142 LETTERS TO MARCO xxi 



from my intellect rather than from my heart. 

 I am quite sure the heart is the only true guide. 

 It is very sad at my age, but I suppose one 

 lives and learns even after fifty. You, my 

 dear Marco, have always succeeded best 

 when your subjects have dropped as it were 

 from the clouds to you. Pictures that run 

 straight off the reel at once, heart and hand 

 going together in the work, are always the 

 best a man produces. There is a lot of 

 fluking in the art, and I am quite sure when 

 we once begin to try and make a good picture 

 it is all up with it. The picture ought to 

 make itself if once rightly conceived. Pos- 

 sibly as we get older our inspirations grow- 

 less frequent ; anyhow, let us not grow sour 

 and crapulous. 



I long for an hour's chat with you in my 

 own studio, or in yours, as in old days, when 

 a visit from one of us to the other often cleared 

 away a lot of cobwebs of gloom and despond- 

 ency. Scarcely a D.B. ending, but forgive 

 and believe me, ever yours, G. D. L. 



