A Portrait of Himself.—A portrait of himself is signed and dated 1660. This is only nine inches by six and one-half inches. It is only a bust showing a shaven face with a thread of a moustache, long black hair, brilliant eyes, and handsome mouth. He wears a grayish costume with puffed sleeves, and his right hand somewhat pretentiously holds the drapery of his cloak on his chest.
Dujardin's Other Works.—A Landscape, dated 1655, and showing a peasant winnowing corn, is noted for its silvery tone; A Trumpeter on Horseback shows a cavalier in a blue mantle and on a white horse, stopping before the door of an inn, and drinking from a glass offered by the hostess, who is standing at the door. His other works are an Italian Landscape with Animals and The Muleteers. Another Landscape in the Van der Hoop Collection was bought at the Duchesse de Berry's sale in 1837 for 4,000 florins. A copy after Karel Dujardin shows an Italian Landscape with figures, and a white horse.
Adam Pynacker.—Adam Pynacker has four landscapes: Border of a Lake in Italy, Italian Landscape, Landscape, and Pilgrimage.
Johannes Both's Pictures.—Johannes Both may be studied in The Courtyard of a Farm; two Italian Landscapes, one of which is a luminous picture of a summer morning, with mountains on the horizon on the left, trees to the right in the foreground, and many small figures on the road; and in Painters Studying from Nature. Here we see on a canvas about six feet by seven, a vast landscape of much beauty, having the Apennines for a background. Beneath a tall oak tree on the right and among the rocks, Johannes Both himself is seated, with his back turned to the spectator. He has a sketch book before him and is talking to a beggar; his brother Andries is facing us; and the fourth person is talking to some one in the distance. The time is a beautiful Summer morning.
Jan Asselijn.—Jan Asselijn (1610-60) was a pupil of Esaias van de Velde, but went when young to Italy, where he was called by the band of Dutch painters "Krabbetje," on account of a contraction in his fingers. His pictures are highly valued, representing, as a rule, views of Rome, enriched with figures and cattle in the style of N. Berchem. He greatly resembles Jan Both.
His Italian Landscape in the Rijks is considered a very true and important landscape, with a background of bluish mountains, and a bridge on the left. The artist has introduced Italian ruins and some muleteers. He is also represented by a Cavalry Combat, signed and dated 1646; and the Allegory on John de Witt.
Philips Wouwermans's Hawking Scene.—Of the thirteen pictures by Philips Wouwermans we may pause before the well-known Hawking Scene, noted as a specimen of his delicacy and precision on a small scale. It is only one foot high by eight inches wide. The exceedingly animated composition shows about a dozen people on horseback scattered through a delicate landscape. Other figures of men, women, and children enliven the scene. This is painted in his last and most prized period.
His Horse-pond.—The Horse-pond is a lovely picture, with a silvery sky filled with luminous morning clouds, and, far away in the distance, hills, trees, and women bleaching linen. In the centre of the picture, a lovely stream in which children are bathing, and a ferry with persons and animals passing over in little boats. It is the moment when grooms and peasants are taking their horses and animals to water; and naturally, therefore, we have some beautiful groups: here a man is leading two horses, one of which is kicking at a barking dog; other horses are at the edge of the stream; others have plunged in. Among the eight horses, there is one splendid white one, and there are about twenty figures, including washerwomen and children. It is impossible, even with Wouwermans, who is so spirituel and clever, to find a richer, more animated, more varied, and more brilliant composition.
A Landscape with Water belongs to the first period when Wouwermans followed Wijnants; The Camp shows horsemen and other people; a horseman turned to the right and mounted on a white and brown horse is very remarkable.
Description of The Kicking White Horse.—A celebrated canvas is The Kicking White Horse. Two mounted horses and one lead horse are under a tree in the foreground. The white horse, after having knocked over an old woman with a basket of fruit, is kicking the lead horse on the right, while a dog is snarling at his heels. On the extreme left, a richly dressed lady and gentleman are watching the affair with interest, and in the middle distance, on the right, two men are watering their horses at a ford. There is fine painting of distance in the low landscape and beautiful aërial perspective in the Summer sky with its floating clouds.