INTRODUCTION xxxvii

now inspector of the Academy at Venice, and that the Historical Society of Venice had just made me a member last month, so I can get anything done that I want almost. And I find so much more beauty than I used to, because I had never time to look for it rightly, doing the technical work of the Stones, but now I see such beautiful things everywhere, and I’m doing pretty things; but, oh dear, they take such a time to do well, and the houses have got so many windows in them !”

“(September 19.)-I’ve been having a quite glorious day with St. Ursula, and am really enjoying my Venice,-the weather delicious and the after-dinner lazy evenings about Murano are exquisite. I enjoy all my meals and sleep sound, and am doing really things that please me....

“Fancy having St. Ursula right down on the floor in a good light and leave to lock myself in with her. ... There she lies, so real, that when the room’s quite quite, I get afraid of waking her! ...

“Then there’s the one of St. Ursula asleep-that other way¹-which was up so high I never found it out till this time. It has been terribly injured, and wants securing to the canvas, and the Academy, like our own [National Gallery], can’t get money from the Government. So I’ve offered to bear all the expense of its repairing, on condition it is brought down where people can see it; and I think they’ll do it!-at all events they’re grateful for the offer.”

“(October 24.)-I have not the least idea at present when I shall get home, for I am determined I will not leave this St. Mark’s school drawing unfinished-if time or patience will do it. I am painting it against Canaletto, and it is of real importance to all my past writings. But the work in it is terrible, and the last fortnight has shown less and less for every day, as the difficulty of finishing increases, I find towards the end, quite beyond calculation. On St. Ursula I find I may still put any quantity of work I choose, but must stop some day or other.

“I am very thankful to find myself gaining strength-the rowing is far better than the digging for that. I rowed to Lido to-day, with the tide, and, against it, from St. Helena back, and am not at all tired.”

“(November 13.)-I never was yet, in my life, in such a state of hopeless confusion of letters, drawings, and work, chiefly because, of course, when one is old, one’s done work seems all to tumble in upon one, and want rearranging, and everything brings a thousand old as well as new thoughts. My head seems less capable of accounts every year. I can’t fix my mind on a sum in addition-it goes off,

¹ See Plate LII. p. 176.

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