irely. The interiors of inns with men smoking and
drinking, playing cards or making jokes, were subjects many times
repeated; dancing villagers, fetes, and fairs were often pictured, and in
all these scenes everything was given exactly to the life. It follows that
these pictures of coarse, vulgar people engaged in rude amusements cannot
be beautiful; but they are oftentimes wonderful. Among the most noted
names in this kind of painting are those of Adrian Brauwer, the Van
Ostades, the Teniers, and Jan Steen. Most of these artists executed small
pictures only. I shall speak particularly of but one of these Dutch
_genre_ painters--DAVID TENIERS the younger (1610-1694), who became the
greatest painter of his time of scenes from common life. This is very
great praise, because there were many Dutch and several Flemish painters
who were noted for such pictures. This Teniers studied with his father,
but his works show that he was much influenced by Rubens. He excelled in
guard-house scenes and peasant life in every aspect. In representations of
the alchemist also he was unequalled, as well as in fairs and festivals of
every sort. He sometimes painted sacred subjects, but they are the least
praiseworthy of all his works.

The pictures of Teniers are very numerous. One author describes nine
hundred of his works which are known to be genuine, and it is believed
that there may be one hundred more. He often represented a great number of
figures on one canvas. At Schleissheim there was a large picture, thirteen
and a half feet by ten feet in size, which contained one thousand one
hundred and thirty-eight figures. It was not unusual for him to paint from
one hundred and fifty to three hundred figures in a single picture of
moderate size. He had a light, brilliant touch, his color was exquisite,
and his arrangement of his subjects was very picturesque. His chief fault
was a resemblance in his heads, and for this reason those pictures with
the fewest figures are his best works.

Teniers had several royal patrons, and earned sufficient money to live in
handsome style in his home in Perck, not far from Mechlin. He chose this
place in order to be near the peasant classes, whose life was his chief
study. He also excelled in his ability to imitate the styles of other
masters. In the Vienna Gallery there is a curious work of his which
represents the walls of a room hung with fifty pictures, imitating those
of various Italian masters; in the