which were the favourite subject of the genre painters of the day.  But with all this demand the artists themselves do not seem to have in any case been highly paid.  The prices were low.  Even Rembrandt himself, whose gains were probably much larger than those of any of his contemporaries, and whose first wife, Saskia Uilenburg, was a woman of means, became bankrupt in 1656, and this at a time when he was still in his prime, and his powers at their height.  Some of his most famous pictures were produced at a later date.

During the Thirty Years’ War Holland became the centre of the publishing and book-selling trade; and Leyden and Amsterdam were famed as the foremost seats of printing in Europe.  The devastation of Germany and the freedom of the press in the United Provinces combined to bring about this result.  The books produced by the Elseviers at Leyden and by Van Waesberg and Cloppenburch at Amsterdam are justly regarded as fine specimens of the printer’s art, while the maps of Willem Jansz Blaeu and his Dutch contemporaries were quite unrivalled, and marked a great step forward in cartography.

This chapter must not conclude without a reference to the part taken by the Netherlanders in the development of modern music and the modern stage.  The love of music was widespread; and the musicians of the Netherlands were famed alike as composers and executants.  It was from its earlier home in the Low Countries that the art of modern music spread into Italy and Germany and indeed into all Europe.  Similarly in the late Middle Ages the people of the Netherlands were noted for their delight in scenic representations and for the picturesque splendour with which they were carried out.  The literary gilds, named Chambers of Rhetoric, never took such deep root elsewhere; and in the performance of Mystery Plays and Moralities and of lighter comic pieces (chuttementen and cluyten) many thousands of tradespeople and artisans took part.  In the 17th century all the Chambers of Rhetoric had disappeared with the single exception of the famous “Old Chamber” at Amsterdam, known as The Blossoming Eglantine, to which the leading spirits of the Golden Age of Dutch Literature belonged and which presided over the birth of the Dutch Stage.  From the first the stage was popular and well-supported; and the new theatre of Amsterdam, the Schouburg (completed in 1637), became speedily renowned for the completeness of its arrangements and the ability of its actors.  Such indeed was their reputation that travelling companies of Dutch players visited the chief cities of Germany, Austria and Denmark, finding everywhere a ready welcome and reaping a rich reward, whilst at Stockholm for a time a permanent Dutch theatre was established.

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CHAPTER XIII

THE STADHOLDERATE OF WILLIAM II.

THE GREAT ASSEMBLY