a 
 
 : 
 4 
 
 
 

 

 
BRITISH ARTISTS 
 
 ee 
 
 RAEBURN 
 
 Edited hy $. C. KAINES SMITH 
 
BRITISH ARVISTS 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 S. C. KAINES SMITH, M.A., M.B.E. 
 
 The volumes at present arranged comprise the following 
 here given in (approximately) chronological order. 
 
 XV. 
 
 Vol. 
 The XVI.Century Painters. XVI. 
 With a note on the influ- 
 ence of Holbein. 
 Cornelius Johnson and 
 Jamesone. 
 Dobson and Walker. With Sap di' 
 a note on the work of Van XVIII. 
 Dyck in England. XIX. 
 Lely and Kneller. XX. 
 J. Riley, Greenhill, J. M. 
 Wright and Mary Beale. gk, 
 Thornhill, Jervas, Dand- x f 
 ridge, Richardson and XXIII. 
 Hudson 
 Hogarth. eS 
 Richard Wilson and Joseph : 
 Farington. XXV. 
 Reynolds. XXVI. 
 Gainsborough. XXVII. 
 Romney. XXVIII. 
 Wright of Derby. XXIX. 
 . PaulSandby,Towne,Cozens. XXX. 
 With a note on the rise of XxXI1 
 water-colour painting. ; 
 B.West, J.S. Copley, and G. XXX. 
 Stuart. With a note on 
 American painting in the 
 XVIII. Century. 
 Barker of Bath and the XXXII. 
 Bath Painters. XXXIV. 
 XXXV. Watts. 
 
 Kauffman, Bartolozzi, 
 and Zoffany. Witha 
 note on Foreign Mem- 
 bers of the Royal 
 Academy in 1768. 
 
 Downman and Dance. 
 Hoppner. 
 
 Opie and Cosway. 
 Raeburn. 
 Rowlandson. 
 
 Morland and Ibbetson. 
 
 John (old)Crome. With 
 a note on the Norwich 
 School. 
 
 Lawrence. 
 
 James Ward. 
 
 Girtin and Bonington. 
 Constable. 
 
 Cotman. 
 
 Cox. 
 
 De Wint. 
 
 Copley Fielding. 
 
 Bewick and Clarkson 
 Stanfield. With anote 
 
 on the Newcastle 
 group. 
 
 Turner. 
 
 Alfred Stevens. 
 
 OTHERS IN PREPARATION. 
 

 
National Gallery of Scotland 
 PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST 
 
 SIR HENRY RAEBURN 
 
 (Frontispiece) | 
 
 
 
BRITISH ARTISTS 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 S. C. KAINES SMITH, 
 M.A., F.S.A. 
 
 RAEBURN 
 
 E. RIMBAULT DIBDIN 
 
 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 
 PUBLISHERS 
 
First published in 1925 
 
 Made and Printed in Great Britain by 
 The Camelot Press Limited, 
 Southampton 
 
EDITOR’S FOREWORD. 
 
 I FORGET when it was that I first saw The Macnab. 
 It was a very long time ago, and until last year, 
 at Wembley, I had not seen it again: yet I found, 
 to my delight, that there was scarcely a stroke of 
 it that I did not remember perfectly. Moreover, 
 when I come to examine my experience, I find every 
 great picture by Raeburn that I have ever seen 
 possesses, so far as I am concerned, this same 
 quality of indelibility. The Lieut.-Colonel McMurdo, 
 and the inimitable Mrs. H. W. Lauzun in 
 the National Gallery, hold their own with the 
 same insistence from the days when I used to 
 lecture at the National Gallery, and indeed, to 
 recount the names of Raeburns that cannot be 
 forgotten, would be merely to give a list of those 
 that I have seen. 
 
 It is difficult to define the source of this quality, 
 but I have always felt that there is in Raeburn’s 
 work a complete absence of the interposition of 
 any traditional or conventional method between 
 the artist and the spectator of his picture; 
 a certain honesty and freshness that carry 
 
 Vv 
 
vi Editor’s Foreword 
 
 conviction, and make the method integral with 
 the result. 
 
 This directness appears to me to be one of 
 the most essential qualities of greatness, and 
 _ Raeburn, perhaps because of his remoteness 
 from the atmosphere of cosmopolitanism which 
 had invaded London in matters touching the 
 art of painting, has it in a remarkable 
 degree. 
 
 What was needed to provide a setting for the 
 quality of the artist was precisely the work Mr. 
 Dibdin has done for this series; he has brought 
 together facts, and has abjured fancies. While 
 it is true that he has dispelled some of the atmo- 
 sphere of romance which Allan Cunningham had 
 sought to throw about his subject, he has succeeded, 
 on the other hand, in giving us a picture of Sir 
 Henry Raeburn, which, in a great measure, accounts 
 for the forceful simplicity, and workmanlike 
 directness of his art. 
 
 The businesslike practicality itself, of the painter 
 who painted as a business, in business hours, and 
 lived the pleasant life of his acquired position of a 
 gentleman of means outside those business hours, 
 
 ds its reflection in what we may call a practicality 
 of his handling of his medium; while his insight 
 into character, always shrewd, and sometimes 
 humorous, a kind of dry, penetrative humour 
 characteristic of his race, shows itself in the fresh- 
 ness and vigour with which he places real human 
 beings on his canvas. 
 
 Our debt to Mr. Dibdin is great for his exercise 
 
Editor’s Foreword vil 
 
 of qualities very like those of the painter whose 
 life he has written. 
 S. C. KAINES SMITH. 
 City ART GALLERY, 
 LEEDs. 
 24th April, 1925. 
 

 
PREFACE. 
 
 RAEBURN is so great a figure in the history of 
 British painting that an adequate account of his 
 life and work is to be desired. His early biographers, 
 when the collection of material was a comparatively 
 easy task, unfortunately failed to make good use 
 of their opportunities ; and Sir Walter Armstrong, 
 writing in 1901, although he detected some errors in 
 the narratives of his predecessors, and found some 
 new matter, does not seem to have examined all 
 the details of his theme with a thoroughness com- 
 mensurate with the pretensions of his handsome 
 and well-illustrated volume. He provided a list 
 of Raeburn’s paintings, but its incompleteness is 
 sufficiently shown by comparison with the list 
 printed ten years later in the Connoisseur volume, 
 after Mr. James Greig’s ‘Life.’ Mr. Edward 
 Pinnington, Mr. James L. Caw, Mr. Greig, and 
 other writers have made useful incursions into the 
 terra incognita of Raeburn’s life, but we still know 
 too little about it. A full century after Raeburn’s 
 death his life story, as we have it, is rather like 
 those ancient maps of Africa, on which the coastal 
 towns, mouths of rivers, details of the lower Nile, 
 
 ix 
 
x Preface 
 
 and the Sahara are duly indicated; and the vast 
 interior is agreeably patterned by the industrious 
 chartographer with imaginary figures of lions, 
 elephants, ostriches, and naked savages with bows 
 and arrows. 
 
 The smooth smiling verdure of a Highland bog 
 is not more deceptive than was the prospect Il 
 imagined before me, when I undertook with a 
 light heart to write of Raeburn; conscious that I 
 had a wide and life-long knowledge of and 
 admiration for his work, as well as of the 
 city where he was born, lived, and died; and 
 had read nearly all that had been written about 
 him. 
 
 However extensive one’s acquaintance may be 
 with what is known on any subject, it is only on 
 sitting down to write about it that the gaps in our 
 knowledge appear. Ifoundthat Allan Cunningham 
 and William Raeburn Andrew had not only omitted 
 to report much that it was desirable we should 
 know, but had presented their blend of fact and 
 fiction distorted by a conception of Sir Henry 
 Raeburn probably invented by his descendants to 
 match his title, and almost certainly not very like 
 the actual man. I have tried to get back through 
 the fog to the latter: the God-made being always 
 preferable to the man-created. On the relatively 
 small scale allowed by this series it has not, of 
 course, been possible to do all that my love of the 
 subject prompted ; but I have been able to correct, 
 on what appears to be sound evidence, a good deal 
 that was erroneous; and I have endeavoured to 
 
Preface x1 
 
 present a coherent picture of the man, in conformity 
 with the facts and acts of his career; not as I or 
 any one else may have imagined him. For the 
 doing of this, all the space at my disposal was 
 required, so I had to avoid, as far as I could, 
 discursions on Scottish life and Scottish art, 
 Edinburgh and its citizens, the people who sat to 
 Raeburn, and other topics with which the biographi- 
 cal narrative might have been appropriately and 
 agreeably varied. 
 
