IN BELGIUM AND HOLLAND
Reluctantly Alfonso and Leo left Lucille and May in Paris. Both were well
educated and beautiful women. It is possible that Alfonso might have
loved May Ingram had he been thrown more into her company, and so known
her better in early life, but the Harrises and Ingrams rarely met each
other in society. As for Leo, he loved Lucille, but she had erected an
impassable barrier in her utterance on the steamer, "First love or none."
Leo in a thousand ways had been kind to her, because he hoped eventually
to win her favor, and possibly because he fully appreciated the value of
money. Fortunes in Europe are not so easily made, but once won, the rich
of the old world as a rule husband their resources better then they of
the new world. On the whole Alfonso and Leo were glad to cut loose from
society obligations and be free to absorb what generations of art
development in the Netherlands had to offer.
Leaving Paris they took the express via Rheims for Brussels. Entering
this beautiful capital of the Belgians in the northern part of the city,
they took a cab that drove past the Botanic Garden down the Rue Royale to
the Hotel Bellevue which is near the Royal Palace and overlooks a park,
embellished with sculptures, trees, flowers, and smooth lawns. One of the
most enjoyable and profitable things for tourists to do in their travels
is to climb at least one tower or height, as the views and correct
information thus obtained will cling longest to the memory.
Brussels is Paris in miniature. The royal palace and park may be compared
to the Tuileries. The beautiful drive down the Boulevard de Waterloo and
up Avenue Louise leads directly to the Bois de la Cambre, a lovely forest
of four hundred and fifty acres, which resembles the Bois de Boulogne of
Paris. Nearly six miles of old and new boulevards encircle Brussels,
passing through the upper and lower portions of the city. The pleasing
variety of some of the more handsome buildings is due to the competition
for large premiums offered for the finest façades. The resemblance of
Brussels to Paris is perhaps more apparent in the cafés, shops, and
public amusements along the busy boulevards. West of the Royal Palace is
the picture gallery owned by the state, and by judicious and repeated
purchases, the collection of pictures is considered superior to that of
the famous gallery in Antwerp. In this gallery the two young artists
spent several pleasant half-days comparing the early Flemish and Dutch
schools. Especially did they study portrait work by Rubens, Frans Hals,
and Van der Helst. All the work by the blacksmith artist Quinten Matsys
in color or iron proved of great interest to the young Americans.
Finally Leo, who knew much of the old masters of Europe, took Alfonso to
see the Musee Wiertz, which contains all the works of a highly gifted and
eccentric master. In a kind of distemper Wiertz painted Napoleon in the
Infernal Region, Vision of a Beheaded Man, A Suicide, The Last Cannon,
Curiosity, and Contest of Good and Evil, Hunger, Madness and Crime, etc.
As Brussels is located near the center of Belgium, the city is very
convenient to several cities that contain many works attractive to
painters and architects.
On arrival at Antwerp Alfonso and Leo rode to one of the stately
cathedrals, near which a military band was playing. Before the church
stood a bronze statue of Peter Paul Rubens. The scrolls and books,
which lie on the pedestal, with brush, palette, and hat, are allusions
to the varied pursuits of Rubens as diplomatist, statesman, and painter.
The two young artists hastened into the cathedral to see Rubens's famous
pictures, The Descent from the Cross, and The Assumption. His conception
and arrangement were admirable, his drawing carefully done, and his
coloring harmonious and masterly.
Rubens, the prince of Flemish painters, was knighted. He was handsome and
amiable, and his celebrity as an artist procured for him the friendship
and patronage of princes and men of distinction throughout Europe.
Not far from the cathedral the young artists came to the museum, in
front of which rises a statue to Van Dyck, pupil of Rubens. "Here,
Alfonso," said Leo, "is encouragement for you, for Van Dyck like yourself
was the son of a wealthy man or merchant of Antwerp. He was educated in
Italy, where he executed several fine portraits which I saw in Genoa as
I journeyed to Paris." Charles I. of England appointed Van Dyck
court-painter and knighted him. Van Dyck's ambition was to excel in
historical works, but the demand upon him for portraits never left him
much leisure for other subjects. How often "man proposes, but God
disposes."
