CHAPTER IX. THE AUTHENTIC ETCHINGS

In the entire absence of any evidence to the contrary, we are reasonably safe in concluding that the two etchings dated 1628 were, if not actually the first, among the very first he ever did; and, regarded in this light, they are truly astonishing. Both are called Rembrandt’s mother, though the one in full face (B. 352) seems to represent a woman in a much humbler station of life than the stately old lady in the other (B. 354), while both, furthermore, seem to portray a woman much more advanced in years than his mother was at that time.

In the first the kindly old lady, whoever she may be, wears a large white hood shading her forehead. The right side of her face, with the exception of the prominence of the cheekbone, is in shadow, and the strong light falling on the left side of the head brings into relief the wrinkles by the nose and at the corner of the mouth, and the soft fleshy forms of the cheek and jaw. The seemingly toothless mouth is slightly open above the strong square chin. The work is simple and straightforward, but admirably expressive of the varied forms, and the roundness and solidity of the little head are excellent. The second (B. 354) is slighter and broader in handling, the forms are expressed with greater freedom, the elaboration of the modelling in the one being often replaced by a single significant line, but the shadows are somewhat forced, which results, especially in the hollow of the cheek and on the right temple, in an excessive and unpleasant blackness. Yet the dash and surety of the line-work is very fine, and to the student it is well worth careful study through a lens. The first excels in delicacy, the second in strength.

The only etching actually known to have been executed in 1629 is the first of many portraits of himself (B. 338), very broadly and strongly etched, and worked upon in places with two needles fastened side by side, a useless device, to which he never again resorted. There are fifteen dated etchings of the year 1630. Among these are no less than six portraits or studies of himself, including an excellent “Portrait in a fur cap and light dress” (B. 24), and an admirably etched study of expression known as “Rembrandt with haggard eyes” (B. 320), which is, rather, a humorous sketch of amazed bewilderment. He also, for the first time, attempted a composition with several figures— “The Presentation in the Temple” (B. 51), distinguished as the one with the angel, which, however, was not altogether a success, owing to insufficient biting. A spirited note of “An Old Beggar Man conversing with a Woman” (B. 164), and various small heads, including two profiles of the same “Bald Man” (B. 292 and 294), which M. Michel has given sound reasons for believing to be Rembrandt’s father, make up the number.

He was again his own model twice in 1631 — one, with a broad hat and mantle (B. 7), being the most elaborately finished piece of work he had yet attempted. There are also two “Portraits of his Mother” (B. 348 and 349); one said to be “His Father” (B. 263) though made after his death; a brilliant little sketch of a “Blind Fiddler” (B. 138), and others. There are only three dated etchings of 1632 — a little figure called “The Persian” (B. 152), the first of several pictures of “St Jerome” (B. 101), a subject which had a singular fascination for the artist, and the group of “The Rat-killer” (B. 121). Three also bear the date 1633, “An Old Woman” etched no lower than the chin (B. 351), very doubtfully identified as his mother; a badly overbitten “Portrait of Himself” with a scarf round his neck (B. 17); and one subject, “The Descent from the Cross” (B. 81), which came so utterly to grief in the biting, owing apparently to bad grounding, that it was at once abandoned, only three impressions being known, and a second undertaken, though not by himself, the work having been carried out under his supervision by some unknown pupil. Another equally important plate bearing this date, “The Good Samaritan” (B. 90), is included among the disputed etchings.

The year 1634, which brought Saskia into his home, also naturally enough brought her portrait into the list of etchings. One, with pearls in her hair (B. 347), is certainly a likeness of her, and M. Michel believes it to have been the companion plate to one of Rembrandt (B. 2), executed about the same time. Another charming piece of work, “A Young Woman Reading” (B. 345), though not a portrait, was also very possibly studied from Saskia. For subjects both the Old and New Testaments supplied inspiration, the first for a decidedly seventeenth-century Dutch rendering of “Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife” (B. 39), the second for the earliest treatment of a favourite subject “Christ and the Disciples at Emmaus” (B. 88). “Christ driving the Money-lenders from the Temple” (B. 69), a crowded and unsatisfactory composition, the central figure of which was borrowed from Durer; the “Martyrdom of St Stephen” (B. 97), with some singularly bad drawing in it; and another, “St Jerome” (B. 102), were the subjects treated in 1635, which is more notable for a vivacious “Portrait of Johannes Uijtenbogaerd” (B. 279); a splendid little study of “A Mountebank” (B. 129), a model of direct etching from nature wherein there is not a superfluous line, though everything that should be is expressed; and a skilful piece of chiaroscuro, “The Pancake Woman” (B. 124).

