British School. One of the original “Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood,” but elected A.R.A. in 1853. With the exception of No. 1506, these pictures have all been removed to the Tate Gallery, and are not included in the new catalogue of the National Gallery.
LONDON, NATIONAL GALLERY
THE YEOMAN OF THE GUARD Life-size figure of an old soldier, seated in profile to left, in the picturesque uniform of the ” Beefeaters.” He holds a staff in his right hand, in his left a folded paper. The heads of three halberds are seen over the top of a screen in the background.
Signed and dated 1876, R.A. 1877.
OPHELIA She floats in a clear stream overhung with vivid green foliage, her head to the left, her hands on either side of her. The face is that of Miss Siddall, afterwards married to Rossetti.
Signed and dated 1852. Exhibited R.A. 1852.
THE VALE OF REST “The scene is the interior of a convent garden just at sunset. Two women are in the garden, which is illuminated by the light remaining in the western sky, while the rigid poplars, each like death’s `lifted forefinger,’ make bars against the red, orange, and crimson of the west. The guarding wall of the enclosure is hidden by ash and other trees, filling the intervals of the loftier foliage…. One of the women is a novice, or lay sister, who, up to her knee in a grave, is busily and vigorously throwing out large spadefuls of earth…. Upon the prostrate head-stone, taken from the new-made grass, sits an elder nun holding a rosary, and with the long black of her robes sweeping the dark coarse grass.” (Ruskin, “Academy Notes,” 1859.)
Signed and dated, 1858. Exhibited R.A. 1859
THE NORTH-WEST PASSAGE “It might be done, and England should do it.”
In a parlour, near a window on the left which looks on to the sea, sits facing right a weather-beaten sea captain with a flowing white beard knitting his brows over the stories of search for the North-West Passage read out to him by his daughter, whose caressing hand lies upon his on his knee. She sits at his feet dressed in white with pink fichu and ribbons. On the table is a map of the polar regions, and on the floor green-bound log-books of former voyages; to the right a telescope and a glass of grog. On the wall behind hangs an engraving of Nelson and a coloured print of a ship in an ice-floe. On the right is a screen covered with ” scraps,” and draped with the Union Jack.
Signed and dated 1874. Exhibited R.A. 1874.
THE ORDER OF RELEASE A Highlander, out in the rebellion of 1745, wounded and imprisoned, is delivered by an order of release brought to him by his wife. Carrying her baby on her left arm, she presents it to the jailer who has admitted her, who examines it, while her husband lets his head fall on her shoulder; his collie dog jumps up and fawns upon him.
Signed and dated 1853. Exhibited R.A. 1853.