Bubbles (painting) prospect of his work and his grandson being the subject of commercial exploitation. However, when he was shown the proofs of the proposed advertisements he grew to appreciate the idea, which portrayed the soap as if the child had used it to make the bubbles. Following the success of this advertisement Millais was attacked in print by the novelist Marie Corelli who accused him in her novel "The Sorrows of Satan" of prostituting his talent to sell soap. Millais wrote to her pointing out that he had sold the copyright of the painting and so was unable to stop the
The North-West Passage was promoting at the time. The female figure was a professional model, Mrs Ellis, who was later used in another painting, "Stitch, Stitch, Stitch" (1876). The right side of the painting originally depicted two of the sailor's grandchildren, who were modelled by John and Alice Millais, two of Millais' own children. They were shown looking at a globe of the world. But after Millais completed the painting, he became unhappy with the figures of the children, thinking that they distracted the eye from the main figure. He cut out this section of the painting and replaced it with a screen,