 When one writes the life of a man who died 
 more than a century ago, it is a matter of course 
 _that the construction is one for which the writer 
 is indebted to others for the bricks with which he 
 builds up his edifice: his part is only the archi- 
 tectural arrangement of material. It is the first 
 duty of a biographer to take into account and 
 weigh what has been written by others on the 
 subject, and he cannot avoid using facts they have 
 made known. No honest writer would, however, 
 take exception to his doing so, provided due 
 acknowledgment is made. To all my predecessors: 
 as noted in the Bibliography, I gladly make such 
 acknowledgment now. 
 
 For much more than such passive aid I have 
 pleasure in thanking many friendly helpers who 
 have taken a lively interest in my enquiries, and 
 in one way or another have added considerably 
 to the value of this monograph. Mr. W. Forbes 
 Gray, F.R.S.E., F.S.A., Scot., Chairman of the 
 Old Edinburgh Club, made researches for me, 
 advised me on many points, and read in MS. the 
 
xii Preface 
 
 biographical part of this book. My friend of many 
 years Mr. D. Croal Thomson, did me a similar service 
 by reading the portion of my MS. which treats of 
 Raeburn’s pictures and his position in art. Another 
 old friend to whom, alas, my thanks cannot be 
 expressed, was W. D. McKay, R.S.A., LL.D., 
 with whom, after much helpful correspondence, I 
 spent considerable time, not very long before his 
 death, in discussing difficult points. The Assistant 
 Secretary of the R.S.A., Mr. Henry Hastings, was 
 at the same time continually helpful, Mr. McKay’s 
 successor as Secretary to the R.S.A., Mr. James 
 Paterson, R.S.A., R.W.S., P.R.S.W., has proved 
 equally kind in his readiness to help. Mr. R. Hill 
 Stewart, F.F.A., the General Manager, and Mr. T. 
 MacMaster, the Secretary of the Caledonian In- 
 surance Company were at considerable pains to 
 provide me with interesting facts as to Raeburn’s 
 connection with that company. I am indebted 
 also for help in various ways to Mr. John K. 
 Ballantyne, Mr. T. C. F. Brotchie, Superintendent 
 of the Glasgow Museums and Art Galleries, Mr. 
 James L. Caw, Director of the Scottish National 
 Gallery, Mr. George Clausen. R.A., Miss Deuchar, Mr. 
 H. D. Dickie and Miss Dickie, Mr. G. A. Dunlop, 
 Director of the Warrington Art Gallery and 
 Museum, Miss M. M. Guthrie, Mr. Gemmell 
 Hutchison, R.S.A., Mr. Arthur Kay, Mr. W. 
 R. M. Lamb, M.A., Secretary of the Royal 
 Academy, Mr. Peter Munnoch, Mr. Frank Rinder, 
 Mr. W. Roughead, W.S., and Mr. Marion H. 
 Spielmann, F.S.A., and to Sir William H. Raeburn 
 
Preface xili 
 
 for permission to reproduce the portraits of Robert 
 Hay of Drumelzier, and Lady Inglis, in his collec- 
 tion. Last but not least among helpers I desire 
 to thank the officials of the British Museum Reading 
 Room, the Edinburgh University Library, and the 
 Liverpool Public Library. 
 
 E. RIMBAULT DIBDIN. 
 

 
 RRS * 
 ) ile eae 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PREFAC , z A : : : 
 
 CHAPTER I: BIOGRAPHICAL AND PERSONAL 
 
 re II: ASSOCIATION WITH ARTISTS 
 
 3 III: SomME CONTEMPORARY 
 ESTIMATES é . 4 
 < IV: INFLUENCE ON CONTEMPOR- 
 
 ARIES AND SUCCESSORS s 
 ae V: THE QUALITY OF THE ARTIST 
 APPENDIX I: BIBLIOGRAPHY . : 2 
 
 II: List oF PICTURES IN PUBLIC 
 
 GALLERIES se é . 
 
 XV 
 
 71 
 
 106 
 129 
 
 149 
 
 155 
 

 
et ON a BR et 
 
 tio. OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 SIR HENRY RAEBURN . . Frontispiece 
 
 HENRY DAVID INGLIS 
 
 Mr. AND Mrs. ROBERT CAMPBELL 
 ROBERT Hay 
 
 Mrs. Hosson 
 
 Lt.-CoL. BRycE McMurpDo 
 
 LapDy INGLIS ° : : é 
 
 JAMES WARDROP 
 
 BR xvii 
 
 24 
 44 
 64 
 

 
CHAPTER I. 
 BIOGRAPHICAL AND PERSONAL. 
 
 ‘ Y dear old Stockbridge,’ as David 
 
 Roberts, R.A., affectionately wrote 
 
 of it, is not and never has been a 
 notably fashionable quarter of Edinburgh ; 
 but it enjoys the distinction that it was the 
 birthplace of two very eminent painters: 
 Roberts himself, and Henry Raeburn, the 
 greatest master in portraiture that Scotland 
 can boast. He was full forty years old when 
 Roberts was born not far from his house, 
 in a ‘ land’ where David’s parents lived and 
 his father worked as a shoemaker or cobbler, 
 but it is pleasant to have the story recorded 
 by William Raeburn Andrew that Raeburn, 
 walking in his garden one morning, en- 
 countered a small boy who had no business 
 there, but who was freely forgiven on his 
 exhibiting a sketch he had been making of a 
 Gothic window in the house. He had 
 arrived ‘over the garden wall, but he had 
 now free access, encouragement and in- 
 struction from Raeburn.’ How far the boy, 
 who became famous as David Roberts, was 
 indebted to Raeburn in the matter of 
 
 I 
 
2 Raeburn 
 
 instruction is not recorded, nor do we know 
 if it was before or after a passion for drawing 
 led to his being apprenticed to Gavin Beugo, 
 housepainter, member of a family that had 
 at least one artist member in John Beugo, 
 engraver of Alexander Nasmyth’s portrait 
 of Robert Burns for the first Edinburgh 
 edition of his poems, and also of several 
 Raeburn portraits. It is to be inferred that 
 Raeburn’s favour to the boy endured, as 
 W. R. Andrew says that he ‘ continued to 
 have a friendly interest in the family as 
 long as he lived.’ There is no trace of the 
 agreeable legend in the life of Roberts which 
 James Ballantine compiled from his auto- 
 biographical notes. 
 
 Henry Raeburn was born at Stockbridge 
 on Thursday, 4th March, 1756, and appar- 
 ently baptised at St. Cuthbert’s Church on 
 the following Sunday, 7th March. The entry 
 in the parish records, as quoted by Cumber- 
 land Hill, is as follows: ‘Sunday, 7th 
 March, 1756.—Robert Raeburn, yarn-boiler 
 at Stockbridge, and spouse Ann Elder; a 
 son, Henry, born 4th March, instant. 
 Witness: Thomas Spence and _ Robert 
 Dixon, weavers in Edinburgh.’ 
 
 To Cumberland Hill we are indebted for a 
 description, based on personal knowledge, 
 of the locality: ‘ The yarn-boiling premises 
 of the elder Raeburn and of his son William, 
 who afterwards carried on the business, as 
 
Biographical and Personal 3 
 
 well as their dwelling-house, were situated 
 at the side of the mill-lade, exactly where the 
 western part of Horne Lane now stands. 
 Their dwelling-house was a neat one-storeyed, 
 slated cottage, that stood in the midst of a 
 small piece of pretty garden ground, a little 
 to the west of the yarn-boiling premises. 
 As this house continued to be occupied by 
 some of the descendants of the family up 
 to the time that the business was given up, 
 there is every probability that in this house 
 Sir Henry was born. It was a pleasantly 
 situated little spot. Immediately behind the 
 house ran the mill-lade, at that time pure and 
 limpid. To the north was a beautiful fruit 
 orchard, covering the ground where Saunders 
 Street now stands.’ 
 
