A Wanderer in Holland | Page 6

no place for jokes. In
Holland one must in short do as the Dutch do, and remain well.
Rotterdam's first claim to consideration, apart from its commercial

importance, is that it gave birth to Erasmus, a bronze statue of whom
stands in the Groote Market, looking down on the stalls of fruit.
Erasmus of Rotterdam--it sounds like a contradiction in terms. Gherardt
Gherardts of Rotterdam is a not dishonourable cacophany--and that was
the reformer's true name; but the fashion of the time led scholars to
adopt a Hellenised, or Latinised, style. Erasmus Desiderius, his new
name, means Beloved and long desired. Grotius, Barlaeus, Vossius,
Arminius, all sacrificed local colour to smooth syllables. We should be
very grateful that the fashion did not spread also to the painters. What a
loss it would be had the magnificent rugged name of Rembrandt van
Rhyn been exchanged for a smooth emasculated Latinism.
Rotterdam had another illustrious son whose work as little suggests his
birthplace--the exquisite painter Peter de Hooch. According to the
authorities he modelled his style upon Rembrandt and Fabritius, but the
influence of Rembrandt is concealed from the superficial observer. De
Hooch, whose pictures are very scarce, worked chiefly at Delft and
Haarlem, and it was at Haarlem that he died in 1681. If one were put to
it to find a new standard of aristocracy superior to accidents of blood or
rank one might do worse than demand as the ultimate test the
possession of either a Vermeer of Delft or a Peter de Hooch.
One only of Peter de Hooch's pictures is reproduced in this book--"The
Store Cupboard". This is partly because there are, I think, better
paintings of his in London than at Amsterdam. At least it seems to me
that his picture in our National Gallery of the waiting maid is finer than
anything by De Hooch in Holland. But in no other work of his that I
know is his simple charm so apparent as in "The Store Cupboard". This
is surely the Christmas supplement carried out to its highest power--and
by its inventor. The thousands of domestic scenes which have
proceeded from this one canvas make the memory reel; and yet nothing
has staled the prototype. It remains a sweet and genuine and radiant
thing. De Hooch had two fetishes--a rich crimson dress or jacket and an
open door. His compatriot Vermeer, whom he sometimes resembles,
was similarly addicted to a note of blue.
No one has managed direct sunlight so well as De Hooch. The light in

his rooms is the light of day. One can almost understand how
Rembrandt and Gerard Dou got their concentrated effects of
illumination; but how this omnipresent radiance streamed from De
Hooch's palette is one of the mysteries. It is as though he did not paint
light but found light on his canvas and painted everything else in its
midst.
Rotterdam has some excellent pictures in its Boymans Museum; but
they are, I fancy, overlooked by many visitors. It seems no city in
which to see pictures. It is a city for anything rather than art--a
mercantile centre, a hive of bees, a shipping port of intense activity.
And yet perhaps the quietest little Albert Cuyp in Holland is here, "De
Oude Oostpoort te Rotterdam," a small evening scene, without cattle,
suffused in a golden glow. But all the Cuyps, and there are six, are
good--all inhabited by their own light.
Among the other Boymans treasures which I find I have marked (not
necessarily because they are good--for I am no judge--but because I
liked them) are Ferdinand Bols fine free portrait of Dirck van der
Waeijen, a boy in a yellow coat; Erckhart's "Boaz and Ruth," a small
sombre canvas with a suggestion of Velasquez in it; Hobbema's
"Boomrijk Landschap," one of the few paintings of this artist that
Holland possesses. The English, I might remark, always appreciative
judges of Dutch art, have been particularly assiduous in the pursuit of
Hobbema, with the result that his best work is in our country. Holland
has nothing of his to compare with the "Avenue at Middelharnis," one
of the gems of our National Gallery. And his feathery trees may be
studied at the Wallace Collection in great comfort.
Other fine landscapes in the Boymans Museum are three by Johan van
Kessel, who was a pupil of Hobbema, one by Jan van der Meer, one by
Koninck, and, by Jacob van Ruisdael, a corafield in the sun and an
Amsterdam canal with white sails upon it. The most notable head is
that by Karel Fabritius; Hendrick Pot's "Het Lokstertje" is interesting
for its large free manner and signs of the influence of Hals; and
Emmanuel de Witte's Amsterdam fishmarket is curiously modern. But
the figure picture which most attracted me was "Portret