Then sublimity again; for here is Rembrandt of the Rhine. After Leonardo, Rembrandt is to me the glory of the Louvre, and especially the glory of the Grande Galerie, the last section of which is now hung with twenty-two of his works. Not one of them is perhaps superlative Rembrandt: there is nothing quite so fine as the portrait of Elizabeth Bas at the Ryks, or the "School of Anatomy" at the Mauritshuis, or the "Unjust Steward" at Hertford House; but how wonderful they are! Look at the miracle of the flying angel in the picture of Tobias—how real it is and how light! Look closely at the two little pictures of the philosopher in meditation. I have chosen the beautiful "Venus et L'Amour" and the "Pèlerins d'Emmaus" for reproduction; but I might equally have taken others. They will be found opposite [pages 146] and [154].
On the other wall are a few pictures by Rembrandt's pupils and colleagues, such as Ferdinand Bol and Govaert Flinck, who were always on the track of the master; and more particularly Gerard Dou: note the old woman in his "Lecture de la Bible," for it is Rembrandt's mother, and also look carefully at "La Femme Hydropique," one of his most miraculously finished works—a Rembrandt through the small end of a telescope.
From these we pass to the sumptuous Salle Van Dyck, which in its turn leads to the Salle Rubens, and one is again filled with wonder at the productivity of the twain—pupil and master. Did he never tire, this Peter Paul Rubens? Did a new canvas never deter or abash him? It seems not. No sooner was it set up in his studio than at it he must have gone like a charge of cavalry, magnificent in his courage, in his skill and in his brio. What a record! Has Rubens' square mileage ever been worked out, I wonder. He was very like a Frenchman: it is the vigour and spirit of Dumas at work with the brush. In the Louvre there are fifty-four attested works, besides many drawings; and it seems to me that I must have seen as many in Vienna, and as many in Dresden, and as many in Berlin, and as many in Antwerp, and as many in Brussels, to say nothing of the glorious landscape in Trafalgar Square. He is always overpowering; but for me the quieter, gentler brushes. None the less the portrait of Helène Fourment and their two children, in the Grande Galerie, although far from approaching that exquisite picture in the Liechtenstein Gallery in Vienna, when the boys were a little older, is a beautiful and living thing which one would not willingly miss.
Van Dyck was, of course, more austere, less boisterous and abundant, but his record is hardly less amazing, and he seems to have faced life-size equestrian groups, such as the Charles the First here, without a tremor. The Charles is superb in his distinction and disdain; but for me, however, Van Dyck is the painter of single portraits, of which, no matter where I go, none seems more noble and satisfying than our own Cornelius Van Voorst in Trafalgar Square. But the "Dame et sa Fille," which is reproduced on the opposite page, is very beautiful.
UNE DAME ET SA FILLE
VAN DYCK
(Louvre)
All round the Salle Rubens are arranged the little cabinets in which the small Dutch pictures hang—the Jan Steens and the Terburgs, the Hals' and the Metsus, the Ruisdaels and the Karel du Jardins, the Ostades and the golden Poelenburghs. Of these what can I say? There they are, in their hundreds, the least of them worth many minutes' scrutiny. But a few may be picked out: the Jan van Eyck (No. 1986) "La Vierge au Donateur," reproduced [opposite page 166], in which the Chancellor Rollin reveres the Virgin on the roof of a tower, and small wild animals happily play around, and we see in the distance one of those little fairy cities so dear to the Flemish painter's imagination; David's "Noce de Cana"; Metsu's "Vierge et Enfant" the Memling and the Rogier van der Weyden, close by; Franz Hals' "Bohémienne," reproduced [opposite page 186]; Van der Heyden's lovely "Plaine de Haarlem" (No. 2382); Paul Potter's "Bois de La Haye" (No. 2529), almost like a Diaz, and his little masterpiece No. 2526; the Terburgs: the "Music Lesson" (No. 2588) and the charming "Reading Lesson" (No. 2591) with the little touzled fair-haired boy in it, reproduced [opposite page 206]; Ruisdael's "Paysage dit le Coup de Soleil" (No. 2560); Hobbema's "Moulin à eau" (No. 2404); and, to my eyes, almost first of all, Vermeer of Delft's "Lacemaker" (No. 2456), reproduced [opposite page 216]. These are all I name.
So much for the paintings by the masters of the world. The Louvre also has drawings from the same hands, which hang in their thousands in a series of rooms on the first floor, overlooking the Rue de Rivoli. Here, as I have said, are other Leonardos (look particularly at No. 389), and here, too, are drawings by Raphael and Rembrandt, Correggio and Rubens (a child's head in particular), Domenico Ghirlandaio and Chardin, Mantegna and Watteau, Dürer and Ingres. I reproduce only one, a study attributed to the school of Fabriano, [opposite page 228]. Here one may spend a month in daily visits and wish never to break the habit. We have in England hardly less valuable and interesting drawings, but they are not to be seen in this way. One must visit the Print Room of the British Museum and ask for them one by one in portfolios. The Louvre, I think, manages it better.