d live birds admirably, but chiefly cocks and hens in
the taste of Savery and Vincaboom. Melchior was born in 1636, and
studied for a time with his father; but meantime his aunt Josina had
married Jan Baptist Weenix, and a son was born to them, Jan Weenix, who
inherited from old Giles Hondecoeter, his grandfather, his talent for
painting poultry, and from his father, Jan Baptist Weenix, he acquired
the benefit of several influences which were not shared by his cousin
Melchior.

JAN BAPTIST WEENIX, who was nicknamed "Rattle," was born at Amsterdam
about 1621. His father was an architect, who bred his son up to that
profession, but he was afterwards put to study painting under Abraham
Bloemart. Soon after his marriage with Josina he was seized with the
desire to visit Italy, and he set off alone to Rome, promising to return
in four months. In Rome, however, he was so well received that he stayed
there four years, and Italianized himself to an extent that may be seen
in a picture in the Wallace Collection, a _Coast Scene with Classic
Ruins_, which he signs _Gio. Batta. Weenix_. Though he returned to
Holland and settled near Utrecht, his manner was sensibly modified by
his sojourn in Rome.

JAN WEENIX, who was born at Amsterdam in 1649, though he succeeded in so
far assimilating his father's style that his earlier works are often
confused with those of "Giovanni Battista," did not acquire the energy
or the dramatic force displayed by Melchior Hondecoeter in representing
live birds and animals, though he sometimes surpassed him in the finish
and the harmony of his decorative arrangements of dead game and still
life. Accordingly the one usually painted dead and the latter live
birds. In other respects there is not much to distinguish their works.

NICHOLAS BERCHEM was the only other pupil of Jan Baptist Weenix of whom
we know anything. Berchem had other masters, beginning with his father,
who was a painter of fish and tables covered with plates, china dishes,
and such like. Having given his son the first rudiments of his art he
found himself unequal to the task of cultivating the excellent
disposition he observed in him, and therefore placed him with Van Goyen,
Nicholas Moyaert, Peter Grebber, Jan Wils, and lastly with Jan Baptist
Weenix, all of whom had the honour of assisting to form so excellent a
painter. Indefatigable at his easel, Berchem acquired a manner both easy
and expeditious; to see him work, painting appeared