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come and see him on her return. Two years afterwards she appeared accompanied by her husband, who was restored to health and had found work in America, and repaid the money which Watts had lent her. When the painter asked what had led her to apply to a total stranger like himself, she replied, "The sight of your picture, Love and Life." She felt that the man who had painted that picture must have a heart overflowing with love and pity for sorrowing humanity, and the issue proved that she was right. And as in small things in SO great, Watts gave several of his noblest paintings without a thought to provincial museums and galleries. version of Love and Life went to New York; another to the Luxembourg, where it has been the object of the ut most admiration on the part of French critics; one replica of Love and Death, which had been valued at £3300, was presented to the city of Manchester; another important picture, Fata Morgana, was given to Leicester. Happy Warrior, that beautiful and inspired vision which is one of Watts's most popular works, was lent to an Exhibition at Munich, and finally allowed to remain there, at the urgent entreaty of the Bavarian artists, who could only afford to give a nominal price for the picture. And it was the same when, in 1897, the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul's were anxious to place one of the master's pictures in their great Cathedral. He had not been inside St. Paul's for fifty years, and knew none of the members of the Chapter personally; but when their request was laid before him, he never hesitated for a moment, and sent the following letter in reply:

The

All my work of the most serious intention and character has, for many long years, been dedicated to the nation, as it has been only in this way that I could do anything for the coun

try I love so well, and which I feel is drifting backwards in so many directions, especially in want of moral earnestness. Therefore, of course, anything I have done must be at the disposition of those who by weight of character or station have a right to dispose of the work. It would give me great satisfaction to have any of my efforts used for a good purpose and the idea of placing a picture in St. Paul's is in entire accordance with my views and objects, if all my works of this kind cannot be kept together, which no doubt is out of the question. But the objection is that an oil-painting requires as favorable a light and surrounding as can be obtained, and I do not think either condition could be found in St. Paul's. . . The experiment, however, might be tried, with the permission of the Dean and Chapter, with the large picture you mention, Time, Death, and Judgment, which will be at Whitechapel next week. If it should be thought advisable, I, of course, will waive any objection I could make, too happy, as I said before, to find my work placed where it may serve some good purpose.

It had been the painter's intention, had he lived to finish his great statues of Tennyson and Physical Energy, to paint a new version of Love Triumphant over Time and Death, which should hang under the dome of St. Paul's, opposite to the picture of Time, Death and Judgment, as the natural complement to the former subject. But the needful leisure never came; and to the end, as we know, the master was at work on the two colossal works which took up his whole time and strength during the last years of his life.

If England had treated her great painter with neglect and indifference at one period of his career, Watts took his revenge nobly. He gave her of his best, not only presenting the nation with that grand series of painted poems in which he delivered his message to the men of his generation, but the magnificent collection of portraits of contemporary heroes and statesmen,

poets, painters, authors and philanthropists, who have made England what she is to-day. The series is distinguished by what Mr. Swinburne once called "the splendid and imperishable excellence of sincerity and strength," and will prove a priceless treasure to future historians of the

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Victorian age. The same inborn sympathy with his fellow creatures, the same fine perception was the secret of his success in portrait-painting. had a wonderful way of reading the character of his sitters, of finding out their habits and thoughts, and of bringing the whole man before our eyes. So it is that he is able to represent men and women of the most different types and character, and show us in turn the intellectual refinement of Mr. George Meredith's countenance, the look of quiet courage and manly resolve on the face of Lord Roberts, the restless energy that lives in Gladstone's mobile features, or the gleam of romance and mystic poetry that lights up Burne-Jones' eye.

In this way Watts was brought into close relations with the most brilliant and distinguished personages of the age, and knew every one who was worth knowing in his time. Many were the stories which the old master had to tell of his sitters. Carlyle, who complained that Watts made him look like a mad laborer; Gladstone, who talked so much and was so eager to learn the painter's opinion on the burning questions of the hour, that his portrait proved a failure; Cecil Rhodes, who died before his picture was finished, but whose grave in the wild Matoppo Hills is to be adorned with a bronze cast of the great equestrian statue which he admired so much. In his candor and guilelessness Watts never shrank from giving his sitters good advice. He has been known to remonstrate with Cabinet Ministers for ill-timed speeches or actions which

he held to be unworthy of their exalted post. He told one artist that he ought to free himself from the foolish prejudices which hampered his work; and warned Rhodes solemnly to see that he was numbered among the makers, and not the marrers, of the nation. A thorough-going idealist himself, Watts expected his friends to live up to the level of their art, and was pained to see any inconsistencies in their .conduct. "Come, King Arthur would not have talked in that way," he said to Tennyson one day when the poet was in a more bearish mood than usual. But when the Laureate showed him his knotted and swollen fingers, he understood, and felt satisfied that it was "all the gout."

