Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
file which includes the original illustrations.
See 30262-h.htm or 30262-h.zip:
(https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/30262/pg30262-images.html)
or
(https://www.gutenberg.org/files/30262/30262-h.zip)
FREDERIC LORD LEIGHTON
Late President of the Royal Academy of Arts
An Illustrated Record of His Life and Work
by
ERNEST RHYS
[Illustration: _Winding the Skein._
_By permission of the Fine Art Society._
_F. Leighton. pinxt._
_Swan Electric Engraving Co. Sc._]
George Bell & Sons
London: George Bell & Sons
1900
First Published, super-royal, 4to, 1895.
Second Edition, revised, colombier 8vo, 1898.
Third Edition, revised, crown 8vo, 1900.
Publishers' Note to Third Edition
The reception given to previous editions of this work encourages the
publishers to hope that a re-issue in a smaller form may be appreciated.
The present volume is reprinted with a few alterations and corrections
from the second edition published in 1898. A chapter on "Lord Leighton's
House in 1900," by Mr. S. Pepys Cockerell, has been added.
The publishers take the opportunity to repeat their acknowledgments of
assistance most kindly given by numerous owners and admirers of the
artist's work. By the gracious consent of H.M. the Queen, the _Cimabue_
in the Buckingham Palace collection, is here reproduced. Especial thanks
are also due to Lord Davey, Lord Hillingdon, Lord Rosebery, Mrs.
Dyson-Perrins, the late Mr. Alfred Morrison, Sir Bernhard Samuelson, Lady
Hallé, Mr. Alex. Henderson, Mr. Francis Reckitts, the late Sir Henry
Tate, the Birmingham and Manchester Corporations, and the President and
Council of the Royal Academy, who have kindly permitted the reproduction
of pictures in their possession. To the late Lord Leighton himself the
author and publishers have to acknowledge their indebtedness for a
large number of studies and sketches, hitherto unpublished, as well as
for his kind co-operation in the preparation of the volume. The author
wishes also to record his thanks to Mr. M. H. Spielmann for permission
to use his admirable account of the President's method of painting.
By arrangement with the holders of several important copyrights,
including Messrs. Thos. Agnew and Sons, P. and D. Colnaghi and Co.,
H. Graves and Co., Arthur Tooth and Sons, the Society for Promoting
Christian Knowledge, the proprietors of the Art Journal, the Berlin
Photographic Company, and the Fine Art Society (whose courtesies in the
matter are duly credited in the list of illustrations), the publishers
have been enabled to represent many of the most popular paintings by the
artist, and a selection of his famous designs for Dalziel's Bible
Gallery.
Contents
PAGE
CHAPTER I. HIS EARLY YEARS 3
II. YEAR BY YEAR--1855 TO 1864 12
III. YEAR BY YEAR--1864 TO 1869 21
IV. YEAR BY YEAR--1870 TO 1878 28
V. YEAR BY YEAR--1878 TO 1896 39
VI. HIS METHOD OF PAINTING 54
VII. MURAL DECORATION, SCULPTURE, AND ILLUSTRATION 61
VIII. DISCOURSES ON ART 71
IX. LORD LEIGHTON'S HOME 88
X. LORD LEIGHTON'S HOUSE IN 1900. BY S. PEPYS COCKERELL 92
XI. THE ARTIST AND HIS CRITICS 103
XII. CONCLUSION 115
APPENDIX I. CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF WORKS 121
II. LIST OF LANDSCAPES AND STUDIES SOLD AT CHRISTIE'S
(JULY, 1896) 132
INDEX 137
List of Illustrations
I. FIGURE SUBJECTS.
PAGE
WINDING THE SKEIN _Frontispiece_
_By permission of the Fine Art Society._
(_Photogravure plate._)
CIMABUE'S MADONNA 10
_By the gracious permission of Her Majesty the Queen._
GOLDEN HOURS 21
_By the kind permission of Lord Davey._
HELEN OF TROY 22
_By permission of Messrs. H. Graves and Co._
ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE 22
_By the kind permission of Francis Reckitts, Esq._
VENUS DISROBING FOR THE BATH 24
_By the kind permission of Alexander Henderson, Esq._
ELECTRA AT THE TOMB OF AGAMEMNON 24
DÆDALUS AND ICARUS 26
_By the kind permission of Alexander Henderson, Esq._
ST. JEROME 26
_By the kind permission of the President and Council of
the Royal Academy of Arts._
HERCULES WRESTLING WITH DEATH FOR THE BODY OF ALCESTIS 30
_By the kind permission of Sir Bernhard Samuelson._
SUMMER MOON 30
_By the kind permission of the late Alfred Morrison, Esq.,
from the photogravure published by Messrs. P. and D.
