There is the sketch for the picture which Leighton and one of his fellow-students, Signor Gamba, on that same journey, took it into their heads to paint on the walls of an old ruined castle near Darmstadt. "The schloss," writes Mrs. Andrew Lang, "where this piece was painted is still in ruins, but the Grand Duke has lately erected a wooden roof over the painting to preserve it from destruction." While still at Frankfort, Leighton had begun the design for the "Cimabue's Procession" (No. 42). In the collection we find the drawing of the first design. For extraordinary precision of outline and graceful arrangement of moving figures, this is one of the most remarkable on the walls. We have also the study of the head in pencil for the figure of Dante in the right-hand corner of the picture (No. 42-B), (given by Canon Rawnsley), and a large study in water-colour and pencil of the woman seated at the window (given by Mr. J.A. Fuller Maitland) (No. 42-C). Hanging near these is a very finely pencilled head of that boy whom Leighton called "The prettiest and the wickedest boy in Rome." On it is written "Vincenzo—Roma, 1854, F.L." Another, on which is written "Venezia, 1856, F.L.," is, for strength of character and beauty combined, one of the most powerful in the collection (purchased by a donation given by Lord Rosebery). These are a few out of fifty drawings of heads in the House, executed for the main part, between the years 1852 and 1856. There are many records in landscape and street scenes of Leighton's journeying to Capri, Athens, Rhodes, Damascus, and Algeria. Of the drawings made during his stay in Algeria (presented to the House by Mr. Walter Derham) (Nos. 284 and 285), Mr. Pepys Cockerell wrote in his interesting article which appeared in the Nineteenth Century, "The finest of all, except the famous 'Lemon Tree,' which is in silver point, and was done in 1859, are the products of a visit to Algeria in 1857. I do not believe that more perfect drawings, better defined or more entirely realised, than these studies of Moors, of camels, &c., were ever executed by the hand of man.... They are not particularly summary, nor do they look as if they had been done in a moment, or without trouble. The drawings in question are as complete as if they came from the hand of Lionardo or Holbein."
Among the most perfect drawings Lord Leighton has left, are also the studies from flowers and foliage. Professor Aitchison writes: "One day I found him (Leighton) drawing the flower of the pumpkin, and he said flowers were quite as hard to draw as human heads, if you drew them conscientiously, but doing that rested with yourself, for there could be no critics. He said of drawing that the great thing was to thoroughly understand the structure, and that then, by patience and labour, you could express the outline and the modelling. In 1859, while at Capri, he drew the celebrated 'Lemon Tree,' working from daylight to dusk for a week or two, and giving large details in the margin of the snails on the tree." Mr. Ruskin writes: "Two perfect early drawings are of 'A Lemon Tree,' and another of the same date, of 'A Byzantine Well,' which determine for you without appeal the question respecting necessity of delineation as the first skill of a painter. Of all our present masters, Sir Frederic Leighton delights most in softly-blended colours, and his ideal of beauty is more nearly that of Correggio than any since Correggio's time. But you see by what precision of terminal outline he at first restrained and exalted his gift of beautiful vaghezza."
Of this drawing of "A Lemon Tree," now in the Oxford Museum, lent by Mr. Ruskin, Sir Henry Acland has given a singularly fine photograph, very nearly the size of the original. Lord Leighton gave Mr. Ruskin for his life this wonderful drawing of "A Lemon Tree" to hang in his Oxford Museum, that it might serve to impede, if possible, the increasing wrong-headedness in study—the careless conceit, the irreverent dash, the incompetent confidence of many modern students.
How Leighton's theories as to the manner in which flowers should be drawn were carried out, is exemplified by two wonderful studies of the said pumpkin flower (Nos. 97 and 104), and fifty other studies from flowers and plants in this collection. This artist in his early twenties, brilliant in society, full of intellectual and every other kind of vitality, could nevertheless sit for hours perfecting the study of a flower or a plant. One who knew him well in 1854 and 1855, wrote in the Times of 28th January 1896, three days after Leighton's death: "I remember hearing a relative of his, a clergyman, deplore in 1854, the persistency with which Leighton was throwing away his chances in life to become a mere artist." Five years previously, Leighton had embodied in a design, now in his house, the longing, the home sickness, the Sehnsucht he felt for his own true much-loved vocation. It is in the drawing of Giotto as a boy lying among his sheep upon a bank (No. 227). Below the sketch, in Leighton's handwriting, are the words "Giotto, Sehnsucht." The same writer continues: "I enjoyed constant intercourse with him during the whole of 1854 and to the middle of 1855. The summer of the former year we passed at the Baths of Lucca, dining together every day for three months. Finding the solitary splendour of the hotel at 'Villa' irksome, he suggested that we should mess together in my lodgings, which happened to be close to a little restaurant. In after years, meeting in London houses, we always referred with pleasure to the modest, but always wholesome and cleanly feasts that Lucrezia, landlady, chef, and waitress, supplied us with at an almost nominal cost. To me, at least, that period was one of great value and interest, for it gave me the opportunity of studying the character of one whose personality was attractive in no small degree. He was the most brilliant man I ever met.... He longed for and desired success: but only in so far as he deserved it. When he was sharply checked in his upward career, he accepted the rebuke with humility, for he was a modest man.[91] I had not met him for years when, coming into contact with him, I told him how keen the interest had been with which I had watched his progress. 'I am not satisfied,' he answered; 'I alone know how far I have fallen short of my ideal.'" In his House are two records of this visit to the Bagni di Lucca. One has been presented by Mr. J. MacWhirter, R.A. (No. 249). It is a highly finished drawing of a wreath of leaves exquisitely executed. On the same sheet is a drawing of a vine in fruit, and in Leighton's own writing "Pomegranate Lucca Bagni Villa."
