[Illustration: DÆDALUS AND ICARUS (1869)] [Illustration: ST. JEROME (1869)] CHAPTER IV YEAR BY YEAR--1870 TO 1878 Sundry journeys into the East during this period of Leighton's career, gave him new subject-matter, new tints to his palette, and added something of an oriental fantasy to the classic sentiment of his art. The sketches of Damascus and other time-honoured eastern cities, mosques, gardens, and courtyards, which figured largely among Sir Frederic's studies, were made for the most part in the autumn of 1873. Previously, as early as 1867, the East had cast its spell upon him. In 1868, he went into Egypt, and made a voyage up the Nile with M. de Lesseps, then at the flood of good-fortune. The Khedive himself provided the steamer for this adventure. "It was during this voyage," we are told, "that Sir Frederic came across a small child with the strangest and most limited idea of full dress that probably ever occurred to mortal--a tiny coin strung on to one of her strong coarse hairs." Of the studies made during the journey, one is a woman's head, draped so as to have a singularly archaic and Sphinx-like effect. Another is the fine profile of a young peasant; and yet another, the head of an old man, simple-minded and philosophical. [Illustration: GARDEN AT GENERALIFE, GRANADA] [Illustration: MIMBAR OF THE GREAT MOSQUE AT DAMASCUS (Since destroyed by fire)] In 1869 the _Helios and Rhodos_, already mentioned, served as the first sign to the public of the new R.A.'s interest in things oriental. To the 1870 exhibition, his only contribution was the picture, _A Nile Woman_, which is now owned by the Princess of Wales. It is a small full-length figure of a girl, balancing an empty pitcher upon her head, at the time of moonrise. Anticipating the Eastern subjects which future years produced, we may note a picture of _Old Damascus_, showing the Jews' quarter in that fabled city, in all its motley picturesqueness, and the delightful _Moorish Garden,--A Dream of Granada_, which were exhibited in 1874. A powerful picture, shown in 1875, of the _Egyptian Slinger_,[4] is illustrated later in this volume, but no reproduction can quite suggest the striking colouring of the original, and the masterly treatment of its light and shade, in the presentment of this lonely figure posed high on its platform against the clear evening sky. The delightful _Little Fatima_, and the _Grand Mosque, Damascus_, enlarged from the sketch previously alluded to, were also exhibited in 1875.