worth while--but certainly the "Little White Girl," which was not
rejected at the Salon of '63, was, I am forced to say, not "inspired
by the following lines of Swinburne," for the one simple reason that
those lines were only written, in my studio, after the picture was
painted. And the writing of them was a rare and graceful tribute from
the poet to the painter--a noble recognition of work by the production
of a nobler one!

Again, of the many tales concerning the hanging at the Academy of the
well-known portrait of the artist's mother, now at the Luxembourg, one
is true--let us trust your gentleman may have time to find it
out--that I may correct it. I surely may always hereafter rely on the
_Morning Post_ to see that no vulgar Woking joke reach me?

It is my marvelous privilege then to come back, as who should say,
while the air is still warm with appreciation, affection, and regret,
and to learn in how little I had offended. The continuing to wear my
own hair and eyebrows, after distinguished confrères and eminent
persons had long ceased their habit, has, I gather, clearly given
pain. This, I see, is much remarked on. It is even found inconsiderate
and unseemly in me, as hinting at affectation.

I might beg you, sir, to find a pretty place for this, that I would
make my apology, containing also promise, in years to come, to lose
these outer signs of vexing presumption.

Protesting, with full enjoyment of its unmerited eulogy, against your
premature tablet, I ask you again to contradict it, and appeal to your
own sense of kind sympathy when I tell you I learn that I have lurking
in London still "a friend"--though for the life of me I cannot