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Chapter VII}
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Title:       Rembrandt
Author:      Sharp, Elizabeth A.

Chapter VII

Chapter VII - Landscapes - Hendrickje Stoffels

     Landscapes - Etched and painted - Method of expression - Hercules Seghers
- Landscapes at Budapest and Crakow - Glasgow - Problems of artistic
expression - Important portraits - Religious compositions - Mature work - "The
Supper at Emmaus" - Head of Christ - Peace rejoicings in 1648 - "The
Pacification of Holland" - Prices of pictures - Titus - His nurse - Her
portrait - Transactions between master and servant - Hendrickje - Her
portraits - Rembrandt's friends - His home - Portraits - "Burgomeister Six."

     Landscape was regarded by Rembrandt at the beginning of his career as
valuable material for backgrounds in his pictures; for style in its use he
modelled himself on the Italian conventions in accordance with the taste of
the day; though the details in several of his compositions show careful
observation of the growth of plants.  He used pencil or wash to note down
impressions and details, and after 1633 in etchings such as "The Angels
Appearing to the Shepherds" landscape becomes of more importance in the
composition.  His first-known etched landscape is "A Large Tree and House," a
"View of Amsterdam," both made in 1640, and in 1641 he produced etchings of a
"A Dutch Barn" and "A Mill with Sails." During the ensuing sixteen years he
etched several superb landscapes, broadly and boldly handled, yet full of fine
perception and delicate observation, with effects heightened or wholly
produced by dry-point with extraordinary mastery of material.  The most widely
popular are the sombre storm-study, "The Three Trees," "The Canal," and "The
Vista," a beautiful dry-point of fine woodland.

     After Saskia's death the widower seems to have made more frequent
excursions into the country.  He etched views of Amsterdam, Omval, of "Six's
Bridge" near Hillegom, of Randorp, "The Village with the Square Tower," and
"The Goldweigher's Field" between Muiden and Amsterdam.  Many drawings made
about this time prove that he visited friends in their country houses, and
also sketched views of Dordrecht and the Rotterdam Market.  He sketched in
chalk, pen and ink, with pen, bistre, and wash, and selected such subjects as
a "Clump of Swaying Trees," or the fine "Farm Buildings near a Brook" that
anticipates Constable in breadth of handling.

     The earliest known of Rembrandt's painted landscapes bears the date 1646,
"The Frozen Canal," now at Cassel, painted in grey-greens and browns. Richer
harmonies and broader handling are seen in the landscapes in the Wallace
Collection and the National Gallery, in that entitled "The Holy Family Resting
in Egypt" and the magnificent "Landscape with Ruins on a Hill" at Cassel.  The
artist's development in landscape painting was as sequent as in his portraits
and subject compositions.  Fine exquisite statement of facts gives place to
generalisation, crude realism to intelligent synthesis; colour changes from
clarity and a monotony of greys and greens to richer tones and deeper
harmonies; leafage and contours are expressed in masses in place of elaborate
detail.  Prosaic faithfulness develops into a courageous symbolic treatment of
collective facts, and expresses a higher form of truth.  In proportion as his
feeling became more impassioned and his mastery of materials perfect, so did
his touch broaden, the impasto became thicker, the handling more impetuous and
generous.  By a hitherto unattempted use of chiaroscuro, of transfiguring
veils of light and mysterious shadow, he attempted to interpret Nature's
deepest moods.

     Thus it is his landscapes differ wholly in method and approach from those
of his predecessors - van Goyen, Cuyp, Salomon van Ruysdael, and Roghman.
Roghman certainly is his most direct precursor, as Philip Koninck is his
immediate follower.  The man whose influence was greatest on Rembrandt was the
little-known Hercules Seghers, of whose work he possessed eight examples.
Seghers lived misunderstood, and died in poverty.  His engravings are
remarkable, printed in monochrome on coloured paper; and he is said even to
have printed with oil colours in two or three tints.^1 Not only was Rembrandt
attracted by his work, but he adapted a plate of Seghers for his "Flight into
Egypt" in the manner of Elsheimer, by substituting the Holy Family for "Tobit
and the Angel," by retouching the trees, etc.; and this plate obviously
inspired the composition of the National Gallery Landscape.

