1. This anecdote was most probably taken from Corot, souvenirs intimes, which contains an account of how Corot would tell his would-be pupils that they would sometimes have to be content with very little to eat: ‘See if you can dine on a big scrap of bread bought from the baker at sundown, as has happened to me more than once. The next morning, I would look at myself in the mirror, feeling my cheeks, – they were the same as the previous day; – the regime is therefore not so risky, and I recommend it to you, if need be.’ (Voyez si vous pouvez dîner avec un gros chiffon de pain acheté le soir chez le boulanger à soleil couché, comme cela m’est arrivé plus d’une fois. Le lendemain matin, je me regardais dans le miroir en tâtant mes joues, – elles étaient comme la veille; – le régime n’est donc pas si dangereux, et je vous le recommande, au besoin.) See Dumesnil 1875, p. 53.

2. 24 x 200 francs makes 4800 francs, which at that time was equivalent to about 2400 guilders (and not francs as Van Gogh writes). The sum that Van Gogh subsequently rounds off to ‘1500 guilders’ must therefore have been the sum per year – 1200 guilders.

3. Van Gogh believed that Elbert Jan van Wisselingh had difficulty keeping going as an independent art dealer in the unfavourable climate in the art trade in Paris; cf. letters 393, 397 and 398; however, very little is known about the two years that Van Wisselingh spent in Paris. Cf. also letter 331, n. 3.

4. Van Gogh added this last sentence (‘We’ll ... win’) later.

5. Letter sketch B, Farm with stacks of peat (F - / JH 422) is after the painting of the same name F 22 / JH 421 . The location, like that in the unknown painting of a ploughman after which Van Gogh made letter sketch A, Ploughman with a stooping woman (F - / JH 422), may have been Heerendijk, in the distance, opposite the lodging-house. See Dijk and Van der Sluis 2001, pp. 189, 224-227.

6. See for ‘collier’s faith’: letter 286, n. 17.

7. See for this expression: letter 288, n. 15.

8. Cf. in this context Dupré’s Le Crotoy and Fisherman’s boat and small fishing vessels : letters 66, n. 7 and 98, n. 17.

9. Cf. Rom. 6:4, Rom. 8:1-4 and Rom. 12:2.

10. See for Correggio’s saying ‘anch’io sono pittore’: letter 214, n. 3.