1636 has only four etchings to show— “The Prodigal Son” (B. 91), a boldly-handled piece of work, superbly executed, full of movement and expression, but marred by the revolting hideousness of the faces; the excellent portrait of “Manasseh ben Israel” (B. 269); a charming little revelation of domestic contentment, “Rembrandt and his Wife” (B. 19); and a sheet of sketches, including a very pleasing head of Saskia (B. 365). 1637 has only one etching of importance, “Abraham dismissing Hagar” (B. 30); but for sheer skill in craftsmanship the “Young Man seated in Meditation” (B. 268) would be difficult to match.

Rembrandt’s unfortunate lack of the sense of beauty is nowhere so glaringly made manifest as in the preposterous “Adam and Eve” (B. 28) of 1638; nor are the faces in an etching of that year, rejected, however, by Sir Seymour Haden, of the brothers listening to “Joseph relating His Dreams” (B. 37) much less absurd, though they are to a considerable extent atoned for by the dignified Jacob, the very human interest of Rachel, and the simple earnestness of Joseph himself. The “St Catherine,” otherwise known as “The Little Jewish Bride” (B. 342), and a “Portrait of Himself with a Mezetin Cap and Feather” (B. 20), are the only others of the year. In the following year he achieved, with conspicuous success, the most ambitious etching he had yet attempted, the magnificent “Death of the Virgin” (B. 99), which, with the exception of the unfortunate angels hovering above, is admirable alike in conception and execution, attaining by straightforward simplicity the full pathos of the scene. The truthfulness and variety of attitude and expression, the wholly effective yet unforced arrangement of the composition, and the perfection of the chiaroscuro are beyond praise, and justify the somewhat bold assertion that beyond this the etcher’s art cannot go. It is no matter for wonder, therefore, that this splendid plate seems to have absorbed most of the time he could devote to etching that year, for a little sketch of “A Jew in a High Cap” (B. 133), and the fine “Portrait of Himself leaning on a Stone Sill” (B. 21), alone share the date with it. His interest or his leisure would indeed appear to have been exhausted for some time, since only two small etchings, “The Beheading of St John the Baptist” (B. 92), and “An Old Man with a divided Fur Cap” (B. 265), are dated 1640.

A return of energy, however, marked 1641, from which year we have twelve dated plates; among them, the first three, to our certain knowledge, of a long series of landscapes, the elaborate study known as “Rembrandt’s Mill” (B. 233), the beautiful “Cottage and Barn” (B. 225), and the “Landscape with a Cottage and Mill Sail” (B. 226). There are four subjects from scripture — a “Virgin and Child in the Clouds” (B. 61), “The Baptism of the Eunuch” (B. 98), one called “Jacob and Laban” (B. 118), and “The Angel departing from Tobit and his Family” (B. 43), in which his inability to perceive the absurd and undignified is once again demonstrated in the inflated petticoat and foreshortened legs which are all that is seen of the angel. A little night-effect, “The Schoolmaster” (B. 128), and the grand and very rare “Portrait of Anslo” (B. 271), are the most important of the remainder. With the exception of a “Bearded Man seated at a Table in an Arbour” (B. 257), the only etchings of 1642 were three sacred subjects, all small, and two of them, “The Raising of Lazarus” (B. 72) and “The Descent from the Cross” (B. 82), mere sketches. The finished plate represents “St Jerome” (B. 105), distinguished as being in Rembrandt’s dark manner, seated reading at a table in a room lighted only by one window high up in front of him, so that the contrasts of light and shade are strong, and the effect very excellent.

1643 has only two signed etchings, but both are masterpieces of out-door work— “The Hog” (B. 157), and the justly-renowned “Three Trees” (B. 212). There is only one etching dated 1644, a landscape with figures, called “The Shepherd and his Family” (B. 220).

