LXXXII

To work on the _Ladye_. Found part of the drapery bad, rubbed it out,
heightened the seat she sits on, mended the heads again; did a great
deal, but not finished yet. Any one might be surprised to read how I
work whole days on an old drawing done many years since, and which I
have twice worked over since it was rejected from the Royal Academy in
'47, and now under promise of sale to White for £20. But I cannot help
it. When I see a work going out of my hands, it is but natural, if I see
some little defect, that I should try to mend it, and what follows is
out of my power to direct: if I give one touch to a head, I give myself
three days' work, and spoil it half-a-dozen times over.

_Ford Madox Brown._


LXXXIII

In literature as in art the rough sketches of the masters are made for
connoisseurs, not for the vulgar crowd.

_A. Préault._


LXXXIV

It is true sketches, or such drawings as painters generally make for
their works, give this pleasure of imagination to a high degree. From a
slight, undetermined drawing, where the ideas of the composition and