LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS "LESSON PHOTOGRAPH," No. 1: LIPPI'S MADONNA (Photo gravure). PLATE PLATES Frontispiece I. "THE MARRIAGE OF ST. FRANCIS AND POVERTY' (Photogravure of the fresco by Giotto) To face page 164 II. ASSISI: THE CHURCH OF S. FRANCESCO AND THE IIA. A PAGE OF A THIRTEENTH-CENTURY PSALTER III. HOLBEIN'S DRUMMER BOY (Woodcut by H. S. IV. LOMBARDIC WRITING (Facsimiled by Arthur Burgess, V. "LESSON PHOTOGRAPH," No. 2: "THE ETRUSCAN LEUCOTHEA" (Photogravure from a bas-relief in the Villa Albani, Rome) 574 VI. NELSON'S WRITING (Facsimile of portion of an autograph letter in the British Museum) VII. "LESSON PHOTOGRAPH," No. 8: TITIAN'S "MADONNA WITH THE CHERRIES" (Photogravure from the picture in the Imperial Gallery, Vienna) VIII. "LESSON PHOTOGRAPH," No. 4: THE INFANTA 625 626 627 ILLUSTRATIONS IN THE TEXT FIG. PAGE 1. THE COACHMAN'S HYPOTENUSE 49 2. THE AUTHOR'S HANDWRITING, IN CHILDHOOD AND IN 1875 3. MODERN IRON-WORK AT KIRKBY LONSDALE 275 300 11. ISIS AND HORUS (from a bronze in the British Museum) 12. MINUTE SHELLS 575 602 FACSIMILES THE MS. OF A PORTION OF LETTER 41 (§ 8). A LETTER TO MR. GEORGE ALLEN, LETTER 57 1 INTRODUCTION TO VOL. XXVIII THIS Volume contains Letters 37-72 of Fors Clavigera; that is, volumes iv., v., and vi. of the original issue (1874, 1875, 1876). Full particulars of the original publication, and of subsequent alterations, are given in the Bibliographical Note (p. xxiii.). To the general account of Fors Clavigera, given in the Introduction to Vol. XXVII., it is only necessary to add here a few particulars about Ruskin's movements and enterprises during the years 1874-1876. Two features of the present volume will strike every reader. One is the bulk, in spite of the brevity of its prefatory manner; the other is the more and more distinctively Christian tone of the author's teaching. To this latter point he himself called attention in a subsequent Letter.1 Both these features of the volume are connected with a phase of Ruskin's history, which has been described in a previous Introduction. The time covered by the present Letters of Fors was the time of his "conclusive " sorrow.2 The romance of his life came, after much tribulation, to a tragic ending; and, as Carlyle noted, "despair on the personal question" made Ruskin "go ahead all the more with fire and sword upon the universal one."3 Thus Fors Clavigera, and the business of the St. George's Guild which grew out of it, came to occupy more and more of his time and thoughts. The correspondence connected with it greatly increased, and the numbers of Fors itself became longer. At the same time their tone became more definitely religious, and their temper was heightened. The writing of these Letters, with their passionate appeals and note of mystic fervour, greatly excited Ruskin, and this is probably the reason which led Carlyle to regret their continuance. "Ruskin," he wrote to his brother, Dr. John Carlyle (November 6, 1875), "has not sent me the Fors Clavigera this month, hitherto. Does that mean anything? I fear it does not mean that he has given it up altogether!" 4 1 See Vol. XXIX. p. 86. 2 See Letter 61, § 3 (p. 486). 3 See Vol. XXÍV. p. xx. New Letters of Carlyle, edited by Alexander Carlyle, vol. ii. p. 316. Carlyle's pleasure in an earlier number of 1875 is noted below, p. 319 n. Several of the earlier Letters in this volume are written, it will be seen, from Italy, where Ruskin spent several months in 1874. The influence of his sojourn at Assisi was particularly marked, both in causing some revision of his estimate of Italian art, and in quickening his spiritual life. These impressions are noted by him in Fors,1 and have been discussed in an earlier Introduction.2 The sketch of the Sacristan's Cell at Assisi, introduced into the present volume (Plate II.) was made at this time. The development of Ruskin's schemes in connexion with St. George's Guild appears in the Letters themselves, and the subject is further dealt with in Vol. XXX. One or two minor enterprises, to which incidental reference is made in the present volume, may, however, here be noted. One of these, which belongs to an earlier date, was an endeavour to exhibit "an ideally clean street pavement, in the centre of London, in the pleasant environs of Church Lane, St. Giles's." 3 This modern instance of cleansing Augean stables was to be the first Labour of St. George, as Ruskin explained in the following letter to the editor of the Pall Mall Gazette (December 28, 1871): "SIR,-I have been every day on the point of writing to you since your notice, on the 18th, of the dirty state of the London streets, to ask whether any of your readers would care to know how such matters are managed in my neighbourhood. I was obliged, a few years ago, for the benefit of my health, to take a small house in one of the country towns of Utopia; and though I was at first disappointed in the climate, which indeed is no better than our own (except that there is no foul marsh air), I found my cheerfulness and ability for work greatly increased by the mere power of getting exercise pleasantly close to my door, even in the worst of the winter, when, though I have a little garden at the back of my house, I dislike going into it, because the things look all so dead; and find my walk on the whole pleasanter in the streets, these being always perfectly clean, and the wood-carving of the houses prettier than much of our indoor furniture. But it was about the streets I wanted to tell you. The Utopians have the oddest way of carrying out things, when once they begin, as far as they can go; and it occurred to them one dirty December long since, when they, like us, had only crossing-sweepers, that they might just as well sweep the whole 1 See Letter 76 (Vol. XXIX. pp. 90-91). 2 Vol. XXIII. pp. xlv., xlvi. Letter 48, § 3 (p. 204). A paragraph complaining of the condition of the streets. t |