A superb combination of pure etching and dry-point dates from 1645 — the “View of Omval, near Amsterdam” (B. 209), one of the most entirely satisfactory of the etchings, both for perfection of workmanship and beauty of effect. The transition from the loving care bestowed upon the splendid study of the gnarled and shattered willow-tree in front, through the more broadly yet quite adequately expressed foliage behind it on the left, to the slight yet all-sufficient treatment of the river and landscape beyond it on the right, shows a precise adaptation of the necessary means to the desired end, which, had no other line of Rembrandt’s etching come down to us, would have been enough to stamp him as the finest known exponent of the art. A second landscape of that year is a study of a boat-house, known as “The Grotto” (B. 231); and a third, the one known as “Six’s Bridge” (B. 208), a masterly little sketch from nature. As an example of the utmost expressiveness with the fewest necessary means, of a thorough grasp of the essentials and rejection of superfluities, and of a profound mastery of technical methods, this etching cannot easily be over-estimated. An outline sketch of the “Repose in Egypt” (B. 58), and a more highly finished “Abraham conversing with Isaac” just previous to the projected sacrifice (B. 34), are the only subject-etchings of that year, which is further remarkable for the absence of any portraits or studies of heads.

The next few years are singularly devoid of dated etchings. There are three from 1646 — a small sketch of “An Old Beggar Woman” (B. 170); a subject known as “Ledikant” (B. 186), one of those frank improprieties to the perpetration of which Rembrandt, with the freedom of his time, more than once degraded his talents, from our modern point of view; and a direct study from the nude model, “A Man seated on the Ground” (B. 196). 1647 has only two, both highly-finished endeavours to realise a wholly pictorial effect — an endeavour which, however successful, is always to some extent a mis-application of the art, a deliberate sacrifice of its special advantages, in order to attain an object more easily and efficiently obtainable in other ways. Still, regarded as attempts to express the full tonality, there is much to admire and study in these two portraits of “Six” (B. 285), and “Ephraim Bonus” (B. 278), the Jewish physician, descending a staircase, with his right hand on the banister, as if pausing on his return from visiting a patient, a reversed reproduction of the picture in the Six collection already referred to.

In 1648 he once more undertook a “Portrait of Himself” (B. 22), a very different presentment from the earlier ones, with their feathered caps and embroidered cloaks, their flowing locks and brushed up moustaches. Time and trouble have told upon him, and it is pathetic to contrast the proud elegance of the Rembrandt of 1639 (B. 21), his fine clothes, rich velvet cap flung carelessly on one side of his long curling hair, and his self-satisfied air, with this grave, soberly-clad, middle-aged man, in his plain, high, square-topped, broad-brimmed hat, and dark working blouse. His cavalier curls are cropped, his once airily upturned moustache trimmed short, the dainty tuft upon his chin is gone. He has grown stout, his throat hangs in puffy folds below his chin, his nose has coarsened, and he bears his two-and-forty years but badly; but if his face has aged, it has also strengthened, he has learned as well as suffered, and, if there is no longer in his eyes the look of undoubting self-approval, there is still the same keen, penetrating gaze of observation, and a wiser self-confidence born of trials and labours past and overcome. Among all the portraits of Rembrandt, real or supposed, there is none which makes one feel so strongly that here, indeed, one is face to face with him, as he saw himself when he sat drawing from the mirror in front of him.

Another splendid example of that year is the “Beggars at the Door of a House” (B. 176), a masterpiece of composition and workmanship. It has all the rich effect of a highly-laboured piece of work, yet a careful study of it shows how simple and direct are the means actually employed; for the elaborately-finished effect, it will be found, is due, not to the multiplication of lines, but to the absolute rightness and appropriateness of the comparatively few that are used. The crispness and firmness of the drawing are quite magnificent, and it is satisfactory to know that this marvellous little plate, simple and unsensational as it is, comes third, according to M. Amand Durand, in popularity with the purchasers of reproductions. Yet another masterpiece of the same year is “The Jews’ Synagogue” (B. 126); and a fourth etching is “The Marriage of Jason and Creusa” (B. 112), a composition of many figures, made to illustrate his friend Jan Six’s tragedy of Medea, published that year, in which, as usual with him, the attempt to convey the classical spirit was scarcely successful.

