xxv RIVERSIDE LETTERS 199 



then in every respect than it did on its second 

 appearance. I feel sure that the trouble that 

 Landseer had over this picture did more than 

 anything else to hasten his death. It had 

 been in his studio for so many years that 

 some of the personages portrayed in it were 

 dead and the others of course greatly altered ; 

 he had worked on the faces from time to time, 

 often without nature, and had made so many 

 alterations that the surface was utterly ruined, 

 the freshly added colour sinking in and 

 becoming opaque and heavy a few days after 

 it was put on. He used to scrape out with 

 bits of glass, which were broken to a curved 

 scimitar shape, and the floor in front of this 

 picture was frequently covered with paint 

 scrapings. 



This picture was not sent to the Academy 

 until the day before the Private View ; it 

 arrived quite early in the morning, when the 

 servants were cleaning the rooms. Sir Edwin 

 asked me to accompany him, to see his work 

 in its place, and we drove to the Academy 



