h
charges are too foolish to answer seriously. When he was at work, it
mattered little to him what he ate, so that he was not disturbed; who
would not stoop to pick up coins apparently scattered on the floor?
The money he devoted to his collection is sufficient to show how small
a fancy he had for hoarding; upon it a princely fortune had been
squandered. To his own people in Leyden, when times were hard, he had
not been slow to hold out a generous hand. It was because he was not
enough of a miser, because he gave too little heed to business
matters, that difficulties at length overwhelmed him. It is too sad a
story to tell in detail. Perhaps the beginning was when he bought a
house for which he had not the ready money to pay, and borrowed a
large sum for the purpose. More and more involved became his affairs.
In time his creditors grew clamorous, and at length the blow fell
when, in 1657, he was declared bankrupt. The collection of years, the
embroidered mantles and draperies, the jewels with which Saskia had
been so gayly decked, the plumes and furs and gorgeous robes in which
he himself had masqueraded, the armor and plate, the engravings and
pictures which had filled his house--all were sold. He, the master,
had, at the age of fifty-one, to begin life anew as if he were still
but the apprentice.

In the midst of his troubles and losses, Hendrickje Stoffels, whose
portrait hangs in the Louvre, was the friend who cheered and comforted
him. She had been his servant; afterward she lived with him as his
wife, though legally they were not married. To Titus, as to her own
children, she was ever a tender mother, and Titus, in return, seems to
have loved her no less well. In the end, they together took
Rembrandt's business interests into their own hands, the son,
probably, using his inheritance in the enterprise. Renting a house in
their own name, they became his print and picture dealers.

But as time went on, Rembrandt's work brought lower and lower prices,
and he, himself, the last two years of his life, was almost forgotten.
Though he still lived in Amsterdam, the town from which he had so
seldom journeyed, and then never far, he had fallen into such
obscurity, that report now established him in Stockholm as painter to
the King of Sweden, now in Hull, or Yarmouth. In his own family
nothing but sorrow was in store for him. Hendrickje died, probably
about 1664, and he was once more alone; and next he lost Titus, who
then