2732. THE SHIPWRECKED MARINER.
Joseph Israels (Dutch: 1824-1911). See 2713.
This celebrated picture—one by which the master often said he would like to be judged—created a great sensation at the International Exhibition of 1862. It was, said one critic, the most moving picture in the exhibition; before it, said another, crowds daily linger. The storm has passed, the waves have subsided, the greyish-black thunderclouds have vanished, and greenish, pallid sky smiles upon the earth once more. But upon the waves a shattered boat still rocks, and men and women and children have come down to see what victim may have been cast up by the tide—"For men must work, and women must weep, Though storms be sudden, and waters deep, And the harbour bar be moaning." Two fishermen reverently bear home the body of their dead comrade. His disconsolate wife and two awestruck children walk in front, and his old mother beside him. A man with a boat-hook, a woman pointing to the wreck on the reef, and others follow the procession, in the rear of which is the pathetic figure of a dog.