1. The Rev. Johannes Elias Schröder.

2. A sizeable collection of Rembrandt etchings was preserved in the Trippenhuis.

3. A reference to the two Rembrandt prints which Van Gogh mentions a couple of lines later (see notes 5 and 6), both of which are nocturnal scenes lit by a lantern.

4. Cf. Ps. 119:105.

5. Rembrandt, The flight into Egypt, at night, etching, 1651 (B 53,I) (Amsterdam, Rijksprentenkabinet). Ill. 375 .

6. Rembrandt, The entombment of Christ, etching, c. 1654 (B 86) (Amsterdam, Rijksprentenkabinet). Ill. 339 . There is an impression in the family estate (inv. no. t1441).

7. The Museum Fodor (opened in 1863) at Keizersgracht 609-613 in Amsterdam concentrated on paintings, drawings and prints by nineteenth-century artists, though it also owned works by old masters, including 25 drawings attributed at that time to Rembrandt; a number of those attributions have now been revised or cast into doubt. See cat. Amsterdam 1863 and Broos 1981, pp. 7-12. The collection is now housed in the Amsterdams Historisch Museum.

8. John 5:39.

9. Matt. 13:52.

10. Ps. 133:3 and rhy. ps. 133:3.

11. In the summer of 1873, Christoffel Martinus Vos was forced by a pulmonary condition to resign from the ministry. He subsequently took up an editorial post at the newspaper Algemeen Handelsblad (FR b2638).

12. Cf. hymn 200:2, hymn 271:2, and the hymn ‘Lead, kindly light, amid the encircling gloom’.

13. Johannes (Jan) Paulus Vos.

14. Not only was Christoffel Vos suffering from an incurable illness, but on 4 February 1877 he and Kee lost their one-year-old son Catharinus Henri.

15. The groundwork being done to build the new Central Station; see letter 118, n. 14.

16. Van Gogh’s mention of Andersen was prompted by his Vertellingen van de maan (What the moon saw) (see letter 68); it is not certain whether he is referring to a specific work by Matthijs Maris. Fairy-tale-like representations and atmospheric townscapes of his are known, however, including Fairy tale, c. 1877 (Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum), City outskirts, 1872 (private collection) and The castle ploughman, 1875-76 (Cardiff, National Museum of Wales) – the last one is mentioned in letter 134, n. 18.

17. The end of the first recitative in Hieronymus van Alphen’s poem ‘De starrenhemel. Eene cantate’ (The starry sky. A cantata). The variant is ‘ritzelt’ (rustles) instead of ‘schuifelt’ (shuffles). See Van Alphen 1857, vol. 2, pp. 57-61 (quotation on p. 58). From the list of subscribers (p. 488), it appears that Uncle Cor had ordered ten copies of this work for his bookshop in Amsterdam. Van Gogh is possibly quoting Van Alphen indirectly, for the lines are also included in Johannes van Vloten’s Aesthetica of schoonheidskunde, to which Van Gogh referred in letter 19. Ed. Deventer 1865, p. 8.

18. See for this quotation from the poem ‘Under the stars’ by Mulock Craik: letter 119, n. 15.

19. On Sunday, 16 September, Jeremias Posthumus Meijjes preached at 10 a.m. in the Oudezijdskapel.

20. The quotation from Ecclesiastes is not rendered word for word.

21. Gal. 6:7-8.

22. On Sunday, 9 September, Laurillard preached the early sermon in the Zuiderkerk.

23. Paul Alexandre Protais, Souvenirs de la patrie (Souvenirs of the homeland), was included in Goupil’s list as an aquatint-engraving (engraved by ‘Masson’) and as a photograph, appearing in both the series ‘Musée Goupil’, ‘Carte-album’ (no. 178) (Ill. 1221 ) and in the ‘Carte de visite’ series (Bordeaux, Musée Goupil).

24. There are no details of either Vincent’s or Theo’s visit to Antwerp, 33 km south of Zundert.

25. The Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten in Antwerp did not have a portrait by Rembrandt in its collection, though it did have the panel of An old man (Ill. 1848 ), which is presumably a late-seventeenth-century copy after Rembrandt’s Portrait of an old man in the Louvre. Van Gogh could also be referring to the Saskia van Uylenburgh (Ill. 1849 ), a contemporary copy of the original portrait by Rembrandt (now in Kassel, Gemäldegalerie), which was viewed by Vosmaer and Thoré as an autograph replica by Rembrandt. See cat. Antwerp 1988, p. 306, cat. nos. 615, 293.

26. On Monday evening, 10 September, fire had broken out on a barge carrying arrack (rice liquor), lying in the Oosterdok. The ‘Amsterdamsche Onheil-kroniek’ in the Geïllustreerd Politie Nieuws of 15 September 1877 reported the attempts to extinguish the blaze.

