1. The letter from Gauguin is letter 675; the letter from Bernard has not survived (it was not sent on to Theo).

2. Gauguin was staying in the boarding house run by Mrs Gloanec in Pont-Aven; see letter 581, n. 5.

3. Theo had sent Vincent 300 francs to furnish the Yellow House; see letter 676. Whether Theo had actually had to borrow money is questionable; he may have suggested something of the kind in order to curb Vincent’s spending.

4. See letter 47, n. 8, for Rembrandt’s Jan Six .

5. It is very likely that Van Gogh was thinking here of Rembrandt’s Self-portrait at the easel , which the brothers had seen in the Louvre. See letter 649, n. 15.

6. See letter 651, nn. 9 and 10, for Hals’s Regents of the Old Men’s Alms House and Regentesses of the Old Men’s Alms House . Vincent and Theo saw the paintings in the museum in Haarlem, see letter 130, n. 2.

7. For Gauguin’s family see letter 625, n. 22.

8. Van Gogh had sent twelve drawings to Russell at the beginning of August 1888 in the hope of making him favourably disposed towards buying a work from Gauguin. See letter 652, n. 3.

9. See letter 623, n. 16, for Russell’s house.