atches the process with intense
interest. There are two other figures near by which can hardly be
discerned.

[Illustration: THE THREE TREES
_Museum of Fine Arts, Boston_]

The wide outlook of flat country is the setting for the little
tree-crowned hill which rises near us at the right. It would seem a
very small hillock anywhere else, but in these level surroundings it
has a distinct character. It is the one striking feature which gives
expression to the face of the landscape. The eye turns with pleasure
to its grassy slopes and leafy trees. The trees have the symmetrical
grace so characteristic of Dutch vegetation. Nothing is allowed to
grow wild in this country. Every growing thing is carefully nurtured
and trained. We see that the distances between these trees were
carefully spaced in the planting, so that each one might develop
independently and perfectly without injury to the others. The branches
grow from their straight trunks at the same height, and they are
plainly of the same age. Their outer branches interlace in brotherly
companionship to make a solid leafy arbor, beneath which the wayfarer
may find a shady retreat. On the summit of the hill, outlined against
the sky, is a hay wagon followed by a man with a rake. At a distance,
also clearly seen against the sky, on the ridge of the hill, sits a
man, alone and idle.

The sky is a wonderful part of the picture. Rembrandt, it appears,
almost never ventured to represent the clouds. He had the true
artist's reverence for subjects which were beyond his skill, and
preferred to leave untouched what he could not do well. Now in this
case, lacking the experience to draw a sky as finished in workmanship
as his landscape, he _suggested_ in a few lines the effect which he
wished to produce. At the left a few diagonal strokes show a smart
shower just at hand. A whirl of dark-colored clouds comes next, and in
the upper air beyond, a stratum of clouds is indicated by a mass of
lines crossing and recrossing in long swirling curves.

With these few lines Rembrandt conveys perfectly the idea that a storm
is approaching. The clouds seem to be in motion, scurrying across the
sky in advance of the rain. One imaginative critic has thought that
he could discern in the cloud-whirl a dim phantom figure as of the
spirit of the on-coming storm. Like the clouds we often see in nature,
it takes some new fantastic shape every time we look at it. Altogether
the impression we receive