“She is very well, I thank God; and when she is set to her feet and held by her sleeves she will not go softly but stamp, and set one foot before another very fast, and I think she will run before she can go. She loves dancing extremely; and when the Saraband is played, she will get her thumb and finger together offering to snap; and then when “Tom Duff” is sung, she will shake her apron; and when she hears the tune of the clapping dance my Lady Frances Herbert taught the Prince, she will clap both her hands together, and on her breast, and she can tell the tunes as well as any of us can; and as they change tunes she will change her dancing. I would you were here but to see her, for you would take much delight in her now she is so full of pretty play and tricks. Everybody says she grows each day more like you.” Can you not see the engaging little creature, clapping her hands and trying to step out in a dance? No imaginary description could equal in charm this bit of real life, this word-picture painted in bright and living colors by a mother’s love. I give another merry picture of her childhood and widowhood in a later chapter. Many portraits of “Pretty Moll” were painted by Van Dyck, more than of any woman in England save the queen. One shows her in the few months that she was the child-wife of the eldest son of the Earl of Pembroke. She is in the centre of the great family group. She was married thrice; her favorite choice of character in which to be painted was Saint Agnes, who died rather than be married at all. Infant’s Cap. Infant’s Cap. Both mother and child in this picture wear a lace cap of unusual shape, rather broader where turned over at the ear than at the top. It is seen on a few other portraits of that date, and seems to have come to England with the queen of James I. It disappeared before the graceful modes of hair-dressing introduced by Queen Henrietta Maria. The genius of Van Dyck has preserved for us a wonderful portraiture of children of this period, the children of King Charles I. The earliest group shows the king and queen with two children; one a baby in arms with long clothes and close cap—this might have been painted yesterday. The little prince standing at his father’s knee is in a dark green frock, much like John Quincy’s, and apparently no richer. A painting at Windsor shows king and queen with the two princes, Charles and James; another, also at Windsor, gives the mother with the two sons. One at Turin gives the two princes with their sister. At Windsor, and in _replica_ at Berlin, is the famous masterpiece with the five children, dated 1637. Eleanor Foster. 1755. Eleanor Foster. 1755.