Printable Vintage Illustration: A Chaperoned Tryst, 1896

It isn't possible to love and part. You will wish that it was. You can transmute love, ignore it, muddle it, but you can never pull it out of you. I know by experience that the poets are right: love is eternal.
― E.M. Forster, A Room with a View

We stood there, looking at each other, saying nothing. But it was the kind of nothing that meant everything. In his eyes, there was no trace of what had happened between us earlier and I could feel something inside me break. So that was that. We were finally, finally over. I looked at him, and I felt so sad, because this thought occurred to me: “I will never look at you the same way again. I'll never be that girl again. The girl who comes running back every time you push her away, the girl who loves you anyway.”
I couldn’t even be mad at him, because this was who he was. This was who he’d always been. He’d never lied about that. He gave and then he took away. I felt it in the pit of my stomach, the familiar ache, that lost, regretful feeling only he could give me. I never wanted to feel it again. Never, ever. Maybe this was why I came, so I could really know. So I could say good-bye. I looked at him, and I thought, “If I was very brave or very honest, I would tell him.”
I would say it, so he would know it and I would know it, and I could never take it back. But I wasn’t that brave or honest, so all I did was look at him. And I think he knew anyway. “I release you. I evict you from my heart. Because if I don't do it now, I never will.” I was the one to look away first.
― Jenny Han, It's Not Summer Without You

Antique illustration of a Victorian lady having a tryst with a handsome gentleman in military costume while accompanied by a strict chaperon; originally published 1896. You can download the high-res illustration as an 12” x 7” @ 300 ppi JPEG here.


For personal use only. Not for resale. All digitized work by The Real Victorian is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Please cite RealVictorian.com as your source when sharing or publishing.

Printable Vintage Art: A Bouquet of Poppies by the Window by Olga Wisinger-Florian

A Bouquet of Poppies by the Window, before 1926
by Olga Wisinger-Florian (1844–1926)

She taught me all about real sacrifice. That it should be done from love... That it should be done from necessity, not without exhausting all other options. That it should be done for people who need your strength because they don't have enough of their own.
― Veronica Roth

For you, and for any dear to you, I would do anything. I would embrace any sacrifice for you and for those dear to you. And when you see your own bright beauty springing up anew at your feet, think now and then that there is a man who would give his life, to keep a life you love beside you.
― Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

Sources:
[1] Original image from Wikimedia.
[2] The Real Victorian's digitally enhanced version of the painting (seen above), downloadable as a 9" x 12" @ 300 ppi JPEG.


Digitally enhanced reproductions of public domain paintings are shared under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Printable Vintage Art: Funeral Procession in the Rain by Carl Strathmann

Funeral Procession in the Rain, c1913
by Carl Strathmann (1866–1939)
Sometimes when you sacrifice something precious, you're not really losing it. You're just passing it on to someone else.
― Mitch Albom, The Five People You Meet in Heaven

There are memories that time does not erase... Forever does not make loss forgettable, only bearable.
― Cassandra Clare, City of Heavenly Fire

The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.
― Ralph Waldo Emerson

Sources:
[1] Original image from Wikimedia.
[2] The Real Victorian's digitally enhanced version of the painting (seen above), downloadable as a 10" x 7.75" @ 300 ppi JPEG.


Digitally enhanced reproductions of public domain paintings are shared under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.