Thenceforward his progress was an almost unbroken series of successes, gained by superb mastery of craftsmanship, and by the splendid confidence in himself that put his intentions always beyond the possibility of doubt. With few exceptions his pictures, to the end of his life, were worthy to rank with the best that the British school can show, great in accomplishment, admirable in style, and attractive always by their frankness of manner and purity of motive. In some ways he enlarged his borders, for in 1871 he made, with _Chill October_, his first digression into landscape without figures, and began that array of important studies of the open air which reveal most instructively his limitless patience and searching power of observation. As a portrait painter also he developed superlative gifts, adding year by year to a collection of masterpieces unequalled by any of his contemporaries. He was fortunate in his sitters, and the list of his productions in this branch of art includes a large proportion of the most beautiful women and distinguished men who have graced the latter half of the century. He immortalised impartially leaders of fashion, pretty children, noted politicians, and people eminent in many professions; and in his rendering of these various types he missed nothing of the individuality and distinctive character with which each one was endowed. Here especially his Pre-Raphaelite training stood him in good stead; for the habit of close analysis and careful investigation had been so impressed upon him by the experiences of his youth, that his instinctive judgment was now perfectly reliable, and his ability to decide promptly and with certainty about the aspects of his subject which were fittest for pictorial record had become absolutely complete.