Being less disposed to appear humorous, _Adolf Dillens_ makes a more sympathetic impression. He, too, had begun with forced anecdotes, but after a tour to Zealand opened his eyes to nature; he laid burlesque on one side, and depicted what he had seen in unhackneyed pictures: sound and healthy men of patriarchal habits. Even his method of painting became simpler and more natural; his colouring, hitherto borrowed from the old masters, became fresher and brighter. He emancipated himself from Rembrandt's _chiaroscuro_, and began to look at nature without spectacles. There is something poetic in his method of observation: he really loved these good people and painted them in the unadorned simplicity of their life--cheery old age that knows no wrinkles and laughing youth that knows no sorrows. He is indeed one-sided, for a good fairy has banished all trouble from his happy world; but his pictures are the product of a fresh and amiable temperament. His usual themes are a friendly gathering at the ale-house, a conversation beneath the porch, skating, scenes in cobblers' workshops, a gust of wind blowing an umbrella inside out; and if he embellishes them with little episodic details, this tendency is so innocent that nobody can quarrel with him. In France it was _François Biard_, the Paul de Kock of French painting, who attained most success in the thirties by humorous anecdote. He devoted his whole life to the comical representation of the minor trespasses and misfortunes of the commonplace _bourgeoisie_. He had the secret of displaying his comicalities with great aptitude, and of mocking at the ridiculous eccentricities of the Philistine in an obvious and downright fashion. Strolling players made fools of themselves at their toilette; lads were bathing whilst a gendarme carried off their clothes; a sentry saluted a decorated veteran, whose wife gratefully acknowledged the attention with a curtsey; the village grandee held a review of volunteers with the most pompous gravity; a child was exhibited at the piano to the admiration of its yawning relatives. One of his chief pictures was called "Posada Espagnol." The hero was a monk winking at a beauty of forty who was passing by while he was being shaved. Women were sitting and standing about, when a herd of swine dashing in threw everything over and put the ladies to flight, and so called forth one of those comic effects of terror in which Paul de Kock took such delight.