His health was, through his later life, bad; and for my own part, I
believe that the same morbid feeling manifested in his art affected
injuriously his physical life, aided doubtless by the excessive work
which occupied all his available hours. For many years previous to his
death he alternated between periods of almost unbroken labor, taking
time only to eat and sleep, and intervals of absolute rest for days
together. In his working fits, so deranged had his digestion become, he
could take only one meal, a late dinner, each day, and saw no visitors
except in the hour preceding his dinner.
Having gone to Paris to spend a winter in professional studies, I made
an earnest application by letter to Delacroix to be admitted as a pupil
to his _atelier_. In reply, he invited me to visit him at his rooms the
next day at four, to talk with him about my studies, proffering any
counsel in his gift, but assuring me that it was impossible for him to
receive me into his studio, as he could not work in the room with
another, and his strength and occupations did not permit him to have a
school apart, as he once had.
At the appointed time I presented myself, and was received very
pleasantly in a little drawing-room at his house in the Latin Quarter.
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