Here, in this dark hall, the past was the present. Here loomed vivid
and vital on the walls those women of Rossetti whom I had known but as
shades. Familiar to me in small reproductions by photogravure, here
they themselves were, life-sized, `with curled-up lips and amorous
hair' done in the original warm crayon, all of them intently looking
down on me while I took off my overcoat--all wondering who was this
intruder from posterity. That they hung in the hall, evidently no more
than an overflow, was an earnest of packed plenitude within. The room
I was ushered into was a back-room, a dining-room, looking on to a
good garden. It was, in form and `fixtures,' an inalienably Mid-
Victorian room, and held its stolid own in the riot of Rossettis. Its
proportions, its window-sash bisecting the view of garden, its
folding-doors (through which I heard the voice of Watts-Dunton booming
mysteriously in the front room), its mantel-piece, its gas-brackets,
all proclaimed that nothing ever would seduce them from their
allegiance to Martin Tupper. `Nor me from mine,' said the sturdy
cruet-stand on the long expanse of table-cloth. The voice of Watts-
Dunton ceased suddenly, and a few moments later its owner appeared. He
had been dictating, he explained. `A great deal of work on hand just
now--a great deal of work.
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