 David Roberts, describing Stockbridge 
 as he remembered it at the beginning of the 
 nineteenth century, wrote: ‘The villagers 
 were almost all equally poor. There were 
 three or four shops kept by old women, and 
 the men were generally engaged in outdoor 
 occupations, such as masons, carpenters, 
 quarrymen, and carters—a somewhat 
 primitive, and, as my poor mother used to 
 say, “‘ a godless race.” ’ 
 
 Stockbridge, long since swallowed up by 
 the growth of Edinburgh, is now a closely 
 built locality ; but in 1756 it was a village 
 of five or six hundred inhabitants (they 
 numbered 524 in 1743) in the parish of St. 
 
4 Raeburn 
 
 Cuthbert’s, or West Kirk, and separated by 
 a considerable distance from the city, which 
 had not yet begun to set about building the 
 ‘New’ Town on the north side of the Nor’ 
 Loch, in fulfilment of Daniel Defoe’s far- 
 seeing anticipation half a century before that 
 the High Street would be forsaken, and the 
 city would ‘run all out of its gates to the 
 north.’ Other and similar villages strung 
 on the Water of Leith, because of the water- 
 power it supplied, were Dean, Silvermills, 
 and Canonmills. Approached by one very 
 steep country road, Stockbridge had prob- 
 ably less communication with Edinburgh 
 than with the Port of Leith. I found no 
 trace of it, or of any Raeburns, in the list of 
 citizens in the first Edinburgh Directory 
 published in 1773; although the family 
 yarn-boiling business was then a_ well- 
 established one, and Raeburn’s brother was 
 actually noted in the list of Extraordinary 
 Council Deacons ; nor is it to be found later 
 in the 1788 Directory. 
 
 Of Robert Raeburn and his ancestry the 
 one fact certainly known hitherto is that he 
 was a yarn-boiler at Stockbridge in 1756. 
 To this I am able to add the information, 
 obtained from the Scottish Record Society’s 
 Register of Marriages for the Parish of 
 Edinburgh, 1701-1750, that “Robert Rae- 
 burn, weaver in N.E.p., married Ann Elder, 
 d. of Henry Elder, indw. in Aberdour par., 
 
Biographical and Personal 5 
 
 now in N.W.p. 9th November, 1740.’ W.R. 
 Andrew, although a descendant, evidently 
 knew no more, for he was content to repeat 
 Allan Cunningham to the effect that ‘ his 
 ancestors were of the sturdy Border stock— 
 reiving pastoral lairds—husbandmen in 
 peace, and soldiers in war, till the days of 
 disorder ended with the Union of the Crowns, 
 upon which they laid aside the helmet and 
 sword, and peacefully cultivated the ground 
 during succeeding generations.’ This 
 definite statement is weakened by what 
 follows: ‘They probably took their name 
 from a hill-farm in Annandale, still held by 
 Sir Walter Scott’s kinsfolk. Sir Henry used 
 to say that he was a Raeburn of that ilk, 
 his forbears having had it before the Scotts. 
 On his shield is a Rae, or Roe-deer, drinking 
 from a burn running at its feet. The crest 
 is a Roe’s head, with the motto, “‘ Robur 
 sm Deo.”’ 
 
 W. R. Andrew, in his next paragraph 
 makes, with what has the air of veiled un- 
 belief, a reference in practically the words of 
 Cunningham, to the labours of ‘a Northern 
 antiquarian, who, unwilling to _ believe, 
 perhaps, that any one so distinguished could 
 come from such an ancestry, resolved to find 
 for him a loftier origin ; and accordingly set 
 up a genealogical tree, which averred, in the 
 mystic language of allegorical biography, 
 that he was a direct descendant from the 
 
6 Raeburn 
 
 Raeburns of Raeburn, a family distinguished 
 in the Scottish wars, who had won worthily 
 the honours of knighthood, and were allied, 
 moreover, in blood and by marriage to many 
 of those of martial fame. Whether this 
 lineage be rooted in reality or romance is not 
 very material in the history of one whose 
 fame arises from his being the Reynolds of 
 the North, and the worthy companion of the 
 most eminent men of the British School of 
 Painting.’ 
 
 With this entirely sensible pronouncement 
 Allan Cunningham and W. R. Andrew leave 
 the subject, where we also may be content to 
 leave it until some definite evidence emerges. 
 At present there is none beyond the fact 
 that Sir Henry Raeburn is said to have 
 used a crest and a coat of arms, which is 
 scarcely conclusive. W. R. Andrew, writing 
 more than sixty years after his ancestor’s 
 death and residing in England, knew, and 
 frankly shows that he knew, nothing de- 
 finitely on the subject, and merely set down, 
 with careful reserve, what he had been told, 
 or had read in Cunningham’s memoir. In 
 ‘An Ordinary of Arms in the Public Register 
 of all arms and bearings in Scotland,’ by Sir 
 James Balfour Paul, Lyon King at Arms 
 (1893), there is a record of a grant in 1841 
 to Raeburn of St. Bernard’s (the painter’s 
 son), “ Arg. on a piece of ground in base vert a 
 roebuck statant ppr., drinking out of a burn 
 
Biographical and Personal 4 
 
 or brook running bendways az. ; on a canton 
 erm. a knight’s helmet ppr.’ From this my 
 conclusion is, in absence of any proof to the 
 contrary, that the Raeburn arms only came 
 into existence after the painter’s death. 
 Robert Raeburn, then, ‘ removed to Stock- 
 bridge, married Ann Elder, commenced 
 manufacturer, became the proprietor of 
 mills... ..~  Other-.biographers... have 
 assumed that he removed from the Border 
 country, but this is not stated on early 
 authority. All Raeburns probably were from 
 the south, but the migration may have been 
 by an earlier generation. Robert was 
 described as ‘ Burgess and Freeman’ in the 
 Heriot’s Hospital Records, which seems to 
 imply that he was a native of the town. 
 Reference to the valuable publications 
 of the Scottish Record Society and to old 
 Edinburgh Directories shows that the name 
 Raeburn (Reaburn, or Reburn) occurred in 
 the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, 
 and was by no means uncommon in the 
 eighteenth century. Without making an 
 exhaustive search I have found twenty-two 
 entries of marriages, testaments, and deaths : 
 4 labourers, 3 gardeners, 2 weavers, 2 wrights, 
 and 1 each either following the trade of 
 (or, if a female, married to) a servitor, 
 metster, tailor, indweller, maltman, mariner, 
 silk-dyer, bookbinder, hairdresser, perfumer, 
 and soldier. Turning to the Directories we 
 
8 Raeburn 
 
 find that several Raeburns were inhabiting 
 Edinburgh in the eighteenth century. There 
 are none in the lists of residents for 1773-6, 
 but in 1778 there was a ‘ Wil. Raeburn, 
 ladies’ hair-dresser and perf., bridge str.,’ 
 who continued long in business. In 1788, 
 in addition to Henry, then established in 
 George Street, we find this William Raeburn, 
 perfumer, and George Raeburn, tailor, in 
 Leith, who continued in the Directories 
 until 1800. William Raeburn evidently 
 became an eminent man in his walk of art, 
 as he was styled ‘ perfumer to H.R.H. the 
 Prince of Wales.’ His shop was 13 North 
 Bridge, and his house was at the foot of 
 Carrubber’s Close. He died* on 24th March, 
 1812, and in the 1812 Directory the entry 
 became ‘Mrs. Raeburn, Perfumer, etc.’ 
 In that year she effected an insurance 
 against fire with the Caledonian Insurance 
 Company, cancelling an earlier one, probably 
 dated 1805, and effected by her husband, 
 for £1,000 on the building of her tenement on 
 the North Bridge, ‘ possessed by herself 
 and her tenants. Pomatum occasionally 
 made therein,’ a further sum of {£1,000 on 
 
 * There are records of two marriages of William 
 Raeburn, not improbably the same person: in 1775, 
 when he was described as a hairdresser, and married a 
 daughter of a Musselburgh farmer; and in 1785, when he 
 was styled perfumer, and married a Leith merchant’s 
 daughter. 
 
Biographical and Personal 9 
 
 stock-in-trade and utensils, and £300 on 
 household furniture, etc. in her dwelling- 
 house, No. 37 North Bridge. In the 
 Directories her name continued until 1817 
 when there was only Mrs. Raeburn, Mound 
 Place, seemingly indicating that she had 
 retired from business. In or before 1823 
 she probably retired from the world, as her 
 name ceased. In 1819, James Raeburn, 
 perfumer, Prince Street, made a single 
 meteoric appearance. 
 
