After this tragic event Rossetti could no longer live in the rooms he had occupied at Chatham Place. He looked for some others, living meanwhile for a few months in a house in Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Then he took a lease of the house at No. 16 Cheyne Walk, sharing it at first with Swinburne and Meredith. Mr. Meredith did not stay long and after awhile Mr. Swinburne also gave up his tenancy, leaving Rossetti sole occupant of the premises.

One of the last works he did before his misfortune, and the last picture for which his wife sat to him, was the water-colour of “St. George and the Princess Sabra.” For sometime after the blow of his wife’s death he was idle. The first things he did after his recovery was a crayon portrait of his mother (1862) followed by “The Girl at a Lattice,”[49]
[50]
[51] “Joan of Arc,” and a replica of his early “Paolo and Francesca.”

The celebrated picture of “Beata Beatrix,” now in the Tate Gallery is dated 1863, but was finished later, being only partly painted in that year. In Rossetti’s own words the following is a description of the picture: “The picture illustrates the Vita Nuova, embodying symbolically the death of Beatrice as treated in that work. The picture is not intended at all to represent death, but to render it under the semblance of a trance in which Beatrice, seated at a balcony overlooking the city, is suddenly rapt from earth to heaven....”

The whole strikes a sombre note apart from its symbolic representation through its delicious purple harmony. The city in the sunset light in the distance, supposed to be Florence, is very like London in atmospheric effect. Beatrice is seen sitting at the balcony against the sunset background, with the light playing round her golden auburn hair, in fashion suggesting an aureole. She is dressed in green with dull purple sleeves. A bright red bird holding in its beak a dim purple poppy, emblem of death, is flying towards her. In the misty distance the figures of Dante and Love are watching her. Rossetti painted in 1872 a replica of that picture, adding to the main subject the meeting of Dante and Beatrice in Paradise, with maidens bearing instruments of music. He was rather reluctant to send out that replica, but the unwillingness was overcome. He painted several others, none of them being equal in quality to the original.

In 1863 Rossetti painted an oil picture called “Helen of Troy,” and the last of the St. George subjects, representing St. George killing the dragon, which is a water-colour version of the stained-glass series. Then come three small subjects, “Belcolore,” a girl in a circular frame biting a rosebud. Of this there is a red chalk study and a water-colour version, “Brimfull,” a water-colour showing a lady stooping to sip from a full glass, and a picture called “A Lady in Yellow.”

Rossetti now gave up painting those quaint little romantic subjects so intense in literary feeling and dramatic expression, and devoted himself to large single figures upon a background of rich accessories.

When a painter makes a single figure the central interest of his picture, he must, to a certain extent, avail himself of psychological facts in the model before him, for if he recognises no limits to the foreign sentiment and character he may impose, he will, little by little, fall to the creation of a type which is not far short of a monstrosity. Although the first of his pictures in this new style are among his finest works we see this inevitable degeneration in Rossetti’s latest paintings.

The first pictures of this kind and some of the best are, “Fazio’s Mistress,” and “Lady Lilith.” The former is dated 1863, but was altered and repainted ten years later, and Rossetti changed its title to “Aurelia.” In 1864 he painted the latter which is a modern conception of that first wife of Adam mentioned in the old Talmudic Legend. The Lady Lilith is seated against a background covered with roses. Dressed in white, she holds a mirror in her hand, and combs her long fair hair. Although dated 1864 it was really not finished until 1867. The face as it is now was repainted in 1873 from a different model, and is said to be quite inferior to the former one. Rossetti at that time seemed to be a victim of a mania for repainting his earlier work.

The next great picture, begun in 1864, is “Venus Verticordia,” the oil version of which was not finished before 1868. It represents the nude bust of a massively built woman surrounded by roses and honeysuckle. She holds an arrow in her right hand and in the left an apple on which a yellow butterfly has alighted. The face is conventionally pretty and lacks character.

“Morning Music,” an elaborate little water-colour; “Monna Pomona,” a girl holding an apple with roses on her lap and in a basket at her side; “How Sir Galahad, Sir Bors, and Sir Percival received the Holy Grael” (done in his earlier manner); “Roman de la Rose,” a water-colour version of the earlier panel, and “The Madness of Ophelia,” represent the remaining production of 1864.