27. For the ship De Admiraal Van Wassenaer, see letter 125, n. 6.

28. Van Gogh is referring to a series of four works by Alexandre Jean Louis Japhet (Jazet), all photographed by Billon: L’incendie (The fire), no. 77 (another name for ‘The conflagration’) Ill. 1000 ; La nuit de Noël (Christmas Eve), no. 78 Ill. 1001 ; Changement de garnizon (Changing of the garrison), no. 79 Ill. 1851 ; and Chasse aux loups (The wolf hunt), no. 80 Ill. 1852 .

29. Taken from Charles Dickens, Dombey and Son (chapter 50): ‘Blessed twilight stealing on, and shading her so soothingly and gravely, as she falls asleep, like a hushed child, upon the bosom she has clung to’. See Dealings with the firm of Dombey and Son. Introduction by W.H. Garrod. Oxford etc. 1981, p. 713. The same line served as a caption to the accompanying engraving by F. Barnard. Ed. London 1890, pp. 364-365.

30. Cf. Matt. 18:20.

31. Cf. Matt. 13:52.

32. Cf. Matt. 18:20.

33. John 13:17.

34. Cf. Luke 6:45.

35. The drawing, attributed to Rembrandt, of Christ with Mary and Martha (c. 1650) was also called The house at Bethany (London, The British Museum). Ill. 345 . Van Gogh visited the British Museum’s Department of Prints and Drawings on Friday, 28 August 1874, as evidenced by the visitors’ book. See Bailey 1990, p. 51.

36. John Halifax is the protagonist of the novel John Halifax, gentleman by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik (cf. letter 122). ‘No, I am a Christian’, he says when, during a conflict, he is taken for a Quaker (ed. New York [c. 1900], p. 166). The scene sketched by Van Gogh has not been traced. It is probably a combination of passages, for example, ‘All were gathered in a group at the window, the child being held on her father’s lap’ (pp. 204-205) and the one where John Halifax tells his children that there is only one name that should be revered: that of the Lord (p. 306). Rose Cottage plays an important role, but the scenes mentioned do not occur in the book. Van Gogh’s ‘I think’ indicates his own doubt as to the accuracy of his recollections.

37. Cf. Luke 10:42.

38. Van Gogh is mistaken in thinking that Martha is busy stirring up the fire.

39. John 8:12.

40. Matt. 26:29.

41. Matt. 5:15.

42. Cf. Matt. 25:29.

43. John 11:25-26.

44. Cf. John 14:23.

45. Rev. 3:20.

46. Deut. 29:4, Isa. 6:10, Matt. 13:15 and Acts 28:27.

47. Van Gogh knew Ruipérez’s La Imitación de Jesucristo from a print; see letter 40, n. 16.

48. Rembrandt, David in prayer, etching, 1652 (B41) (Amsterdam, Rijksprentenkabinet). There is an impression in the family estate (Amsterdam, Van Gogh Museum, inv. no. p111). Ill. 1853 .

49. Ps. 42:2-3, 8-9 and 12 (in KJ Ps. 42:1-2, 7-8 and 11).

50. To the end of the paragraph ending ‘blessed twilight’ (l. 123), Van Gogh’s handwriting had gradually become less compact, owing to the increasing darkness; after this he wrote considerably smaller.

51. Hendrik Jacob Eerligh van Gogh (son of Uncle Jan) and Maria Elisabeth Vos were married on 16 August 1877.

52. The ship the Madura had put to sea on Sunday, 16 September, bound for Batavia (Nieuwe Amsterdamsche Courant. Algemeen Handelsblad, no. 14638). Ships destined for far-off lands departed from the port of Southampton on the south coast of England.

53. The naval officer Jan Vos, the father of Marie, was deputy director of the navy at Amsterdam. From 1876 until his death, Vos was a member of the Hoog Militair Gerechtshof (Supreme Court Martial) at Utrecht. See Adelborstopleiding te Delft – Medemblik – Breda 1816-1857. Ed. M.J.C. Klaassen. The Hague 1979, p. 79, no. M 144.

54. The Nieuwediep is the harbour on the eastern side of Amsterdam, near the mouth of the River IJ where it flows into what was then called the Zuiderzee (now the IJsselmeer).

55. On Thursday, 20 September 1877, the Levende Meesters (Living Masters) exhibition was to open in the premises of the former Koninklijke Akademie van Beeldende Kunsten. See exhib. cat Amsterdam 1877. Such exhibitions lasted three to four weeks. See exhib. cat. Amsterdam 1995, pp. 52-53.

56. 2 Cor. 12:9.