[Footnote 1: Vosmaer.]

     There is a lovely landscape at Budapest of a stretch of a river and field
seen behind a group of trees beneath slowly clearing storm-clouds.  The trees
are rather hard in treatment; the beauty lies in the fine play of sunlight
which irradiates the intervening plains and atmosphere and lights up the
flowing river with luminous touches.  Even in Rembrandt's most sombre
backgrounds there is a sense of atmosphere, in the deepest shadow a sense of
motion and air.  Still more beautiful is the landscape with "The Good
Samaritan," in Crakow.  The figures are a mere detail, such detail as
Giorgione used to mark successive planes of atmosphere and indicate receding
distances.  The design is of twisted tree trunks upon a tapestry of rich
foliage and intervening shadows.  In the background lowers a dark storm-cloud;
in the middle distance there is a stretch of landscape, with river, cascades,
bridges, windmills, and a country wain drawn by white horses - all radiant in
the brilliant white gleams of sunlight that turn the verdure to exquisite
emerald, and glitter on the water and fans of the mills, on the harness and
polish of the cart.  The landscape with "Tobias and the Angel," in Glasgow,
painted in his later period, seems inspired by a loftier mood; serene if less
joyous, it is more synthetic in treatment.

     The magnificent portrait of "The Polish Rider," in the collection of
Count Tarnowski at Dzikow, has a fine open landscape background.  It is not
known how or where this picturesque rider of the white horse, armed with bow
and quiver full of arrows, was painted.  Dr. Hofstede de Groot thinks it is
done "too much in the stroke" to be other than a bona fide portrait.  "The
animal is alive and in vigorous action while carrying its heavily armed rider
through the evening landscape, the greater part of which is wrapped in
twilight while the setting sun casts its last rays on the youthful figure.
Students of Polish history will recognise in his peculiar costume the
accoutrements of the Lysowski Regiment.  It is half European, as it were, and
half Oriental: the skin under the saddle, the horse tail at the charger's
neck, the two swords, one on either side of the body (that on the right
passing under the saddle), and, lastly, the battle-axe, they are all elements
which at this time had already disappeared from the equipment of European
armies." Rembrandt's one other equestrian portrait is the "Portrait of
Turenne," in the Panshanger Collection.

     After Saskia's death the solving of various problems of artistic
expression absorbed Rembrandt wholly.  He lived for his work, and it in
returned deepened and broadened; every painting, indeed every stroke, bore the
direct impress of this vibrant intense soul, who had passed beyond the stage
of painting as the craftsman primarily, to that of the accomplished master who
used his mastery of means (which to the last he continued to develop) to
express his impressions of life, to depict the visions of the seer in touch
with the straining heart-throbs of humanity.  An endless curiosity into the
mysterious workings of Life spurred him to ceaseless quest and experiment; and
to this we owe that marvellous sequence of self portraits which forms an
invaluable autobiography of the great painter, both as man and seer.  Among
the most important portraits of this period are the beautifully luminous and
refined "Gentleman with a Hawk" in the Grosvenor House Collection, and its
pendant, the equally reserved and delicate "Lady with a Fan"; the fine double
portrait of Nicholas Berchem and his wife, and the superb, dignified
presentment of Elizabeth Bas.

     The year 1648 is important on account of two fine religious compositions
- "The Good Samaritan" and the "Supper at Emmaus" of the Louvre.  Both
subjects had often fascinated Rembrandt and occupied his thoughts from the
beginning of his career.  The Good Samaritan he repeated many times, with
brush and needle.  The painting of 1648 is his mature expression of sympathy
with this most beautiful of the Parables.  The scene is laid at the wayside
inn, to which the wounded victim of life's mischance is carried at wane of
day.  Fromentin points out the evidence of "the great importance attached by
the thinker to the direct expression of life; a building up of things that
seem to exist in his inner vision, and to suggest by indefinable methods alike
the precision and the hesitation of nature. . . .  Nowhere a contortion, an
exaggerated feature, nor a touch in the expression of the unutterable which is
not at once pathetic and subdued; the whole instinct with deep feeling,
rendered with a technical skill little short of miraculous."