If his own life was clouded by heavy trials and disappointments at one period, the Fates made divine amends to him in the blessedness of his later days, and the companionship of his devoted wife shed a radiance over the great master's declining years. Under her wise and gentle rule, Limner's Lease, Watts's beautiful country home in Surrey, became a centre of gracious and kindly activities, an ideal retreat for a painter of his aims. Those who were privileged to spend a few days in this lovely spot will not soon forget the quiet charm of this little corner of earth which seemed to have dropped out of heaven. Visitors of distinction came from all parts of England and Europe, attracted by the fame of the great artist. No one ever failed to find a welcome there or was sent empty away. Watts had always been a brilliant talker-Gladstone more than once expressed his deliberate opinion that he was the best talker whom he had ever met-and the wisdom and experience of years combined with the freshness and enthusiasm of youth which he had retained in so marvellous a manner, gave a rare charm to his conversation in these latter years. He

read all the newest books and discussed their contents with vigor and animation. The poetry of William Watson and of Rudyard Kipling afforded him great delight, and the lastnamed poet's "Recessional" and "Seven Seas" appealed in an especial manner to his strong sense of patriotism. Tolstoy's earnestness and sincerity never failed to impress him, although he could not accept all his theories, and himself counted war among the inevitable evils of the world, and looked upon strife as "a necessary condition of human progress." Among contemporary foreign painters, Millet had long held the foremost place in his affections. The largeness and simplicity of the great French master's designs, the strong human interest of his work, had for Watts a powerful attraction; and while the tale of poor Millet's struggles and suffering moved him deeply, he always declared that he ought to be envied rather than pitied. There was much, he felt, in common between them, even the headaches from which they both suffered! Music, again, was an unfailing delight to him, especially that of Bach and Beethoven, whose "Marche Funèbre" was played at the memorial service at St. Paul's in the dead master's honor. Many years ago Watts painted a fine portrait of Dr. Joachim, the great violinist, and the last time that he appeared in public was at the memorable gathering in the Queen's Hall, when the Prime Minister, on behalf of a number of friends, presented Dr. Joachim with a portrait of himself painted by Mr. Sargent.

To the end of his life Watts took the keenest interest in political events, and followed every incident of the South African War with close attention. When his old friend Lord Dufferin's son was killed, he sent him a copy of The Happy Warrior with his letter of condolence, and rejoiced to

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learn how largely photographs of that picture and his Sir Galahad had sold during the war. Education was one of the subjects which interested him profoundly during these last years. was dissatisfied with the present system, and had plenty of theories of his own on the problem. Instead of cramming children with facts, he maintained that we ought to give them high ideals of life, and make them realize their responsibility to others. Above all, he was strongly of opinion that education should be distinctly religious in character. The young should be taught to remember that they are children of one Father, and to look on all mankind as brothers and sisters, to whom they owe a distinct duty. "I want to teach people how to live," he sometimes said, "how to make use of all their powers, to work and hope and enjoy life, not to be mere slaves and drudges, but to care for something higher than money-making and selfish pleasure." It was this interest in the youth of England which made him give the cartoon of his Sir Galahad to Eton College, where it hangs on the chapel walls, to remind Eton boys of the painter whose whole life was one long endeavor to fulfil the words of his chosen motto "The utmost for the highest."

With regard to artistic training Watts often said that he did not believe in teaching art, and that the best thing was to set good models before the student, and to inspire him with a great purpose which no disappointment or neglect could alter. His strong sense of the decay of national taste, and of the deplorable conditions under which the lives of large classes of people are spent, led him to take keen interest in the Home Arts and Industries Association. Both he and Mrs. Watts devoted large sums of money, as well as endless time and trouble, to this object, while Mrs. Watts raised

and decorated a mortuary chapel and founded a flourishing pottery in their own village of Compton. Another object which the great painter had much at heart was the effort to record the heroism of humble obscure lives which is often allowed to pass unnoticed. With this end in view, a few years ago, he gave a thousand pounds to erect a cloister in St. Botolph's, Aldersgate, commonly known as Postman's Park, which should contain memorial tablets of noble deeds done by English men and women in our own days, such as Alice Ayres, or the brave stewardess of the Stella.

