Off The Top Of My Head

 Ailz guessed the tapas bar would be closed when she saw one of the guys who run it breeze past on a bicycle. And so it was- for "technical reasons" according to the note pasted to the inside of the window glass. Instead we went to an Italian restaurant a few doors up that we hadn't tried. Very good it was too. Eastbourne is full of excellent places to eat- and though we've had simple meals and run-of-the mill meals I don't think we've ever had a bad one.

 Water rats (that's the species to which Ratty in The Wind in the Willows belongs) have been re-introduced to East Sussex. I doubt I'll ever see one but it's nice to know they're around....

 The Sahara is turning green again. This is due to equatorial weather systems moving north. The anchor woman who fronted this story tried to put a negative spin on it by saying this meant countries like Nigeria and Cameroon were no longer getting the rainfall they need. Unfortunately for her agenda the clip had been watched by people who were better informed and the comments underneath mostly said things like "I'm a Nigerian and our country has never been wetter."

Frederic Burton

 A couple of days ago I posted an image of the painting "Hellelil and Hildebrand, the Meeting on the Turret Stair." I think it's terrific,  so naturally I wanted to know more about the artist. 

Sir Frederic William Burton is not well-known. Google him and you have to sift his entries from the ones dealing with an obscure American actor of approximately the same name. He was Irish, left handed and worked almost exclusively in watercolour. "Hillelil and Hildebrand" is untypical; it was created under the influence of the pre-Raphaelites and has a simplicity and intensity that are unique in his work. He was in demand as a portrait painter- and he was a good one- but not individual or original enough to stand out from the competition. You know how you can go into a gallery and certain picures sort of leap of the wall at you (not literally)?  Well that's unlikely to happen with the average Burton. He doesn't have a style or an aura that is instantly recognisable- as the greatest artists do. 

Here's a fine example of his portrait work. It's famous because of its sitter- a personal friend of his-  but there are other images of George Elliot and this is almost certainly the most vivid. 



In later life he was appointed director of the National Gallery in London- and seems gradually to have given up painting. He was an excellent director and purchased some of the collection's great masterpieces, for example, Hans Holbein's wall-filling portrait of "The Ambassadors". In person he was austere and retiring and a life-long bachelor (though there was an engagement to a much younger woman that dragged on and on until it petered out.)  Here's a photograph of him in old age which I find both endearing and a little sad. I think I would have liked him.