GIOVANNI COSTA 
my friends in Rome that Mr. Watts really thought a 
picture of mine worthy to hang in the National 
Gallery ? ” And when Mr. Watts himself confirmed 
the statement he replied, “ Then I shall die happy.” 
The master’s last days, we rejoice to think, were 
spent in peace and happiness. In his old studio of 
the Via Margutta, or in the more spacious rooms of 
the Palazzo Odescalchi, he lived, surrounded by his 
own sketches and the memorials of his artist friends, 
the portraits of his two daughters painted by Leighton 
and Alma-Tadema, and pictures or studies by Corot 
and Decamps, by Arnold Bocklin and Lenbach. But 
the fatigue and hardships which he had undergone 
during his different campaigns, and the cold nights 
which he had spent on the Campagna, had told upon 
his vigorous frame. He suffered from repeated attacks 
of arthritis and partly lost the use of one arm. 
“ Since my last illness,” he wrote with his stiffening 
hand, “ I paint for fewer hours at a time, but with 
greater intensity and deeper earnestness than before. 
Each movement gives me pain, but I realise the joy 
of overcoming this for love of my art. So I have at 
length found that great God who lives at the heart 
of things, and I seek with all my might to set forth 
that divine idea which lies at the root of art. And, 
burdened as I am with the weight of years, I take 
courage when I think of the many good friends and 
great painters whom I have known and loved, and my 
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