Page:Recollections of Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1904).djvu/86

 in the book exhibiting the poetic genius of Blake that he, in conjunction with Gilchrist, brought out.106 Rossetti was greatly interested in Nettleship and all he did. He regarded him as a genius, and the various anecdotes which I told him from time to time concerning Nettleship and his peculiarities vastly amused him and excited his curiosity.

Ted Hughes107 once showed a little picture to Rossetti—or he saw it at Hughes' house—entitled Hushed Music, which delighted him very much. He spoke to me afterwards about it on several occasions, remarking that such a work gave fine promise of greater, and that Hughes would surely make a name for himself.

"Lewis Carroll,"108 the author of Alice in Wonderland, was another frequent visitor at Cheyne Walk in the early days of Rossetti's occupancy of the house there. Being an adept in the art of photography, he took several very good studies there. One of Rossetti, his mother, and his sister Christina, seated on a little flight of steps that led to the back hall-door, was especially happy in the likeness and arrangement of the family group.

One day Longfellow,109 who had not long arrived in London from a tour in Italy, called on Rossetti. He was a grand-looking man, although somewhat short, with a fine silver-white beard, and still a goodly amount of snow-white hair on his head. He had absolutely no knowledge of painting, and his remarks concerning