HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL

NOTICE

OF

ADRIAN VAN OSTADE.

Adrian Van Ostade, who was born at Lubeck in 1610, left his native town when very young for Harlem, where he entered into the school of Francis Hals, a painter of high reputation. He formed a friendship with Adrian Brauwer, and after having consoled him under the torments he endured from the avarice and covetousness of his master, he persuaded him to quit him and employ his talents for his own advantage.

After a long residence at Harlem, the approach of the French troops, in 1672, threw Van Ostade into such alarm that he determined to sell his furniture and effects and return to his own country, to shelter himself against the chances of war. Having gone to Amsterdam to embark, an amateur, named Constantine Senneport, induced him to remain with him for some time, and shewed him the advantage he would find in taking up his abode in a town where his works were highly esteemed. Ostade, in short, never after quitted the capital of Holland, and notwithstanding his close application to labour, had great difficulty in executing all the orders that he received.

Taillasson, in his Observations on some great painters, says rightly, when speaking of the pictures and talents of Ostade, that his heroes are workmen, Dutch peasants, drunkards, smokers and gamesters; from among whom he seems to have