The generous employment of his fortune alone prevented him from realising his intention. "England has at all times given the example of honouring great men; she will, I am sure, find the means of preserving for Art a monument of which she has such reason to be proud."[57] [Illustration: VIEW OF ARAB HALL. 1906] FOOTNOTES: [42] In the Leighton House Collection is a splendid study for the wrestling figure of Heracles, also for the recumbent Alcestis, and the drapery for the phantom figure of Death. The figure of Heracles, fine as it is in the picture, lacks somewhat of the ardent quality in the action of the sketch. Owing to the public-spirited generosity of its owner, the late Right Hon. Sir Bernhard Samuelson, this picture has travelled all over the world for exhibition. It was also lent to Leighton House for more than a year in 1901. [43] In the Leighton House Collection is a head in oils (presented by the late Alfred Waterhouse, R.A.) which Leighton painted actually by moonlight in Rome, as a study for one of the figures in "Summer Moon." See List of Illustrations. [44] See study for picture in Leighton House Collection. [45] Leighton had a cast made of this, and his copy is still in the collection in his house. Another copy he gave to Watts, who admired it beyond measure. Watts recounted to me that so preciously did he value it, that, not daring to expose it to the danger of housemaids' dusting, he carefully wrapped it up in handkerchiefs and put it in a drawer. One day, alas! forgetting it was there, in a hurry, he pulled the bundle of handkerchiefs out; it fell to the floor and was smashed. [46] _The Athenæum_ described the work when it appeared. "There is the grandeur of Greek tragedy in Mr. Leighton's 'Clytemnestra watching for the signal of her husband's return from Troy.' The time is deep in the fateful night, while the city sleeps; moonlight floods the walls, the roofs, the gates, and the towers with a ghastly glare, which seems presageful, and casts shadows as dark as they are mysterious and terrible. The dense blue of the sky is dim, sad, and ominous. But the most ominous and impressive element of the picture is a grim figure--the tall woman on the palace roof before us, who looks Titanic in her stateliness, and huge beyond humanity in the voluminous white drapery that wraps her limbs and bosom. Her hands are clenched and her arms thrust down straight and rigidly, each finger locked as in a struggle to strangle its fellow; the muscles swell on the bulky limbs. Drawn erect and with set features, which are so pale that the moonlight could not make them paler, the queen stares fixedly and yet eagerly into the distance, as if she had the will to look over the very edge of the world for the light to come." [47] The Hon. Mrs. Grenfell. [48] Purchased by the trustees of the Chantrey Bequest and placed in the Tate Gallery.