The letters on both sides may be read in "The Gentle Art of Making Enemies." The whole story only makes it clear that Wilde was better able to appreciate Whistler than Whistler to appreciate a younger man, whose talent, no less brilliant, was entirely different from his own. As Mr. Ross has pointed out, all Wilde's best work was written after their friendship ceased. FOOTNOTES: [4] "The AEsthetic Movement in England," by Walter Hamilton. [5] He wore at this time a velvet _beret_ on his head, his shirts turned back with lace over his sleeves, puce velveteen knickerbockers with buckles, and black silk stockings. V MISCELLANEOUS PROSE On May 29, 1884, Oscar Wilde was married to Constance Mary Lloyd, the daughter of a Dublin barrister. He settled with her in Chelsea. They had two children, both boys, born respectively in 1885 and 1886. Wilde's marriage was not felicitous, though he regretted it more for his wife's sake than his own. It is said that Mrs. Wilde was rather cruelly made to pose for Lady Henry Wotton in _Dorian Gray_, that "curious woman, whose dresses always looked as if they had been designed in a rage and put on in a tempest.... She tried to look picturesque, but only succeeded in being untidy ... looking like a bird of paradise that had been out all night in the rain...." She was sentimental, pretty, well-meaning and inefficient. She would have been very happy as the wife of an ornamental minor poet, and it is possible that in marrying Wilde she mistook his for such a character. It must be remembered that she married the author of _Poems_ and the lecturer on the aesthetic movement. His development puzzled her, made her feel inadequate, and so increased her inadequacy. She became more a spectacle for Wilde than an influence upon him, and was without the strength that might have prevented the disasters that were to fall through him on herself. She had a passion for leaving things alone, broken only by moments of interference badly timed. She became one of those women whose Christian names their husbands, without malice, preface with the epithets "poor dear." Her married life was no less ineffectual than unhappy. Wilde supplemented his wife's income by writing reviews of books for The Pall Mall Gazette, and articles on the theatre for The Dramatic Review. From the autumn of 1887 to that of 1889 he edited The Woman's World. Little of this was wasted labour, though Wilde had no need to fillip his invention by such practice as the writing of reviews provided. Conversation was to him what diaries, note-books, and hack-work are to so many others. But there is an ease in the essays of _Intentions_ wholly lacking in 'The Rise of Historical Criticism' and in the lectures. It is impossible not to believe that in writing literary notes in The Woman's World and reviews in The Pall Mall Gazette, he quickened the turn of his wrist and sharpened the point of his rapier.