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that dogged his steps from Rome back to BS.le. At last 

 he went to Munich, where the distinguished novelist, 

 Paul Heyse, seems to have held out to him a friendly 

 and helping hand. Must one believe that success is 

 necessary to an artist? The fact is that Boecklin 

 never really became himself till his individuality was 

 recognised. His best works all belong to this latest 

 period, and his admirers hope for him an illustrious old 

 age. M. Edouard Rod adds : ' In looking at his later 

 works I thought, what a beautiful thing is old age when 

 it remains healthy, brave, and laborious. I thought of 

 those luminous evenings that sometimes are the end of 

 glorious summer days.' Boecklin's work will be all the 

 more interesting in the days that are to come, because it 

 is singularly devoid of French influence. In a closiug 

 sentence of an admirable article on the Millais Exhibi- 

 tion, Mr. Claude Phillips says : 'A vast wave, starting 

 from France as a centre, is now more or less rapidly 

 spreading itself over the whole expanse of the civilised 

 globe, enveloping even us, who, with a wise obstinacy, 

 most strenuously interposed our barriers of race and po- 

 sition as a defence. If it continues to advance, steady 

 and resistless as heretofore, will there not, before the next 

 century has spent half its course, be practically but one 

 art 1 ' But, as time goes on, will not individuality always 

 assert itself, and may we not hope for Boecklins in the 

 future who will struggle and be free of all schools, even 

 the French? 



July 13th. — After Bile I came back once more to 

 Cronberg. Nothing is so interesting, next to one's own 

 garden, as the gardens one knows weU, belonging to 

 one's friends, especially when they have very different 

 situations and soil. At Cronberg the soil is very strong 

 and tenacious, and bakes into a hard crust, about as 

 different to my Bagshot sand as can be imagined. In 



