There seems to have been bitter feeling between Hoppner, who was an intense Whig, and Lawrence, who knew no politics, but was all things to all men. "The ladies of Lawrence show a gaudy dissoluteness of taste, and sometimes trespass on moral as well as professional chastity," and "Lawrence shall paint my mistress and Phillips my wife," were the two rapier phrases Hoppner thrust at his rival. But it is recorded that thenceforth Lawrence's commissions from fair sitters multiplied. Sir Thomas was a finished flatterer. No man ever knew better, except it was Lely, how to pay the compliment of the brush. This form is the substantial, the lasting compliment for which golden guineas are gladly paid. Grace and elegance are the hall-mark of his every picture. But the artist was a courtier in speech and manners as well, and this got him into trouble once. He was attentive to the ill-used Princess Caroline,--markedly attentive! A royal commission inquired into his conduct, but absolved him from the charges of wrongdoing. When Lady Grosvenor, who had become Marchioness of Westminster, was an old lady, in 1881, she wrote in a letter to Lord Leveson Gower her recollections of the painter: "His manners were what is called extremely 'polished' (not the fault of the present times). He wore a large cravat, and had a tinge about him of the time of George IV., pervading his general demeanor.... I should not say he was amusing, but what struck me most, during my two hours sitting in Russell Square, was the perfection of the drawing of his portraits. Before any color was put on, the drawing itself was so perfectly beautiful that it seemed almost a sin to add any color." This portrait of her, which was painted at this one sitting, is considered the very best Lawrence ever painted. The head has distinction and hauteur, albeit the face is sweetly ingenuous. And the eyes! Well, Sir Thomas always excelled here! Never, since Titian, has painter given us such "strange sweet maddening eyes,"-- "Fathomless dusk by night, the day lets in Glimmer of emerald,--thus those eyes of hers!" This picture now hangs in the gallery of Stafford House, and was mezzotinted by Cousins, in 1844, and included in the published collection of the artist's works. This volume is representative of the artist. It opens with that perennially delightful picture of the "Calmady Children," called "Nature,"--one of the very best and sweetest representations of child life ever made. Here is the elemental artlessness of nature, and here the beatitude of innocence. Another child-picture is the portrait of Lady Emily Cowper, afterwards Lady Ashley, called "The Rosebud." Among the ladies shown are Lady Leicester, Lady Lyndhurst, and Lady Georgiana Agar Ellis, the picture of the latter being surpassing in its elegance. That majestically maternal picture is here of Lady Gower and Lady Elizabeth Leveson Gower,--not our Elizabeth Mary, but she who became Duchess of Argyll.