     "The Supper at Emmaus" of the same year is perhaps the deepest spiritual
insight of any of Rembrandt's conceptions.  All needless accessories are
avoided; it is treated with the utmost simplicity, yet breathes a profound
sense of the reality of the Divine presence, of the marvellous spiritual
Selflessness of the Risen Saviour.  As Michel says of the scene: "It was
reserved for Rembrandt to comprehend and translate its intimate poetry.
Henceforth it seems hardly possible to conceive the scene but as he painted
it." The recognition and adoration of the one disciple, the dawning wonder of
the other, the curiosity of the servant, the extraordinary suggestion of the
mental absorption of Christ, the sense of divinity and non-earthliness that
emanates from him, are marvellously rendered; and suggest, moreover, how fine,
how reverent must have been the spirit of the painter, how profound the vision
of the seer.  Several of Rembrandt's studies of the head of Christ exist.
One, the most beautiful, is a masterly painting possibly for this picture,
probably the idealised version of a young Amsterdam Jew: it belongs to M.
Kann.  Another, less beautiful, but more finely idealised, was lent to the
Amsterdam Exhibition of 1898 by Count Raczynski of Posen.  Rembrandt was a
supreme master of psychological portrait-painting.  He even sought to suggest
the character and tendencies of his sitter as intimately expressed behind, as
well as through, the shape of the eyes, the lines of the mouth and forehead,
the attitude of the lips, the position and type of the hands, the strength and
quality of the hair.  In no work that I have seen is that knowledge better
demonstrated than in this "Study for a Christ," painted in the artist's
fifty-second year.  No young man could have done this; one who had himself
lived and suffered could alone thus interpret a life such as this, suffering
such as this.  At first sight the features, expression, the head itself, are a
little effeminate, but the face grows on one on closer study, and there awakes
suddenly the realisation of all that it is meant to convey - through eyes,
forehead, and mouth.  Divide the face, and the right side is that of the
dreamer, the spiritual poet, with large clear eye and serene forehead; and on
this side of the face Rembrandt has focussed the light.  The only hint of
disquietude is the touch of red under the right eyebrow.  Cover the right side
of the face, and what a change.  Here, on the left side, in slight shadow, all
the vital stress, the suffering, the physical, and, what is more terrible, the
nervous exhaustion of the man is shown by those three slightly-arched lines on
that side of the brow, by the slightly contracted, restless eye, by the
tell-tale redness of eyelid, of eyebrow, by the furrows of the forehead,
absent on the right side, even to the edge of the hair.  The mouth, too,
confirms the eyes with its compression of lips on the right side, and the
slight lift to the left upper lip, making the lips on that side almost parted.
What a story of dual nature in one individual this face tells - of the active,
directing, high-wrought emotionalist, subject to terrible exhaustion; and of
the calm, well-controlled, impersonal dreamer and poet, whose thought outruns
the possibilities of time.  Many artists, either by instinct or by reflection,
have depicted the strange problem of double nature as expressed by most eyes,
but I know of none who have so deliberately endeavoured to depict the life
history of a strongly defined dual nature as Rembrandt has in this study for a
Christ, painted in his days of deepest adversity.

