This panel of about 1657 is one of the first works in which de Hooch employed linear perspective to assist in creating the typical Delft image of a realistic domestic interior. His earlier dependence upon figure groups, furniture, and contrasts of light and shadow to suggest three-dimensional space is evident here, incongruously in the case of the underscaled bed. Hints of de Hooch's association with Vermeer are found in the study of light on the woman to the left and in her reflection in the window. The French critic Thoré-Bürger attributed the picture to Vermeer in articles of 1864 and 1866.

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