H U Y H U Y 417 ratiociniis in ludo alecc, printed in 1657 with Schooten s Excrcita- tiones Mathematical, is notable as one of the first formal treatises on the theory of probabilities ; nor should his investigations of the properties of thecissoid, logarithmic, and catenary be left unnoticed. His invention of the spiral watch-spring was explained in the Journal dcs Savants, February 25, 1675. An edition of his works was published by S Gravesande, of which two quarto volumes appeared under the heading Opera varia, Leyden, 1724, and two supplementary ones entitled Opera reliqua, Amsterdam, 1728. His scientific conespondence, edited from manuscripts preserved at Ley- den by P. J. Uylenbroek, was published with the title Christiani Hiigenii aliorumque seculi XVII. virorum celebrium Exercitationes Mathematical ct Philosophical, The Hague, 1833. (A. M. C. ) HUYGENS, SIR CONSTANTIJN or CONSTANTIN (1596- 1687), Dutch poet and diplomatist, was born at the Hague on the 4th of September 1596. His father, Christiaan Huygens, was secretary to the state council, and a man of great political importance. At the baptism of the child, the city of Breda was one of his sponsors, and the famous admiral Justinus van Nassau the other. From his earliest childhood he was trained in every polite accom plishment, and before he was seven he could speak French with fluency. He was taught Latin by Johannes Dedelus, and soon became a master of classic versification. As he grew up, he developed not only extraordinary intellectual gifts but great physical beauty and strength, and was one of the most accomplished athletes and gymnasts of his age ; his skill in playing the lute and in the arts of painting and engraving attracted general attention before he began to develop his genius as a writer. In 1616 he proceeded, with his elder brother, to the university of Leyden, He stayed there only one year, and in 1618 proceeded to London with the English ambassador Carleton ; he re mained in London for some months, and then went to Oxford, where he studied for some time in the Bodleian Library, and to Woodstock, Windsor, and Cambridge; he was introduced at the English court, and played the lute before James I. The most interesting feature of this visit was the intimacy which sprang up between the young Dutch poet and the famous Dr Donne, for whose genius Huygens preserved through life an unbounded admiration. He returned to Holland in company with the English con tingent of the synod of Dort, and in 1620 he proceeded to Venice in the diplomatic service of his country ; on his return he nearly lost his life by a foolhardy exploit, namely, the scaling of the topmost spire of Strasburg cathedral. In 1621 he published one of his most weighty and popular poems, his Batava Tempe, and in the same year he pro ceeded again to London, as secretary to the ambassador, Wijngaerdan, but returned in three months. His third diplomatic visit to England lasted longer, from the 5th of December 1621 to the 1st of March 1623. During his absence, his volume of satires, Costelick Mai, dedicated to Jacob Cats, appeared at the Hague. In the autumn of 1622 he was knighted by James I. He published a large volume of miscellaneous poems in 1625 under the title of Otiorum lilri sex ; and in the same year he was appointed private secretary to the stadliolder. In 1627 Huygens married Suzanna van Baerle, and the young couple settled in a handsome house in the best part of the Hague ; four sons and a daughter were born to them. In 1630 Huygens was called to a seat in the privy council, and he continued to exercise political power with wisdom and vigour for many years, under the title of the lord of Zuylichem. In 1634 he completed his long-talked-of version of the poems of Donne. In 1637 he had the misfortune to lose his admirable wife, and he immediately began to celebrate the virtues and pleasures of their married life in the remarkable didactic poem called Dar/werck, which was not published till long afterwards. From 1639 to 1641 he occupied himself by building a magnificent house and garden outside the Hague, and by celebrating their beauties in a poem entitled Hofwijck, which saw the light in 1G54. In 1647 he wrote his beautiful poem of Ooyentroost or " Eye Con solation," to gratify his blind friend Lucretia van Trollo. He made his solitary effort in the dramatic line in 1659, when he brought out his comedy of Trijntje Cornells, which deals, in rather broad humour, with the adventures of the wife of a ship s captain at Zaandam. In 1658 he rearranged his poems, and issued them with many additions, under the title of Corn Flowers, He proposed to the Government that the present highway from the Hague to the sea at Scheven- ingen should be constructed, and during his absence on a diplomatic mission to the French court in 1666 the road was made as a compliment to the venerable statesman, who expressed his gratitude in a descriptive poem entitled Zeeslraet. Huygens edited his poems for the last time in 1672, and died in his ninety-first year, on the 28th of March 1687. His second son, Christiaan, the eminent astronomer, is noticed above. Constant ijn Huygens is the most brilliant figure in Dutch literary history. Other statesmen surpassed him in political influence, and at least two other poets surpassed him in the value and originality of their writings. But his figure was more dignified and splendid, his talents were more varied, and his general accomplishments more I remarkable than those of any other person of his age, the greatest age in the history of the Netherlands. Huygt-ns is the grand
seigneur of the republic, the type of aristocratic oligarchy, the jewel
and ornament of Dutch liberty. When we consider his imposing character and the positive value of his writings, we may well be surprised that he has not found a modern editor. It is a disgrace to Dutch scholarship that no complete collection of the writings of
- Hnygcns exists. His autobiography, DC vita propria sermoncs,
! did not see the light until 1827, and his remarkable poem, Clinjs-
werck, was not printed until 1842. As a poet Huygens shows a
! finer sense of form than any other Dutch writer ; the language, in his hands, becomes as flexible as Italian. His epistles and lighter pieces, in particular, display his metrical ease and facility to perfec tion. (E. W. G.) HUYSMANS. Four painters of this family matriculated in the Antwerp guild in the 17th century. Cornells the elder, apprenticed in 1633, passed for a mastership in 1C3G, and remained obscure. Jacob, apprenticed to Frans Wouters in 1650, wandered to England towards the close of the reign of Charles II., and competed with Lely as a fashionable portrait painter. He executed a portrait of the queen, Catherine of Braganza, now in the national portrait gallery, and Horace Walpole assigns to him the likeness of Lady Bellasys, now catalogued at Hampton Court as a work of Lely. His portrait of Izaak Walton in the National Gallery shows a disposition to imitate the styles of Rubens and Van Dyke. According to most accounts he died in London in 1696. Jan Baptist Huysmans, born at Antwerp in 1654, matriculated in 1076-77, and died there in 1715-16. He was younger brother to Cornells Huysmaus the second, who was born at Antwerp in 1648, and educated by Caspar de Wit and Jacob van Artois. Of Jan Baptist little or nothing has been preserved, except that lie registered numerous apprentices at Antverp, and painted a landscape dated 1697 now in the Brussels museum. But for the signature critics would assign this piece to his brother. Cornelia the second is the only master of the name of Huysmans whose talent was largely acknowledged. He chanced to receive lessons from tvo artists, one of whom was familiar with the Roman art of the Poussins, whilst the other inherited the scenic style of the school of Rubens. He combined the two in a rich, highly coloured, and usually effective style, which, however, was not free from monotony. Seldom attempting anything but woodsidc views with fancy backgrounds, half Italian, half Flemish, he painted with great facility, and left numerous examples behind. At the outset of his career he practised at M alines, win re hts married in 1682, and there too he entered into some busi ness connexion with Van der Meulen, for whom lie paintel eome backgrounds. In 1706 he withdrew to Antwerp,
XIL
