ilar pictures of court-yards as well as of rooms in
houses. The list of the names of all these Dutch masters cannot be given
here, and I hasten to tell you of one whose name and fame is so great that
when we hear of Dutch art we always think first of him, because he stands
out as its head.

REMBRANDT VAN RYN (1607-1669) was born at Leyden, and was educated by his
parents with the hope that he would be a scholar and a prominent man in
Leyden. But his taste for drawing and painting would not be put aside, and
in 1620 he entered the studio of J. J. van Swanenburg, where he learned
the first lessons in his art, and was then placed under the teaching of
Pieter Lastman in Amsterdam, where he remained only six months, after
which he returned to his father's house, and there lived for seven years.
He was not far from seventeen years old when he thus left the usual course
of study. From this time he gave himself up to close observation of nature
in every form.

He studied broad landscapes--farms, groves, gardens, rivers, canals,
sunshine, clouds, and shadows, and with and above all these, the human
faces that he saw, as well as the varying forms, movements, and
peculiarities of the men and women about him. That nothing escaped his
observation is proved by the works he did in later life.

In 1630 Rembrandt settled in Amsterdam, which was called the "Venice of
the North," and was the centre of northern commerce, civilization, and the
activity of political and intellectual life. Rembrandt was no sooner
established in his studio on one of the western quays than he was pressed
with orders for pictures and applications from young men who desired his
instructions. The years following were crowded with work--with painting
and engraving. Rembrandt is called the "Prince of Etchers," and he used
the etching needle most skilfully, but he also employed the dry-point and
even the graver in finishing. Thus he may be said to have established a
new school of engraving of great excellence.

[Illustration: FIG. 58.--ONE OF REMBRANDT'S PORTRAITS OF HIMSELF.]

It would seem that in these early years one of his amusements was to make
etchings of himself. In one year, 1630-31, he made nineteen of these
portraits in different costumes and positions, with as many kinds of
expression on his face. He often repeated the portrait of his mother also.

[Illustration: FIG. 59.--THE LECTURE ON ANATOMY. _By Rembrandt._]

In 1632 he painted the "School of A