![Pieter de Hooch - Paying the Hostess [c.1670] by Gandalf's Gallery](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7317/9083789030_305601e59f.jpg)
In this canvas of the mid-1670s, De Hooch depicts the familiar theme of a disputed reckoning, which as usual involves a soldier and an innkeeper. Here, however, the elegance of the officer and the shrewdness of the pretty hostess raise the subject to the level of social commentary in the artist's adopted city of Amsterdam.
[Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York - Oil on canvas, 94.6 x 111.1 cm]