecessors; an example of which will be given hereafter. g Bernaert and his pupil were soon separated, death having removed the former before his young disciple had profited so greatly by his teachings as he would have done, in all probability, had the life of the master been prolonged; yet it is easy to see in the vivid colouring of Desportes, and in his firm and vigorous touch, that the example and instruction of Bernaert were not lost upon him. It is quite certain that by this time he had made sufficient progress to satisfy himself that he could dispense with the assistance of any other master, for he had none, but set zealously to work to apply the knowledge he had already gained, in simple reliance on his own energy and powers. Having determined in his mind the class of art he would follow, he gave his whole time to the study of such objects as would serve to embellish his compositions—the living model, plants, fruits, vegetables, animals of every kind, both living and dead, and landscapes. In after-life, when induced to undertake portraiture, he found the advantage of the wide range of study he, at that time, imposed on himself. Before he had reached the age of thirty his reputation was made. - But his first appearance as an artist in the fashionable world was not in the capacity of a painter of hunting-scenes. Certain Polish noblemen whom he knew in Paris, and the Abbé de Polignac, Ambassador of France at the court of John Sobieski, King of Poland, persuaded Desportes to accompany them to the latter country. On his arrival he painted the portraits of Sobieski and his queen, and at once was established as a favourite at court, the Polish grandees being most solicitous to sit to him : he was loaded with presents, and, still more, with flatteries, during the two years he remained in Poland. At the end of this period an irresistible desire to return to France urged him to set out for Paris. Hunting, in the reign of Louis XIV., was almost a ruinous pastime to those who indulged in it at their own cost; for the King himself set an extravagant example to his subjects in the extent of his hunting-establishment, which formed almost a little army, entailing an annual expenditure of several millions of francs. The woods and forests in the environs of Paris were carefully preserved, and well stocked with animals of every kind suited to the chase. Rambouillet and Fontainebleau, which during nine months of the year were left in gloomy solitude, became in the remaining three animate with the voices of bold hunters, and the rushing of dogs over the short turf and the seared leaves that covered the ground of those extensive forests. From all points there came to the “meet” keepers, whose business it was to direct the huntsmen to the haunts of the animals, detachments of gendarmes, livery-servants, nobles and courtiers well mounted, king’s messengers, carriages filled with ladies to witness the “throw off,” pages on horseback, cross-bow-men, &c., and a pack of two or three hundred dogs. The king always appeared last on the ground, heralded by an officer, who proclaimed the hunt. With such a prelude to the pastime, it is only reasonable to suppose that Louis 208 Grzaz MASTERS OF AR7. was more enamoured of the state and ceremony which surrounded him, than with the excitement and interest of the chase that followed: even at that period we managed, in our opinion, these things better in England than our continental neighbours. The class of painting that is limited to such scenes as these is not of a high order of art, but it affords ample scope for the display of talent in composition, in correct drawing, and anatomical knowledge of figures and animals; life and movement are the qualities which the POINTERS. painter must strive after chiefly, which, united with effective grouping and the gay colouring of courtly pageantry, will render his work pleasing, if not instructive. It is rather extraordinary that in England, where hunting is such a favourite pastime, we so seldom see good pictures of this class, though huntsmen and hounds as “presentation ''-pictures are not rare. Desportes having returned from his travels in Poland to resume the tasks more consonant with his taste than portrait-painting, once again occupied himself with subjects of the chase; ALEXANDER FR.A.VCIS DESPOR7′E.S. . . 2O9. Louis XIV appointed him painter of the royal hunting-establishment, and gave him apartments in the Louvre, with a pension. Whatever animals or birds of a rare or curious kind reached Versailles from foreign countries, Desportes was employed to make pictures of them: he attended all the royal hunts on horseback for the purpose of observing the incidents that might occur during the chase, and of sketching the attitudes of the dogs and their movements, and whatever else he thought necessary for his object. After having thoroughly determined his composition, he repaired to the royal kennel, sketched some of the handsomest hounds of the pack, and then showed the studies to the King, who would point out to the artist the animals by their respective names. These studies were principally drawn on tinted paper, the high lights being produced with white chalk, a style frequently adopted by artists of our own day; occasionally, however, they were made with a pen, and tinted with Indian ink. But inasmuch as very many of these sketches contained the elements of his pictures, he coloured them afterwards with great care. The artist who has the honour of being patronised by royalty is, in France, considered to be eligible for academical honours; and, accordingly, Desportes was admitted into the Royal Academy of the Fine Arts in Paris, in 1699, at the age of thirty-one; at least, so says M. Charles Blanc. But there is evidently an error either of date or age, for, if Desportes was born in 1661, and elected into the Academy