Jan Steen was born in Leyden about 1626, which would make him nineteen years younger than Rembrandt. He is said to have studied first under Nicolas KnÜpfer and then possibly under Adriaen van Ostade in Harlem, and finally under Jan van Goyen at the Hague. In 1648 he was enrolled in the Painter's Guild at Leyden, and the following year he married Margaretha van Goyen, the daughter of his latest master. His father was a well-to-do merchant and beer-brewer and Steen himself at one time ran a brewery, though apparently not with great success. He incontestably was familiar with the life of drinking places and houses in which rough merrymaking was the chief business. Many of his subjects are drawn from such sources and his brush brings them before us with their characteristic features sharply observed and emphasized. He has been accused of a moralizing tendency and it may at least be said that he permits us to draw our own moral from perverted and unpolished facts. In his least restrained moments he is a kind of Dutch Jordaens, less exuberant, less sturdy and florid and gesticulatory; but with the same zest for living, the same union of old and young in any festival that includes good meat and good drink with song and dance and horse-play. If we compare "Die Lustige Familie" at Amsterdam with that ebullient rendering of the same subject by Jordaens entitled "Zoo de ouden zongen: Zoo pypen de jongen" that hangs in the Antwerp Museum, we have no difficulty in perceiving the points of similarity. There even are likenesses in the color-schemes of the two painters, Jordaen's silvery yellows for once meeting their match; but we find in Steen's picture a more subtle discrimination in the characters and temperaments lying beneath the physical features of the gay company.

Oftentimes Steen indulges in a gay and harmless badinage as different as possible from the bold and keen irony of his wilder themes. In "Die Katzentanz Stunde" of the Rijks museum at Amsterdam the laughing children putting the wretched little cat through a course of unwelcome instruction, the excited pose of the dog, the concentration of the girl upon her dance-music, are rendered with joyous freedom and animation, and suggest a childlike mood. The lovely Menagerie of the Hague is conceived in a still milder and gentler temper, the demure child among her pets, feeding her lamb, with her doves flying about her head and the faithful little Steen dog in the background, is an idyllic figure. Indeed the entire composition has a tenderness and almost a religious depth of sentiment that make it unique among the painter's achievements. Another charming composition in which homely pleasures enjoyed with moderation and in a mood of simple merriment are delicately depicted is "Der Wirtshausgarten" in Berlin, in which the young people and their elders together with the happy dog are having a quiet meal under a green arbor. Family pets play an important part in all these scenes of domestic life; apparently Jan Steen even more than other Dutch painters was interested in the idiosyncrasies of the animals about him and was amused by incidents including them. His pictures gain by this a certain suggestion of kindliness and community of good feeling that is refreshing in the midst of the frequent vulgarity of theme and sentiment. Reminiscences of the exquisite feeling shown in "Die Menagerie" continually occur in such incidents as a girl feeding her parrot, the play of children with the friendly dogs and cats of the noisy inn, and especially in the importance given to the expressions and attitudes of the dumb creatures. The dog is nearly always in the foreground, invariably characterized with the utmost vivacity and clearness, and usually playing his cheerful part in whatever of lively occupation his masters are engaged in. In "Die Lustige Familie" he joins his voice to the family concert with an expression of canine agony.

Frequently the subjects are obviously drawn from the life of his own family circle and the portraits of his children in these canvases are always sympathetic and delightful, giving a peculiarly intimate character to the artist's works in this kind. In "Das Nikolausfest" at Amsterdam the little girl in the foreground—apparently the little Elisabeth born in 1662, who figures in so many of the later paintings—is a particularly engaging figure.

These simpler "feasts" and family gatherings in which gay laughter reigns in place of brawling, constitute a delightful phase of Steen's art, yet curiously they are seldom as beautiful in their esthetic qualities as the tavern scenes and incidents of low and vicious life. The picture in the Louvre, however, "Das Familien Mahl," contradicts this generalization in the sheer loveliness of color, in the light that streams through the window hung with vines, and in the delicately discriminated textures of the gowns and furnishings. In this picture the figure of the woman nursing her child in the background has an amplitude of line and graciousness of pose that places it on a plane with Millet's renderings of similar subjects, while the painting in itself is of a quality never achieved by the poetic Frenchman.

Occasionally we find compositions by Steen in which only two or three figures are introduced, although as a rule he crowds every inch of his canvas with human beings and still-life. A very beautiful example of these compositions is seen in "Die Musikstunde" of the National Gallery, London. The daintiness and innocence of the young girl's profile, the refinement of the man's face, and the enchanting tones of the yellow bodice and blue skirt make of this picture a worthy sequel to "Die Menagerie."

