I am soldiering too. I drill three times a week, and make as bad a soldier as anybody else. The Sartoris, you know, are no longer in London—a great loss to all their friends—but I go pretty often to see them in the country, and have spent many a happy day there in the course of the winter. By-the-bye, do you hear or know anything of those two drawings I did of you and Mrs. Browning? If so, will you give the one of you to Hookes that he may send with some other things he has? And now, dear Browning, "vi leverò l'incomodo," and will bring this very tedious epistle to a close. Remember me most kindly to Mrs. Browning, to Cartwright and his wife, to Odo Russell, B——, Pantaleone with better half, Storeys, and last, but not least, dear little Hatty! Love to Cerinni; tell me about him. Good-bye.—Believe me, very affectionately yours,
Fred Leighton.
I am hand-and-glove with all my enemies the pre-Raphaelites. Woolner sends his affectionate remembrances.
Leighton writes to his sister in Italy:—
2 Orme Square, Bayswater,
March 12.
My dear Gussykins,—You may have heard from Mamma that I went to Paris to hear Madame Viardot in "Orphée." What wonderful singing! what style! what breadth! what pathos! You would have been enchanted, I am sure. Do you know the music? It is wonderfully fine and pathetic, the first chorus particularly is quite harrowing for the accent of grief about it. Madame Viardot's acting, too, is superb—so perfectly simple and grand, it is really antique. And when you consider all she has to overcome—a bad, harsh voice, an ugly face, an ungainly person; and yet she contrives to look almost handsome. She enters heart and soul into her work; she said it was the only thing she ever did that (after fifty performances) had not given her a moment's ennui. I am afraid there is no chance of her singing it in England this year, if at all; I don't believe the Covent Garden audience would sit through it.[14]
I also saw Gounod's new opera, "Philémon et Baucis," and was disappointed. Nothing but the care and distinction of the workmanship redeems it from being a bore; the subject is ill adapted for the stage, and is dragged through three acts with portentous efforts. Striking melodies there are few, charming accompaniments many; all the pretty music (or nearly) is in the orchestra—c'est la sauce qui fait avaler le poisson. The introductions to the first and second acts, but particularly the latter (a little motif on the oboë), are charming; there is also a capital chorus. All this, however, is an impression after one hearing; I might alter my mind on hearing it oftener, but I think not.
In the Royal Academy Exhibition of 1860 Leighton sent one picture only, "Sunrise—Capri."
Translation.]
2 Orme Square, September 15, 1860.