 Peter, evidently a struggling member of 
 the clan, let furnished lodgings in 1796; in 
 1800 he had become a grocer; in 1811 he 
 again let lodgings ; in 1814 he had returned 
 to grocery, and, after 1816 he disappeared. 
 In 21 years this rolling stone had eight 
 different addresses. He may. have been 
 succeeded in business by Robert, who was 
 announced to let lodgings from 1824 to 1826. 
 Alexander, a spirit-dealer, is recorded in 
 1823 and 1824, and William announced the 
 same trade as his from 1826 to 1830: the 
 last year for which I searched the Directory. 
 James was a broker in the Cowgate from 
 1827 to 1830, and a Mrs. Raeburn followed 
 the same profession at another number in 
 the Cowgate in 1828 and 1829. From 1817 
 to 1819 John Raeburn was an ‘ ordained 
 surveyor’ at 1m Market Street. In 1818 
 James Raeburn, architect, St. Bernard’s 
 Well, Stockbridge, made an appearance. 
 
Io Raeburn 
 
 Three years later he removed to Royal 
 Circus (or S. E. Circus Place), where he was 
 still noted in 1830. In 1821 there is a single 
 entry of George Raeburn, a writer, at 3 
 Gilmore Place. 
 
 A dozen Raeburns sufficiently prominent 
 in the community to get their names entered 
 in the Directory show that persons of that 
 name were not uncommon in Edinburgh. 
 None, it may be concluded, were descendants 
 of Sir Henry. We do not know if his brother 
 had any children ; in fact we know practic- 
 ally nothing about him except that he carried 
 on his father’s business until he died, on 6th 
 December, 1810. His name appears in the 
 1811 Directory, but in that for 1812 the 
 entry is changed to Mrs. Raeburn, and her 
 name remains until 1821. 
 
 Nothing is known about the infancy and 
 early years of Raeburn, except that in his 
 eighth year he was left an orphan; his ~ 
 mother, who had survived her husband, 
 dying in August 1763. The child was left 
 to the care of his only brother William, 
 twelve years or more his senior, who carried 
 on the business. For so young a man the 
 double duty was most likely rather a heavy 
 burden, and it is not surprising to find that 
 he was ready to relieve himself by sending 
 Henry to George Heriot’s Hospital. 
 
 That Institution was founded after the 
 death of George Heriot, ‘jeweller to the 
 
Biographical and Personal Iz 
 
 King’s most excellent Majesty’ in 1624; 
 who left the residue of his fortune, after 
 providing legacies for relatives and servants, 
 and provision for two natural daughters, 
 ‘for and towards the founding and erection 
 of an Hospital . . . for the maintenance, 
 relief, bringing up, and education of so many 
 poor fatherless boys, freemen’s sons, of the 
 town of Edinburgh, as the means which I 
 give, etc. . . . shall amount or come to.’ 
 Thanks to the good management of the 
 Institution, and the judicious investment of 
 its funds, the number of boys at the Hospital 
 had increased from 30 in 1659 to I40 in 1763. 
 There had, however, been periods of difficulty 
 in the earlier years, and during one of these 
 Robert Sandilands, of Meldrumsheugh, in 
 1695 bought for £2,000 the right to appoint 
 two boys in perpetuity, ‘within ten years 
 and six months of age at the time they are 
 presented, and clean and wholesome.’ 
 After the death of Robert Sandilands his 
 eldest daughter, Sarah, as his legal repre- 
 sentative, exercised the right; and _ she 
 presented Henry Raeburn, who, being found 
 eligible, was admitted in April 1765, just 
 after entering his tenth year. In the third 
 edition of William Steven’s History of George 
 Heriot’s Hospital (1872) the date is given as 
 1764, but Cumberland Hill’s evidence is 
 satisfying as to the later date, though not 
 so on another matter. An easy computation 
 
12 Raeburn 
 
 based on dates would show that Sarah 
 Sandilands was by this time an elderly 
 person, but according to Hill she, having 
 afterwards married Mr. Durham of Boghead, 
 Linlithgowshire, had issue, and her grand- 
 daughter, Mrs. Durham Weir, was present 
 at Hopetoun House in 1822, when Raeburn 
 was knighted by King George IV. Mr. 
 James Greig correctly describes the lady as 
 in 1765 ‘Relict of Thomas Durham of 
 Boghead.’ Hull was doubtless misled by the 
 fact that, according to Scottish usage, she 
 continued for legal purposes to be known 
 by her maiden name. 
 
 The original plan of the persons who 
 framed the rules and regulations of George 
 Heriot’s Hospital, was in pursuance of the 
 founder’s intention, ‘only to relieve the 
 poor,’ and so the boys were only to be 
 “taught to read and write distinctly, and 
 cast all manner of accounts; also the rudi- 
 ments of the Latin language.’ This pro- 
 gramme was gradually widened, but it would 
 be hard to say to what extent this had taken 
 place by 1765. From a Memoir of George 
 Heriot, published by Constable in 1822, (the 
 year in which The Fortunes of Nigel 
 appeared), we learn that the boys in the 
 Hospital “are now taught Greek, Mathe- 
 matics, etc. If the professions chosen by 
 the boys require a knowledge of drawing or 
 navigation they are sent to teachers for that 
 
Biographical and Personal 13 
 
 purpose ; those who aim at learned pro- 
 fessions may be sent to the University for 
 four years, and allowed {30 a year... 
 most of the boys were apprenticed to trades 
 in Edinburgh, and are allowed fro sterling 
 yearly for five years, being equal to an 
 apprentice fee of £50. At the end of the 
 apprenticeship, on producing a certificate of 
 good conduct from the master, they receive 
 £5, to buy a suit of clothes.’ 
 
 This was a fairly liberal programme, having 
 regard to the value of money at the time, as 
 indicated by the fact that the three teachers 
 appointed in 1759 each received a salary of 
 £17, with thirty shillings extra for a gown. 
 It is to be hoped that the pewter platters 
 used at table in the Hospital were better 
 supplied with nutriment for the body than 
 these starveling pedagogues were likely to 
 provide for the minds of the boys they 
 taught. W. R. Andrews remarks that 
 “singularly few of those brought up in this 
 Scottish Christ’s Hospital became distin- 
 guished in after life.’ The explanation is 
 that the aim of the Governors was only to 
 turn out a good type of apprentice for the 
 use of the local tradesman, and any lad who 
 became ‘distinguished’ did so in spite of 
 his start in life. 
 
 The boys, like those of the London Blue- 
 coat School, were compelled to wear a 
 distinctive costume. The statutes, compiled 
 
I4 Raeburn 
 
 in 1627, enjoined that ‘ they sall be comlie 
 and decentlie apparrelled as becumeth both 
 in thair lynning and cloathis. And thair 
 apparrell sal be of sad Russet cloath doub- 
 lettis breikis and stockingis or hose and 
 gownes of the same colour with black hattis 
 and stringis whiche they sal be bund to weare 
 during thair aboad in the said Hospittal and 
 no uther.’ Two centuries and a half later 
 (1872), the dress for resident boys was a 
 dark grey Melton jacket and cap, with light 
 grey tweed vest and trousers, and a Kilmar- 
 nock bonnet for week-day wear. The 
 “apparrell’ of the eighteenth century, of 
 which I have found no description, was 
 probably something transitional between 
 these two specifications, both suitably dismal 
 for charity-school boys, and in marked con- 
 trast to that of High School and other boys, 
 as described by Henry Cockburn, who was 
 born in 1779: ‘a round black hat, shirt 
 fastened at the neck by a black ribbon and, 
 except on dress days, unruffled, a double- 
 breasted cloth waistcoat, rather large, a 
 single-breasted jacket which in due time got 
 a tail and became a coat, brown corduroy 
 breeches, tied at the knees by a showy knot 
 of brown cotton tape . . . coat and waist- 
 coat always of glaring colours such as bright 
 blue, grass green and scarlet.’ Creatures so 
 gay of hue probably invented and used the 
 taunting rhyme with which Edinburgh 
 
Biographical and Personal T5 
 
 school-boys continued to shout after Heriot 
 boys, as an incitement to combat until in 
 1886 the Hospital became a secondary day 
 school : 
 
 Heriéti, 
 
 Wee short coatie ! 
 