     1648 was a year of great rejoicing in Holland.  The long war with Spain
was over; the Dutch Beggars had swept the Spanish galleons out of supremacy;
the peace was signed.  Poets and painters alike vied with one another to
commemorate the event; van der Helst and Flinck were called upon to execute
important civic pieces.  Rembrandt, once so popular, seems to have been
forgotten.  Yet he, too, evidently hoped for a commission, or it may be he
competed for some stipulated design.  At any rate, there is one interesting
composition in grisaille intended to be worked on a large scale, now at
Rotterdam, called "The Pacification of Holland," "a confused, overloaded
composition, full of subtle allusions, suggested, perhaps, by some pedant of
the master's acquaintance. . . .  With its two compact masses of combatants
separated by a lioness chained beneath a shield emblazoned with the arms of
Amsterdam and the legend Soli Deo Gloria; its figure of Justice clumsily
grasping a scale loaded with papers; its infinite variety of grotesque detail,
is a mere jumble of enigmatical episodes.  The general effect is remarkable.
The neutral blue tint of the sky is happily contrasted with the predominant
brown and russet tones which are heightened here and there by fat touches of
pale yellow applied with superb brio for the high lights."^1 The picture was
never accomplished, and the grisaille remained in Rembrandt's house until the
auction sale.  Perhaps he was prompted to this essay by the commission he had
received a year or two previously from Prince Frederick Henry; for we know
that on November 29th, 1646, he received from him 2,400 florins for a
"Circumcision" and a "Nativity." This was a high price in those days, for the
year before the Prince had paid only 2,100 to Rubens for two large pictures.
Another proof of the lost popularity of Rembrandt is to be found in the
accounts by the poet Asselijn of the two great feasts of the Guild of St.
Luke, in 1653 and 1654, wherein no mention is made of his friend's name.
Rembrandt's rival, van der Helst, figures prominently in the courtesies
exchanged between poets and painters on the drastic reorganisation of the
Guild; and though the full list of members is not given, one is surprised that
Rembrandt's name should not be at least side by side with that of the younger
rival.  Michel concludes that Rembrandt was absent from the festival.
Vosmaer, however, thinks he may have been present, for, in a poem written
shortly after the fetes by Jan Vos, "Combat between Death and Nature, or the
Triumph of Painting," a prophetic vision of the glories of Amsterdam, he
enumerates some of the "painters and poets who swarm" in that city, among
others, Rembrandt, Flinck, van der Helst, Philip Koninck, Bol; so that here,
in any case, he is quoted at the head of the list.

[Footnote 1: Michel.]