Colnaghi and Co._
THE JUGGLING GIRL 32
_By the kind permission of Lord Hillingdon._
A CONDOTTIERE 32
_By permission of the Corporation of Birmingham._
THE DAPHNEPHORIA 34
_By permission of the Fine Art Society._
NAUSICAA 38
SISTER'S KISS 40
_By permission of the Fine Art Society._
PHRYNE AT ELEUSIS 42
_By permission of the late Lord Leighton._
DAY DREAMS 42
_By permission of the Fine Art Society._
CYMON AND IPHIGENIA 44
_By permission of the Fine Art Society._
(_Photogravure plate._)
THE LAST WATCH OF HERO 46
_By permission of the Corporation of Manchester._
GREEK GIRLS PLAYING AT BALL 48
_By permission of the Berlin Photographic Company._
THE BATH OF PSYCHE 48
_By permission of the Berlin Photographic Company._
FAREWELL 50
_By permission of Messrs. A. Tooth and Sons._
"AND THE SEA GAVE UP THE DEAD WHICH WERE IN IT" 50
_By the kind permission of Sir Henry Tate._
THE FRIGIDARIUM 50
_By permission of Messrs. H. Graves and Co._
RIZPAH 52
_By permission of Messrs. Cassell and Co._
THE BRACELET 52
_By permission of Messrs. T. Agnew and Sons._
FATIDICA 52
_By permission of Messrs. T. Agnew and Sons._
A BACCHANTE 54
_By permission of Messrs. H. Graves and Co._
HIT 54
_By permission of the proprietors of the "Art Journal."_
EGYPTIAN SLINGER 112
_By the kind permission of Lord Davey._
ELISHA AND THE SHUNAMITE'S SON 114
_By the kind permission of Mrs. Dyson-Perrins._
"... SERENELY WANDERING IN A TRANCE OF SOBER THOUGHT" 128
II. LANDSCAPES, ETC.
GARDEN AT GENERALIFE, GRANADA 28
MIMBAR OF THE GREAT MOSQUE AT DAMASCUS 28
FOUNTAIN IN COURT AT DAMASCUS 132
THE ISLAND OF ÆGINA, PNYX IN THE FOREGROUND 132
RUINED MOSQUE, BROUSSA 134
CITY OF TOMBS, ASSIOUT, EGYPT 134
ATHENS, WITH THE GENOESE TOWER, PNYX IN FOREGROUND 136
COAST OF ASIA MINOR SEEN FROM RHODES 136
RED MOUNTAINS DESERT, CAIRO 136
III. PORTRAITS.
PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST. (In the Uffizi Gallery, Florence) 3
