Painted in 1624. No painter has left a more charming and more characteristic portrait of himself and his wife than this. There they sit, all in a garden green, as happy as happy can be. The "idea" was Lysbeth's. She knew Franz was painting other couples and getting wealth and fame—why not their own? She put on her best go-to-Groote-Keerke gown and a new cap, and made Franz don his Town Hall suit; she gauffered very carefully his cuffs, and tied round his neck his finest Van Dyck collar. The pose is splendidly realistic—good-humouredly she smiles, but he is in restless mood, as was his wont, and so she just grasps his shoulder—a reminder of the sweet restraint of happy married life! For fifty years they lived together, sharing their sorrows and their joys.
Still the Hals, and their companions of the tankard and the brush, were downright, loyal honest citizens, and all were enrolled in the ranks of the Civic Guard—Franz and Dirk in 1618.
"The Banquet of the Shooting Guild of St. Joris" was not the only work which Franz Hals signed and dated in 1616; at least two other very striking portraits were finished. "Pieter Van der Morsch," now labelled "The Herring Seller," was a beadle in the service of the Municipality of Leyden, and a member of the "Guild of Rhetoric" of that city—an oldish man with sparse locks and furrowed face. He is holding up a herring, and on the canvas some one has scratched, "WIE BEGEERT?"—"Who'll buy?"
This portrait is the earliest dated work which exhibits Hals' speciality—characterisation. It now belongs to the Earl of Northbrook, but it sold in 1780 at a public auction in Leyden for the ridiculous sum of £1, 5s.
"[The Merry Trio]" belongs to the same year, 1616. A girl of the town in gala dress is seated, willy-nilly, between the knees of a Falstaffian lover, whilst a saucy apprentice boy holds over the couple a mock coronal of sausages! The man was evidently a pork butcher; probably one of Hals' creditors later on. The pose and play were probably suggested by an allegorical picture which had charmed the young artist in Antwerp—"The Feast of Love," by Frans Pourbus (1540-1601), now in the Wallace Collection. This humorous composition is in America; but a good copy, said to be by Dirk Hals, hangs in the Royal Museum in Berlin.
But years pass on once more, and there is little enough of episode to record in the life of our accomplished, jovial painter. Hals was now a happy father, and his heart went out to children—his own were growing fast, and their infant moods arrested him. Down by the sea-dunes, too, were lads and lasses—strong and lithe of build, bronzed with the sun and spray, full of life's gaiety. Of these he took liberal toll—just as did Leonardo da Vinci of posturing peasant youths and maidens in Tuscan villages. A merry suite of "Fisher-boys" and "Fisher-girls" danced off his palette, and now they display his genre delightfully in many a picture gallery.
There were also dignified patrons of Hals' brush in Haarlem, and rich burghers and their wives sat to him by scores. At Cassel, dated 1620, are portraits of a Haarlem gentleman and his spouse—the leading pair in his procession of full-dress Mijnheers and Mevrouws "posed for posterity," but rich in characterisation of face and hands—the latter a very marked feature.
The years 1622, 1623, and 1624 are "red-lettered" for the historian of Franz Hals, for among the portraits he dated then are three of surpassing interest—"His own Likeness," "[Himself and his Wife]," and "[The Laughing Cavalier]." The first of these belongs to the Duke of Devonshire; it hangs at Devonshire House in Piccadilly, and has never been exhibited.
This is "Franz Hals" as he wished to be known to posterity. His head, slightly on one side, is marked by strong features—a nose which shows strength of purpose, a mouth which indicates quiet decision, and dreamy eyes, looking craftily for new impressions. It is a self-satisfied, reflective face, with nothing base about it. The folded arms show grasp of purpose and individuality of action, whilst the figure of the man is in repose. The costume is sumptuous, full sleeves of heavy black silk brocade, with the latest conceits in buttons and ruffled cuffs. He wears the jewelled token of his Shooting Guild and the be-buttoned cloak of a gentleman of the period. His frill is full, and it is of the finest edged cambric—quite an ultra-mark of fashion! His hat is black velvet—slouched, and steeple-crowned.[1]