No work in the collection evinces the precision and exact truthfulness of Leighton's drawing better than the outline copies from pictures and frescoes by V. Carpaccio, Giorgione, Simone Memmi and Signorelli made in 1852-53. In the copy from the fresco in the Capella Spagnuola, Sta. Maria Novella, Florence (No. 292), we have the portraits of Cimabue, Giotto, Taddeo Gaddi and Simone Memmi whose work it is.[92] The accuracy of the copy and the difficulty of making a copy at all, can hardly fully be realised, save by one who has attempted also to repeat the fading outlines of these dim frescoes in the only half-lighted chapel. Slight and ineffective as Leighton's drawing may appear at a first glance, it is, on further acquaintance, found to be an exquisite piece of work. The absolute truth and precision with which in pencil lines, on a small scale, he has unravelled the outlines of the dim forms, and has depicted the quaint seriousness of these old-world Italian countenances, makes this copy an extraordinary feat of eye and hand. From this drawing he designed the dress of Cimabue for the figure in his large picture, and also for the Cimabue in the South Kensington Mosaic. Written by Leighton above the pencil drawing are the words: "Simone Memmi Capella Spagnoli (St. Maria Novella, Florence), Taddeo Gaddi white and gold cap, Giotto gold and sea green, Cimabue gold flowers on white ground, Sim. Memmi with grey beard, head dress, yellow hood with black lining, Florence, 1853, F.L."
A study in brown (water-colour) (No. 91) signed "Florence, 1854, F.L.," was used by Leighton forty years after it was made in his background for "Lachrymæ" (No. 147), an engraving of which was given to the collection by Messrs. A. Tooth. The same study was also used for a charming design, highly finished in pencil and Chinese white, apparently executed for a book illustration, which is now in the House. One of the most beautiful of the foliage studies tells of a happy day "Near Bellosguardo, Sept./56." (No. 171). It is a perfect and highly-finished study of a vine. What joy Leighton must have had while looking at this exquisite thing in the September sunshine on that delicious Bellosguardo height! A butterfly and a bee were minutely pencilled on the paper as they flew round the vine-leaves as he drew them. "Cyclamen Tivoli, Oct./56." is written on another of these tiny treasures. "Aloes Pampl. Doria," "Pyrte Roma," "Thistle Rhodes," "Lindos/67 Asphodel," "Thistle Banks of Tiber, stalk light warm brown, leaf dark cld. brown, flow. dsk. warm brown, Roma/56," are notes on some of these pages of studies, which can only be said to compare with the work of a Leonardo or an Albert Dürer. There is absolutely no mannerism traceable; there is Nature's own quality of style. There is nothing slovenly in Nature, there is as surely nothing slovenly in Lord Leighton's art. The gift which in these modern days is perhaps most rare is a sense of style. Leighton's feeling for style was as much a part of his individual and native taste as was his delight in any other quality of beauty in Nature. Indeed what we call style in art is but the reflection of the same quality in Nature herself, the love which adds to the more oblivious facts of Nature a further quality of truth, a completer insight into her. Leighton possessed a sculptor's feeling for form. It was his subtle grasp of truth in structure which gives a special value to his outline drawings. The keen sensitiveness to the right character of the form, to which his pencil outline was the limit, influenced the quality of his touch as he portrayed that limit. He felt things "in the round" as solid projections in various planes, advancing or receding from the eye. As in the best sculpture, to every aspect of the solid form you get a fine, subtle, absolutely clear outline; so in Leighton's drawing of a contour, never is there any vague or undecided passage. This insures to his work the quality of distinction. These studies have, one and all, that quality. They are distinguished, as are fragments of the best Greek sculpture. Every born artist falls in love specially with one class of sentiment in Nature. Whether his special gifts guide his passion, or his passion his gifts, who can say? Probably each urges the other. The special note of beauty in Nature which excited Leighton's deepest enthusiasm was the quality which is most like that in a shell. In the pumpkin flowers in the study given by Mr. Hamo Thornycroft of "Kalmia Califolia," and in many others, is recalled notably the fine, pure, carved distinctness of the forms in a shell—the shell that contains the form and colour that at once delights the sense both of the painter and the sculptor. In the oil sketches by Leighton, those poems of Southern sunlight and colour, records of voyages in the Ægean seas, and off the coasts and islands of Greece and Asia Minor, we again recall the special beauty in the quality and colour of a shell, the rainbow tints in mother-of-pearl, the faint translucence trembling in a sheen of light.
