George Morland 



behind their house and took " pot-shots " at each other with pistols 

 and slugs. Fortunately they seem to have been delightfully bad 

 marksmen, and no more serious consequences ensued than a break- 

 up of the household, and the necessary separation of the two 

 couples. 



George and Mrs. Morland set up a new home at Camden Town, 

 and the young artist now devoted himself seriously to his work. 

 Indeed, to do him justice, Morland had never lacked industry, though 

 being of the artistic temperament, to which many things are 

 allowed, it was of a spasmodic character, and alternated with brief 

 periods of idle amusements. Since leaving Margate he had painted 

 his charming pictures of the Idle and Industrious Mechanic, the 

 Idle Laundress, and the Industrious Cottager, as well as his 

 famous and delightful " Letitia " series. These last represent the 

 progress of a young girl from a state of country innocence through 

 the various stages of depravity, until she returns broken-hearted 

 and penitent to her parents. There is no doubt that his wife was 

 the model for these as for many other of his pictures, and they 

 prove her to have been of unusual beauty with the additional charm 

 of a sweet expression. With soft brown eyes, clear-cut and 

 delicately-moulded features, a full and rounded chin, and a graceful 

 figure, she was worthy of Morland's genius by which she has 

 been immortalised. In studying the life of Morland one feels a 

 great respect and a deep pity for this elegant and charming woman, 

 who was faithful to her husband through all the years of his 

 wildness and his heedless extravagance, of his dissolute habits, his 

 debts and endless difficulties, and his moral degeneration. Many a 

 night her pillow must have been wet with weeping when George 

 was away from home on one of his mad escapades, or lying by her 

 side sleeping off the results of a heavy drinking bout. And yet, to 

 be as just as we can to Morland, it must be said that in spite of 

 all his weaknesses and folly he was not ungrateful for the constant 

 love of a good woman, and all that was best in him was his 

 devotion to his wife. 



It was at Camden Road that he began to paint the pictures 

 which first made him famous. These were his charming illustrations 

 of child-Hfe and domesticity, beginning with his well-known picture 



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