over-estimation to its right measure, but it has not shaken Madou's historical importance. He has a firm position as the man who conquered modern life in the interests of Belgian art, and he is the more significant for the _genre_ painting of his age, as he eclipsed all his contemporaries, even in Germany and England, in the inexhaustible fund of his invention. [Illustration: MADOU. THE DRUNKARD.] A merry world is reflected in his pictures. One of his most popular figures is the ranger, a sly old fox with a furrowed, rubicund visage and huge ears, who roves about more to the terror of love-making couples than of poachers, and never aims at any one except for fun at the rural justice, a portly gentleman in a gaudy waistcoat, emerging quietly at the far end of the road. He introduces a varied succession of braggarts, poor fellows, down-at-heel and out-at-elbows, old grenadiers joking with servant girls, old marquesses taking snuff with affected dignity, charlatans at their booth, deaf and dumb flute-players, performing dogs, and boys sick over their first pipe. Here and there are fatuous or over-wise politicians solemnly opening a newly printed paper, with their legs astraddle and their spectacles resting on their noses. Rascals with huge paunches and blue noses fall asleep on their table in the ale-house, and enliven the rest of the company by their snoring. At times the door is opened and a scolding woman appears with a broom in her hand. On these occasions the countenance of the toper is a comical sight. At the sound of the beloved voice he endeavours to raise himself, and anxiously follows the movements of his better half as he clings reeling to the table, or plants himself more firmly in his chair with a resigned and courageous "_J'y suis, j'y reste_."