2 Orme Square, Bayswater, London,
June 30, 1861.
My dear Friend,—Forgive my not having thanked you sooner for your kind note. The same thing has happened to me as to you: work has left me but little leisure for writing. Now, however, my hearty thanks for the open sincerity with which you have spoken of my latest work, I am only sorry that you have not gone into it even more closely. I shall endeavour in my present works to diminish the excessive mannerism of the lines, which will be all the easier for me as I am now painting principally from nature; in my last picture the subject permitted that but little. In any case I hope, dear master, that you will always speak to me with the same candour; it is the best proof to me that I still possess your friendship.
I am extremely eager to see how far your works have got on. Amongst them, however, my dear friend, keep in remembrance your grateful pupil,
Fred Leighton.
P.S.—I notice with regret that already I do not write a German letter with my former fluency.
In a letter to his sister, Mrs. Matthews, January 24, 1860, Leighton wrote: "I am horrified to hear the account you give of Mrs. Browning. I knew she was a confirmed invalid, but had no idea that one of her lungs was already gone! What will poor Browning do if she dies? He adores her, you know."
London, July 1861.
Dearest Mammy,—Thanks for your kind letter, which I have been unable to answer till now. I had heard of poor Browning's bereavement; we were all very much shocked at it, knowing, as we do, how entirely irreparable his loss is. I wrote a few lines to him that he might know how sincerely I grieved with him; I don't at all know what were the circumstances of her death, we have no particulars.
Leighton undertook to design the monument over Mrs. Browning's grave in the English Cemetery at Florence. The work appealed to him in every sense, and remains as a permanent memorial of those friendships which made the years spent in Italy so full, so rich, so entrancing. With reference to the monument Browning writes:—
Chez M. Laraison,
Ste. Marie, Près Pornic, Loire Inférieure,
August 30, 1863.