Le Dernier Regard sur l'Angleterre

In 1852 the sculptor Thomas Woolner, a friend of the painter, gave up on finding work in London and sailed for the Australian goldfields. That departure is what set Ford Madox Brown going on this picture. The year he was working on it, more than 350,000 people left Britain, and the couple you see here are Brown and his wife Emma, wrapped against the Channel wind with the white cliffs of Dover slipping away behind them. The oval frame presses them together and makes the little boat feel unsteady. Look along the bottom edge and you can pick out cabbages strung up in netting on the ship's side, hung there to keep through the long voyage. Her hand holds a smaller hand you almost miss, the baby's, tucked entirely inside her cloak.