Alfonso and Leo reached Dort or Dordrecht, which in the middle ages was
the most powerful and wealthy commercial city in Holland. Huge rafts
float down from the German forests, and at Dordrecht the logs are sawed
by the many windmills. The Dutch province of Zealand is formed by nine
large islands on the coast of the North Sea, and it has for its heraldic
emblem a swimming lion with a motto _Luctor et Emergo_.
Most of the province, which is created by the alluvial deposits of the
Scheldt, is below the sea-level, and is protected against the
encroachments of the sea by vast embankments of an aggregate length of
300 miles. Willows are planted along the dykes, the annual repairs of
which cost $425,000. An old proverb says, "God made the land, we Dutch
made the sea."
This fertile soil produces abundant crops of wheat and other grain. Near
Dort is a vast reed-forest, covering more than 100 islands, which is also
called, "Verdronken land," drowned land. This area of forty square miles,
once a smiling agricultural tract, was totally inundated on the 18th of
November, 1421. Seventy-two thriving market towns and villages were
destroyed, and 100,000 persons perished. Leo made a sketch of the tower
of Huis Merwede, the solitary and only relic of this desolate scene.
The two artists visited Rotterdam, the second commercial city in Holland,
which is fourteen miles from the North Sea and on the right bank of the
Maas. An attractive quay a mile in length is the arriving and starting
point for over 100 steamboats that connect Rotterdam with Dutch towns,
the Rhine, England, France, Russia, and the Mediterranean.
Alfonso and Leo studied the collection of portraits at Boyman's Museum,
and sketched in the River Park the happy people who were grouped under
trees, by the fish ponds, and along the grassy expanses. Alfonso bought a
photograph of the illustrious Erasmus. It is about ten miles to Delft,
once celebrated for its pottery and porcelain, a city to-day of 25,000
inhabitants. Here on the 10th of July, 1584, William of Orange, Founder
of Dutch independence, was shot by an assassin to secure the price set on
William's head by Farnese.
Our two artists visited a church in Delft to see the marble monument to
the memory of the Prince of Orange, which was inscribed "Prince William,
the Father of the Fatherland." Not far is Delft Haven which Americans
love to visit, and where the pious John Robinson blessed a brave little
band as it set sail to plant in a new world the tree of Liberty.
At length the artists reached The Hague, which for centuries has been the
favorite residence of the Dutch princes, and to-day is occupied by the
court, nobles, and diplomatists. No town in Holland possesses so many
broad and handsome streets, lofty and substantial blocks, and spacious
squares as The Hague.
Alfonso and Leo hastened to Scheveningen, three miles west of The Hague,
on the breezy and sandy shores of the North Sea, a clean fishing village
of neat brick houses sheltered from the sea by a lofty sand dune. Here
bathing wagons are drawn by a strong horse into the ocean, where the
bather can take his cool plunge. Scheveningen possesses a hundred fishing
boats. The fishermen have an independent spirit and wear quaint dress. A
public crier announces the arrival of their cargoes, which are sold at
auction on the beach, often affording picturesque and amusing scenes,
sketches of which were made. The luminous appearance of the sea caused by
innumerable mollusca affords great pleasure to visitors, twenty thousand
of whom every year frequent this fashionable sea-bathing resort.
The second evening after the artists' arrival at Scheveningen, as they
sauntered along on the brick-paved terrace in sight of white sails and
setting sun, Alfonso was agreeably surprised to meet in company with her
mother, Christine de Ruyter, a young artist, whose acquaintance he had
made in the Louvre at Paris.
Christine's father, prominent for a long time in the vessel trade, had
recently died, leaving a fortune to his wife and two daughters, one of
whom, Fredrika was already married. They were descended from the famous
Admiral de Ruyter, who in 1673 defeated the united fleets of France and
England off the coast of Scheveningen, which fact added much of interest
to their annual visit to this resort. While Leo talked with the mother,
Alfonso listened to Christine, as she told much about the historic family
with which she was connected, and in return she learned somewhat of young
Harris's family and their visit to Europe.
