APRILIS [The twelve months with views of Dutch towns; set title] Representation of the month of April within the series of the 'Twelve months with views on Dutch towns'. Here is 'Het Leeprosen huys by Haerlem', the hospital for the leprous and mentally ill people in Haarlem as it looked in the beginning of the seventeenth century. As a matter of fact this etching is a real document of a building complex that was heavily remodelled during the centuries according to its different functions. In 1320 begun the building of the hospital, just outside the city walls. Here were taken for the quarantine the sicks from lepra and plague but also, since 1560, mentally ill people. This was probably the oldest health institution in the Netherlands. On the left the Sint-Jacobskapel (ca. 1319-1477) and in the center the buildings for the mentally ill. In the foreground a portion of a field where peasants are sowing; on the right foreground two gentlemen on horseback overlooking the landscape. On the right background some boats on a canal. In the sky, above in the center the zodiacal sign of the Taurus. Inscribed on the bottom:'APRILIS' and four lines of Latin text:'Si Ver nidificum venit, et aeidis ... novis seminibus seges.' numbered on the bottom right:'4' l Etching on paper, trimmed to platemark; total: 275 x 363 mm; crease on the top right margin, on the sky, top left corner slightly damages but not affecting the plate; wonderful impression; Franken & van der Kellen (1883) nr. 153, p. 81; hollstein 37