Then he led him to his stable and presented him with his best saddle-horse, and urged immediate departure for a wider field and pastures new.

A few days later the handsome Van Dyck—­with a goodly purse of gold, passports complete, and saddlebags well filled with various letters of introduction to Rubens’ Italian friends—­followed by a cart filled with his belongings, started gaily away, bound for the land where art had its birth.

“With Italy—­with Italy I can win all!” he kept repeating to himself as he turned his horse’s head to the South.

* * * * *

The first day’s ride took the artistic traveler to the little village of Saventhem, five miles from Brussels.  Here he turned aside long enough to say good-by to a fair young lady, Anna Van Ophem by name, whom he had met a few months before at Antwerp.

He rode across the broad pasture, entered the long lane lined with poplars, and followed on to the spacious old stone mansion in the grove of trees.

Anna herself saw him coming and came out to meet him.  They had not been so very well acquainted, but the warmth of a greeting all depends upon where it takes place.  It was lonely for the beautiful girl there in the country:  she welcomed the handsome young painter-man as though he were a long-lost brother, and proudly introduced him to her parents.

Instead of a mere call he was urged to put up his horse and remain overnight; and a servant was sent out to find the man who drove the cart with the painter’s belongings, and make him comfortable.

The painter decided that he would remain overnight and make an early start on the morrow.

And it was so agreed.

There was music in the evening, and pleasant converse until a late hour, for the guest must sit up and see the moon rise across the meadow—­it would make such a charming subject for a picture!

So they sat up to see the moon rise across the meadow.

At breakfast the next morning there was a little banter on the subject of painting.  Could not the distinguished painter remain over one day and give his hosts a taste of his quality?

“I surely will if the fair Anna will sit for her portrait!” he courteously replied.

The fair Anna consented.

The servant who drove the cart had gotten on good terms with the servants of the household, and was being initiated into the mysteries of making Dutch cheese.

Meanwhile the master had improvised a studio and was painting the portrait of the charming Anna.

After working two whole days he destroyed the canvas because the picture was not keyed right, and started afresh.  The picture was fairish good, but his desire now was to paint the beautiful Anna as the Madonna.

Van Dyck’s affections having been ruthlessly uprooted but a few days before, the tendrils very naturally clung to the first object that presented itself—­and this of course was the intelligent and patient sitter, aged nineteen last June.