F.
[Dante Gabriel had been commissioned by his godfather, Mr Lyell, to paint an oil-portrait of our father; he was now, after some seeming neglectfulness, giving full attention to the matter. The portrait, nearly his first painting, turned out a creditable work; it remains in the Lyell family, the property of Sir Leonard Lyell, and is reproduced in this volume.]
[50 Charlotte Street, London.]
21st August 1848.
My dearest Frances,
I have the satisfaction of informing you that this (Monday) morning our Gabriel has for an hour and a half been working at my portrait in colours, which appears to me to come very like, if I can trust my poor eyesight, and the exclamations of our emphatic Maria. Moreover, I asked Gabriel whether he would go on to-morrow, and he replied yes. If he takes a fancy to it, he will not leave off until he has finished the work; you know that character of his better than myself. I am fain to hope that all I wrote you in my recent letter was only the outcome of the over-much anxiety of a father who gets distressed at any appearance of evil in what concerns a beloved son....
DANTE GABRIEL AND WILLIAM ROSSETTI
From a Water-Colour Sketch by Filippo Pistrucci
C. 1838
I had hoped yesterday to see Pistrucci, whom I supposed likely to come to London, to promote the concert for the benefit of the Italian School. But I was disappointed. I trust he was not offended at that outburst I sent him regarding the demagogues who have contributed to the present ruin of Italy. He, as the perfectly sincere patriot whom all men recognize, must deplore, or rather detest, whatever can have been a cause of the pitiful state to which our country is reduced. But let us hope that the disaster is reparable, and I am certain that his heart desires this no less fervently than my own. I am aware of the glorious event at Bologna, where the Germans got a good lesson. May this be the glorious beginning of a still more glorious re-arising! I know that France and England have become mediators between Italy and Austria in this bloody strife; may they be sincere and effectual mediators for the good of both, and may the reasonable liberty of our poor country result from their efforts! Not every evil comes to do harm—an old adage: let us hope this may be so in our case. Perhaps the republican over-zeal will be toned down, after the events which we are deploring....
Now that I can give you better news from home, I remain with a more cheerful heart
Your loving Husband,
G. Rossetti.
No. 2.—From Eight Letters from Gabriele Rossetti to Charles Lyell, Kinnordy
[As to Mr Lyell, see p. 72. I give the following extracts, bearing upon Rossetti’s theories and speculations regarding Dante and a great number of other writers, not because I suppose him to have been constantly right in detail, nor even as adopting his views in a broad sense, but because the allegations which he here puts forward are certainly both curious and startling; and they formed so intimate a portion of his thought and life, chiefly between the years 1825 and 1842, that no true picture of him could be given without taking matters of this kind into account. The correspondence between Mr Lyell and my father was frequent, and often lengthy. I used to possess the general bulk of the letters written by Mr Lyell, and had been authorized by the present head of the family, Sir Leonard Lyell, to use, in a compilation which I was undertaking, extracts from many of them. In 1898, however, an interchange took place between Sir Leonard and myself; and I now own the letters which my father wrote, in lieu of letters coming from Mr Lyell. In comparison with the full extent of these Rossetti epistles, the extracts which I give are a mere trifle. I have selected not always the most important passages, but such as tend to show the very wide range along which he applied his theory of a covert, esoteric, and perilous meaning in the writings of authors of many centuries and many nations. Copies of Rossetti’s letters to Lyell, one hundred and twenty-eight in number, are deposited in the Taylor Institution, Oxford; the copying was done by Signor de Tivoli.
There is another copious correspondence which my father carried on regarding the like topics—that with Mr Hookham Frere. I possess the letters of Mr Frere appertaining to this correspondence, and also (through the courtesy of Mr John Tudor Frere and Miss Festing) those of Rossetti. I had at one time thought of publishing ample extracts from this series; but ultimately I found it more suitable to place the correspondence at the disposal of Miss Festing, who, in her interesting book named John Hookham Frere and his Friends (1899), has drawn upon it so far as was consistent with her scheme. She has also quoted the passage in verse about Hookham Frere (see p. 60 of the present work). Miss Festing naturally did not publish all the letters in extenso, nor even so much of them as I had at first proposed to extract. Several passages which Miss Festing did not use seem well worthy of being printed at some time or another—Mr Hookham Frere’s letters, not to speak of my father’s, being capital reading; at present, however, I leave all this aside, chiefly with a view to condensing my whole account of Gabriele Rossetti into a moderate space.]