ty.

The cost of the funeral was seven dollars and fifty cents.

In Eighteen Hundred Ninety-seven, there was sold in London a small
portrait by Rembrandt for a sum equal to a trifle more than thirty-one
thousand dollars. But even this does not represent the true value of one
of his pictures--for connoisseurs regard a painting by Rembrandt as
priceless.

There is a law in Holland forbidding any one on serious penalty to remove
a "Rembrandt" from the country. If any one of the men who combined to
work his ruin is mentioned in history, it is only to say, "He lived in
the age of Rembrandt."

RUBENS

I was admitted to the Duke of Lerma's presence, and took part in
the embassy. The Duke exhibited great satisfaction at the
excellence and number of the pictures, which surely have acquired
a certain fair appearance of antiquity (by means of my
retouching), in spite even of the damage they had undergone. They
are held and accepted by the King and Queen as originals, without
there being any doubt on their side, or assertion on ours, to
make them believe them to be such.

--_Letter From Rubens at Madrid, to Chieppo, Secretary of
the Duke of Mantua_

[Illustration: RUBENS]

The father of Peter Paul Rubens was a lawyer, a man of varied attainments
and marked personality. In statecraft he showed much skill, and by his
ability in business management served William the Silent, Prince of
Orange, in good stead.

But Jan Rubens had a bad habit of thinking for himself. The habit grew
upon him until the whisper was passed from this one to that, that he was
becoming decidedly atheistic.

Spain held a strong hand upon Antwerp, and the policy of Philip the
Second was to crush opposition in the bud. Jan Rubens had criticized
Spanish rule, and given it as his opinion that the Latin race would not
always push its domination upon the people of the North.

At this time Spain was so strong that she deemed herself omnipotent, and
was looking with lustful eyes towards England. Drake and Frobisher and
Walter Raleigh were learning their lessons in seafaring; Elizabeth was
Queen; while up at Warwickshire a barefoot boy named William Shakespeare
was playing in the meadows, and romping in the lanes and alleys of
Stratford.

All this was taking place at the time when Jan Rubens was doing a little
thinking on his own account. On reading the history of Europe, Flanders