In gauging the exceptional quality of the gifts which all these studies evince it will be well to remember that Leighton, at the time they were made, was under no influence but that of his own high standard, and led by no lights save those of his own exquisitely delicate perceptions. For the last twenty or thirty years detail in Nature—vegetation and Nature which is called "still life"—has been truthfully popularised by photography, so that now all students have it in their power to study from such detail treated on a flat surface. Beauty of natural structure and grace of line rendered with right perspective on a sheet of paper can be enjoyed and made use of by every artist. Many do avail themselves of photographs to carry out and complete the details of their pictures. But when Leighton made these wonderful drawings no such standards of elaborate finish of detail had been diffused. Nor had he joined, nor in any way come under the influence of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, nor received any inspiration from the teaching of Mr. Ruskin. Though we may truly liken these studies from "still life" to those by Leonardo as regards the truthful perfection of copies from Nature, there is no evidence in Leighton's drawings that the work, even of the great, much-revered-by-him Italian masters had influenced him when drawing from Nature. On the contrary, there is the strong stamp of his own peculiar genius on all of them, the stamp that proves rather that he saw and loved Nature as a Greek would have seen and loved her. Essentially Greek-like was the attitude in which Leighton approached Nature, i.e. with an emotion ever ardent in its intensity; but as ever restrained by the rare gift—the sense of style and of the right balance and proportion necessary in treating worthily the beauties of Nature in the language of art. Indeed, it may truly be affirmed that Leighton was made more like a Greek than like an Englishman as regarded his artistic powers, English though he was to the backbone in feeling and sentiment. The effect produced by that collected exhibition of his works in 1897 was, beyond all other effects, that of achievement; and achievement which was the result of a perfect mastery and grasp of aims meant to be achieved from the first to the last touch on the canvas. Leighton was far too great an artist ever to be satisfied with the results of his labour. Those who knew him best can testify to his terrible depressions and disappointments. Still, there was no "muddling through," to use Lord Rosebery's expression, such as so many English artists confess to in reaching the final result. Greek-like, Leighton saw everything in a definite, clearly outlined view, and, from the beginning to the end, his work was one direct forwarding of his purpose.
In 1860, Leighton migrated to his studio in Orme Square, Bayswater. The collection possesses several drawings made about that time, notably the studies for "Lieder ohne Worte" (No. 36). His young friend, now the well-known portrait-painter, Mr. Hanson Walker, sat for the head in the picture: "A Crowded Scene in Florence" (No. 198), a design full of interest and movement, was the gift to the House of this friend of Leighton's, who, at his instigation, took up art as a profession. In 1866 Leighton moved from Orme Square to the House he had built in Holland Park Road, and there we can now follow his yearly labours by studying the sketches and drawings made for all the well-known famous pictures of the last thirty years, till we come to the last—to that passionate appealing figure of Clytie (No. 27), drawn after the fatal warning had been given. The motive is the same as that of the first design—the early design of the "Giotto" (No. 227), (made very nearly fifty years before), i.e. "Sehnsucht"—not the dreamy half-conscious Sehnsucht of the awakening artist-nature as is seen in the boy Giotto—but the passionate longing to remain in the rich existence that rare gifts and noble affections had secured for that artist-nature. After the studies for "Clytie" there but remain those made for pictures never to be painted, till we reach at last the drawings made on the 22nd of January 1896 (No. 268), the last day on which Leighton worked. Three days after, on the following Saturday, he died.
The object of the Committee is to make this House and its treasures a centre for Art in the Parish of Kensington, where Lord Leighton lived for thirty years. During seventeen of these years he was the President of the Royal Academy, and, by common consent, the greatest President that institution has ever had. The South Kensington Museum is not in the parish, and, though this is one of the richest in London, Kensington proper has no centre of Art, and is sufficiently far removed from the centre of the metropolis to make it important that it should possess such a centre. Since October 1898, the Committee has arranged for Concerts, Lectures, and Readings to take place in the Studios, and the public is now enlightened as to the exceptional acoustic qualities the Studios possess, a fact for long recognised by Leighton's personal friends at the yearly concerts he gave to them when his pictures were ready for the Royal Academy. It is proposed to add to the contents of the House an Art Library, and for this many valuable volumes are waiting to be presented for the book-shelves to contain them. The present proprietors are prepared to hand over the house and all it contains to any public body who will engage to maintain it and to meet the views of the Committee as to the use of the House. As a memorial to Lord Leighton, the most suitable use will be, they feel, to devote it to the furtherance of the interests of Art of the best in all lines and among all classes; in fact to continue in his own home the culture of that "sweetness and light" which emanated so notably from his own nature. To conclude with words written by his old and very intimate friend, Professor Costa, with whom he spent his last holiday in the autumn before he died: "Leighton solved certain problems which appeared insoluble. For instance, he combined a life at high pressure with the most exquisite politeness—truth with poetry, an iron will with the tenderness of a mother's heart, high aims with a practical life and with the worship of beauty, the ardour of which was only equalled by its purity."