Chapter XXVIII: Letter I

Brown and his first wife (his cousin, Elizabeth Bromley) married at a very early age, and lived for a while in Paris. They left Paris and settled in England in the summer of 1844. The state of her health was such as to require her to live out of London, and she went to Hastings; he occupied a studio in the Regent’s Park or Camden Town district, in the same house with the painter Charles Lucy and his family. Another inmate was Frank Howard, an artist of rapid facility and some cleverness, who engaged in the cartoon-competitions for the Houses of Parliament. “My coloured sketch” was (I take it) the same design as Brown’s cartoon, _The Spirit of Justice_, sent to the second of these competitions. The name of the painter, William Etty, explains itself. Martin must be the celebrated John Martin.

35 Arlington Street, Camden Town.
[? December 1844.]

My Blessed Lizzy,

You can’t think how I was pleased to receive your long letter....
I am in no mood to write a long letter. I am bothered and
anxious. This is a horrid place: that study is a regular castle
of indolence, and it is catching--indeed, nothing is more so.
The study is continually full of all of them, gabbling, and it
distracts me. That infernal Howard is a pest, and yet he is so
good-natured one can’t feel offended at him. It is a curse to be
in such a place. Nothing would surprise me less than to want time
just at the last. I have got more work than I can get through. I
ought to have done it all before the new year. I have showed my
coloured sketch to Etty and Martin; they were both pleased with
it, which is a rare feeling for Etty to express. God bless you.
I have no time or humour to write more, but believe me, your
husband loves you as the first day. God bless you.--F. M. BROWN.