“Amice, It gives me so much pleasure that when judging Mesdag's work you only talk about the inner mérites [merits] of that work and you abandon the impossible rubbish about his wealth, his presidency of Pulchri.. ..and his art collection. As was expected from you anyway. You say perfectly well that his Water [in his seascapes] is not the strong side and happily you refuse to talk about his infinity of horizon, his space and his mouvement, which everybody always is talking about. (translation from original Dutch: Fons Heijnsbroek)”