     Meanwhile, Rembrandt's little son Titus was growing to boyhood under the
care of a faithful, devoted nurse, who apparently ruled the household.  The
widow of a trumpeter, Abraham Claesz, she had been carefully selected by
Saskia, and proved herself worthy of the trust, for the child was delicate,
and difficult to rear.  His father drew and etched him, as he was wont to draw
those near him; there is a charming and light etching of him dated about 1652,
and two very fine portraits.  The one, in the possession of M. Kann, dated
1655, is dressed in fancy costume.  His doublet is of Rembrandt's favourite
reddish brown, with a gathered white chemisette showing at the neck, a green
fur-trimmed cloak, a black velvet mezzetin cap and white feather; he has
pearls round his neck and in the large pendent earrings.  The face, with its
dark eyes and curling hair, is lovingly handled, and shows a delicate,
sensitive face, a dreamy temperament, and the gravity of a child brought up
among older people.  Another portrait of Titus at about the same age, less
fanciful, less beautiful, is in the Wallace Collection, dressed in brown, and
a red cap on his soft curls.  Half the face is in light and half in shadow,
and the fine brown eyes are beautifully expressed.  To this boy his nurse,
Geertje Dircx, was so devoted, that in her will, dated 1648, she bequeathed to
him all her property, excepting a small portion which should revert to her
mother, and one hundred florins to be given to the daughter of a certain
Pieter Beetz de Hoorn, together with her portrait.  From the wording of the
will, Titus obviously knew of the portrait among her possessions, and
therefore it was probably in Rembrandt's house.  The question arises - Was the
portrait painted by Rembrandt, who, whether from gratitude or other reasons,
would probably have painted the portrait of an inmate so long in his house?
In the Teyler Museum there is a charming little pen and wash drawing, with an
inscription identifying the model with Titus's nurse; but hitherto the
portrait has not been identified.  There is one portrait, however, attributed
to Rembrandt, about 1648, which in my opinion is in all likelihood the one in
question.  It is now in M. J. Porges' collection in Paris, and was bought in
Scotland not long ago by M. Sedelmeyer.  It represents an old woman seated
with a Bible in her lap, and her left hand resting upon it, holding her
spectacles.  The old face is careworn and wrinkled, the eyes red with weeping.
The colour-scheme is a harmony of brilliant reds and yellows cooiing into
greys.  The expression is admirably rendered - a pathetic, sorrow-worn,
harassed old face.  My belief that this portrait represents Geertje Dircx
rests on a comparison of the figure and costume with that of the inscribed
drawing in the Teyler Museum, in which, unfortunately, only the back of the
model is seen.  But there is the same high-waisted skirt and voluminous band
under the arms, the same fur trimming at neck and over shoulders pointing to a
V-shape, the same kind of sleeves, and the same kind of close cap lying in
folds or plaits round the head, concealing almost all the hair.  The figure of
the drawn model, moreover, is that of an old woman.  When the picture was
exhibited at the commemorative Rembrandt Exhibition in Amsterdam in 1898 there
was a divergence of opinion regarding its attribution, and it was suggested
that the style of handling was hardly that of Rembrandt's work at that period,
neither large nor free enough, and that the colour-scheme suggested rather the
work of his pupil Maes.  This may be so, only it should be remembered that
Maes learnt these particular tones and harmony from his master; also, the
expression is so admirable, so indicative of the perturbed mental condition of
the sitter, and treated with such sympathy, that I am inclined to consider it
from the hand of the master.  If so, it is painted somewhat after his earlier
manner, but that also seems to me indicative of Rembrandt's sensitiveness,
because in painting this patient old woman and her Bible his mind must have
naturally reverted to his mother in her familiar attitude with her Bible, and
the work would thus sympathetically fall into the earlier manner.  If this
surmise be correct, the strained, wearied face and tear-dimmed eyes lead one
to learn without surprise that in 1650 Geertje's health and reason gave way,
and she was put into an asylum at Gouda.  In Oud-Holland an account is given
of transactions between master and servant in 1649, to the effect that Geertje
made a claim against him, stating that the annuity settled upon her was
insufficient, and took out a summons against him; whereupon Rembrandt,
supported by two witnesses, certified before a notary to the terms of his
agreement with her.  A few days later, when the nurse should have signed a
deed in connection with her will, she "passionately refused, and poured out a
torrent of abuse." Nevertheless, when her mind gave way, Rembrandt, at the
request of her family, advanced money for her journey to, and the necessary
fees for, the asylum.  In 1656, when Rembrandt's bankruptcy was declared, he
brought an action for the recovery of this money against Geertje's relatives,
and had one Pieter Dircx, arrested.

