Chapter III.,--'Still the chief advanced, Looked on the sun with

hope'--Turner's fitting epitaph, and life-long aspiration. He added to the _Fallacies of Hope_ off and on for forty years, and it dealt with almost every conceivable subject from the Deluge to Napoleon.

This year his town address is given as Queen Anne Street West, but, as I have already explained, this did not mean a change of domicile, as the three houses, two in Harley Street and one in Queen Anne Street, were the same dwelling with a communication at the back.

Turner, Thornbury tells us, almost entirely rebuilt his house in Queen Anne Street, and while all the houses round it from time to time smartened themselves up, this alone remained unchanged. The Gallery in later years, as we know, became most dilapidated:--

The oiled paper of the skylight hung down in black, sooty, furred slips. The damp here and there had free access; and it is certain that while many of the pictures ripened and improved, others were cracked, warped, chilled, and seriously injured. Both the "Hero and Leander," and "The Building of Carthage," suffered. Mr. E. Godall tells me that in one picture particularly, a great white button of paint that had stood for the sun had dropped off.

'"I think some one has picked it off intentionally," he could not help saying.

'"I think he has," replied Turner, quite unmoved.'

Turner was 'quite unmoved.' As he grew older he cared less and less for the things that most people deem so important. His golden visions did not depend upon material accessories. May we not find a hint of his almost inarticulate inner life in that little red book unearthed by Thornbury from his studio, where, amid notes about chemistry, memoranda as to colours, and prophylactics against the Maltese plague, are certain scraps of verse, something about 'Anna's Kiss,' 'A Look Back,' 'A Toilsome Dream,' 'Human Joy, Ecstasy, and Hope'?

But I am anticipating. We are still in the year 1812 and Turner is preparing 'A Frosty Morning' for exhibition, and considering one of his earliest series of book illustrations,--_The Southern Coast of England_, which was probably begun about 1812, although the first seven plates, including 'St. Michael's Mount,' 'Poole,' and 'Land's End,' were not published until 1814. The last issue was in 1826. De Wint, Clennell and Prout were also contributors to _The Southern Coast._ Turner was to receive seven and a half guineas apiece for the drawings, which was increased later to ten and twelve guineas. But in spite of that advance he became dissatisfied and broke with W. B. Cooke, the line engraver and publisher of _The Southern Coast._ Business relations with Turner were not easy.