Christine, who was about Alfonso's age, had fair complexion, light hair,
and soft blue eyes. Her beauty added refinement that education and wide
travel usually furnish.
It was seen in Alfonso's face and in his marked deference that Christine
filled his ideal of a beautiful woman. Christine and her mother and the
young artists were registered at the Hotel de Orange, so of necessity
they were thrown into each other's company. They drove to The Hague,
compared the statues of William of Orange with each other; rode along
the elegant streets, south through the Zoological and Botanical Gardens,
through the park, and to the drill grounds. A half-day was spent in
visiting the "House in the Woods," a Royal Villa, one and one-half
miles northeast of The Hague. This palace is beautifully decorated,
particularly the Orange Salon, which was painted by artists of the school
of Rubens.
Alfonso and Leo enjoyed their visits to the celebrated picture gallery,
which contains among many Dutch paintings the famous pictures by Paul
Potter and Rembrandt. Paul Potter's Bull is deservedly popular. This
picture was once carried off to Paris, and there ranked high in the
Louvre, and later the Dutch offered 60,000 florins to Napoleon for its
restoration.
Christine, who was well conversant with art matters, knew the location
and artistic value of each painting and guided the young Americans to
works by Van Dyck, Rubens, the Tenniers, Holbein, and others. She was
proud of a terra-cotta head of her ancestor, Admiral de Ruyter. The party
soon reached Rembrandt's celebrated "School of Anatomy," originally
painted for the Amsterdam Guild of Surgeons. Tulp is in black coat with
lace collar and broad-brimmed soft hat, dissecting a sinew of the arm of
the corpse before him. He is explaining, with gesture of his left hand,
his theory to a group of Amsterdam surgeons. No painter ever before
succeeded in so riveting the attention of spectators in the presence of
death. The listeners appear altogether unconscious of the pallid corpse
that lies before them on the dissecting table.
Invited by Christine's mother, the young artists accompanied the De
Ruyters to Amsterdam, the commercial capital of Holland, with 300,000
inhabitants. They live on ninety islands formed by intersecting canals,
which are crossed by three hundred bridges. The buildings rest on
foundations of piles, or trees, which fact gave rise to Erasmus's jest,
that he knew a city where the people dwelt on tops of trees, like rooks.
Alfonso took Leo into the suburbs to see diamond polishing. The machinery
is run by steam, and the work is done largely by Portuguese Jews. These
precious stones are cut or sawed through by means of wires covered with
diamond dust, and the gems are polished by holding them against rapidly
revolving iron disks moistened with a mixture of diamond dust and oil.
Christine's people lived in a red brick mansion, the gable of which
contained a portrait in relief of Admiral de Ruyter, and fronted a shaded
street on a canal. Here the American artists were handsomely entertained.
They were driven to the picture galleries and the palace or town-hall in
the Dam Square, where Louis Napoleon and Hortense once resided. From the
tower which terminates in a gilded ship the artists obtained fine views
of Northern Holland. Christine pointed out the Exchange and other objects
of interest in the city, which abounds in narrow streets and broad
canals, the latter lined with fine shade trees. Many of the tall,
narrow houses have red tile roofs, quaint fork-chimneys, and they stand
with gables to the canals. The docks show a forest of masts.
The environs of the city are covered with gardens; trees adorn the roads,
while poplars and willows cross or divide the fields, which are studded
with windmills and distant spires, and everywhere are seen fertile corps,
black and white cattle, and little boats creeping slowly along the
canals.
A Hollander's wealth is often estimated by his windmills. If asked, "How
rich?" The reply comes, "Oh, he is worth ten or twelve windmills."