in 1699, he must then have been thirty-eight years old. His “reception-picture,” on his election, was a very fine one; it represents the artist himself as a hunter, a character ingeniously selected to exhibit the versatility of his talents. Near him is a noble pointer with his head upturned to his master, as if to reciprocate his attention : at the feet of the hunter lies a quantity of game—hares, partridges, and mallards—painted with much delicacy and truth, but in subordination to the principal figure, who, with one hand resting on his fowling-piece, is caressing his dog with the other. A portion of the figure is seen in the accompanying portrait of the painter. The life of Desportes offers but little for the biographer to narrate; neither does the department of the arts which he practised afford much room for criticism and comment. Yet the number of his works was immense, for during a period of sixty years he laboured incessantly at the easel, and on walls, doors, and panels. In conjunction with Claude Aubran, he decorated the Château of Anet, the Ménagerie of Versailles, and the palaces of Fontainebleau, Meudon, Marly, and la Muette. He was commissioned in 1735 to produce eight large pictures for the tapestry works of the Gobelins, and he also executed about the same time five important paintings for Compèigne, among which may be reckoned one of his chefs-d'auvre, “The Stag at Bay.” Nor was it, according to D’Argenville, in France only that he laboured so industriously and success- fully, for that writer tells us, although the information is not seconded by any authority, nor am I aware of the existence of any of Desportes' pictures in England, that he came over to this country in the suite of the Duke d'Aumont, ambassador from the Court of France, and that while here he painted several pictures, among them a series representing “The Seasons.” M. Charles Blanc repeats the statement of M. d’Argenville, but, it may be presumed, only from what the latter writer asserts, and says that his paintings were seen everywhere, in London, in Poland, at Munich, Vienna, Turin, and that very recently M. Viardot discovered some in the imperial palace of the Hermitage at St. Petersburg. That they exist in all these places but the first is probable; 3 H - 2 IO GREAT MASTERS OF A R7. there may be some possibly in England, but, if so, they cannot be in any gallery of repute. Dr. Waagen, in his comprehensive work, “The Art Treasures of Great Britain,” with its supple- mentary volume, in which is a complete index to every collection of importance, does not even mention the name of this artist. Desportes died in 1743, at the advanced age of eighty-two years, working almost to the end of his life with the ardour of his younger days; thus presenting a similar example of faculties unimpaired by age and laborious exertion to that furnished in our own time by the late James Ward, R.A., who died in 1859, more than ninety years old : and the coincidence is rather singular that both of these veteran artists were animal-painters. The latter, however, rarely included dogs in his representations. De Fontaine called Desportes the “Nestor” of painting. THE DEATH. It might not unnaturally be presumed, from the character of the period in which he lived, and more especially from the courtly influences of those with whom the art he loved and practised brought him into connection, that the private life of Desportes would have been more or less tainted with the unwholesome social atmosphere which surrounded him : but this was far from the case. Married at the age of thirty, he always bore the character of a man of strict and irreproachable conduct: his disposition was amiable, his temper lively, his habits simple. The expression of his face is that of a good-humoured person, with the air of one who has mingled in the best society, and caught its easy and affable manners. But he was lofty and repellent when occasion required it, and knew how to resent folly and impertinence when obtrusive. A man of more wealth than of wit and wisdom was once boasting of his riches in a way that greatly ALEXANDER FRANCIS DESPORTES. 2 I I offended the artist, who replied to his observations, “Sir, I could be what you are whenever I please, yet you could never be what I am.” There was another French artist, John Baptist Oudry, who painted the same class of subjects aS Desportes, and was cotemporary with him during the latter days of his life. Oudry died in 1755, and as his pictures have not been unfrequently set up in rivalship to those of Desportes, a few words respecting them will not be out of place. It is not easy at first to distinguish the works of these two painters; not, however, because they both represented similar subjects, for you may set two or half-a-dozen artists down to the same model or landscape, and each will produce a different work, varying according to the view each takes of it, to his feeling, his taste, and the style he has adopted as his own; but Oudry and Desportes had been educated in one school, though not under one master; the former acquired the principles of his art from a fellow-countryman, Nicholas de Largillière, settled in Antwerp ; and the latter, as we have seen, from a pupil of Snyders; thus both had imbibed the principles of the Flemish school, and carried them into their own practice. Still, a close examination of their works will enable the student to discover a difference between them; the style of Desportes is free and unconventional; he studied Nature, and painted it as if by instinct; he exhibits more of grace than of deep knowledge and thought; that of Oudry, on the contrary, is the style of an able and well-taught artist, of one who thoroughly knows all the resources of his art, the effect to be produced by skilful management of chiar' oscuro, and the power of grouping his figures to create