There is no etching which we can definitely assign to 1649. In 1650, on the other hand, we have six, including four landscapes, to which he again turned his attention after an interval of five years. These are “A Village by the High-Road” (B. 217), with its big tree and high-gabled cottages; the excellent “Village with a Square Tower” (B. 218); the “Canal with Swans” (B. 235); and the sketch of “A Canal with a Large Boat” (B. 236) lying broadside on athwart the foreground, which is, however, chiefly interesting from the background, which has given rise to a question as to whether Rembrandt was about that time on his travels to some place unknown. This hilly distance, with the steep cliff on the left, and the Italian-looking tower in the centre, certainly bears no resemblance to anything in his ordinary surroundings, but there is nothing in it to assure us that it was done from nature, and as we know that he more than once adapted a landscape from some Italian master, generally Titian, it would be rash to found any conclusion on the resemblance.

A remarkable instance of patient and loving care is seen in the “Shell” (B. 159), an astonishingly truthful and minute study of still life, which is equally attractive in the first state against a plain white background, and in the second against a nearly black one, which, however, may have been added by some other hand. The sixth etching of that year, “Christ appearing to the Disciples” (B. 89), is a sketch in outline with a little tentative shading here and there, and, though handled with freedom and boldness, has little of interest or beauty to recommend it.

During 1651 he devoted himself once and once only to each class of work; for there is one subject, “The Flight into Egypt” (B. 53), showing Joseph carrying a lantern, and leading the ass bearing the Virgin and Child through the night; one landscape, “The Goldweigher’s Field” (B. 234) — so called from the view including the country-house of his friend Uijtenbogaerd, the treasurer, whose portrait, etched by Rembrandt, is known as “The Goldweigher”; and one portrait, “Clement de Jonghe” (B. 272), one of the best, if not the best, he ever did. Still fewer etchings were produced in 1652, and one of the two, the larger “Christ disputing with the Doctors” (B. 65), is only a sketch — in places, indeed, it degenerates to a mere scrawl — displaying, for Rembrandt, an unwonted amount of indifferent and inexpressive drawing; but the other, a landscape, generally known in England as the “Vista” (B. 222), with the two large trees on the left and the dense wood in the centre, is, perhaps, the finest specimen of work in pure dry-point ever produced.

1653 is, again, a blank as far as dated etchings are concerned, but to 1654 belong eight, seven of which are subjects from the New Testament; a “Circumcision” (B. 47), known as the one with the cask and net; a sketch of “The Holy Family crossing a Rill during the Flight into Egypt” (B. 55), in which the figures are clumsily and unpleasantly thrown into relief by a band of shadow closely following their outlines in very naïve fashion, but which, nevertheless, contains a great deal of bold and expressive drawing; “Jesus and His Parents returning from Jerusalem” (B. 60), in which we have another instance of an altogether foreign landscape, which might as well be adduced in evidence of his foreign travels as that of four years before. In this case, however, it has evidently been so closely copied from an unknown original that there can be no doubt that there is somewhere, or at any rate was then, a drawing of the subject, and there is, furthermore, a very high degree of probability that the drawing was by Titian. The figures are full of movement, and there is, in especial, much animation in the young Christ, who, led by His father, himself leads His mother, turning half backwards as He walks to speak to her, but the types of the heads, especially that of the Virgin Mary, are disagreeably ugly and vulgar. The Virgin in “The Holy Family with the Serpent” (B. 63), has, on the other hand, an unusual amount of grace, but this, it has to be admitted, is due to the fact that it is borrowed from Mantegna, and the plate is otherwise an indifferent piece of work. “Christ and the Disciples at Emmaus” (B. 87) is, again, no more than a sketch, presenting with much vividness the actions of surprise on the part of the two disciples and of the serving-man descending the stairs in front; but here, as so often elsewhere, Rembrandt has failed to rise to any sense of the sublimity or dignity of Christ, and as, in this example, he sits in full face in the very centre of the picture, the fault cannot well be overlooked or condoned. A far more satisfactory production, indeed the best of the year, is “The Descent from the Cross by Torchlight” (B. 83), with its bold drawing and coarse yet effective handling, but, like all the work of 1654, it has serious and obvious defects; while the last to be noted, “The Game of Golf” or Kolf (B. 125), is yet another instance of Rembrandt’s contentedly signing a work which would disgrace a man without a tithe of his genius, and is one of those plates which, if it be authentic — and no one else that I know of disputes it — renders any test of genuineness by workmanship impossible.

