and sickness, never failed in giving the energy of intellect
to his pictures. He died at the age of sixty-three, in the year 1640,
leaving great wealth. The pomp and circumstance of funeral rite can
only be of consequence as showing the estimation in which a departed
citizen is held. Public funeral honors were awarded, and men of every
rank were eager to manifest their respect to his memory. He was buried
in the Church of St. James, at Antwerp, under the altar of his private
chapel, which was decorated with one of his own noble pictures.

REMBRANDT[4]

[Footnote 4: Copyright, 1894, by Selmar Hess.]

By ELIZABETH ROBINS PENNELL

(1606-1669)

[Illustration: Rembrandt.]

A heretic in art Rembrandt was to many of his Dutch contemporaries; to
us, he is the master, supreme alike in genius and accomplishment.
Because, as time went on, he broke completely from tradition and in
his work gave full play to his originality, his pictures were looked
at askance; because he chose to live his own life, indifferent to
accepted conventions, he himself was misunderstood. It was his cruel
fate to enjoy prosperity and popularity in his earlier years, only to
meet with neglect in his old age. But this he felt probably less than
other men; he was not a courtier, with Velasquez, nor vowed to
worldly success, with Rubens. His pleasure and his reward, he found
in his work. So long as easel and canvas, brushes and paints were left
to him, he demanded no greater happiness.

[Illustration: Marie De Medici at the House of Rubens.]

In Leyden, a town already made famous by another master, Lucas van
Leyden, Rembrandt was born in 1606; though this date has been
disputed, some authorities suggesting 1607, others, 1608. His family
were respectable, if not distinguished, burghers, his father, Harmen
Gerritszoon, being a miller by trade, his mother, Neeltjen Willems of
Zuitbroeck, the daughter of a baker. Not until early in the
seventeenth century did permanent surnames become common among
Dutchmen; hitherto children had been given their father's, in addition
to their own Christian name; Rembrandt for many years was known as
Rembrandt Harmenzoon, or the son of Harmen. But the miller, to be in
the growing fashion, had called himself Van Ryn--of the Rhine--and
thus, later on, Rembrandt also signed himself. Harmen was well-to-do;
he owned houses in Leyden, and beyond the walls, gardens, and fields,
and the mill where Rembrandt, bec