unity and harmony, according to the academical rules which he had learned. Desportes is a dashing painter, as the artist who aims at producing striking effects with comparatively little labour is sometimes called, and, as a colourist, he preserved in a far greater degree than Oudry the traces of his Flemish teaching; he is fresher, more brilliant and transparent; it is this last-mentioned quality that causes his pictures to seem more highly- finished than they really are. The colouring of Oudry is often dull, leaden, and monotonous. Perhaps, however, Oudry possessed those general qualities of a good painter in which Desportes was deficient; he knew, better than his predecessor, how to arrange an imposing Scene, or, in technical language, was more skilful in composition, and understood how to elevate the character—like our own Landseer, only in a far inferior degree—of the object he represented. But then, again, the pictures of Desportes have a charm peculiar to themselves, in the elegant, graceful, and elastic forms of his dogs, and in the delicacy and liveliness of his birds. There are in the Louvre two pictures of fighting cocks, by these artists respectively. Oudry has placed the combatants with more skill than the other: one of the birds has been thrown on its back by its rival, but he is yet endeavouring to tear him with his strong talons; the plumage of this bird is most brilliantly painted, and the motion of its wings, of which one is elevated in a pyramidal form, is really grand. These qualities are wanting in the picture by Desportes, who seems to have been unable to give to his combatants an equal degree of fierce courage both in the victor and the vanished; as a compensation, however, for what his work lacks in this respect, he has introduced a number of fowls as spectators of the passage d’armes by their feathered companions, which add greatly to the interest of the scene. These two pictures may be accepted as examples of the styles of the respective painters. 2 I 2 GREA 7" J/AS 7 ERS OF A R7. Art, such as Desportes and his compeers practised, could scarcely be expected to survive the popularity of what it represented; it is not an art for all time; the works of Snyders, and of other distinguished masters of the schools of the Low Countries, are now, except those of Rubens, held in comparatively small estimation ; moreover, hunting is not the favourite amusement in France that it was when Louis Quatorze sat on the throne, and threw off the cares of government while he followed the hounds; Desportes, therefore, is now little thought of or cared for, and his pictures, clever as they are, have little pecuniary value. But if we go back to the period when he lived, one can readily conceive what importance was attached to such productions as his—works which, exhibited as they were on the walls at the entrance IN THE FIELL). of the Château of Muette, on the staircase of Meudon, and in the vestibule of Compiègne, recalled those pleasant scenes in which king and courtiers, lords and ladies, the flower of the ancient moſ/esse of France, joined with equal spirit and pleasure. But in the present day what exercise of the imagination does it not require to see the wild boars, the deer, and the dogs with the same eyes that Louis and his attendant-hunters saw them | In contemplating the works of Desportes one feels much of the Ares/ge of such a painter is lost when the manners and habits of the people they reflect are known to us only by the records of history. º º º' * * º: #:* SIMON-MATURIN LANTARA. ſº IMON-MATURIN LANTARA, one of the few landscape-painters of the last century whom France holds in estimation, but who is little, if at all, known beyond the confines of that country, was born, it is said, in 1745, somewhere in the vicinity of Fontainebleau, but "º neither the time nor the place of sº his birth has been ascertained with any accuracy. His father is reported to have been a sign- painter, yet was quite incompetent to teach his son even the rudiments of art; nor does it seem that he was able or willing to bring up the boy to any- thing that may be called an honest calling, for the latter passed his youth wandering about the forests - ITALIAN SCENERY. of Fontainebleau, and watching Nature under her clouds and sunshine, as he stretched himself on the grass and moss. But while thus preparing himself for the art with which his name is associated, he was also acquiring habits that kept down his loftier aspirations, and rendered him only the fit companion of those who frequented places of the lowest resort; in short, he became desultory, idle, and dissipated, and when he arrived in 3 I 2 I 4 GA'EAT MASTERS OF AA’7. Paris, while yet a very young man, he entered it with all those vicious propensities which could not fail to attach themselves to such a course, and finally he reaped the fruits of it. Still, says Lenoir, “Lantara was happy in his wretchedness and poverty;” his pencils, his palette, and a lapwing which he had tamed, and of which he was very fond, formed his only worldly wealth; and with all his great talents he had the simplicity and the merriment of a child. WIEW ON THE BAN KS UF THE SELNE. There is a line from a French poet which one of his biographers asserts may appropriately stand as his motto:- “Joyeux comme un enfant, libre comme un Böheme.” Of his career in Paris nothing is recorded; his death is said to have taken place in the hospital there at the early age of thirty-three; the portrait on the preceding page, however, gives the idea of an older man. His known pictures are very few, but good, especially in picturesque composition; the subjects are, for the most part, scenes in the vicinity of Paris, represented chiefly at sunrise or sunset. They are only to be found in some of the best French galleries. 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