1655 saw Rembrandt employed once more as an illustrator, the book being one entitled “Piedra gloriosa ò de la estatua de Nebucadnezar,” by his friend Manasseh ben Israel, for which he etched four subjects on one plate, afterwards sub-divided— “Jacob’s Dream,” “The Combat of David and Goliath,” “Nebuchadnezzar’s Dream,” and “The Vision of Ezekiel” (B. 36). “Abraham’s Sacrifice” (B. 35), of the same year, is another of those bold and rapid sketches in which Rembrandt seems to have dashed at his subject and realised it by sheer force of energy, caring little about detail, shading where he wanted shadows, and omitting them where he wanted light, without any regard to where light and shade would have been, yet putting such vitality, such genuine, undeniable, human feeling into it, that even bad drawing passes unnoticed. The swirl of the broad-winged angel swooping down from behind on Abraham, grasping his left arm just above he elbow to hold back the knife, while with his right he removes Abraham’s right hand from the eyes of the resignedly kneeling Isaac, is marvellous. The startled surprise of Abraham is amazingly true; and, carried away by the vigour of the actions and the sound breadth of the work, we ignore the fact that Abraham is left-handed, and that the angel has no forearm. Another equally bold work in outline is “Christ before Pilate” (B. 76), with its wonderful crowd of figures in the foreground relieved against the platform on which Christ and Pilate stand surrounded by soldiers. The only highly-finished work of the year is the “Portrait of Thomas Jacobsz Haring” (B. 275), known as “The Young Haring,” to distinguish it from the etching of his father “The Old Haring.”

There are only two etchings dated 1656,— “Abraham entertaining the Angels” (B. 29), in which yet again we have forced upon us the incapacity of Rembrandt’s mind to evolve an acceptable supernatural figure, and the splendid “Portrait of Jan Lutma” (B. 276). It is impossible to look on this and doubt that it is an admirable likeness of a delightful old man. With what a shrewd humorous expression he sits in that high-backed arm-chair, surmounted by lions’ heads, which figures in so many of Rembrandt’s portraits at that time. How broad and easy, yet neither over-laboured nor careless, is the handling. Rembrandt never worked better, and one cannot but feel convinced, in regarding the result, that, to both artist and sitter, the work was a labour of love, and the sittings periods of mutual enjoyment. In this, the last dated portrait we have, he reached the highest pitch of excellence he ever attained.

In 1657, as far as we know, he executed only one etching, “St Francis praying” (B. 107), unfinished, and chiefly notable for the fine study of a tree which it contains. Three figures of nude women, “A Woman preparing to dress after Bathing” (B. 199), “A Woman sitting with her Feet in Water” (B. 200), and a so-called “Negress lying down” (B. 205), are dated 1658, while 1659 was marked by two very diverse subjects, “St Peter and St John at the Gate of the Temple” (B. 94), and “Jupiter disguised as a Satyr discovering the sleeping Antiope” (B. 203).

Throughout 1660 Rembrandt would seem to have left his etching needle to rust in idleness, but he resumed it once more in 1661, and produced a study of the nude, “A Woman with her Back turned sitting cross-legged upon a Bed, holding an Arrow in her right Hand” (B. 202); and with this the list of authentic dated etchings is brought to a close.

There are one hundred and one etchings generally accepted as Rembrandt’s to which no date can positively be assigned, but lack of space forbids our considering them at length, and we must be content to review them somewhat hastily, dwelling only on those of special importance. The earlier years, from 1628 or 1629 to about 1635, are chiefly characterised by a number of small portraits of himself, and of various unknown old men and old women, and by a remarkable series of sketches of beggars and peasants. About 1631 we find the first study from the nude, “Diana bathing” (B. 201), altogether excellent as an example of well-directed line, devoted, however, to a coarse and unshapely figure. Of approximately the same date is a masterly portrait of “An Old Lady,” in all probability Rembrandt’s mother (B. 343), seated at a table, turned in three-quarter face to the right, her hands lightly folded in her lap, which is worthy of remark as showing how rapidly Rembrandt mastered all the available styles of etching, and how subtly and skilfully he combined them.