Gambling was, in his eyes, the blackest of all vices, the curse of our nation, and it was against this sin, which is pictured on the wall behind his figure of the prophet Jonah, that his sternest denunciations were lifted. But, although he saw much to lament in the present state of his country, he never despaired of her future. The heart of the nation, he was convinced, still beat true, and nothing rejoiced him more than to hear the strong and hopeful words in which his friend and neighbor, Mr. George Meredith, expressed his firm belief in the great work which lay before the English race. In spite of passing moods of weariness and dejection, Watts himself remained an optimist at heart, strong in the unshaken faith and trust which he has set forth in so many noble with his paintings, and believing,

ranean, he frequently turned his attention to natural beauties. The mountains of Carrara and the jagged peaks of Mentone, the Bay of Naples and the banks of the Nile, the summit of Ararat and the hill of the Acropolis were the subject of some of his best landscapes in past days; but of late he has chiefly painted English scenery, the woods and meadows of his Surrey home, Green Summer, and Autumn Sunset, and many more of those exquisite little pieces which we saw from time to time in the New Gallery, as romantic in conception as they were fine in execution. "Every year that I live," he said to me not long ago, "I seem to realize more and more of the beauty and seriousness, the solemn grandeur of Nature."

All his life he had been frail and delicate, "a sickly lad and often a suffering man." Early in his career he realized that unless he devoted himself entirely to work, he should effect nothing. So he made a firm resolve to rise with the sun, live on the simplest fare, and avoid the distractions of society. By strictly keeping to this rule, and giving himself up to hard work from early dawn till dark, this delicate man has accomplished more than the strongest of us would dare to attempt. To the end he worked with the same unceasing ardor, planning new pictures on a grand scale, and undertaking colossal works at an age when other men feel they have a right to think only of rest. He was actually at work, putting the last touches to his great statue of Physical Energy, when the last call came, and a short illness closed the long and strenuous career. The Now the great life is over. master has laid down brush and chisel and is gone to his well-earned rest. Statesmen and painters, friends and fellow workers, many of the wisest and noblest in the land, met under the dome of the great Cathedral where his

picture hangs, to do honor to his memory, and the next day his ashes were laid to rest in the shadow of the fair chapel which loving hands had reared on the green Surrey hillside. On the most radiant of summer days we sang the "Nunc Dimittis" over his grave, and left him sleeping under the flowering lilies and tall elms of the home which he loved. In our blindness and ignorance we were loth to let him go. "We are, it must be owned, a little unreasonable," said another venerable painter, now the last survivor of all that brilliant group, on the morrow of his old friend's death.

The Monthly Review.

"A great

man is given to us, who does many mighty works, and we are allowed to keep him for a longer term of years than usual. And when the end comes, we complain because he is taken away, leaving a few unfinished works behind him." But there is no real cause for grief. Our beloved master is gone beyond the sound of human voices, but he has left us work that will not die and a memory that can never fade. His life will be an inspiration to many in the coming days, and his paintings and statues will live among the noblest monuments of art in this or any age. "Nothing is here for tears."

Julia Cartwright.

CHAPTER X.

HALL.

MID NIGHT VISITORS.

The sun was setting when we approached the lychgate, and the shadow of the old Hall reached down to us across the lawn and the flagged path.

We both started when Malachi's bent figure suddenly darted out from the gateway, his face wild, his manner full of excitement.

"He's here!" he cried hoarsely. "Turn about and go away if ye don't want to see 'un."

Dorothy stood stock still, but answered not a word.

"I knowed he'd track ye sooner or later," went on Malachi. "He's kept his word. I told him you was out; he said he knew you was and would come in and wait for 'ee. If I was you I'd make off to The Delf."

"He'd find me there," said she.

She spoke almost in a whisper, and her whole form wavered like a reed in

the wind. Looking in her face I seemed to distinguish the counterpart of the look which I had noted in that of the gentleman in black when she had smiled upon Sir Jocelyn-an expression of anger and despair-yet in her case it was mingled with, almost mastered by, a kind of terror. I was convinced that the mysterious "He" in question was no other than this stranger; his remarks to me, his excitement on hearing the name of Dorothy, his questioning of Stumpy, taken in conjunction with the words let fall by Malachi, pointed conclusively to his identity.

After a moment Dorothy began to move towards the house with an uncertain step; Malachi laid hold of her dress.

"You are never going in," he cried. "Indeed I am going in," said she. "I must see him. I must get it over, Malachi."

It seemed to me that in her voice was