 W. R. Andrew was not able to say in what 
 way a taste for drawing was created and 
 developed in the boy who ‘during his 
 youthful education did not discover any 
 particular propensity to the art in which he 
 was destined so remarkably to excel.’ This, 
 in the next sentence, is contradicted by the 
 information that at the arithmetic class, 
 when the boys were amusing themselves in 
 drawing figures on their slates, his displayed 
 a very striking superiority to those of the 
 other boys. This may have been observed 
 by the teacher and may have resulted in his 
 being taught drawing—one of the extras 
 above referred to—with a view to fitting him 
 for some. trade in which it would be useful. 
 In this connection there seems to be illumina- 
 tion in the fact that (I quote Mr. Greig) ‘ on 
 the 4th of June, 1770, Henry Raeburn and 
 Francis Ronaldson were each awarded for 
 their skill in writing, etc., the sum of one 
 pound, five shillings, sterling, accruing from 
 the Dean of Guild Heriot’s Mortification. In 
 the following year Henry was again considered 
 bestZentitled to a similar reward.’ As the 
 
 CR 
 
16 Raeburn 
 
 boy displayed such special dexterity in 
 penmanship as to earn him prizes it is not 
 at all improbable that he was instructed in 
 the rudiments of drawing and perhaps design 
 in order to qualify him for some trade in 
 which such manual skill would be useful. 
 My own experience was that even in the 
 latter half of the nineteenth century teachers 
 of writing in Edinburgh schools regarded it 
 as including ornamental pen-work and even 
 ambitious painted ‘illuminations,’ which 
 were proudly displayed at the “ examination,’ 
 when parents and friends assembled for the 
 annual prize-giving. If a prize was given 
 for work of this kind it was described as for 
 ‘ Writing.’ 
 
 Mr. Pinnington points out that from and 
 after 1760 the Trustees’ Academy classes 
 were held at Heriot’s Hospital. In 1771, 
 when Raeburn was probably still there, 
 Alexander Runciman was appointed Master of 
 the Academy, in succession to a Frenchman 
 named Pavillon. Runciman, then 35 years 
 old, and newly arrived from five years of study 
 in Rome, was a draughtsman of considerable 
 ability, and a very ambitious painter. 
 
 Of the six or seven years during which the 
 foundations of the boy’s education and the 
 development of his character were laid we 
 have as little knowledge as of the previous 
 period which passed at Stockbridge. There 
 he was outside of the town on the north, at 
 
Biographical and Personal 17 
 
 the Hospital he was on its southern border, 
 and practically in the country, although 
 Lauriston, where the Hospital stands, was 
 not far from the busy Grassmarket. To the 
 south, only the common-lands known as 
 “The Meadows’ and the Bruntsfield Links 
 beyond them divided it from the open coun- 
 try. On the eastern side they were equally 
 near to Salisbury Crags, Arthur’s Seat, and 
 Duddingston Village and loch. The rule of 
 the Hospital was severely monastic: the 
 men and women employed in it were required 
 to be unmarried, the six women servants 
 over 45 years of age; but probably the boys 
 in their leisure hours were free to roam the 
 country, fish in the burns, perhaps play 
 primitive golf on the Links, or even to dive 
 down a close for a visit to the turmoil of the 
 Grassmarket and the picturesque grime of 
 the Cowgate. 
 
 With a commendable delicacy for the 
 memory of his distinguished ancestor, W. R. 
 Andrew avoids any mention of the fact that 
 on leaving school Raeburn was. apprenticed 
 to a tradesman. He skilfully makes the 
 transition thus: ‘Soon after attaining the 
 age of fifteen he began to paint beautiful 
 water-colour miniatures of his friends. In 
 what manner this taste first showed itself 
 is not exactly known; but it certainly was 
 altogether spontaneous, without lesson or 
 example. About this time he was in the 
 
18 Raeburn 
 
 employment of Mr. Gilliland, an eminent 
 jeweller in Edinburgh.’ 
 
 The fact that young Raeburn was accepted 
 as apprentice by ‘an eminent jeweller’ is 
 pretty good evidence that his preceptors were 
 able to give a satisfactory account of his 
 qualification to succeed in a craft that re- 
 quired hands and brains of more than normal 
 cleverness. A jeweller in the eighteenth 
 century was not a smart salesman of goods 
 bought from or sent on sale by a wholesale 
 manufacturer in Birmingham: he and his 
 workmen and apprentices had to be skilled 
 craftsmen, capable of making gold, silver, 
 gems and the like into more or less beautiful 
 objects of art. It was indeed an admission, 
 though only as it were by a back door, into 
 the Palace of Art ; the same through which 
 Gainsborough also entered it. The splen- 
 dour of the trade had ere this deteriorated 
 from that of the good old days of George 
 Heriot, when his most gracious Majesty 
 would drop in now and again for a ‘ twa- 
 handed crack’ with his jeweller, who was 
 also his banker, and, upon occasion, money- 
 lender. Regular banks had arisen and taken 
 away this most profitable part of the jewellers’ 
 business. It was still, however, a good and 
 gentlemanly trade, and certainly was just 
 the one to be selected by the Governors of 
 Heriot’s Hospital for a specially skilled 
 and promising pupil. 
 
Biographical and Personal 19 
 
 It was most likely in 1772, at the age of 
 16, that Henry Raeburn was indentured to 
 James Gilliland, of Parliament Close, near 
 to St. Giles’ Church, which at that time was 
 the nucleus of clustering barnacle-like shops 
 and stalls that surrounded it. There is 
 again, unfortunately, a dearth of informa- 
 tion about this all-important period of 
 Raeburn’s life, on which he entered a raw and 
 not over-tutored school-boy, and from which 
 he emerged a full-blown and efficient painter 
 of portraits. Probably, after the usage of 
 the period, he lived on the premises, and 
 either slept under the counter, or in an attic 
 of Gilliland’s house, which seems to have 
 been not far from the shop, at No. 10 Nicolson 
 Street ; at least that is the address at which 
 Mrs. Gilliland dwelt in 1796, presumably a 
 widow, as the eminent jeweller’s name was 
 no longer in the Directory. At first the boy 
 would, whether he liked it or not, have to 
 apply himself with diligence to learning his 
 craft, in which apparently he attained to 
 proficiency. The Royal Scottish Academy 
 has among its treasures an elegant silver 
 toddy ladle, which is said to have been made 
 by Raeburn as a lad. The workmanship is 
 faultless, and the design is good; the bowl 
 of the ladle is stamped A.G. There is no 
 hall-mark. 
 
 Whether or not this article was made by 
 Raeburn, there is no doubt about another 
 
20 Raeburn 
 
 piece of work placed to his credit, for we 
 have first-hand evidence about it from Dr. 
 Andrew Duncanin his ‘ Tribute to the Memory 
 of Sir Henry Raeburn,’ spoken and then 
 printed in the year after the painter’s death. 
 In this Dr. Duncan recalled how, after the 
 death on 15th May, 1778, of his young 
 friend Charles, son of Dr. Erasmus Darwin, 
 the poet, he went to Gilliland with a lock of 
 the dead man’s hair, in order to bespeak a 
 memorial ring of the kind then much in 
 vogue. ‘ He told me that one of his present 
 apprentices was a young man of great genius 
 and could prepare for me in hair a memorial 
 that would demonstrate both taste and art. 
 Young Raeburn was immediately called, and 
 proposed to execute on a small trinket, 
 which might be hung at a watch, a muse 
 weeping over an urn, marked with the 
 initials of Charles Darwin. The trinket 
 was finished by Raeburn in a manner which 
 to me afforded manifest proof of very 
 superior genius, and I still preserve it as a 
 memorial of the singular and early merit 
 both of Darwin and Raeburn.’ If this 
 example of the painter’s craft-work could 
 now be found it would be a highly interesting 
 memento, and it is quite likely that it still 
 exists, but is stowed away in one of those 
 little stores of obsolete jewellery that exists 
 in many old houses. Dr. Duncan’s story may 
 or may not be true, but it has to be kept in 
 
Biographical and Personal 2I 
 
 view that he was an octogenarian who, to 
 judge by some of his statements which can 
 be checked by independent evidence, wrote 
 without verifying his recollections, and often 
 blundered. 
 