A little later, the assigned dates ranging between 1633 and 1636, we have the first portrait, outside his family circle, to which we can definitely attach a name, that of the minister “Jan Cornelis Sylvius” (B. 266), with whose family Saskia was staying before her marriage. If, as we may imagine, it was undertaken to ingratiate himself with people so important to him, or later out of gratitude for their good offices, we can only hope that they were not over-critical, for it must be confessed that this exercise in pure dry-point is about as bad an example as could be found. A sheet of sketches (B. 367), dating from 1635 or 1636, is noteworthy for the charming “Head of Saskia” included in it, and a “Portrait of Himself in a flat cap and slashed vest” (B. 26), slightly but beautifully etched, as undoubtedly an admirable presentment of himself as he appeared about 1638. Four scripture subjects are, a sketch of “The Flight into Egypt” (B. 54), dating anywhere between 1630 and 1640; a “Holy Family,” known as “The Virgin with the Linen” (B. 62), dating between 1632 and 1640; a beautiful little “Crucifixion” (B. 80), dating from 1634 or 1635; and “An Old Man caressing a Boy,” who stands between his knees (B. 33), dating from 1638 or 1639, believed by some authorities to represent “Abraham caressing Isaac.”

There are, altogether, forty-eight etchings attributed with every probability of correctness to the years before 1640, many of which deserve more attention than we can spare them; while two, “A Sketch of a Tree” (B. 372), and “The Presentation in the vaulted Temple” (B. 49), are placed by some a year or two earlier, by others a year or two later, than that year. To the year itself probably belongs a landscape “A large Tree by a House” (B. 207), and to it or to the following year “The Virgin mourning the Death of Jesus” (B. 85), “The Flute-Player” (B. 188), and “A View of Amsterdam” (B. 210); while to 1641 are generally assigned two sketches of lion-hunts (B. 115 and 116), more remarkable for energy of action then accuracy of drawing; a vigorous “Battle-Scene” (B. 117); “The Draughtsman” (B. 130), and “A Portrait of a Boy” (B. 310). Other landscapes, of doubtful date, but almost certainly of some year between 1640 and 1650, are, “The Bull” (B. 253), “A Village with a River and Sailing Vessel” (B. 228), the beautiful “Landscape with a Man sketching” (B. 219), and the “Landscape with a ruined Tower” (B. 223). Portraits of known originals are those of “Jan Asselyn” (B. 277), a fellow-artist, a dwarfed, deformed little man, nicknamed by his contemporaries the little Crab, whose personal failings evidently did not weigh on him, for he stands gazing at the spectator with a superb air of ludicrous conceit; and a magnificent one of the same “Jan Sylvius” (B. 280) with whom Rembrandt had so conspicuously failed before, so full of life and movement that it is hard to believe, though an indubitable fact, that it was etched from a study in 1645 or 1646, seven or eight years after the death of the minister. The scripture subjects of this decade include an oval “Crucifixion” (B. 79), and “The Triumph of Mordecai” (B. 40).

In the debatable land between the late forties and the early fifties there are two magnificent works, one, oddly included in the usual classifications among the portraits, “Dr Faustus” (B. 270), the other the famous Hundred Guilder print, “Jesus Christ healing the Sick” (B. 74). There are, all told, twenty-eight etchings dating between 1640 and 1650.

Only eighteen of uncertain date are placed between 1650 and the end of Rembrandt’s career as an etcher in 1661, but they are nearly all worthy of more space than can be devoted to them. One is a landscape, “The Sportsman” (B. 211). Five are portraits, one of “A Youth,” long known as Rembrandt, but undoubtedly his son Titus (B. 11); the large one of “Coppenol” (B. 283), probably among the last of the etchings, but beautifully and minutely finished in an exquisitely delicate fashion, though the hands are less well expressed than usual with Rembrandt, who, whether in painting or drawing, delighted in bringing out with care the full character revealed by them; a portrait in dry-point of “Dr Arnoldus Tholinx” (B. 284), of which it would be impossible to speak too highly; a less admirable one of “Abraham Francen” (B. 273), whose long and faithful friendship with the painter has been referred to in the Life; and one of Jacob Haring (B. 274), known as “The Old Haring.”

