Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 9.djvu/336

 324 L I F L I FLINCK, GOVERT (161 5-1GGO), born at Cleves in 1G15, was apprenticed by his father to a silk mercer, but having secretly acquired a passion for drawing, was sent to Leuwarden, where he boarded in the house of Lambert Jacobszon, a Mennonite, better known as an itinerant preacher than as a painter. Here Flinck was joined by Jacob Backer, and the companionship of a youth deter mined like himself to be an artist only confirmed his passion for painting. Amongst the neighbours of Jacobs zon at Leuwarden were the sons and relations of Rombert Ulenburg, whose daughter Saske married Rembrandt in 1G34. Other members of the same family lived at Amster dam, cultivating the arts either professionally or as amateurs. The pupils of Lambert probably gained some knowledge of Rembrandt by intercourse with the Ulenburgs. Certainly Sandrart, who visited Holland in 1637, found Flinck acknowledged as one of Rembrandt s best pupils, and living habitually in the house of the dealer Hendrik Ulen burg at Amsterdam. For many years Flinck laboured on the lines of Rembrandt, following that master s style in all the works which he executed between 1636 and 1648 ; then he fell into peculiar mannerisms by imitating the swelling forms and grand action of Rubens s creations. Finally he sailed with unfortunate complacency into the Dead Sea of official and diplomatic painting. Flinck s relations with Cleves became in time very important. He was introduced to the court of the Great Elector, Frederick William of Brandenburg, who married in 1646 Louisa of Orange. He obtained the patronage of Johann Moritz of Orange, who was made stadtholder of Cleves in 1649. In 1652 a citizen of Amsterdam, Flinck married in 1656 an heiress, daughter of Ver Hoeven, a director of the Dutch East India Company. He was already well known even then in the patrician circles over which the burgomasters D3 Graef and the Echevin Six presided ; he was on terms of intimacy with the poet Vondel and the treasurer Uitenbogaard. In his house, adorned with antique casts, costumes, and a noble collection of prints, he often received the stadtholder Johann Moritz. whose portrait is still preserved in the work of the learned Barleius. The earliest of Flinck s authentic pieces is a likeness of a lady, dated 1636, in the gallery of Brunswick. His first subject picture is the Blessing of Jacob, in the Amsterdam museum (1638). Both are thoroughly Rembrandtesque in effect as well as in vigour of touch and warmth of flesh tints. The four &quot;civic guards&quot; of 1642, and &quot;the twelve musketeers&quot; with their president in an arm-chair (1648), in the town-hall at Amsterdam, are fine specimens of composed portrait groups. But the best of Flinck s productions in this style is the Peace of Munster in the museum of Amsterdam, a canvas with 19 life-size figures full of animation in the faces, &quot; radiant with Rembrrmdtesque colour,&quot; and admirably distributed. Flinck here painted his own likeness to the left in a doorway. The mannered period of Flinck is amply illustrated in the Marcus Curius eating Turnips before the Samnite Envoys, and Solomon receiving Wisdom, in the palace on the Dam at Amster dam. Here it is that Flinck shows most defects, being faulty in arrangement, gaudy in tint, flat and shallow in execution, and partial to whitened flesh that looks as if it had been smeared with violet powder and rouge. The chronology of Flinck s works, so far as they are seen in public galleries, comprises, in addition to the foregoing, the Grey Beard of 1639 at Dresden, the Girl of 1641 at the Louvre, a portrait group of a male and female (1646) at Rotterdam, a lady (1651) at Berlin. In November 1659 the burgomaster of Amsterdam contracted with Flinck for 12 canvases to represent four heroic figures of David and Samson and Marcus Curius and Horatius Codes, and scenes from the wars of the Batavians and Romans. Flinck was nnablc to finish more than the sketches. In the same year he received a flattering acknowledgment from the town council of Cleves on the completion of a picture of Solomon which was a counterpart of the composition at Amsterdam. This and other pictures and portraits, such as the likenesses of Frederick William of Brandenburg and Johann Moritz of Nassau, and the allegory of Louisa of Orange attended by Victory and Fame and other figures at the cradle of the first-born son of the elector, have disappeared. Of- several pictures which were painted for the Great Kurfiirst, none are preserved except the Expulsion of Hagar in the Berlin museum. Flinck s death at Amsterdam on the 22d of February 1660 was sudden and unexpected. FLINDERS, MATTHEW (1774-1814), English navigator, explorer, and man of science, was born at Donington, near Boston, in Lincolnshire, March 16, 1774. Matthew was at first designed to follow his father s profession of surgeon, but his enthusiasm in favour of a life of adventure impelled him to enter the royal navy, which he did, October 23, 1789. After a voyage to the Friendly Islands and West Indies, and after serving in the &quot; Bellerophon &quot; during Lord Howe s &quot;glorious first of June&quot; (1794) off Ushant, Flinders went out in 1795 as midshipman in the &quot;Reliance&quot; to New South Wales. For the next few years he devoted himself to the task of accurately laying down the outline and bearings of the Australian coast, and he did his work so thoroughly that he left comparatively little for his successors to do. With his friend George Bass, the surgeon of the &quot; Reliance,&quot; in the year of his arrival he explored George s River ; and, after a voyage to Norfolk Island, again in March 1796 the two friends in the same boat, tho &quot; Tom Thumb,&quot; only 8 feet long, and with only a boy to help them, explored a stretch of coast to the south of Port Jackson. After a voyage to the Cape of Good Hope, when he was promoted to a lieutenancy, Flinders was engaged during February 1798 in a survey of the Furneaux Islands, lying to the north of Tasmania. His delight was great when, in September of the same year, he was commissioned along with Bass, who had already explored the sea between Tasmania and the south coast to some extent and inferred that it was a strait, to proceed in the sloop &quot; Norfolk &quot; (25 tons) to prove conclusively that Van Diemen s Land was an island by circumnavigating it. In the same sloop, in the summer of next year, Flinders made an exploration to the north of Port Jackson, the object being mainly to survey Glasshouse Bay (Moreton Bay) and Hervey s Bay. Returning to England he was appointed to the command of an expedition for the thorough exploration of the coasts of Terra Australis, as the southern continent was still called, though Flinders is said to have been the first to suggest for it the name Australia. On July 18, 1801, the sloop &quot;Investigator&quot; (334 tons), in which the expedition sailed, left Spithead, Flinders being furnished with instructions and with a passport from the French Government to all their officials in the Eastern seas. Among the scientific staff was Robert Brown, one of the most eminent English botanists ; and among tho midshipmen was Flindcrs s relative, John Franklin, of Arctic fame. Cape Leeuwin, on the south-west coast of Australia, was reached on November 6, and King George s Sound on December 9. Flinders sailed round the Great Bight, examining the islands and indentations on the east side, noting the nature of the country, the people, products, &c.,and paying special attention to the subject of the variation of the compass. Spencer and St Vincent Gulfs were discovered and explored. On April 8, 1802, shortly after leaving Kangaroo Island?, at the mouth of St Vincent Gulf, Flinders fell in with the French exploring ship, &quot; Le Geographe,&quot; under Capta ; n Nicolas Baudin, in the bay now known as Encounter Bay. In the narrative of the French expedition published iu