852. THE CHAPEAU DE POIL.
Rubens (Flemish: 1577-1640). See 38.
One of the best known and most be-copied pictures in the Gallery. Its fame among artists "depends to no slight extent on its being a tour de force. The head is painted in reflected light, so as to come as near as may be to Queen Elizabeth's shadowless ideal" (Armstrong: Notes on the National Gallery, p. 31). "No one who has not beheld this masterpiece of painting can form any conception," says Dr. Waagen, "of the transparency and brilliancy with which the local colours in the features and complexion, though under the shadow of a broad-brimmed hat, are brought out and made to tell, while the different parts are rounded and relieved, with the finest knowledge and use of reflected lights." The expression of the subject is as much a tour de force as the technical treatment—
I know a maiden fair to see,
Take care!...
She gives a side-glance and looks down,
Beware! beware!...
She has a bosom as white as snow,
Take care!
She knows how much it is best to show,
Beware! beware!
Trust her not,
She is fooling thee!
Longfellow: from the German.
The picture is a portrait of Susanne Fourment, an elder sister of Rubens's second wife, Helène Fourment. Susanne often sat to Rubens; other paintings and drawings of her by his hand exist. She afterwards married Arnold Lunden. The picture remained in the possession of the painter until his death, when it passed into that of Nicholas Lunden, who had married Isabella, a daughter of Rubens by his second wife, Helène Fourment. The picture remained in the Lunden family until 1822, when it was sold by auction for 36,000 florins and brought to England. After being offered in vain to George IV., it was bought by Sir Robert Peel for 3500 guineas. Why and when this picture of a lady in a beaver hat acquired the inappropriate title of "Chapeau de Paille" ("The Straw Hat"), by which it has hitherto been called, is unknown. Perhaps the title is a corruption of "Chapeau d'Espagne." An entirely different story about the picture was current in the Lunden family. According to this not very probable tradition, Miss Susanne had refused to sit to Rubens, so he painted her unawares whilst she was in her garden, wearing a large straw hat. When the picture was done, she pardoned the flattering indiscretion and accepted it as a gift. Rubens afterwards begged leave to take back the portrait, promising in return a work in which he would put all his talent. This was a replica of the same portrait, but instead of a straw hat (chapeau de paille) he introduced in the second version the beaver hat (chapeau de poil) that we see. The Lunden family had christened the original "Chapeau de Paille," and the present picture has ever since retained the same title. (See letter in the Times, August 6, 1886, from M. Jules Nollée de Noduwez, himself a connection of the Lunden family).