On the same scale as the drawings for the Garden of Idleness, this study for Love Leading the Pilgrim (cat. no. 75) must be Burne-Jones's original design, although the land- scape background — not required for the embroidery — may have been elaborated to give the work a sense of completeness. De Lisle dates it to 1877, and describes it as: one of the finest, in quality of line and composition as well as in charm of poetic feeling, of all Burne-Jones s drawings. Love is represented as a spirit, a guardian angel crowned with roses, round whose head all the birds of the air make sweet music — He semede as he were an aungel That down were comen fro hevene clere, And so intent is the Pilgrim on following him, that he does not even see the smiling valley with its winding river, nor the road which leads to the fair city; but, with his hand in that of Love, he climbs the rocks, and struggles through the thorny places, happy with that vision in front of him, anxious only to follow. 1 The artist presented the drawing to the daughter of his patron William Graham. Until her marriage to John Horner in 1883, Frances provided a platonic focus for many of his later romantic yearnings, and reciprocated with an appreciation of his art and benevolent humor. 2 The gift is recorded on the drawing by a cartouche with her initials, symbolically pierced by one of Cupid s arrows. Burne-Jones began the large oil painting in 1877, probably then deciding to make several substantial changes in setting 1. De Lisle 1904, p. 115. 2. See Frances Horner 1933 and "Sir John and Lady Horner," Abdy and Gere 1984, chap. 10.
Traditionally the drawing given to Frances Graham is dated to 1877 and since the style is somewhat different from the softer drawings of c. 1874 of the series. The rippling lines of the earlier figures are replaced with severity and an uninterrupted flowing line that runs across the Pilgrim's shoulders and is continued through the figure of love to his bow.
Vast in scale, this is a pencil study for Love and the Pilgrim of 1896–7 (Tate, London, N05381). The subject was inspired by Geoffrey Chaucer’s allegorical poem The Romaunt of the Rose which Burne-Jones had read while a student at Oxford and which influenced many of the works he produced in collaboration with William Morris (1834–1896). Burne-Jones presented this pencil study to Frances Graham (1854–1940) as a Valentine’s Day present in 1883. Frances’s friend Mary Gladstone recorded the gift in a letter: ‘Valentine’s Day – a big picture of Cupid dragging a maiden through all the meshes of love’.1 Frances provided a platonic focus for many of Burne-Jones’s later romantic yearnings, and reciprocated with an appreciation of his art and his benevolent humour. The gift is recorded on the drawing by a cartouche at the bottom right containing Frances’s initials symbolically pierced by one of Cupid’s arrows. Burne-Jones began work on the large oil painting in 1877 though it would not be completed for another twenty years. In the final painting, the God of Love holds an arrow instead of a bow from the original drawing. Burne-Jones also made several substantial changes to the setting, replacing craggy mountains and broken rocks with bucolic, rolling hills and grassland. 1. Mary Gladstone, 14 February 1875, quoted in Jane Abdy and Charlotte Gere, The Souls, London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1984, p. 131.