     One of the witnesses called by Rembrandt was a young servant girl who
worked in the house under Geertje's teaching, and was destined to play an
important part in the master's life.  Recently found documents show that
Hendrickje Stoffels, who was the peasant girl quoted as Rembrandt's "wife" or
"housemate" by Houbraken, was born at Ransdorf on the borders of Westphalia.
She was uneducated, and used the sign of a cross as her signature.  It is
evident from the beautiful portrait in the Louvre of her that by 1652 she was
no longer in the position of house-servant, but in that of housekeeper, or, in
fact, of "housemate," for in that year she bore him a child, born dead.
Whether or not a legal marriage ever took place is unknown; but in 1654 the
elders of her church interfered and censured her method of life and refused
her the Sacrament.  In October of the same year she gave birth to a daughter,
acknowledged by Rembrandt and christened by him Cornelia, a name already given
to two of Saskia's children.  She, like Saskia, sat as model to the painter,
and is the subject of the finest of his nude paintings; for, owing to the
severity of the religious training of the day, it was impossible to procure
refined models, and Rembrandt too often contented himself with coarse, vulgar,
and even hideous figures.  Hendrickje's figure is not beautiful in proportion,
but it has a sense of youthful strength and vigour that is beautiful in
degree.  The finest of these studies are the "Bathsheba" in the Louvre, 1654,
the admirable "Woman Bathing" in the National Gallery, 1654, and the fine,
boldly handled study of her in bed, in the Scottish National Gallery.
Hendrickje, unlike Saskia, was a gentle brunette with large, faithful-looking
brown eyes.  In the "Bathsheba" the face is finely imagined, and if true to
her suggests a certain degree of native refinement. The painting of the
luminous delicate flesh-tints are, as Dr. Bode justly writes, worthy of
comparison with the best work of Giorgione, Titian, and Correggio.  Hendrickje
employed a young girl to help her in the house, and two portraits exist also
of this sturdy little peasant, "A Girl with a Broom" in the Hermitage, and
another version of her in the Stockholm Museum.  In spite of her lack of
education Hendrickje proved herself a true helpmate to the master; she learned
to help him in his direst straits, was a kind and thoughtful stepmother to
Titus, and a more healthful companion for him than the nerve-distraught older
nurse.  The society of the rich and powerful did not attract Rembrandt; he
attached himself in preference to a few men of artistic taste, theologians,
and thinkers.  The manners and conventions of polite society in themselves
were neither natural nor congenial to him. External restraints and conventions
were irksome to him.  A man of the people himself, he came into intimate touch
with the underlying springs of human life more easily among the uncultured.
Thus it was that the loving gentle nature of the devoted Hendrickje, with her
obvious refinement of heart, appealed to the lonely painter, helpless in his
home without a woman's aid, and made him content with her as Saskia's
substitute.  Once more Rembrandt grew happy; once more his home is kept in
order; and again he is able to devote himself untiringly to the production of
his maturest and some of his finest work.  The series of portraits of himself,
etched and painted at this date, show him to be an older and graver man.  The
painting of 1646 in Buckingham Palace, or that of 1655 in the Wallace
Collection, and the etching of himself, a drawing of 1648, show him aged and
dignified, with deeply lined face, and dressed in simple, severe garb.  All
the fantasy and display of the earlier portraits are gone; and the sorely
tried man, the worker, the thinker, only, is revealed.  In these years of
comparative peace - for difficulties were gathering around him in hopeless
tangle - he produced magnificent work, such as the dignified "Portrait of an
Old Man," in a crimson dress and heavy mantle, at Dresden; a broad, powerful
study, the "Man in Armour," at Cassel, and another in Glasgow; "Joseph and
Potiphar's Wife," in Berlin (another version is at the Hermitage), a superb
harmony of rich colour.  "To avoid the gaudiness and incoherence of multiple
tints he has with exquisite art confined the general tonality to the play of
two complementary colours, opposing the various reds of the picture to
skilfully distributed greens."^1 To the same year, according to a journal in
the Six family, belongs the admirable portrait of "Burgomeister Six,"
Rembrandt's constant friend, from whom the year before the painter had
borrowed money. Rapidly executed in a few hours with bold vigorous touch,
every stroke tells, and the study is characterised by freshness and
spontaneity, by broad simplicity and careful emphasis.  The dominant colours
are greys, soft reds and gold, in marvellous harmony.  The treatment of the
face is admirable and sympathetic - the fine temperament of his friend is
lovingly suggested; the character and quality of the work, especially of the
broadly brushed hands and gloves, is masterly in the highest degree.  The
portrait is still in the family of the Burghermaster, and hangs opposite to
that of his mother, Anna Wymer, the daughter of Dr. Tulp, painted in 1641, in
a smoother and more elaborate manner.

[See Woman Bathing: Hendrickje, unlike Saskia, was a gentle brunette with
large, faithful-looking brown eyes.]

[Footnote 1: Michel.]

     The friendship between Rembrandt and Six arose, doubtless, through the
mediumship of Dr. Tulp, whose daughter Jan Six married, a friendship that
stood the master in good stead in the days of his adversity.  Jan Six was a
cultivated man of fine tastes; he became Burghermaster in later life, and
owned a charming house in the country whose doors were ever open to the
painter.  Moreover, Jan Six was an author.  In 1648 he published a tragedy,
entitled Medea, for which Rembrandt etched the illustration of the "Marriage
of Jason and Creusa." It was for him probably that Rembrandt painted the small
head of Dr. Ephraim Bonus, a Portuguese Jew, now in the Six Collection. In the
same year he etched the interesting portrait of Jan Six standing at the window
of his study, book in hand, with a pile of books lying on a chair, his sword
and cloak thrown on a couch beside him.