| Disgrifiad | In 1862 he spends January and February touring Macclesfield, Derbyshire, the Potteries, Stafford and Wolverhampton, is in Cornwall and Devon in April, North Wales and Liverpool in May, Durham and Newcastle in June, where he visits Stephenson's factory and describes the process of silver extraction, and then in Glasgow and Edinburgh. From 20 August to 2 October he paints in Paris and returns with his friend the French painter Jean Léon Gèrome. From 3 to 7 October they sight-see furiously around London and Windsor Castle, about which Crowe remarks, "the suite of halls is a disgrace to England". On 20 October he leaves for the Midlands for more Art School work, and crosses to Dublin, returning to London on 8 November having examined in Bangor and Carnarvon and passed through Birmingham and Oxford. Before the end of the year Crowe is also found in Edinburgh, Norwich, Peterborough, Lincoln, Sheffield and Lancashire.
1863 is just as busy, starting on 2 February with a working tour around Birmingham, the Potteries and Derbyshire. On 26 February, Crowe is in Ipswich and is shown around a factory. On 7 March there is a vivid description of Princess Alexandra's formal entrance procession into London. April sees Crowe in Cambridgeshire and Boston, and on 20 May Derby Day is described. June is spent in West Yorkshire, Newcastle, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Paisley, Greenock and Ayr, but after that Crowe remains in London until 4 October when he leaves for Dublin. On 10 October he on exam work in Limerick, and visits Ennis, co. Clare, meeting the village gaoler, dean and Oldest Inhabitant in an attempt to research his friend Mulready's family history. Crowe travels further around Southern Ireland before the diary breaks off in Dublin on 22 October.
In between travelling, Crowe works hard on his painting. In March 1862 he finishes De Foe, which is sold on 2 May for £400. At the start of the year there is an ongoing project of "cartoons" for mosaics at the International Exhibition. By August he is working on Death of Goldsmith, and in France he begins on a "Charles 2nd picture". In November he starts work on a painting of Luther, and in December sketches on the Marriage at Cana theme. These projects continue in 1863. On 7 January 1863 Crowe describes painting a beggarwoman: "ye Gods, what squalor! 10 till 3, opening & closing the windows, snuffling chlorate, smoking cigarettes - &c. - but the fumes were all of little avail against the tremendous odds". By April he is also working on a painting of Jonathan Swift, and in July and August he completes a commission for a life-size painting of Hogarth. Work also begins on Christopher Wren in August. On two occasions, on 12 January and 16 March 1862, Crowe's friend and fellow artist Ffrith offers criticism and advice.
The diary is detailed in its account of Crowe's social life, and is full of anecdotes. On 12 April 1863 there is a long account of a duel in France during which Gèrome was shot in the arm. A year earlier, Crowe met Landseer, and he sketches his face in the diary. He meets or mentions W.M. Thackeray on a number of occasions, and remarks on 23 May 1862, "he can be in thorough rollicking humour; make a hundred witty repartees, banter the ladies, fire off puns by the score, &c., &c., as he did this evening, & yet let every body have his say besides". Crowe spends much of his time dining with his younger brother George, a medical student, and meeting friends and acquaintances at his Club. He sees his sister Amy regularly until her marriage to Edward Thackeray in December 1862, and when she goes to India they correspond by post, as he does with his other sister Eugenie Marie Wynne, referred to by him as 'Zen'. Frequent references to 'the Governor', meaning his father, Eyre Evans Crowe. On 22 January 1863 Crowe travels by the newly-opened (10 January) Underground Railway: "...a term confined to the way the good niggers go hitherto: but this great revolution in London locomotion is taken quite cooly by every-one, except the Stokers who can't keep their condensing water sufficiently so". |