PORTRAIT OF THE HON. MABEL MILLS 36
_By the kind permission of Lady Hillingdon._
PORTRAIT OF CAPTAIN (SIR) RICHARD BURTON 36
PORTRAIT OF SIGNOR COSTA 40
PORTRAIT OF THE LADY SYBIL PRIMROSE 46
_By the kind permission of Lord Rosebery._
IV. STUDIES AND SKETCHES.
TWO EARLY PENCIL STUDIES 6
SCHEME FOR A PICTURE, "THE PLAGUE IN FLORENCE" 8
STUDY FOR A HEAD--"THE DEAD ROMEO" 14
A PENCIL STUDY 16
A LEMON TREE. (A pencil study) 18
BYZANTINE WELL-HEAD. (A pencil study) 18
STUDY FOR "THE DAPHNEPHORIA" 34
STUDY FOR "ELIJAH IN THE WILDERNESS" 38
STUDY FOR "CAPTIVE ANDROMACHE" (nude) 56
STUDY FOR A FIGURE IN "CAPTIVE ANDROMACHE" 56
STUDY FOR "ANDROMACHE" 56
STUDY FOR "PERSEUS AND ANDROMEDA" 58
STUDY FOR A FIGURE IN "THE BATH OF PSYCHE" 58
STUDY FOR "SOLITUDE" 58
STUDY FOR A FIGURE IN "THE RETURN OF PERSEPHONE" 60
STUDY FOR "PERSEPHONE" 60
STUDIES FOR THE DECORATION OF THE CEILING OF A MUSIC ROOM 62
CAIN AND ABEL { }
MOSES VIEWS THE PROMISED LAND { From Dalziel's }
SAMSON AND THE LION { "Bible Gallery" } 70
SAMSON CARRYING OFF THE GATES { }
_By permission of Messrs. J. S. Virtue and Co. and the
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge._
"A CONTRAST" 72
A STUDY IN OILS. (Head of a girl, back view) 74
HEAD OF A YOUNG GIRL. (A Study in oils) 76
_By the kind permission of Lady Hallé._
STUDY OF A HEAD 78
STUDY OF A HEAD 80
A STUDY IN OILS. (Head of a girl) 82
V. FRESCOES, WALL PAINTINGS, ETC.
TWO FRIEZES--MUSIC, THE DANCE 44
DECORATION FOR THE CEILING OF A MUSIC ROOM 62
THE INDUSTRIAL ARTS OF WAR. (From the fresco at South
Kensington Museum) 64
THE INDUSTRIAL ARTS OF PEACE. (From the fresco at South
Kensington Museum) 64
CUPID. (From a fresco) 66
PHOENICIANS BARTERING WITH BRITONS. (Panel in the Royal
Exchange) 66
VI. SCULPTURE.
AN ATHLETE STRUGGLING WITH A PYTHON. (Bronze statue, from
two points of view) 68
STUDY IN CLAY FOR "CYMON" 68
STUDY IN CLAY FOR "THE SLUGGARD" 68
STUDY IN CLAY FOR "PERSEUS" 68
STUDY IN CLAY FOR "ANDROMEDA" 68
DESIGN FOR REVERSE OF THE JUBILEE MEDALLION (1887) 130
VII. LORD LEIGHTON'S HOUSE.
IN THE INNER HALL. (From a photograph taken specially
by Mr. James Hyatt) 88
IN THE ARAB HALL. (From a photograph by Messrs. Bedford,
Lemere, and Co.) 96
BOOKPLATE OF LORD LEIGHTON. (Designed by R. Anning Bell) 120
_With four exceptions all the reproductions are by the Swan
Electric Engraving Company._
FREDERIC LORD LEIGHTON, P.R.A.
LIST OF DIGNITIES AND HONOURS CONFERRED
ON FREDERIC LEIGHTON.
Knighted, 1878; created a Baronet, 1886; created Baron Leighton of
Stretton, 1896; elected Associate of the Royal Academy, 1864; Royal
Academician, 1869; President of the Royal Academy, 1878; Hon. Mem. Royal
Scottish Academy, and Royal Hibernian Academy, Associate of the
Institute of France, President of the International Jury of Painting,
Paris Exhibition, 1878; Hon. Member, Berlin Academy, 1886; also Member
of the Royal Academy of Vienna, 1888, Belgium, 1886, of the Academy of
St. Luke, Rome, and the Academies of Florence (1882), Turin, Genoa,
Perugia, and Antwerp (1885); Hon. D.C.L., Oxford, 1879; Hon. LL.D.,
Cambridge, 1879; Hon. LL.D., Edinburgh, 1884; Hon. D.Lit., Dublin, 1892;
Hon. D.C.L., Durham, 1894; Hon. Fellow of Trinity College, London, 1876;
Lieut.-Colonel of the 20th Middlesex (Artists') Rifle Volunteers, 1876
to 1883 (resigned); then Hon. Colonel and holder of the Volunteer
Decoration; Commander of the Legion of Honour, 1889; Commander of the
Order of Leopold; Knight of the Prussian Order "pour le Mérite," and of
the Coburg Order Dem Verdienste.
[Illustration: PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST (1881)
_Painted for the Uffizi Gallery_]
FREDERIC LORD LEIGHTON, P.R.A.
AN ILLUSTRATED CHRONICLE
CHAPTER I
HIS EARLY YEARS
To Italy, at whose liberal well-head English Art has so often renewed
itself, we turn naturally for an opening to this chronicle of a great
English artist's career. Frederic Leighton was the painter of our time
who strove hardest to keep alive an Italian ideal of beauty in London;
therefore it is in Italy, the Italy of Raphael and Angelo and his
favourite Giotteschi, that we must seek the true beginnings of his art.
