whose hope of raising children seemed doomed to disappointment, for in addition to losing the little Rombertus, two daughters, each named Cornelia, had died soon after birth. In 1640 Rembrandt's mother died. Her picture remains on record with that of her husband, painted ten years before, and even the biographers of the artist do not suggest that Rembrandt was anything but a good son. A year later the well-beloved Saskia gave birth to the one child who survived the early years, the boy Titus. Then her health failed, and in 1642 she died, after eight years of married life that would seem to have been happy. In this year Rembrandt painted the famous "Night Watch," a picture representing the company of Francis Banning Cocq, and incidentally a day scene in spite of its popular name. The work succeeded in arousing a storm of indignation, for every sitter wanted to have equal prominence in the canvas. They had subscribed equally to the cost, and Rembrandt had dared to compose the picture!

It may be said that after his wife's death, and the exhibition of this fine work, Rembrandt's pleasant years came to an end. He was then somewhere between thirty-six and thirty-eight years old, he had made his mark, and enjoyed a very large measure of recognition, but henceforward, his career was destined to be a very troubled one, full of disappointment, pain, and care. Perhaps it would have been no bad thing for him if he could have gone with Saskia into the outer darkness. The world would have been poorer, but the man himself would have been spared many years that perhaps even the devoted labours of his studio could not redeem.

Saskia's estate, which seems to have been a considerable one, was left to Rembrandt absolutely, in trust for the sole surviving child Titus, but Rembrandt, after his usual free and easy fashion, did not trouble about the legal side of the question. He did not even make an inventory of the property belonging to his wife, and this carelessness led to endless trouble in future years, and to the distribution of a great part of the property into the hands of gentlemen learned in the law. Perhaps the painter had other matters to think about, he could no longer disguise from himself the fact that public patronage was falling off. It may be that the war with Spain was beginning to make people in comfortable circumstances retrench, but it is more than likely that the artist's name was not known favourably to his fellow-citizens. His passionate temperament and his quick eye for truly artistic effects could not be tolerated by the sober, stodgy men and women who were the rank and file of Amsterdam's comfortable classes. To be sure, the Stadtholder continued his patronage; he ordered the famous "Circumcision" and the "Adoration of the Shepherds." Pupils continued to arrive, too, in large numbers, many of them coming from beyond Holland; but the public stayed away.

Rembrandt was not without friends, who helped him as far as they could, and advised him as much as they dared; but he seems to have been a man who could not be assisted, because in matters of art he allowed no outside interference, and he was naturally impulsive. Money ran through his hands like water through a sieve, though it is only fair to point out that he was very generous, and could not lend a deaf ear to any tale of distress.

Between 1642, when Saskia died, and 1649, it is not easy to follow the progress of his life; we can only state with certainty that his difficulties increased almost as quickly as his work ripened. His connection with Hendrickje Stoffels would seem to have started about 1649, and this woman with whom he lived until her death some thirteen years later, has been abused by many biographers because she was the painter's mistress. Some have endeavoured to prove, without any evidence, that he married her, but this concession to Mrs. Grundy seems a little beside the mark. The relations between the pair were a matter for their own consideration, and it is clear that Hendrickje came to the painter in the time of his greatest trouble, to serve him lovingly and faithfully until she passed away at the comparatively early age of thirty-six.

She bore him two children, who seem to have died young, and, curiously enough, her position in the house was accepted by young Titus Rembrandt, who, when he was nearing man's estate, started, in partnership with her, to deal in pictures and works of art—a not very successful attempt to support the establishment in comfort.

In the year when Hendrickje joined Rembrandt, he could no longer pay instalments on the house he had bought for himself in the Joden Breestraat. About the following year he began to sell property, hoping against hope that he would be able to tide over the bad times. Three years later he started borrowing on a very extensive scale. In 1656 a fresh guardian was appointed for Titus, to whom his father transferred some property, and in that year the painter was adjudged bankrupt. The year 1657 saw much of his private property sold, but his collection of pictures and engravings found comparatively few bidders, and realised no more than 5000 florins. A year later his store of pictures came under the hammer, and in 1660, Hendrickje and Titus started their plucky attempt to establish a little business, in order that they might restore some small part of the family fortune.

PLATE IV.—PORTRAIT OF AN OLD MAN

Rembrandt painted very many portraits of men and women whose identity cannot be traced, and it is probable that the original of this striking portrait in the Pitti Palace at Florence was unknown to many of the painter's contemporaries. This is one of Rembrandt's late works, and is said to have been painted about 1658.

For a little time the keen edge of trouble seems to have been turned. One of Rembrandt's friends secured him the commission to paint the "Syndics of the Drapers' Guild," and this is one of the last works of importance in the artist's life, because his sight was beginning to fail. To understand why this fresh trouble fell upon him, it is necessary to turn for a moment to consider the marvellous etchings he produced between 1628 and 1661. The drawings may be disregarded in this connection, though there are about a thousand undisputed ones in existence, but the making of the etchings, of which some two hundred are allowed by all competent observers to be the work of the master, must have inflicted enormous strain upon his sight. When he was passing from middle age, overwhelmed with trouble of every description, it is not surprising that his eyes should have refused to serve him any longer.

One might have thought that the immortals had finished their sport with Rembrandt, but apparently their resources are quite inexhaustible. One year after the state of his eyes had brought etching to an end, the faithful Hendrickje died. A portrait of her, one of the last of the master's works, may be seen in Berlin. The face is a charming and sympathetic one, and moves the observer to a feeling of sympathy that makes the mere question of the Church's participation in her relations with Rembrandt a very small affair indeed.

In the next seven years the old painter passed quietly down towards the great silence. A few ardent admirers among the young men, a few old friends whom no adversity could shake, remained to bring such comfort as they might. With failing sight and health he moved to the Lauriergracht, and the capacity for work came nearly to an end. The lawyers made merry with the various suits. Some had been instituted to recover money that the painter had borrowed, others to settle the vexed question of the creditors' right to Saskia's estate. In 1665 Titus received the balance that was left, when the decision of the courts