Ostade did, however, make use of sketches for his etchings. There is in the British Museum a sketch for _The Father of a Family_ (B. 33). A comparison of this with the etched plate is interesting. There is a certain affinity to Rembrandt in the manner of drawing; less summary and swift, but masterful and free. And, like Rembrandt, Ostade does not use his sketch as a finished thing, and copy it faithfully and minutely. His [Illustration: _Fig. 7.--The Humpbacked Fiddler. By Ostade. B. 44._] interest in the subject has not died out; he is alert for a new posture, a fresh touch, a livelier handling of some part of his design, that may improve the whole. In this case the drawing, which is of a different shape from the print and much broader, contains at the left the figure of a man seated and cutting a loaf of bread on his knees. Ostade felt that this figure disturbed the unity of the piece no less than the sense of home seclusion, and he omitted it from his work on the copper. This reveals the born etcher: one who works with directness, swiftness, passion; whose needle takes the impulse of his thought immediately, who never works in cold blood. III Let us now consider the etchings themselves. There are just fifty in all, and nine or perhaps ten of the number are dated. The earliest date is 1647, the latest 1678. Arranging the dated plates in order of time, we get the following table. The references are to the numbers in Bartsch, _Peintre-Graveur_, Vol. I.:-- 1647. The Hurdy-Gurdy Player. B. 8. The Barn. B. 23. The Family. B. 46. 1648. The Father of the Family. B. 33. 1652. The Wife Spinning. B. 31. 1653. The Tavern Brawl. B. 18. Saying Grace. B. 34. 1671. The Cobbler. B. 27. 1678.[1] The Child and the Doll. B. 16. To this may possibly be added _The Humpbacked Fiddler_ (B. 44). Neither Bartsch nor Dutuit appears to have noticed a date on this plate; but it seems clear that it is there, following the signature, though obscured by lines. The writer inclines to decipher it as 1631 or 1651; but it is impossible to be positive on the point. These data would doubtless serve many critics with material for constructing a chronological list of the whole of the etchings. But this amusement shall be left to the reader. The etchings, as a matter of fact, do not present any marked variety of treatment. Ostade was not, like Rembrandt, a master of many styles; nor did he develop any particular style by continually surpassing his own successes. We can only say that he seems to have attained his greatest mastery in a middle period, about 1650. _The Wife Spinning_ of 1652 is not followed by any dated piece that at all rivals it. _The Cobbler_ of 1671, for instance, which was a failure in the first biting, betrays also a certain languor of handling, very different from the inexhaustible care and skill bestowed on the earlier plate.