collection of drawings by the masters, including several Rembrandts. In
this room one may well plan to spend much time. One of the best Israels
that I saw in Holland is a little water-colour interior that is hung
here. I asked one of the attendants if they had anything by Matthew
Maris, but he denied his existence. James he knew, and William; but
there was no Matthew. "But he is your most distinguished artist,"
I said. It was great heresy and not to be tolerated. To the ordinary
Dutchman art begins with Rembrandt and ends with Israels. This perhaps
is why Matthew Maris has taken refuge in St. John's Wood.

And now we come to Haarlem's chief glory--which is not Coster the
printer, and not the church of Bavo the Saint, and not the tulip
gardens, and not the florid and beautiful Meat Market; but the painter
Frans Hals, whose masterpieces hang in the Town Hall.

I have called Hals the glory of Haarlem, yet he was only an adopted
son, having been born in Antwerp about 1580. But his parents were
true Haarlemers, and Frans was a resident there before he reached
man's estate.

The painter's first marriage was not happy; he was even publicly
reprimanded for cruelty to his wife. In spite of the birth of his
eldest child just thirty-four weeks earlier than the proprieties
require, his second marriage seems to have been fortunate enough. Some
think that we see Mynheer and Myvrouw Hals in the picture--No. 1084
in the Ryks Museum--which is reproduced on the opposite page. If this
jovial and roguish pair are really the painter and his wife, they were
a merry couple. Children they had in abundance; seven sons, five of
whom were painters, and three daughters. Abundance indeed was Hals'
special characteristic; you see it in all his work--vigorous, careless