London made its first acquaintance with him and his painting in 1855,
when the picture, _Cimabue's Madonna carried in Procession through the
Streets of Florence_, startled the Royal Academy, and proved that a
'prentice work could be in its way something of a masterpiece. This
picture, the work of an unknown young artist of twenty-five, painted
chiefly in Rome, showed at once a new force and a new quality, and in
its singular feeling for certain of the archaic Italian schools, showed,
too, where for the moment the sympathies of the painter really lay. How
far the potentiality disclosed in it was developed during the forty
years following, how far the ideals in art, which it seemed to declare,
were pursued or departed from, the Royal Academy year by year is
witness. Here, before we turn to consider the history of those later
years, we shall find it interesting to use this first picture as an
index to that period of probation, which is so often the most
interesting part of an artist's history. In accounting for it, and
finding out the determining experiences of the artist's pupilage, we
shall account, also, for much that came after. Although Frankfort and
Paris play their part, the formative influences of that early period, we
shall find, carry us chiefly, and again and again, into Italy.
Frederic Leighton was born on the 3rd of December, 1830, at Scarborough,
the son of a medical practitioner. His father, Dr. Frederic Leighton,
was also the son of a physician who was knighted for eminence in his
profession. Thus we have two generations of medicine and culture in the
family; but there is no sign of art, or love for art, before the third.
This generation produced three children, all devoted to the graphic arts
and to music, of whom the boy, Frederic was the eldest.
A word or two more must be given to his forbears, on grounds of
character and heredity, before we pass. Sir James Leighton, the
grandfather, was Physician to the Court at St. Petersburg, where he
served in succession Alexander the First, and Nicholas, with whom he was
on terms of considerable intimacy. His son, Dr. Frederic Leighton, who
promised to be a still more brilliant practioner, was educated at
Stonyhurst, but after taking his M.D. degree at Edinburgh, just as he
was rapidly acquiring the highest professional reputation, contracted a
cold that led to a partial deafness. This made it impossible for him to
go on practising with safety, and retiring to his study he turned from
physical to metaphysical pursuits. In spite of his deafness, as severe
an embargo on social reputation as can well be laid, Dr. Leighton is
said to have been equally noted among his friends for his keen
intellectual quality and his urbanity.
To be the son of his father, then, counted for something in our hero's
career. Even in art, which Dr. Leighton did not care for particularly,
the boy had very great opportunities. Before he was ten years old, he
went abroad with his mother, who was in ill health; and already he had
shown such decided signs of the _furor pingendi_ during a chance visit
to Mr. Lance's studio in Paris, that it is without surprise that we hear
of him in 1840 as taking drawing lessons from Signor F. Meli, at Rome.
During these early travels the boy's sketch books were full (we are
told) of precociously clever things. The climacteric moment came early
in his career. At Florence, in 1844, when he was fourteen, he delivered
himself of a sort of boyish ultimatum to his father, who, after taking
counsel of Hiram Powers, the American sculptor, wisely gave the boy his
wish, and decided to let him be an artist. Powers when asked, "Shall I
make him an artist?" exclaimed in no uncertain terms, "Sir, you have no
choice in the matter, he is one already;" and on further question, the
father being anxious about the boy's possibilities, said, "He may become
as eminent as he pleases."
Few art students of our time appear to have encountered more fortunate
conditions, on the whole, than did Frederic Leighton in the years
immediately following. The Florentine school of fifty years ago,
however, was not the best for a beginner. It was full of mannerisms,
which a boy of that age was sure to pick up, and exaggerate on his own
account. At that time Bezzuoli and Servolini were the great lights and
directors of the Academy of the Fine Arts, and they delighted,
naturally, in so able and so apt a pupil; that he found it hard to shake
off their teaching becomes evident later.
Those who had the good fortune at any time to have heard Lord Leighton
describe his early wanderings in Europe, must have been struck by the
warmth of his tribute to Johann Eduard Steinle, the Frankfort master,
who did more than any other to correct his style, and to decide the
whole future bent of his art.
