1. Sunday, 17 April 1881 was Easter.

2. The drawing The lampbearers is not known; the other drawing is The bearers of the burden (F 832 / JH - ).

3. The English engraver Burn Smeeton and the French wood engraver Auguste Tilly formed a partnership in Paris. Their work appeared in Le Magasin Pittoresque, L’Art, L’Illustration and The Illustrated London News. The last-mentioned magazine had published their portrait of Corot after Gilbert, which Van Gogh knew (see letter 30, n. 6). They signed ‘Smeeton Tilly sc.’ It is not clear whether Smeeton Tilly was still operating as an engraving business in the 1880s, but their work appeared in L’Illustration until 1884.

4. Cf. Landscape with a hut (F 842 / JH 5); see letter 167, n. 3. Landscape (F 874v / JH 3) and Hut (F 875 / JH 4) probably date from the Brussels period.