failures, and in 1844, being thoroughly dissatisfied with Tasmanian
society, he presented a memorial to the governor of the settlement, Sir
John Eardley Wilmot, praying for a ticket-of-leave. In it he speaks of
himself as being 'tormented by ideas struggling for outward form and
realisation, barred up from increase of knowledge, and deprived of the
exercise of profitable or even of decorous speech.' His request,
however, was refused, and the associate of Coleridge consoled himself by
making those marvellous _Paradis Artificiels_ whose secret is only known
to the eaters of opium. In 1852 he died of apoplexy, his sole living
companion being a cat, for which he had evinced at extraordinary
affection.

His crimes seem to have had an important effect upon his art. They gave
a strong personality to his style, a quality that his early work
certainly lacked. In a note to the _Life of Dickens_, Forster mentions
that in 1847 Lady Blessington received from her brother, Major Power, who
held a military appointment at Hobart Town, an oil portrait of a young
lady from his clever brush; and it is said that 'he had contrived to put
the expression of his own wickedness into the portrait of a nice, kind-
hearted girl.' M. Zola, in one of his novels, tells us of a young man
who, having committed a murder, takes to art, and paints greenish
impressionist portraits of perfectly respectable people, all of which
bear a curious resemblance to his victim. The development of Mr.
Wainewright's style seems to me far more subtle and suggestive. One can
fancy an intense personality being created out of sin.--_Pen, Pencil and
Poison_.