A man riding on a horse which is pulling a wagon loaded with masonry, while another man attempts to keep the wagon steady. Engraving by S. à Bolswert after Sir Peter Paul Rubens.

The painting is described by Adler as follows (left and right have to be reversed for the engraving): "In the centre of a landscape sloping down the left, near the front of the picture is a rock on which small trees and shrubs are growing. Between it and the spectator is a rushing stream which starts its course from the depth of the picture at the back and runs from the right to the left foreground. The rock is split vertically in the middle, and at the bottom of the cleft is a cave-like opening. The main course of the stream runs past this opening into the dark area of the lower left corner of the picture—for, curiously enough, the scene to the left of the rock is a nocturnal one: the full moon, in front of which bats are fluttering, shines out in a cloudy sky and is reflected in a calm stretch of water below. To the right of the rock the scene is in broad daylight, and the broken-up terrain rises in successive elevations to a distant mountain. In front of this prospect at the right, but without obscuring it, stands a gnarled oak-tree with sparse foliage, its top cut off by the upper edge of the picture. The tree, rooted at the rear of the foreground plane, leans impressively to the left and towards the spectator, overshadowing a road which leads from the right lower corner towards the stream and the rocky cave. A cart drawn by a white and a bay horse is seen from behind obliquely and close to: it is a vehicle of the South Netherlands type, laden with large quarried stones, and is negotiating with difficulty the slope leading down to the stream, which is no doubt fordable at this point. The cart is tilted to the left and is in imminent danger of capsizing. The driver on the white horse, in a whitish coat, is attempting to hold back the horses and looks round anxiously, while his mate, who is barefooted and wears a bright red jacket, is pushing at the cart to prevent it toppling over to the left. Both men are in straw hats. At the left edge of the rock a man and a woman can be seen in the darkness, warming themselves by a fire. Also to the left of the rock, and further away than the oak-tree on the right, whose roots are on this side of the stream, is a tall leafy tree. The two trees embrace the counter-diagonal which the cart, road and cave present to the strike- line of the rock and the stream flowing by; they thus enframe the cleft rock and the central motif of the cart on its toilsome journey from day into night. Two low pollard willows in front on the left are effective repoussoirs and emphasize the detail and depth of the foreground area, always so important in Rubens landscapes."--Adler, loc. cit.

"With reference to this painting Evers in 1942 discussed the question of landscapes presenting, as it were, two independent scenes. This form of composition, frequent in the 16th and early 17th centuries, was linked by Evers with the medieval type of stage which presented several structures simultaneously or consisted of juxtaposed carts with different superstructures. He pointed out that cyclic representations naturally lend themselves to compositions in two or more parts: morning and evening, day and night, the four seasons, the twelve months. An example of the correlation of life and death with summer and winter is pointed out by Evers in the Allegory of Life and Death in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum at Nuremberg, a work that originated c. 1480 in the region of Lake Constance under Franco-Flemish influence. This shows on the left a dead man in a landscape of trees that have lost their leaves, on the right an elegant young couple in a blooming landscape, and in the foreground two naked infants beside a spring."--Adler, loc. cit.

Antuerpiae [Antwerp] : Gillis Hendricx excud. cum privilegio, [between 1600 and 1699]

1 print : engraving ; platemark 33.5 x 45.7 cm

Ornatissimo viro Cornelio de Wael pictori in paruis maximo, ac genio eius munifico, amicorumque amico Martinus vanden Enden D.C.Q. Petrus P. Rubbens pinxit. S. à Bolswert sculpsit.

Wolfgang Adler, Corpus Rubenianum Ludwig Burchard, vol. XVIII, Landscapes and hunting scenes; part I: Landscapes, London 1982, no.19 ("Landscape with a cart crossing a ford, 'La charrette embourbée'"), pp. 80-82 and fig. 62 (the painting in the reverse direction to the present engraving)

Wellcome Collection 29903i

After a painting in the Hermitage, St Petersburg -- Adler loc. cit.