Steinle, whose name is barely known to us in England, was one of that
remarkable school of painters, called familiarly "the Nazarenes,"
because of their religious range of subjects, who were inspired
originally by Overbeck and Pfühler. Leighton in recent years described
him as "an intensely fervent Catholic;" a man of most striking
personality, and of most courtly manners, whose influence upon younger
men was fairly magnetic. In the case of this particular pupil,
certainly, his intervention was of most powerful effect. Religious in
his methods, as well as in his sentiment of art, the florid
insincerities and mannerisms of the Florentine Academy, as they were
still to be seen in the young Leighton's work, found in him an admirable
chastener, but it took many years of painfully hard work, lasting until
1852, to undo the evil wrought by decadent Florence.
Prior to this fortunate intercourse with Steinle, the student had an old
acquaintance with Frankfort, which, like Florence, seemed destined to
play a great part in his history. Before going to Florence, and deciding
on his artistic career, in 1844, he had been sent to school in
Frankfort. He returned there from Florence to resume his general
education, and on leaving at seventeen, went for a year to the
Städtelsches Institut.
[Illustration: TWO EARLY PENCIL STUDIES]
In 1848 he went to Brussels, and worked there for a time without any
master, painting the first picture that deserves to be remembered.
Characteristically enough, this depicted _Cimabue finding Giotto in the
fields of Florence_. The shepherd boy is engaged in drawing the figure
of a lamb upon a smooth rock, using a piece of coal for pencil; an
admirable and precocious piece of work. At the time it was first shown
it was considered especially good in its harmonious and original
colouring, nor did a sight of it in 1896 at the Winter Exhibition of the
Royal Academy contradict the generous verdict of contemporary critics.
At Brussels he painted a portrait of himself, a notable thing of its
kind, wherein we see a slight, dark youth, with a face of much charm and
distinction, whose features one easily sees to be like those of later
portraits. Then, immediately before the return to Frankfort, and the
studying there, under Steinle, Leighton spent some months in Paris,
working in an atelier in the Rue Richer.
The conditions of this most informal of life-schools were such as Henri
Murger, who was alive and writing at the time, might have approved, but
were hardly to be called educative in any higher sense. The only master
that these Bohemians could boast was a very invertebrate old artist, who
seems to have been the soul of politeness and irresponsibility, and who
accompanied every weak criticism with the deprecatory conclusion, "Voilà
mon opinion!"
"M. Voilà mon opinion!" is a type not unknown otherwhere than in that
Paris atelier. A fine alterative the student must have found the severe
and stringent tonics that Steinle prescribed immediately afterwards in
Frankfort.
In the admirable monograph on "Sir Frederic Leighton" by Mrs. Andrew
Lang, from which we have drawn on occasion in these pages, an
interesting account is given of an exploit at Darmstadt, in which the
young artist took a chief part. An artists' festival was to be held
there, and Sir Frederic and one of his fellow-students, Signor Gamba,
took it into their heads to paint a picture for the occasion on the
walls of an old ruined castle near the town. The design was speedily
sketched after the most approved mediæval fashion, and no time was lost
in executing the work. "The subject was a knight standing on the
threshold of the castle, welcoming the guests, while in the centre of
the picture was Spring, receiving the representatives of the three arts,
all of them caricatures of well-known figures. In one corner were the
two young artists themselves, surveying the pageant. The Schloss where
this piece was painted is still in existence, and the Grand Duke has
lately erected a wooden roof over the painting, to preserve it from
destruction."
Before leaving Frankfort, Leighton had already interested Steinle in his
projected picture of _Cimabue's Madonna_, and the design for it was made
under Steinle's direction. Under his direct influence, too, and inspired
by Boccaccio, another Florentine picture--a cartoon of its great
plague--was painted. In speaking of the dramatic treatment of its
subject, Mrs. Lang describes "the contrast between the merry revellers
on one side of the picture and the death-cart and its pile of corpses on
the other, while in the centre is the link between the two--a
terror-stricken woman attempting to escape with her baby from the
pestilence-stricken city. We shall look in vain among the President's
later works for any picture with a similar _motif_. In general he shared
Plato's opinion--that violent passions are unsuitable subjects for art;
not so much because the sight of them is degrading, as because what is
at once hideous and transitory in its nature should not be
perpetuated."
