Page:Hutton, William Holden - Hampton Court (1897).djvu/264

182 portrait of herself at the easel should be studied; Steenwyck the younger, precise and graceful artist; Honthorst, too, with his night-pieces, the Joseph and Mary (No. 383), and "Singing by lamplight" (No. 393), and that fine portrait of the unhappy Elizabeth of Bohemia (No. 128), worthy to stand beside Merevelt's charming presentment of her little son. This last picture, Mr. Law shows, was left to Charles II. (then Prince of Wales), by Sir Henry Wotton, in the words, "I leave to the most hopeful prince the picture of the elected and crowned Queen of Bohemia, his aunt, of clear and resplendent virtues through the clouds of her fortune." There are also the Poelembergs, and especially that of the children of Elizabeth of Bohemia; Van Bassen, Charles and his wife dining in public, which, though the scene is probably Whitehall, may give an idea of their life at Hampton Court; and many more.

"Old Stone" is here with a fine copy of Titian's Cornaro family (No. 444). William Dobson, the kindly "English Vandyck," has here a "portrait of two gentlemen," and a charming half-length of himself and his wife.

From the portraits that belong to the historical setting of Charles's life we pass naturally to the collection which he formed. Here it is well to include other pictures of the same masters not necessarily collected by him. Charles was the only king who set himself to make a fine gallery at Hampton Court, and when we consider the masterpieces he collected, we may well put with them other works added at other times.