Written down the page from left to right and continued on folio 44 recto (
D09120), opposite, Turner’s inscription reads, approximately:
[top left – column one]
The widows in Art
In life gay may
A prey to grief
Tell no relief
Exceeds belief
Whilst looks round other prey
Yet hope in part
And yet not to start
Made one smere
And then one stealing tear
Making to the ...
Twas oer the sight
Of blushing
Concerns starting bright
Loves mellow bluish reflected
Kiss [?] one gay ...
... with this ...
Then show to hope again
The lost
[top right – column two]
... on the cheek
... ... ... ?Blush? ...
on the blush cheek
who the vital ...
our live betrays
and of the
as every age
By thy own smile
... ... blush shining
doubt yet believing
hope soft yielding
light in the heart glows
[bottom centre]
Do ... ...
disrobe the after gem
the natures shed to hand around
the ... ... wound
nature’s sweet balm
her finest charm
heal
the ever ... ...
[and in bottom left corner]
... ... ?
Natures tear
To the gay accent
Is that of dark paint
... ... yesterday
Our loved country
And its ... ... ...
1The writing is very compact and almost indecipherable. Rosalind Mallord Turner’s transcriptions for the 1990 Tate exhibition are necessarily uncertain, and it may be doubted that any definitive reading is possible at all. One can make out enough to see that Turner is writing of themes of love, loss, art and nature in a tragic/elegiac mood. One can also sense a heavy affectation of decorum, perhaps suggesting a rehearsal for some public occasion. One possible context in this period, especially given the associations of this book with Farnley Hall, might be the death of Maria Grimston, the first wife of Walter Fawkes, on 10 December 1813.
