Dicky Doyle was
necessarily a favourite with all who knew him. He was a
frequent inmate of my house after I married, and was engaged
to dine with me, alas! only eight days before he died.
Motley was a singularly pleasant fellow. My friendship with
him began over a volume of Sir W. Hamilton's Lectures. He
asked what I was reading - I handed him the book.
'A-h,' said he, 'there's no mental gymnastic like
metaphysics.'
Many a battle we afterwards had over them. When I was at
Cannes in 1877 I got a message from him one day saying he was
ill, and asking me to come and see him. He did not say how
ill, so I put off going. Two days after I heard he was dead.
Merimee's cynicism rather alarmed one. He was a capital
caricaturist, though, to our astonishment, he assured us he
had never drawn, or used a colour-box, till late in life. He
had now learnt to use it, in a way that did not invariably
give satisfaction. Landseer always struck me as sensitive
and proud, a Diogenes-tempered individual who had been spoilt
by the toadyism of great people. He was agreeable if made
much of, or almost equally so if others were made little of.
But of all those named, surely John Lawrence was the
greatest.
