Nos côtes anglaises

Holman Hunt finished this stretch of cliff and grazing sheep in 1852, painting it outdoors in Sussex with the fierce, exact detail the young Pre-Raphaelites prized, every blade and fleece and sunlit ear rendered as if under a lens. It looks like pure landscape, but the sheep have strayed to the very edge of the cliff, and viewers at the time read a warning in that. Britain was gripped by fear of a French invasion under Napoleon the Third, and one critic saw the wandering flock on an undefended shore as a quiet joke about how exposed the country really was. When the picture travelled to Paris for a great exhibition in 1855 it was shown under a second name, Strayed Sheep.