Another composition of two figures is "Das Trinkerpaar" in the Rijks Museum at Amsterdam. A woman is drinking from a glass, and a man standing at one side holds a jug and looks at her with an expression of concern. The painting of the woman's right hand which she holds to her breast is delightful and so is the clear half-tone of her face. An attractive one-figure composition, also in the Rijks Museum, is "Die Scheuermagd," a scullery maid scouring a metal pitcher on the top of a cask. The discriminations of texture in this picture, the wood and metal surfaces, the cotton of the woman's blouse, the rather coarse skin of her bared arms and the more delicate texture of her full throat, are especially noteworthy. Several compositions in which two or three figures are grouped are variations of one theme, an invalid visited by her physician. In several instances the title, the rather lackadaisical expression of the lady, and the significant glances of her companions, indicate that love-sickness is the malady. The color in these pictures is usually beautiful and the types are cleverly differentiated, the entire story becoming apparent to the spectator by particularities of gesture and feature, neither exaggerated nor emphasized unduly, but acutely observed and rendered at their precise value in the expressiveness of the whole. A very fine example of these "Doktorbilder" is in the collection of the New York Historical Society. The doctor is bleeding his patient, and there are several people in the room. The rich costumes are distinguished by the indescribable blond yellows and silvery blues that make Steen's color harmonies at their best singularly delicate and blithe.

Among the compositions in which many figures in a complicated environment tax the artist's technical skill to the utmost, are several representations of the bean feast, that saturnalia of Germany, upon which abundant eating and drinking are in order. One of the most beautiful of these pictures is in the Cassel Gallery. Steen himself, portly and flushed, sits at the table, grimacing good-naturedly at the racket assailing his ears. His handsome wife is in the foreground, her large free gesture and unrestrained pose bringing out the opulent beauty of her form draped in shining silken stuffs. Her face, turned toward the little urchin who has found the bean in the cake and thus won the right to wear a paper crown as king of the revels, is dimpled with smiles. The two children are babyish in figure and expression and the little dog is more serious than is his wont upon these occasions. A couple of men are making a din with bits of brass and iron, and the place is in complete disorder with eggshells and kitchen utensils scattered about on the floor, yet the aspect of the scene is curiously removed from vulgarity. Both beauty and character have been ideals of the artist. He has not only grasped the loveliness of external things but he has delved rather deeply into the individualities of these roistering Hollanders. You do not feel as you do with Jordaens that excess of flesh and the joys of the palate are all the world holds for the revelers. The world holds, for one thing, appreciation of rich accessories. The columned bedstead, the handsome rugs, the carved furniture, the glint of gold in the ornate picture frame, especially the sheen of the silk skirts, the soft thick velvet and fur of the sacques and bodices, these, while they are not uncommon in the Dutch interiors of the period combine to produce an impression of esthetic well-being that tempers the unctuous physical satisfactions of a merry-making class. With Jordaens it is the satyr in man that sets the standard of enjoyment, except in his religious pictures which often are filled with genuine and noble emotion, and in which he rises superior to Steen where the latter works in the same kind. Nothing could be more commonplace or characterless in color and form than Steen's rendering of the dinner at Emmaus. Occasionally, however, he is equally without inspiration in his lustiest subjects. In the "FrÖhliche Heimkehr" at Amsterdam, a merry enough scene of people returning from a boatride in high spirits, there is neither charm of color (save in the yellow jacket of a girl who leans over the side of the boat) nor subtlety of characterization.

Fully to appreciate Steen, we should know his pictures in the Louvre and at Amsterdam. They cover a wide range and comprise a considerable number of masterpieces. The life he depicts in them is not of a very high order, but he has seen the possibilities for pictorial representation in his surroundings as almost no other painter of his time. His people are alive and their living is active and fervent. What they do they do with zest. There is energy in the painter's line and vitality in his color. Nothing is dull or tame in his family drama. All has a touch of moving beauty. In the "Schlechte Gesellschaft" of the Louvre or the more vulgar "Nach dem Gelage" of the Rijks Museum—least rewarding of pictures for the moralist—how rich in beauties of color and line is the composition, how tender in modeling are the forms, how bewitching to the eye the fine enamel of the surface!

In the Metropolitan Museum, in New York, is one characteristic example: "The old rat comes to the trap at last," which badly needs cleaning, and one new purchase attributed to Steen in the lists of his work but hardly typical or even characteristic. The subject is a kitchen scene. In it we have neither Steen's charm of color nor his perfection of finish. Yet the turn of the woman's head, the unaffected merriment of her expression and that of the youth, and the type to which her face belongs sufficiently recall such examples of the artist's work as "Das Galante Anerbieten" at Brussels with which indeed it has more in common than with any other of Jan Steen's pictures known to me.

Steen's own portrait, painted by himself and hanging now in the Amsterdam Museum, shows a face upon which neither wild living nor ardent toil has left unhappy marks. His serious eyes look frankly out from under arched brows. His mouth is firm though smiling slightly. The high, bold nose and strong chin, the well-shaped head and thoughtful brow indicate a character more decided and more praiseworthy than the legends adrift concerning his life would lead us to expect in him.