British sovereigns were painted--were monumental effigies
well and correctly drawn, with date, length of reign,
remarkable events written underneath, these worthy objects
would be attained--intellectual exercise, decoration of space,
and instruction to the public.

The year 1848 was a critical time for Watts; his first allegorical
picture, "Time and Oblivion," was painted, and, in the year following,
"Life's Illusions" appeared on the walls of the famous Academy which
contained the first works of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Watts was
not of the party, though he might have been had he desired; he preferred
independence.

Watts' personal life was at this time pervaded by the influence of Lord
and Lady Holland, who, having returned from Florence to London, had him
as a constant visitor to Holland House. In 1850 he went to live at The
Dower House, an old building in the fields of Kensington. There, as a
guest of the Prinsep family, he set up as a portrait painter. His host
and family connections were some of the first to sit for him; and he
soon gained fame in this class of work.

There was a temporary interruption in 1856, when a journey to the East,
in company with Sir Charles Newton, for the purpose of opening the
buried Temple of Mausolus at Halicarnassus, gave Watts further insight
into the old Greek world; and, one cannot but think, stimulated his
efforts, later so successful, in depicting for us so many incidents in
classical lore. We have, in a view of a mountainous coast called "Asia
Minor," and another, "The Isle of Cos," two charming pictorial records
of this important expedition. The next six years of the artist's life
were spent as a portrait painter; not, indeed, if one may say so, as a