 The story implies that Raeburn was still 
 in the service of Gilliland in the middle of 
 1778, six years after he was indentured, 
 though the regulation as to apprentices which 
 I have quoted seems to imply that the 
 usual term of service was five years, and 
 biographers have agreed to accept Allan 
 Cunningham’s statement that Gilliland, 
 perceiving and encouraging his apprentice’s 
 talent for portraiture, freed him before his 
 time was up. We also have to take into 
 account Allan Cunningham’s story, accepted 
 by W. R. Andrew, that in 1778 Raeburn 
 had a studio, fell in love with a sitter and 
 married her. 
 
 The growth, concurrently with his labours 
 as a jeweller, of Raeburn’s skill in painting, 
 is not easily to be traced. That he first 
 painted in miniature was a natural beginning 
 for a youth working alone without facilities 
 for larger efforts, or means to get necessary 
 materials. Miniatures too were familiar 
 objects in a jeweller’s shop, as for them some 
 sort of case or setting was a necessary 
 accessory. Very likely commissions for such 
 work were given in the course of trade, and 
 Raeburn may have been incited to try 
 
22 Raeburn 
 
 his hand at it by way of making some pocket 
 money. It is even possible that Gilliland 
 first suggested it—certainly he did nothing 
 to discourage his apprentice, as we know 
 from the story of his early connection with 
 David Deuchar. I quote from it as it 
 appeared in a_ well-written memoir of 
 Raeburn, which appeared in the issue for 
 January 1900 of Caledonian Jottings, a 
 private publication of the Caledonian 
 Insurance Company, of which it is interesting 
 to note that Raeburn was one of the Directors 
 at its foundation in 1805. The author’s 
 name is not given, but, as the Company’s 
 Manager at the time was a later David 
 Deuchar, a descendant of Raeburn’s friend 
 and patron, it may be regarded as having 
 authority. Deuchar was a lapidary and seal 
 engraver of exceptional skill, a goldsmith, 
 and interested in all branches of art; he 
 painted, modelled, and practised etching 
 industriously, and published a large collection 
 of plates copied chiefly from German, 
 Dutch, and Flemish masters. His business, 
 like that of the miniaturist, brought him 
 into frequent communication with jewellers, 
 and often going to see his neighbour Gilliland, 
 he became well acquainted with young 
 Raeburn, who is described as tall and 
 handsome, with a frank, engaging manner. 
 He ‘always had a kindly word for the 
 pleasant-faced apprentice as he passed 
 
Biographical and Personal 23 
 
 through the shop to the private room behind. 
 On several occasions as he passed in, Deuchar 
 noticed the lad hurriedly push something 
 into a drawer as if to conceal what he had 
 been doing. This stimulated Deuchar’s 
 curiosity, and once when returning from the 
 back room he quietly stepped behind Henry 
 before the latter saw him, when to his 
 surprise he found the boy engaged in gazing 
 intently into a small mirror. ‘“ Hullo, 
 Henry,” said he, “are you admiring your 
 good looks? ’”’ “No,” said the boy, “ but 
 I am trying to draw a likeness of myself,”’ 
 and he produced a sheet of paper on which 
 he had made a very creditable likeness of 
 himself in pencil. On being asked if he had 
 ever had lessons in drawing, he said no, 
 but added that he earnestly wished he could 
 afford to have them ; whereupon Mr. Deuchar 
 said he would be glad to give him one or 
 two lessons per week, after his closing hours, 
 which would cost him nothing. This offer 
 was joyfully accepted by Henry, who in a 
 short time showed so great proficiency as to 
 lead both Mr. Deuchar and Mr. Gilliland to 
 the belief that he was a born artist, and that 
 it would be the greatest of mistakes to try 
 to make a mere goldsmith of him. Accord- 
 ingly Raeburn was introduced to David 
 Martin, then the fashionable portrait painter 
 in Edinburgh, and became his pupil. While 
 still nominally serving his apprenticeship 
 
24 Raeburn 
 
 to Gilliland, Raeburn was allowed time for 
 study, and also for the painting of miniatures, 
 the loss of the apprentice’s assistance in the 
 goldsmith’s work being made up to his 
 master by an arrangement that the latter 
 should share in the profits of the miniature 
 painting.’ 
 
 The writer of the article conjectures that 
 Raeburn’s first miniature was a portrait of 
 James Gilliland, the second being one of 
 Deuchar. This is extant, in the possession of 
 my friend Miss Deuchar. On paper pasted 
 on the back of the case there is written : 
 ‘David Deuchar, Esq., of Morningside, by 
 Sir Henry Raeburn, being the second portrait 
 done by him during the time he was an 
 apprentice to Mr. Gilland of Old Parliament 
 Square, Edinburgh. Painted about 1773.’ 
 The writing is old, but obviously it does not 
 date before 1822, because the painter is 
 described as Sizv Henry. It is to be noticed 
 also that there is an error as to Gilliland’s 
 name. As David Deuchar died in 1808, he 
 was not the writer, who was probably a 
 descendant, and set down as wellas he could 
 remember what he had been told regarding 
 the miniature. This, which is chiefly in a 
 neutral tint, with only slight colour in the 
 flesh, is quite efficiently executed, and, if it 
 was only the second attempt by Raeburn 
 in that style, is a very remarkable perform- 
 ance, especially in that expression of alert 
 

 
 In the possession of H. D, Dickie 
 HENRY DAVID INGLIS 
 
 SIR HENRY RAEBURN 
 
 (face p, 24) 
 

 
Biographical and Personal 25 
 
 vitality so characteristic of Raeburn’s 
 portraiture. 
 
 Miss Deuchar has two other miniatures 
 attributed to Raeburn. One, of David 
 Deuchar’s second wife, is a very capable 
 piece of work, fuller in colour and more 
 accomplished than his portrait of David, 
 but not obviously from the hand of Raeburn. 
 However we know too little about his 
 method in this genre to be able to judge 
 with certainty. The third, supposed to be 
 another portrait of Deuchar is a much less 
 capable performance, almost amateurish, 
 and it does not greatly resemble him. Had 
 I been shown the three ivories and told that 
 one was Raeburn’s second attempt I should 
 have picked this out as best answering the 
 description. Mr. H. D. Dickie has an ex- 
 cellent miniature of Henry David Inglis, 
 advocate, said to be by Raeburn, and prob- 
 ably by him, as Inglis was his brother-in-law. 
 
 If Deuchar took Raeburn in hand and 
 began to give him lessons as early as 1773 
 there was ample time for him to supply a 
 good groundwork of knowledge, especially 
 to a youth of exceptional natural ability, 
 before the introduction to David Martin, as 
 that painter, after being long in London and 
 Italy, working as assistant in Allan Ramsay’s 
 picture factory, only returned to Edinburgh 
 in 1775. 
 
 Martin received Raeburn kindly and lent 
 
26 Raeburn 
 
 him some of his own pictures to copy, but 
 declined to give him instruction in painting 
 or preparing his colours: a very important 
 part of a painter’s work in the eighteenth 
 century. Eventually he accused Raeburn 
 of selling his copy of one of the pictures lent 
 to him, and thereafter they pursued their 
 separate ways apart. This is Allan Cunning- 
 ham’s story, repeated by W. R. Andrew, but 
 it may reasonably be doubted on the evidence 
 of his own statement that ‘Raeburn... 
 declared, when his own name was deservedly 
 high, that the kind words of Martin were 
 still in his ears, and his paintings before him.’ 
 Raeburn was of a kindly disposition but he 
 was honest, and would not have so spoken 
 of a man to whom he owed little or nothing. 
 I think it probable that the connection with 
 Martin was closer than has been stated, and 
 that Raeburn worked for him as a painter of 
 costumes and accessories and even of replicas, 
 as Martin had worked for Ramsay. 
 
