I sell. I bring
romance into the homes of all sorts of people. Do you know,
they buy my pictures not only in Holland, but in Norway and
Sweden and Denmark? It's mostly merchants who buy them, and
rich tradesmen. You can't imagine what the winters are like
in those countries, so long and dark and cold. They like to
think that Italy is like my pictures. That's what they
expect. That's what I expected Italy to be before I came
here."
And I think that was the vision that had remained with him
always, dazzling his eyes so that he could not see the truth;
and notwithstanding the brutality of fact, he continued to see
with the eyes of the spirit an Italy of romantic brigands and
picturesque ruins. It was an ideal that he painted -- a poor one,
common and shop-soiled, but still it was an ideal; and it
gave his character a peculiar charm.
It was because I felt this that Dirk Stroeve was not to me,
as to others, merely an object of ridicule. His fellow-painters
made no secret of their contempt for his work, but he earned a
fair amount of money, and they did not hesitate to make free
use of his purse.
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