Præraphaelite diaries and letters

Dante Alighieri · en
I shall not bore you to answer this rubbish, as I hope very soon
  to have the real pleasure of again seeing you and the rest of
  the P.R.B. I long to see what you have done to your picture, and
  shall rush down at once to Brompton on my return.

          Till then, believe Hunt and myself to remain, dear P.R.B.,
                      Your affectionate P.R. Brothers,
                                     D. G. R., W. H. H.


                              LETTER VI.

                            TO JOHN TUPPER.

I don’t know the date of this doggrel (which gives twenty several
rhyme-words in “ack”); it was probably the Spring or Summer of 1850.
The men who “would squeeze a pun in Syriac” may probably have been
of the James Hannay connexion; the men of that connexion were not,
however, entirely likely to indulge in “sloshy tea,” but rather
in ardent spirits. As to the nicknames which appear towards the
close of the epistle--The Prince was George Tupper; The Baron, his
brother Alexander; Spectro-cadaveral Rex, John (or Jack) Tupper;
the Maniac, Holman Hunt. It is not worth while expounding (even
were it practicable to do so) how these epithets arose. Rossetti
was not the inventor of any of them. The reference to “Nature,
sky, sun,” &c., suggests that he had been invited to join in a
pedestrian excursion--such as the P.R.B.’s and their intimates got up
occasionally. In the present instance the party, as we see, was to
consist of Holman Hunt, Stephens, and the three Tuppers.

                                                    [? April 1850.]
                                              72 Newman Street.
                                                 Saturday Afternoon.

        Dear Jack
        Alack!
        A few days back
        I bound myself by oath to smack
        My lips o’er sloshy tea, and attack
        White, brown, or black
        Bread, and vile jokes to crack,
        This night with brutes whose knack
        Would squeeze a pun in Syriac.
        And for to-morrow, alack!
        I have a model on my track,
        So that I may not pack.
        Of course I writhe upon the rack:
        Though as to NATURE, Jack,
        (Poor dear old hack!)
        Touching sky, sun, stone, stick, and stack,
        I guess I’m half a quack;
        For whom ten lines of Browning whack
        The whole of the Zodiac.
        Nevertheless, alack!
        Seeing this time I must send back
        To Prince and Baron, Stephens and Jack
        (Spec-caday Rex, hic hæc hoc hac),
        And to the Maniac,
        The SACK.
        This much from D. G. R. (in black,
        _I.e._, with coal-ash cloth-of-sack.)


                              LETTER VII.

                         TO MARGARET POLIDORI.