Jacob Jordaens was one of the most famous of Rubens' pupils. It is said that "they are of the same family and the same temperament; and Rubens stands between Jordaens and van Dyck. Rubens is gold, van Dyck silver, and Jordaens blood and fire." The latter was an indefatigable painter and a rapid worker, often completing a portrait at a single sitting. He covered a wide range of subjects, religious, allegorical, landscapes, portraits and animals, and he succeeded so well that "there are Jordaens attributed to Rubens and Rubens to Jordaens." Anthony van Dyck was another pupil of the great master, and the aristocrat of the famous seventeenth century Flemings. He was only a boy among boys, quite undistinguished, until one day chancing to rub against a painting of his teacher's on which the paint was still wet, he retouched it so skilfully that it turned out better than before. In time he became so formidable a rival, in spite of his youth, that Rubens sent him off to Italy to study. He came back in four years, greater than ever. A few years later, Rubens contrived to have him called to England as court painter. During the time that he remained in Flanders he produced several religious pictures, among them the Raising of the Cross, at Courtrai, and a Crucifixion, which, before the war, was in the Cardinal's palace at Malines. The same Red Cross worker who rescued the Rubens from destruction at Malines also brought away this composition, of which he says, that it had been cut out of its frame the day before, rolled up, and stowed away in the cellar. But van Dyck's best work was done in portraiture, and in this he was "nearly the equal of Titian." [Illustration: CHARLES I AND HIS FAMILY.--VAN DYCK.] Van Dyck so quickly became a great favourite of Charles I that he was knighted within three months after going to England. He painted the King and Queen many times. The portrait of Charles I in the Louvre was done at the height of his skill. He loved to paint kings and nobles, in velvet and silken garments trimmed with rare old lace. For ten years he was court painter in England, and so many of his portraits are still in the great houses there that a family portrait by van Dyck is said to be "tantamount in England to a patent of nobility." After the execution of Charles, he went to Flanders and to Paris seeking commissions, but his popularity had waned, and he returned to England broken in health and spirit, and died there in 1641. His body rests in St. Paul's Cathedral. Van Dyck painted cavaliers, and he himself belonged to that type. His work is so individual that it is easily recognized. A charming adventurer, a popular courtier, he was a favourite of kings, was fêted in foreign countries. At the close of his life, he is called "a man in ruins, who until his last hour has the good fortune, and this is the most extraordinary thing about him, to preserve his greatness when he paints."