Less important names: Jan van Glabbeck, Jacobus Levecq, Heyman Dullaert, Johan Hendricksen, Adriaen Verdael, Cornelis Drost. VI. FOREIGN CONTEMPORARY PAINTERS Flemish:-- Peter Paul Rubens, 1577-1640. Anthony Van Dyck, 1599-1641. Jacob Jordaens, 1594-1678. Franz Snyders, 1574-1657. Gaspard de Craeyer, 1582-1669. David Teniers, 1610-1690. Spanish:-- Velasquez, 1599-1660. Pacheco, 1571-1654. Cano, 1601-1676. Herrera, 1576-1656. Zurbaran, 1598-1662. Murillo, 1618-1682. French:-- Simon Vouet, 1582-1641. Charles Le Brun, 1619-1690. Eustache Le Sueur, 1617-1655. Italian:-- Carlo Dolci, 1616-1686. Guido Reni, 1575-1642. Domenichino, 1581-1641. Francesco Albani, 1578-1660. Guercino, 1591-1666. Sassoferrato, 1605-1685. I JACOB WRESTLING WITH THE ANGEL The history of the Old Testament patriarch Jacob reads like a romance. He was the younger of the two sons of Isaac, and was at a great disadvantage on this account. Among his people the eldest son always became the family heir and also received the choicest blessing from the father, a privilege coveted as much as wealth. In this case therefore the privileged son was Jacob's brother Esau. Jacob resented keenly the inequality of his lot; and his mother sympathized with him, as he was her favorite. A feeling of enmity grew up between the brothers, and in the end Jacob did Esau a great wrong. One day Esau came in from hunting, nearly starved, and finding his younger brother cooking some lentils, begged a portion of it for himself. Jacob seized the chance to make a sharp bargain. He offered his brother the food--which is called in the quaint Bible language a "mess of pottage"--making him promise in return that he would let their father give his blessing to the younger instead of the older son. Esau was a careless fellow, too hungry to think what he was saying, and so readily yielded. But though Esau might sell his birthright in this fashion, the father would not have been willing to give the blessing to the younger son, had it not been for a trick planned by the mother. The old man was nearly blind, and knew his sons apart by the touch of their skin, as Esau had a rough, hairy skin and Jacob a smooth one. The mother put skins of kids upon Jacob's hands and neck and bade him go to his father pretending to be Esau, and seek his blessing. The trick was successful, and when a little later Esau himself came to his father on the same errand, he found that he had been superseded. Naturally he was very angry, and vowed vengeance on his brother. Jacob, fearing for his life, fled into a place called Padanaram.