 Martin, although not a great painter, was 
 a competent one, much affected as was 
 natural by the influence of Ramsay, and it 
 is probable that his aid, whether grudging 
 or otherwise, was useful in the development 
 of Raeburn’s skillin oil painting. The develop- 
 ment was rapid, as is shown by the portrait 
 of George Chalmers, of Pittencrieff, one of 
 the too few pictures by him of which the 
 date is certainly known, painted in 1776, a 
 
Biographical and Personal 25 
 
 remarkable performance for a youth of twenty, 
 who had not been through the schools. 
 Raeburn was probably indebted to 
 Deuchar among other things for his acquaint- 
 ance with John Clerk, a clever youth, a 
 year younger than himself, who was addicted 
 to painting, without, however, allowing this 
 addiction to prevent his steady success at 
 the Bar, which was crowned by his elevation 
 to the Bench as Lord Eldin in the year 
 when Raeburn died: a name famous in 
 Scottish annals of wit, revelry, and wisdom. 
 Clerk’s father, besides his fame as ‘inventor 
 of the Modern British System of Naval 
 Tactics,’ which, it was claimed, effected, 
 when put in practice, a number of the most 
 signal victories of our Fleet in the latter 
 part of the eighteenth century, was an 
 amateur etcher of no mean skill, and a great 
 patron of art, who would certainly be well 
 known to Deuchar. The friendship subsisted, 
 and Raeburn painted both father and son, 
 the latter at least twice. The only incident 
 of their intimacy that has survived to help 
 out the meagre supply of material available 
 for a biographer of Raeburn illustrates the 
 frugal manner in which the Scottish youth 
 of that day fared, when first trying to make 
 their way in the world, even when they 
 belonged to the upper classes: John Clerk’s 
 grandfather was a baronet. Raeburn had 
 been invited to dine with him at his 
 
28 Raeburn 
 
 lodgings. The landlady brought in two plates 
 (or ‘ ashets,’ as they call them in Scotland) ; 
 on one were three herrings, on the other three 
 potatoes. “‘ Is this a’? ’’ asked Clerk angrily. 
 ““ Ay, it’s a’’’ was the reply. “‘ Didna I tell 
 ye, wumman,”’ cried Clerk, “ that a gentle- 
 man was to dine wi’ me, an’ that ye were to 
 get sax herrin’ an’ sax tatties ? ”’ 
 
 Raeburn having somehow, like Gains- 
 borough, arrived, thanks to innate genius, at 
 definite excellence in art without the proper 
 orthodox course of preliminary academic 
 study, found himself very soon a successful 
 portrait painter. It seems probable that 
 after leaving the service of Gilliland he 
 returned to Stockbridge to live with his 
 brother, who was by this time well established 
 in life. In a list of the Edinburgh Magis- 
 trates and Town Council for 1774-5, William 
 Reaburn (sic), weaver, Stockbridge, is set 
 down as one of the Council Deacons. Through 
 his influence the painter may have obtained 
 commissions in his early years, and it is not 
 unlikely that he followed the common 
 practice of travelling in the country, painting 
 portraits wherever he could get an order. 
 He probably had a painting-room in town, 
 most likely in the old town, as Stockbridge 
 was not readily accessible, and proper studio 
 lighting would not be easily arranged in a 
 cottage such as Cumberland Hill described. 
 He may have lived in Edinburgh, but, even 
 
Biographical and Personal 29 
 
 then, occasional visits to his brother would 
 make his appearance familiar to the resi- 
 dents, especially to the ladies, as he was tall 
 and handsome and had a fine presence. 
 Allan Cunningham’s sentimental story about 
 Raeburn’s wooing and consequent marriage 
 is therefore manifest nonsense; a clumsy 
 replica of his sufficiently stupid fiction about 
 Gainsborough’s courtship. B. R. Haydon 
 certainly had good reason for his emphatic 
 critical estimate: ‘ There never was a man 
 so unfit to be a biographer as Allan Cunning- 
 ham. A poet by nature, he had no pleasure 
 in resting alone on truth as the basis of the 
 lives of the great men. He treats their 
 characters as inventions, not as realities ; 
 he put speeches into their mouths and 
 amplified their sayings, as if they were the 
 heroes of melodrama he had invented, or of 
 a poem, where imagination was of more 
 worth than fact. His Lives of the Painters 
 are quite unworthy of his age.’ 
 Cunningham’s story is that the artist, 
 while sketching a landscape, noticed a 
 charming lady and forthwith put her in his 
 picture. Soon afterwards a lady—the same 
 lady—came to his studio and, after the 
 usual preliminary enquiries, sat for her 
 portrait. Before it was finished the artist 
 was as much in love with her as, evidently, 
 she had been from the outset with him. 
 In a month or so they were married, and, 
 
30 Raeburn 
 
 strange to say, they lived happily ever 
 afterwards, although she was a widow, a 
 dozen years or so older than he, with three 
 children by her first husband, James Leslie, 
 who had, or used, the title of Count* as a 
 prefix to his name. This was in 1778, when 
 Raeburn was 22 years old; six years after 
 her marriage to Leslie (16th September, 
 1772), and five years after the accepted date 
 of his death. That the latter is wrong is 
 obvious, as he left three children (not stated 
 to be triplets). Also we have Cumberland 
 Hill’s definite statement that Leslie bought 
 Deanhaugh on 17th September, 1777,+ and 
 
 
 
 * Walter Leslie, second son of John Leslie, roth 
 Baron of Balquhain (1606-1667) was created a Count of 
 the Holy Roman Empire, and Lord of Neustadt in 
 Bavaria, by the Emperor of Germany, Ferdinand III., 
 in reward of valuable services in war, including the 
 murder of Wallenstein and his four chief associates in 
 1634. He left no son, but the title continued in the 
 family until the death of the 5th count, without issue. 
 This I take from Colonel Leslie’s Historical Records of 
 the Family of Leslie (1869), with such reservation as 
 is necessary when quoting from a rather unintelligible 
 record. I gather also that various members of the 
 family other than the one then in right of the title were 
 in the habit of styling themselves Count. James 
 Leslie was probably one of these ; the second and third 
 Counts were named James, but they died respectively 
 in 1694 and 1738. 
 
 t Leslie’s residence before 1777 is not stated, but 
 Mr. W. Forbes Gray has pointed out to me that in the 
 Directory for 1774 there is an entry, ‘ James Leslie, 
 gentleman, Riekie’s Land, Nicolson Street,’ which may 
 refer to him. It is continued in Directories up to 1778. 
 No Directory for 1779 is known to exist, and the name 
 is not in that for 1780. 
 
Biographical and Personal 31 
 
 the even more definite evidence of a recorded 
 Testament by him dated gth December, 1778. 
 As a period of three weeks of viduity seems 
 all too short for the working out of Cunning- 
 ham’s pretty love story, it is possible that 
 the marriage did not take place in that 
 year. Raeburn’s first son, Peter, was born 
 18th May, 1781 ; the second, Henry, on 24th 
 October, 1783. The arch-blunderer, Dr. 
 Duncan, said the marriage took place after 
 Raeburn’s return from Rome: obviously an 
 error, unless the Roman visit occurred at a 
 much earlier date than that which is accepted. 
 A writer, signing himself S.P., in Notes and 
 Queries for 27th November, 1886, de- 
 nounced Allan Cunningham’s story, and con- 
 tinued : ‘‘ The facts have been notorious in 
 Edinburgh since that period. These facts 
 are that James Leslie of Deanhaugh ... 
 —if the truth must be told—committed 
 suicide at Deanhaugh House with a pistol, 
 in consequence of jealousy, excited under 
 very remarkable circumstances. Immediately 
 after the tragedy the widow married the 
 artist.” This new light on the subject, 
 though never contradicted, has been over- 
 looked by all subsequent biographers of 
 Raeburn, and, as I have been unable to dis- 
 cover the identity of the writer, I should 
 have disregarded it, if it did not fit so well 
 into other evidence on the subject which I 
 have brought together. 
 DR 
 
32 Raeburn 
 
 The faults most readily noticeable in 
 Cunningham’s story are, firstly, that there is 
 no evidence Raeburn ever painted any 
 landscape, although he cleverly employed 
 conventionalised landscape backgrounds for 
 his portraits ; secondly, that “the very fine 
 portrait of her’ which was then painted is 
 not forthcoming, and has not, so far as any 
 one knows, ever been seen. Its disap- 
 pearance, and the absence of landscape 
 studies, might have been accounted for if the 
 artist’s effects had been dispersed soon after 
 his death. But they remained in possession 
 of the family, and many years afterwards 
 were still with his descendants at Charles- 
 field. The only known portrait of the paint- 
 er’s wife, painted by him, is that admirable 
 full-length which remained in possession of 
 the family until 1887, and eventually found 
 its way into the collection of the late Sir 
 Ernest Cassel. In this she appears to be 
 about forty to forty-five years of age, and it 
 seems impossible that it was painted at the 
 age of 34: the picture during the painting of 
 which the affections of the youthful painter 
 were captivated by her mature matronly 
 charms. 
 
