were periods of fun and practical jokes, and Turner always enjoyed, and
made the most of them. He frequently sent his canvas to the Academy merely
sketched out and grounded, and then coming in as early as four in the
morning on varnishing days, he would put his nose to the sketch and work
steadily with thousands of imperceptible touches until nightfall, while
his picture would begin to glow as by magic. About this time he exhibited
many pictures founded on classical subjects, or with the scenes laid in
Italy or Greece, as "Apollo and Daphne in the Vale of Tempe," "Regulus
Leaving Rome to Return to Carthage," the "Parting of Hero and Leander,"
"Phryne Going to the Public Baths as Venus," the "Banishment of Ovid from
Rome, with Views of the Bridge and Castle of St. Angelo." A year later he
exhibited pictures of "Ancient Rome," a vast dreamy pile of palaces, and
"Modern Rome," with a view of the "Forum in Ruins."

One of the most celebrated of Turner's pictures was that of the "Old
Temeraire," an old and famous line-of-battle ship, which in the battle of
Trafalgar ran in between and captured the French frigates Redoubtable and
Fougueux. Turner saw the Temeraire in the Thames after she had become
old, and was condemned to be dismantled. The scene is laid at sunset, when
the smouldering, red light is vividly reflected on the river, and
contrasts with the quiet, gray and pearly tints about the low-hung moon.
The majestic old ship looms up through these changing lights, bathed in
splendor. The artist refused a large price for this picture by Mr. Lennox,
of New York, and finally bequeathed it to the nation. In 1840 Turner
exhibited the "Bacchus and Ariadne," two marine scenes, and two views in
Venice; also the well-known "Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and
Dying, a Typhoon Coming On" (Fig. 76), which is now in the Museum of Fine
Arts of Boston. Of this picture Thackeray says: "I don't know whether it
is sublime or ridiculous." But Ruskin, in "Modern Painters," says: "I
believe if I were reduced to test Turner's immortality upon any single
work, I should choose the 'Slave Ship.' Its daring conception, ideal in
the highest sense of the word, is based on the purest truth, and wrought
out with the concentrated knowledge of a life. Its color is absolutely
perfect, not one false or morbid hue in any part or line, and so modulated
that every square inch of canvas is a perfect composition; its drawing as
accurate as fearless; the