A MERRY TOPER

Taranaki Daily News, 7 June 1930, Page 17 (Supplement)

A MERRY TOPER

HALS IN OLD HAARLEM

(By

“Scriblerus.”)

. In a warm back room of a little tavern in Haarlem, three Dutchmen were sitting round a blackened table. The thin spirals from their meerchaums drifted lazily into the' blue haze of the beamed .ceiling. A wood fire crackled in the hearth and the flames cast a ruddy glow on the tankards. They, had ..been playing backgammon and the board lay at their feet. A merry jest concluded; one of the men turned,' placed his pipe on the table and buried his face in the flagon. The firelight glistened on the good brown ale and turned its depths to amber. ■ He who quaffed last, Franz Hals, wiped his dark moustaches; preened his beard and beamed pleasantly ,at his friend on the right, Admiral Van Tromp.

Things were well with Franz in those early 3()’s of. 1600. He was the first painter in Holland when artists were as nuriiefous as the bubbles in champagne. Success brings friends and the comradeship of the jolly topers of the town was .what his convivial nature craved.

It is as. a portrait painter, however, and not as a Falstaff, that Franz Hals ■gains his place among the immortals. Recently he has been pitchforked into the ranks of living celebrities. The supposed discovery in a-hay loft near Lille of a picture which an expert declared was the original of “The Man with the' Glove” has drawn attention to old Franz in a very similar manner to the way in which the Millet forgeries attracted the notice of connoisseurs to Francois. It is now alleged that before putting up this art discovery to auction, the would-be vendor,. Agre Vanderhagen, who has since been arrested, had made very careful arrangements for discovering it, Forgeries are all very well but the best introduction to Franz Hals is the “Laughing Cavalier” which is typical of his earlier work. It is not necessary to draw attention to the lavish costuming and doublet of the lusty officer, The peculiar thing about the picture is the fact that it has been nicknamed the “Laughing Cavalier,” At times he almost scowls; Contempt, disdain and a marvellous conceit of hiinself are the expressions registered. He certainly would not lower his dignity to laugh in ordinary company.

Beyond the fact that he was born (in Antwerp in 1580) of a good family which had been reduced to penury by the-Span-ish invasions, we hear little or nothing of Franz Hals until 1600, at which time he was a student of Karel Van Mander in Haarlem, We learn from the records tl/at at 31 Hals was married, and latet that tins imirriage was not a success. He was charged with intemperance and wife-beating. This occurred-in 1616 ami iu the same year his wife, Anneke, died. With ■ due respect to . the conventions, Franz waited a year and married. Lyebeth Reyniers, with whom, for 50 years, he lived happily. His treatment by her was very different from that of poor Anndke. Perhaps Lysbech’s tongue was less .virulent. ' . .

The first work of importance by Hals was the stupendous life-size canvas of jt'he “Officers of the Shooting Guild of St. Joris.” This -was the beginning of a series of great group portraits, five of which were of the marksmen of the shooting guilds. Every figure in these vast groups is an exact portrait and what is else, every figure is given a position in exact proportion to the amount of money paid.. Full face portraits in the centre were the most costly and only the richer officers could afford to purchase such a place.

In another of his earlier works an aged rake —lie was a pork butcher they say —is leering saucily at a buxom wench who is sitting .perforce on his kneed. She is gaily garbed in a low bosomed dress and simpers cqquettishly, almost sulkily, as she avoids the man’s glance. A woman of the town no doubt, but one can hardly imagine the picture as the hMerry Trio” that Hals says it is; Behind the man a waggish boy holds a coronal of sausages above his head. There is something rather pathetic in the picture despite the ribaldry. Franz was an absolute master of expression. He revealed the - innermost thoughts of his models with a relentless accuracy. There is just a touch of helplessness on the girl’s face which makes us rather sorry for her. In later years the artist took pleasure in painting many of the more disreputable habitues of the taverns he frequented, The picture of “Old Hille Bobbe” is one of the best of these studies. Franz was so poor his brushes were worn to tho stubbs and he had only two colours left, burnt sienna and a dash of red. With marvellous accuracy he has painted the hideous wrinkled visage of the old hag. On her shoulder is an owl. By her right hand stands a great flagon. Her mouth is opened to hurl some foul oath or threat. Maybe it amused Franz as he reeled by. The most interesting side to the life of Hals from the point of view of the historian, is the number of quaint stories told of him. His pupils, it is said, were accustomed to fetch him home from his cups and put him to bed. .“Now when Franz, lying, in bed, thought he was alone in his room, his piety came to tile surface, for however tipsy he might be he generally closed his halting prayer with his-petition: ‘Dear Lord, take me soon up into Heaven!’ Some pupils who heard him repeat this request night after night decided to test one day whether their piaster was really - in earnest. Brouwer, in company with another pupil called Dirk Van Deelen, bored four holes in the ceiling, right above Franz’ bedstead, and through these .lowered four strong ropes, which they fastened to the four corners of the bed, and then waited eagerly for their master’s return home. Hals returned ’ towards night in' merry mood, and his pupils helped him to bed according to their wont took away the'light, and then crept quietly upstairs to set their plan in motion. As soon as Franz began his usual orison, ‘Lord; take me "up soon into; Heaven,’ they drew him and his bedstead; gently up a little, whereupon Hale, half dazed, fancying that his prayer was being answered literally, altered his tone, and began to cry out' lustily.:; “.‘Not so fast, dear Lord}'not so fast.’ ”