the completed full-size watercolour was first exhibited at the dudley gallery at the egyptian hall, piccadilly in 1873, alongside another watercolour, "the garden of the hesperides" (now in the kunsthalle hamburg). it was one of few works that burne-jones exhibited after he withdrew in high dudgeon from the old watercolour society in 1870, over the negative reception of his watercolour of "phyllis and demophoön " (which included a full-frontal naked male figure, and a portrait of his mistress maria zambaco), and before he started to exhibit at the grosvenor gallery when it opened in 1877. it was an immediate critical and popular success. burne-jones himself rated it very highly, and it was praised by george du maurier as "very stunning - almost the best thing he's done". writing later, julia cartwright has said it was "one of the master's most perfect and beautiful creations", and malcolm bell called it "the most impressive of the painter's works, with its vague hint of an untold tragedy that haunts the memory".