There is little to mention in 1865. The most important productions of that year were “The Blue Bower,” and “The Merciless Lady.” In the “Merciless Lady,” a water-colour in the style of his earlier romantic manner, a man sits on a bank of turf between two maidens, with a sunlit meadow behind. He seems attracted by the one on his left who is fair and plays a lute, the other, his lady love, holds his hand and with a sad expression tries to win him back to her. “A Fight for a Woman,” the composition of which is of a very early date, and the oil-painting, “Bella e Buona,” but renamed “Il Ramoscello,” were also painted in 1865.

After these came “The Beloved,” finished in 1866, but worked again in 1873, this time without being spoiled. In writing to the owner of this picture Rossetti said: “I mean it to be like jewels,” and he carried out his intention. In the middle of the picture is the fair-haired bride radiant in rich stuffs, her gown is green, with large sleeves embroidered in gold and red. She is surrounded by four dark-haired maidens, on the foreground a little negro, adorned with a head-band and a necklace showing the beautiful invention of Rossetti’s taste in decorative art, is holding a golden vase of roses.

Next comes the “Monna Vanna,” which represents a lady dressed in a magnificent embroidered robe with large sleeves, holding a fan of black and yellow plumes. Her luxuriant hair is falling from each side of her face on to her shoulders, a bunch of roses is seen in a vase on the left top corner of the picture.

“The Sibylla Palmifera,” and “Monna Vanna,” were not completed before 1870. The latter represents a Sibyl sitting underneath a stone canopy, which is carved on one side with a cupid’s head wreathed with roses, and on the other with a skull crowned with red poppies. The Sibyl is clad in crimson, her brown hair is parted and falling each side of her face, a green coif spreads from her head over her shoulder and she holds a palm-leaf in her hand. There is a replica of the head of “Sibylla Palmifera.” In the same year (1866) he painted in oils a portrait of his mother, and made a large crayon drawing of his sister Christina. He also made two illustrations for her volume of poems, “The Prince’s Progress.”

In 1867 Rossetti painted in oils “The Christmas Carol,” of which a crayon study exists; “Monna Rosa,” and the “Loving Cup.” For the water-colour, “The Return of Tibullus to Delia,” there are numerous sketches made from Miss Siddal sitting on a couch biting a tress of her hair, which show that the design must have been of a much earlier date. The water-colours, “Aurora,” “Tessa la Bionda;” the crayons, “Magdalene,” “Peace,” “Contemplation,” and the crayon replica, “Venus Verticordia,” bear the same date.

Unfortunately about this time Rossetti began to have serious trouble with his eyesight, and had probably to reduce his hours of work. All the same in 1868 he painted a portrait of Mrs. Morris, who has kindly lent it to the Tate Gallery, where it can now be seen. Several chalk crayon studies have been done for this portrait. Then he began the picture of “The Daydream,” representing Mrs. Morris sitting on the lower branches of a sycamore tree, a replica in water-colour of[59]
[60]
[61] “Bocca Baciate,” called “Bionda del Balcone”; “The Rose,” a water-colour; a crayon drawing, “Aurea Catena,” some studies for “La Pia,” which was begun about this time, and a water-colour replica of “Venus Verticordia.”

PLATE VII.—DANTE’S DREAM

From the oil painting (7 ft. 1 by 10 ft. 6½) now in the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool

This picture which is considered by some to be Rossetti’s most important work, illustrates the following passage in the Vita Nuova:

“Then my heart that was so full of love said unto me: ‘Is it true that our lady lieth dead’; and it seemed to me that I went to look upon the body wherein that blessed and most noble spirit had had its abiding-place. And so strong was this idle imagining, that it made me behold my lady in death, whose head certain ladies seemed to be covering with a white veil.”

This picture, painted in 1871, passed through several hands and was taken back by Rossetti from Mr. Valpy, on account of its large size in exchange for several smaller works. It was eventually bought by the Liverpool corporation.

Rossetti first treated this subject in a little water-colour painted for Miss Heaton in 1856.