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His brow was puckered into deep lines above troubled eyes which stared absently at a Mesdag picture in blue and white tile set in the compartment wall. He smiled at his friend's exuberance and dropped pencil point to paper. "How in thunder do you figure this confounded Dutch money, Little?" he asked. "What's the fare in real money? Fifty gulden sounds like conic sections to me."
Mesdag van Houten bought for their own pleasure without any thought of forming a gallery for the Dutch nation. That came later. W.H. Mesdag is the well-known marine painter whose paintings may be seen in almost every gallery on the Continent. A native of Groningen , he studied under Roelofs and while in Brussels lived with his relative, Alma-Tadema; the latter is a Frieslander.
She signed her work S. Mesdag van Houten. Her gift lies in the delineation of forest views, interiors, portraits, and still-life. Her colour is deep and rich. A cursory walk around the various rooms on the Laan van Meerdervoort impresses one with this idea: with what envy must any curator of any museum in the world study this collection.
Without exaggeration it may indeed be said that this modern renascence of painting in Holland is not unworthy to be compared with that of the days of Rembrandt. The names of Joseph Israels, Hendrik Mesdag, Vincent van Gogh, Anton Maure, and, not least, of the three talented brothers Maris, have attained a wide and well-deserved reputation.
His love of the obscure and the suggestive led to the common refusal of his portraits by patrons, who complained that they lacked distinctness. No painter, however, commands such large prices as he, and from L2000 to L3000 is no rare figure for his canvases. H. W. Mesdag is Holland's most celebrated sea painter.
Mesdag has an exhibition of his own works every Sunday morning in his studio at The Hague, and any one who wishes is allowed to visit it, while for the general public's benefit there is the Mesdag Panorama in the same town. Mauve, who died in 1887, was best known for his pastoral scenes. His pictures of sheep on the moors and fens recall pleasant memories of summer days and sunny hours.
He should be better known; while his ideas are not particularly significant he is colourist for colour's sake, as was Monticelli. Mauve, too, with fourteen pictures. Both the Mesdags, Taco Mesdag, a brother and his wife are present. Also Ter Meulen, a gifted Dutch artist. We have seldom seen better George Michels. The Monticelli up-stairs is an unusual subject.
In the Municipal Museum, full of curiosities in furniture, armour, and costumes, there is a gallery of modern paintings Israel, David Bles, Mesdag, Neuhuys, Bisschop, J. Maris, Weissenbruch, Bosboom, Blommers, and Mauve. But they are viewed with religious awe by the Dutch, whose master passion is patriotic sentiment.
Bastien-Lepage has a preparatory sketch for Les Foins. Indeed, the Mesdag Museum is rich in frottis, painted-in pictures, by such men as Rousseau, Daubigny, Diaz, Vollon, Millet, Dupré. As we admire the etchings of Mari Bauer, it was a new pleasure to see half a dozen of his paintings, chiefly scenes in the Orient.
His wife, not wishing to be separated from him in any sense, resolved on the same profession, and about 1870 they began their study. Mme. Mesdag acquired her technique with difficulty, and her success was achieved only as the result of great perseverance and continual labor. The artists of Oosterbeck and Brussels, who were her associates, materially aided her by their encouragement.
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