The next year has very small results to show, and might, taken by itself, support the belief in the sudden unpopularity of Rembrandt were there not five other years for which we can now find only five pictures, and several with fewer. All the five of 1644 are signed. Three are portraits: Captain Holford's "Man with a Sword," Earl Cowper's "Young Man," and the fancifully named "Constable of Bourbon," in the collection of Herr Thieme at Leipzig. There is one subject-picture, "The Woman taken in Adultery," painted for Jan Six, and now in the National Gallery [No. 45]. Another of the same subject, in the possession of Consul Weber at Hamburg, bears, according to M. Michel, a forged signature, and is regarded by him as very doubtful.
[Illustration: [_National Gallery, London_
There are four subject-pictures dated 1645. First and foremost is "The Holy Family," in the Hermitage [No. 796]. Fine also is "The Tribute Money," belonging to Mr Beaumont, though much more summarily handled. The "Daniel's Vision," at Berlin [No. 806], is more careful in treatment, but the companion picture, "Tobias' Wife with the Goat" [No. 805], is little more than a sketch. At Berlin, also, are two of the five dated portraits of that year, one of "A Rabbi," in the Museum [No. 828=A=], and one of "J. C. Sylvius," in the collection of Herr von Carstangen. The Hermitage has one portrait [No. 820], called at one time "Manasseh ben Israel." A "Portrait of a Young Girl," in the Dulwich Gallery [No. 206], and "An Orphan Girl of Amsterdam," now in the United States, are probably works painted for the purpose of study, rather than portraits; and the same remark applies to the "Portrait of Himself," at Buckingham Palace, which, though the last figure of the date is wanting, was, in all likelihood, a work of that year.
The "Portrait of a Lady," in the collection of Captain Holford; the little sketch of "An Old Man Seated," belonging to the executors of the late Sir F. Cook, and "An Old Man," at Dresden [No. 1571], are undated portraits of about this time; while the "Man reading by a Window," in the Carlsberg Glyptotek at Copenhagen, if it be really a Rembrandt, which is doubtful, is an undated subject. There are, furthermore, two landscapes, both undated, one at Oldenburg [No. 169], and one in the collection of Mme. Lacroix at Paris.