To his older friends I know he was untiring in his devotion, and one of them once told me that at a little Christmas party in a remote quarter of London to which he had been bidden, nearly all the other guests kept away by reason of a severe snowstorm, but that Leighton turned up faithful to his appointment, having walked all the way from Kensington to keep his engagement. CHAPTER VIII FREDERICK WALKER I think it was a criticism of Sidney Colvin’s in the _Pall Mall Gazette_ upon his picture called “The Plough” that first drew me to a closer study of Fred Walker’s work. Sidney Colvin had preceded me as Art Critic of the _Pall Mall_, and I am very conscious that in my first efforts in art criticism I closely modelled myself upon his style. He and Bernal Payne had already done much to direct public attention to the new movement in Art before I entered the field. And it was not wonderful, in view of Colvin’s eloquent advocacy of the men whom I most deeply admired, that I should have been drawn to the art of Fred Walker, whose talent he had particularly distinguished. A little later I got to know Walker himself, but he was difficult to know well, not by reason of any deliberate reserve, but because of an unconquerable shyness which was deeply rooted in his character. Shy in his ordinary converse as a man, he was no less so in regard to his pictures. As one entered his studio he would always turn the work upon which he was engaged with its face to the wall, and [Illustration: A WOMAN IN THE SNOW From _Good Words_. By FREDRICK WALKER, A.R.A., R.W.S. Engraved by the Brothers Dalziel. (Reproduced from their _Fifty Years’ Work_.) _To face page 103._ ] could rarely be induced to allow his visitor any glimpse of it. Shortly after his death, which occurred in 1875, I wrote the introductory note to the catalogue of his collected works exhibited in Bond Street, and, wishing for some closer knowledge of the man than I could boast, I had recourse to Mr. George Leslie, who had known him long and well. I find an interesting letter of his written to me about that time, and concerning, among many other things, Walker’s stay in Algiers, where he had gone for his health. Leslie had asked me to meet Miss Jeykell, who had been in Algiers at the time, but as I was unable to accept his invitation he very kindly jotted down for me some notes of his conversation with her, adding at the same time some interesting reflections upon Walker’s character which throw much light upon his temperament as an artist.