Holland seems alive with immense windmills. They grind corn, they saw
wood, they pulverize rocks, and they are yoked to the inconstant winds
and forced to contend with the water, the great enemy of the Dutch. They
constantly pump water from the marshes into canals, and so prevent the
inundation of the inhabitants. The Hollander furnishes good illustration
of the practical value of Emerson's words, "Borrow the strength of the
elements. Hitch your wagon to a star, and see the chores done by the gods
themselves."
To the west are seen the church spires of Haarlem, and its long canal,
which like a silver thread ties it to Amsterdam. To the east the towers
of Utrecht are visible, and to the north glitter in the morning sun the
red roofs of Zaandam and Alkmaar.
Far away stretched the waters of the Zuider Zee, which Holland plans to
reclaim by an enbankment from the extreme cape of North Holland, to the
Friesland coast, so as to shut out the ocean, and thereby acquire 750,000
square miles of new land; a whole province. At present 3,000 persons
and 15,000 vessels are employed in the Zuider Zee fisheries, the revenues
of which average $850,000 a year. It is proposed to furnish equivalents
to satisfy these fishermen. It is estimated that this wonderful
engineering feat will extend over 33 years and cost $131,250,000.
Christine now conducted her artist friends out of the Palace and over to
the Rijks Museum to see Rembrandt's largest and best work, his "Night
Watch." It is on the right as you enter, covering the side of the room.
It represents a company of arquebusiers, energetically emerging from
their Guild House on the Singel. The light and shade of the Night Watch
is so treated as to form a most effective dramatic scene, which, since
its creation, in 1642, has been enthusiastically admired by all art
connoisseurs.
Rembrandt was the son of a miller, and his studio was in his father's
wind-mill, where light came in at a single narrow window. By close
observation he became master of light and shade, and excelled in vigor
and realism. At $50 a year he taught pupils who flocked to him from all
parts of Europe, but, like too many possessed of fine genius, he died in
poverty. Later, London paid $25,000 for a single one of his six hundred
and forty paintings. The Dutch painters put on canvas the everyday
home-life and manners of their people, while the Flemish represented more
the religious life of the lower Netherlands.
These journeys in Belgium gave Alfonso and Leo enlarged ideas as to the
possibilities of portrait painting. In Alma Tadema, of Dutch descent, and
Millais they saw modern examples of wonderful success, which made clear
to them that the high art of portrait painting once acquired, both fame
and fortune are sure to follow.
Christine de Ruyter had taken lessons of the best masters in Holland,
Italy, and France. Few, if any women artists of her age, equalled or
excelled her. Her conversations on art in the Netherlands charmed her
two artist friends. She said, "The works of art of the fifteenth and
seventeenth centuries in the Netherlands seemed to grow out of the very
soil of the low countries. Our old artists revelled in the varied
costumes and manifold types that thronged the cities of the Hanseatic
League. The artist's imagination was fascinated by the wealth of color he
saw on sturdy laborers, on weather-beaten mariners, burly citizens, and
sagacious traders.
"Rubens delighted often in a concentrated light, and was master of
artistic material along the whole range. He painted well portraits,
landscapes, battles of heroes, gallant love-making of the noble, and the
coarse pleasures of the vulgar. Nearly a thousand pictures bear the name
of Rubens.
"The artistic labor of Frans Hals of Haarlem extended over half a
century. He possessed the utmost vivacity of conception, purity of color,
and breadth of execution, as shown in his latest works, and so well did
he handle his brush that drawing seems almost lost in a maze of color
tone. The throng of genre painters, who have secured for Dutch art its
greatest triumph, are well nigh innumerable."
Christine was very fond of flower-pieces, and had painted lovely
marguerites on Gertrude's white dress, in Alfonso's full length picture
of his sister, which he was soon to carry to Paris as his wedding
present.
Leo and Alfonso much wished to extend their journey north to Copenhagen
and Stockholm, the "Venice of the North," but letters urging a speedy
return to the marriage of George and Gertrude in Paris, forced the two
artists to shorten their journey, say good-bye to their kind friends of
Amsterdam, and hasten back to Paris, taking portraits of their own skill
as wedding gifts.