"I soon saw that my anxiety was foolish. It was evidently, as he said, a grand enjoyment to him simply to sit under a tree and rest; to hear the throstle instead of the hurdy-gurdy; to see the sun instead of the smoke.... He could only sigh his admiration. Presently he opened his pocket sketch-book, and put a point to his pencil; but he turned from one bit of loveliness to another as he sauntered on, and soon closed his book in a kind of profound but calm resignation. 'Much too beautiful for work,' he said; 'I can do no work to-day.' So we sat among the bracken, and drank that delicious air...."
Mr. Hole was, and perhaps still is, a great rose-grower; and the day after the forest walk he gave a garden-party in honour of Leech and the roses. The roses, it appears, were not only brilliant in their summer glory on their native trees, but also glorious indeed on the faces of the young ladies who fluttered about Leech, "with evident expectation of having their portraits taken, for the future admiration of the world." All this was delightful to Leech, but not "to one young man of sullen temperament, who, after watching the idol of his heart 'making up,' as he called it, to Leech with her fascinations, retired to a shrubbery to smoke, and murmured a desire to 'punch that fellow's head.'..." I can well imagine the pleasure of Leech in all his kind friends' care to gratify him; and I can also imagine "the perplexity and annoyance" with which he listened to the lady—let us hope she was neither pretty nor young—who made him a speech in which she ended by telling him he was "the delight of the nation."
It was in the evening of the day of the rose-show that Leech proposed a visit to Ireland for a fortnight's holiday, begging his friend to go with him. To this Mr. Hole consented, little dreaming that on the following morning, just as he was leaving, Leech would say to him, "You must write your impressions, and I will illustrate." Mr. Hole's modesty took alarm, but with no reason, as the "Impressions" subsequently proved. The result of this trip was the publication, in 1859, of a volume entitled, "A Little Tour in Ireland; being a visit to Dublin, Limerick, Killarney, Cork," etc., by an "Oxonian." The "Oxonian" was, of course, Mr. Hole; and the illustrations showed Leech in his happiest vein. These were in the form of coloured folding-plates and numerous woodcuts.
The travellers did a great deal in the fortnight. They saw "Dublin, Galway, the wild grandeur of Connemara, the scenery of the Shannon from Athlone to Limerick, the gentle loveliness of Killarney, the miniature prettiness of Glengariff, and that 'beautiful city called Cork.' ... Ah me, how happy we were! Looking from the steamer at the calm phosphorescent waves (so thankful they were calm, for we were miserable mariners, though Leech had represented himself in a letter as revelling in stormy seas), or gliding along the rails, or riding in cars, or rowing in boats; listening to quaint carmen, oarsmen, and guides; talking and laughing in genial converse with each other, or silent in the serene fruition of the exquisite scenery around...."
Mr. Hole had ample opportunity for seeing Leech's method of making notes from nature. It was not sketching from nature in the true sense of the phrase, but simply memoranda, in a kind of shorthand, which was afterwards elaborated into backgrounds, which are as true to nature as the figures they relieve and foil. The same with faces that attracted the artist from their peculiarities of character or expression; a few touches were sufficient as guides for the finished heads and figures. I have some examples in a sketch-book in my possession.
"Nothing," says Mr. Hole, "escaped him that was in any way absurd, abnormal, incongruous, or in any way ridiculous; and a touch of his elbow or a turn of his thumb drew my attention continually to something amusing in the aspect or the remarks of those about us at the table d'hôte, or the steamer, or public car, which else, in my obtuseness, I had never relished.... It was always his rule, however pressed for time, surrounded with engagements, or enticed by pleasures, never to 'scamp' his work. Sometimes his rapidity of execution was marvellous, but there was never haste. I have known him to send off from my own house three finished drawings on the wood, designed, traced, and rectified, without much effort, as it seemed, between breakfast and dinner. How I wish that the world could have seen those blocks! They were entrusted, no doubt, to the most skilful gravers of the day, but the exquisite fineness, clearness, the faultless grace and harmony of the drawing, could not be reproduced. If the position of an eyelash was altered, or the curve of a lip was changed, there might be an ample remainder to convey the intention and to win the admiration of those who never knew their loss, but the perfection of the original was gone. Again and again I have heard him sigh as he looked over the new number of Punch; and as I, seeing nothing but excellence, would ask an explanation, he would point to some almost imperceptible obliquity which vexed his gentle soul."
Mr. Hole continued to be the intimate friend of Leech during the latter part of a life that was indeed "too short for friendship, not for fame"; and he speaks of the many eminent men whom he met at Leech's house, with the gratification that might be expected from one who was fully able to share in the "flow of soul" that distinguished those meetings.