[Illustration: SCHEME FOR A PICTURE: THE PLAGUE IN FLORENCE]
We have seen how the spirit and sentiment of Italy continually remained
by the artist in his German studio, and how in Frankfort his artistic
imagination returned again and again to Florence, and to the early
Florentines of his particular adoration--Cimabue and Giotto. The recall
to Italy came inevitably, as Steinle's teaching at last had fully worked
its purpose. Steinle himself counselled the move, and gave his favourite
pupil an introduction to Cornelius in Rome. It was to Rome, therefore,
and not to Florence, that the young artist went--to Rome where sooner or
later the steps of all men who work for art or for religion tend, and
where so few stay. This was in 1852, the year which was represented in
the Commemorative Exhibition at Burlington House by _A Persian Pedlar_,
a small full-length figure of a man in Oriental costume, seated
cross-legged on a divan, with a long pipe in his hand. To 1853 belongs a
_Portrait of Miss Laing_ (Lady Nias), which was shown again at the same
time.
The Rome of the mid-century was Rome at its best, with much artistic
stimulus of the present, as well as of the past. The English colony was
particularly strong. Thackeray was there, moving about after his wont in
the studios and salons; the Brownings were there, and in their prime.
The young painter and his work, including the _Cimabue's Madonna_ in its
earlier stages, made a great impression on Thackeray, who turned prophet
for once on the strength of it. On returning to London and meeting
Millais, he prophesied gaily to that ardent Pre-Raphaelite, then
marching on from success to success: "Millais! my boy, I have met in
Rome a versatile young dog called Leighton, who will one of these days
run you hard for the presidentship!" This was early days for such a
rumour to reach the Academy, who knew an older school, represented by
Landseer and Eastlake, and a younger school, represented by Millais and
Rossetti, but as yet knew not Leighton.
Among the leading artists in Rome at this time, beside Cornelius, were
the two French painters, Bouguereau and Gerome. To these, especially to
Bouguereau, who was a great believer in "scientific composition,"
Leighton was, on his own testimony, largely indebted for his fine sense
of form. Yet another famous Frenchman, Robert Fleury, whom he afterwards
met in Paris, may be mentioned here, since from him he learnt much in
the way of colouring, and the technique of his art.
Turning from the painters to the poets, it was at Rome that Robert
Browning, who was at this time writing his "Men and Women," formed close
acquaintance with the young artist. Something of the atmosphere which
permeates such poems as "Bishop Blougram's Apology," "Andrea del Sarto,"
and others of the same series, seems to linger yet in the record of
those early meetings of poets and painters, with all their associations:
"The Vatican,
Greek busts, Venetian paintings, Roman walls,
And English books."
One easily supposes Browning speaking through his Bishop Blougram, as,
it is said, he was heard to speak in those days in praise of Correggio,
to whose qualities, Ruskin tells us, Sir Frederic Leighton curiously
approximates:
"'Twere pleasant could Correggio's fleeting glow
Hang full in face of one where'er one roams,
Since he more than the others brings with him
Italy's self--the marvellous Modenese!"
Italy's self, in truth, Frederic Leighton, like Browning in poetry,
did not fail to bring with him, and revived for us for many years, by
his art and southern glow of colour, in the gray heart of London.
[Illustration: CIMABUE'S MADONNA CARRIED IN PROCESSION THROUGH THE STREETS
OF FLORENCE (1855)]
Among other people whom Leighton met in Rome were George Sand, Mrs.
Kemble, George Mason the painter, of _Harvest Moon_ fame, Gibson the
sculptor, and Lord Lyons. Like Robert Browning, let us add, he was
readily responsive to the quickening of his contemporaries, and
vigorously studied the present in order that he might the better paint
the past, and put live souls into the archaic raiment of Cimabue and old
Florence.
He was working hard all this while, with a devotion and concentration
that impressed other friends beside Thackeray, upon his picture of
_Cimabue's Madonna_, which was exhibited in the Academy of 1855, and as
the work of an unknown hand made a distinct sensation. It was discussed,
angrily by some, delightedly by others. The criticism which Rossetti,
Mr. Ruskin, and other critics bestowed upon it in the press or in
private correspondence[1] will come more fitly into our later pages,
when we turn to deal with contemporary opinions upon Leighton's work.
Enough to say here that it won fame for the artist at a stroke. The
Queen bought it for £600, having bespoken it, I believe, before it left
his studio, and hung it eventually in Buckingham Palace. With this
encouraging first great success, the probationary stage of our artist's
history may be said to close.