211. I have spoken above of his gigantic memory: it is especially necessary to notice this, in order that we may understand the kind of grasp which a man of real imagination takes of all things that are once brought within his reach--grasp thenceforth not to be relaxed forever. On looking over any catalogues of his works, or of particular series of them, we shall notice the recurrence of the same subject two, three, or even many times. In any other artist this would be nothing remarkable. Probably, most modern landscape painters multiply a favorite subject twenty, thirty, or sixty fold, putting the shadows and the clouds in different places, and "inventing," as they are pleased to call it, a new "effect" every time. But if we examine the successions of Turner's subjects, we shall find them either the records of a succession of impressions actually received by him at some favorite locality, or else repetitions of one impression received in early youth, and again and again realized as his increasing powers enabled him to do better justice to it. In either case we shall find them records of _seen facts_; _never_ compositions in his room to fill up a favorite outline. 212. For instance, every traveler--at least, every traveler of thirty years' standing--must love Calais, the place where he first felt himself in a strange world. Turner evidently loved it excessively. I have never catalogued his studies of Calais, but I remember, at this moment, five: there is first the "Pas de Calais," a very large oil painting, which is what he saw in broad daylight as he crossed over, when he got near the French side. It is a careful study of French fishing-boats running for the shore before the wind, with the picturesque old city in the distance. Then there is the "Calais Harbor" in the Liber Studiorum: that is what he saw just as he was going into the harbor--a heavy brig warping out, and very likely to get in his way or run against the pier, and bad weather coming on. Then there is the "Calais Pier," a large painting, engraved some years ago by Mr. Lupton:[37] that is what he saw when he had landed, and ran back directly to the pier to see what had become of the brig. The weather had got still worse, the fishwomen were being blown about in a distressful manner on the pier head, and some more fishing-boats were running in with all speed. Then there is the "Fortrouge," Calais: that is what he saw after he had been home to Dessein's, and dined, and went out again in the evening to walk on the sands, the tide being down. He had never seen such a waste of sands before, and it made an impression on him. The shrimp girls were all scattered over them too, and moved about in white spots on the wild shore; and the storm had lulled a little, and there was a sunset--such a sunset!--and the bars of Fortrouge seen against it, skeleton-wise. He did not paint that directly; thought over it--painted it a long while afterwards.