There are nine scripture subjects of the period, two from the Old Testament, “King David at Prayer” (B. 41), a strong and unhesitating piece of work, in which, however, the face of the king is somewhat too simply expressed, but was probably not considered by Rembrandt as finished; and “Tobit Blind” (B. 42), scarcely more than a sketch, but full of the sentiment of helpless blindness. Of the seven subjects from the New Testament two are of the first importance, “Christ preaching” (B. 67), known as the little La Tombe, because, it is supposed, the plate came into the possession of the dealer of that name; and the “Three Crosses” (B. 78), the former being an etching heightened by dry-point, the second a work in dry-point throughout. “Jesus Christ entombed” (B. 86) is a powerful and effective etching dating probably from the early fifties, and “The Presentation in the Temple” (B. 50), further identified as being in Rembrandt’s dark manner, from about the middle of the decade. “The Nativity” (B. 45), of about the same time, is an exquisite little composition expressed with the utmost simplicity compatible with the desired result. In “Christ in the Garden of Olives” (B. 75), on the other hand, this rapidity of work has been carried too far, and degenerates into sheer carelessness, though, apart from details, the arrangement of the masses of light and shade is good. “Christ and the Samaritan Woman” (B. 70), dating from 1657 or 1658, is drawn with precision and delicacy, but the device of relieving the face of the woman by a dark and impossible shadow on a building in the background, is scarcely a happy or successful one. A figure of “A Nude Woman sitting by a Dutch stove” (B. 197), a portrait of “A Goldsmith at his Work” (B. 123), and “A Sheet of Sketches” (B. 364), of which only three copies are known, bring the tale of etchings to which an approximate date may be assigned to a conclusion.

There remain seventeen, concerning the probable dates of which conjectures vary so widely, that it is safer to admit we do not know, and cannot guess with any prospect of success. Thus the clever little sketch of “Two Beggars walking towards the right” (B. 144), has been dated 1629, 1634, and 1648; another “Beggar leaning upon a Stick” (B. 162), 1631 and 1641, and a pathetic little composition of “Christ’s Body carried to the Tomb” (B. 84), 1632 and 1645; while the small “Portrait of Coppenol” (B. 282), has been attributed by one to 1632, but by another to as far away as 1651. Other plates of equally uncertain date are five landscapes — the exquisite “Landscape with a Flock of Sheep” (B. 224), and the no less admirable “Peasant with Milk Pails” (B. 213); “The Cottage with white Pales” (B. 232), “The Canal” (B. 221), the “Landscape with an Obelisque” (B. 227), and the “Landscape with a Cow drinking” (B. 237). Three are scripture subjects— “The Adoration of the Shepherds” (B. 46), a hurriedly executed night effect, dating between 1632 and 1640 according to Vosmaer, from 1652 according to Middleton; a second night effect, “The Repose in Egypt” (B. 57), also assigned by Vosmaer to some date between 1632 and 1640, by M. Michel to 1641 or 1642, and by Middleton to 1647; and a very indifferent “St Peter” (B. 96), with a signature and date which Middleton reads 1645, Vosmaer 1655. Another dated plate is “The Bathers” (B. 195), which, according to M. Michel, was originally dated 1631, the 3 having subsequently been altered by Rembrandt into a 5. As to the why and wherefore of such an incomprehensible error on the artist’s part, he offers no conjecture, but that the etching does not, at any rate, belong to the earlier year is indicated by the fact that it is signed Rembrandt in full, while all the certain plates of that year are signed with a monogram, the first to bear the full name being the “St Jerome” (B. 101) of 1632. A third plate bearing a date, concerning the interpretation of which the authorities differ, is the mysterious allegorical one “The Phœnix” (B. 110), Vosmaer and Wilson making it 1648, M. Michel and Middleton 1658; while a fourth, “A Sheet of Sketches with a head of Himself” (B. 370), is dated so indistinctly that it has been read as 1630, 1631, and 1650. As, however, it is signed with a monogram, it certainly belongs to one of the earlier years. “The Star of the Kings” (B. 113), a subject from contemporary life, representing a party of boys carrying a large illuminated star through the streets of a town at Epiphany, dating either from 1641 or 1652, is the last to be mentioned of the undisputed etchings.