 The damning fact, however, is that Dean- 
 haugh, where Ann, “ Countess Leslie,’ lived 
 from 1777, if not before, was at Stockbridge, 
 close to the dwelling and mill of William 
 Raeburn ; so, unless Henry Raeburn never 
 
Biographical and Personal 33 
 
 visited his birthplace after he grew up, they 
 must have known each other perfectly well ; 
 at any rate by sight and reputation. 
 
 Ann Leslie was a daughter of Peter Edgar, 
 of Bridgelands (which came to him by 
 marriage), factor to the Earl of Selkirk, and 
 had comfortable means. The marriage 
 therefore at once placed Raeburn in the 
 happy position of being able to live his life 
 and pursue his art without troubling unduly 
 about the wherewithal. Fortunately for his 
 happiness and the glory of Scottish art, the 
 union turned out much more fortunate than 
 many others contracted by couples ap- 
 parently better adapted for each other by 
 age and condition. 
 
 For some seven years (or it may be fewer), 
 we must now be content to imagine Raeburn a 
 happy and contented man, with an amiable 
 and devoted wife, a far better home than he 
 had previously known, sufficient money for 
 all needs, a growing practice as a painter, a 
 consciousness of steady improvement in his 
 art, many friends and admirers, and, best 
 of all, robust health. No details to illuminate 
 that period are available, we do not know if 
 he maintained a studio in town, though it is 
 probable he did, nor with any certainty what 
 portraits he painted, as there were no exhi- 
 bitions in Edinburgh, and Raeburn’s records, 
 if he kept them, are not to be found. Cum- 
 berland Hill mentions with strong approval 
 
34 Raeburn 
 
 that he never painted on the Lord’s Day, and 
 was always to be seen on Sundays in his 
 family pew, one of the front seats of the 
 first gallery in the West Kirk. The same 
 writer shows us too that Raeburn upon 
 occasion could and did play his part as a 
 member of the little community to which he 
 belonged. There was a petition in 1784 to 
 ‘the Trustees . . . relative to the Bridges 
 and Highways in the County of Edinburgh,’ 
 praying for the making of a road and the 
 erection of a stone bridge at the ford of 
 Stockbridge, where there was only a make- 
 shift wooden foot-bridge, privately con- 
 structed. The principal residents, in whose 
 names the petition was made, included 
 ‘William Reaburn, Henry Reaburn, and 
 Walter Ross.’ This last was the eccentric 
 lawyer who lived at St. Bernard’s. The 
 petition was a reasonable one, for the 
 Trustees about twenty-four years earlier had 
 established a toll-bar on the road* between 
 Edinburgh and Stockbridge, which was a 
 constant tax upon the trade of the village, 
 and had spent nothing on improvement of 
 the road. 
 
 The time arrived at last when Raeburn 
 began to feel the need of fresh impetus and 
 inspiration, which Edinburgh could not 
 
 * At Kirkbraehead, now the west end of Princes 
 Street. 
 
Biographical and Personal 35 
 
 supply. The wonder is that, being so com- 
 fortably circumstanced, he did not sooner set 
 out in quest of it. By constant steady effort 
 he had improved his art in a manner that 
 placed him unquestionably well ahead of all 
 Scottish competitors, there was no source in 
 Edinburgh from which he could draw fresh 
 inspiration for further advance: the obvious 
 course was to go south, to study the bril- 
 liant galaxy of painters in London, and then, 
 perhaps, still further to that wonderful 
 painters’ Mecca of the eighteenth century 
 imagination, Rome. So Raeburn and his 
 wife, having put their house in order, left 
 their two infant children, and set out upon 
 their travels, probably by sea, from Leith. 
 This is what we are told by Cunningham and 
 Andrew, but it is hard to believe that a 
 matron of 41 years would set out on the long 
 and risky journey to Italy, leaving behind for 
 two years her three children by her first 
 husband, and the two Raeburn infants, the 
 younger of whom was less than two years old. 
 
 As the purpose of his travel was to improve 
 himself in his art it may be concluded that 
 Raeburn went in the spring, in time to have 
 a view of the Royal Academy’s Exhibition 
 at Somerset House. The only thing definitely 
 known as to his London experiences is that 
 he saw, and was favourably received by, 
 Sir Joshua Reynolds, in whose studio he is 
 said to have painted. 
 
36 Raeburn 
 
 The seventeenth Royal Academy Exhibi- 
 tion was not a great affair judged by modern 
 standards: 616 exhibits of all sorts, in two 
 or three rooms; but to the Scot, who had 
 never seen anything of the kind, it must have 
 been a revelation. He may have seen work 
 by Reynolds in Edinburgh, but even that is 
 uncertain, and it must have been intensely 
 interesting to see and study the great 
 President’s sixteen exhibits, also to measure 
 himself by those of other painters of that 
 blossoming time in English portrait art. 
 The Exhibition included pictures by Beechey 
 (9), who though still resident at Norwich was 
 becoming well known, Copley (1), Cosway 
 (3), Hamilton (4), Hoppner (6), Opie (6), 
 Peters (3), Rigaud (7), and Russell (ro). 
 Of provincial art, except from places near 
 London, there was practically none: a 
 single portrait by R. Home of Dublin, a plan, 
 section and elevation of a temple by J. 
 Henderson of Edinburgh, and two land- 
 scapes by S. Howitt of Richmond, Yorks. 
 
 Ramsay had died in the previous year : 
 perhaps Raeburn may have been moved by 
 this to visit London to see if there was room 
 for another Scot. If so, the array of for- 
 midable rivals to be faced would have a 
 discouraging effect on a man who seems never 
 to have realised his own greatness. As he is 
 supposed to have spent several months in 
 London, he would almost certainly have 
 
Biographical and Personal 37 
 
 visited the exhibition room which Gains- 
 borough opened at Schomberg House in Pall 
 Mall after his final rupture with the Royal 
 Academy; and perhaps he looked up 
 Romney in Cavendish Square. In London 
 he would certainly see the work of both 
 these men, though they did not send to 
 Somerset House. 
 
 Whatever may have been his original 
 intention, Raeburn eventually set out for 
 Rome, in obedience to the emphatic advice 
 of Reynolds to go there and worship Michael 
 Angelo in the Sistine Chapel, and study his 
 terribile via. This is reported by Cunning- 
 ham, who adds that the President took his 
 young friend aside and said: ‘“‘ Young man, 
 I know nothing of your circumstances ; 
 young painters are seldom rich; but if 
 money be necessary for your studies abroad, 
 say so, and you shall not want it.’ As 
 Reynolds was not addicted to profuse 
 generosity, this, if true, is evidence that he 
 recognised the rare ability of Raeburn. No 
 doubt, however, he was relieved in mind when 
 the latter shouted into his ear trumpet that 
 he already had sufficient funds. With a 
 lighter heart he set about giving valuable 
 help in the way of letters of introduction to 
 noted artists and others known to him in 
 Rome, including the aged Pompeo Battoni, 
 who was the most excellent and admired 
 painter there, 
 
38 Raeburn 
 
 The journey to and the return from Rome 
 were overland, according to W. R. Andrew, 
 who summarily tells us that ‘two years of 
 diligent study were spent in Italy, to and 
 from which country he travelled with all 
 possible expedition, without stopping at 
 Paris or any other place.’ It seems strange 
 that on his return he did not even halt at 
 London to pay his respects to Reynolds. To 
 this meagre record there is only to be added 
 that to his fellow-countryman, Gavin Hamil- 
 ton, ‘he was indebted for many attentions,’ 
 and that James Byres, of Tonley, discoverer of 
 the Barberini Vase, gave him the valuable 
 advice never, when possible, to trust to his 
 memory when painting, even on _ subor- 
 dinate parts of his pictures. Andrew 
 comments: ‘ This advice Raeburn followed, 
 and whether it was the principal figure or the 
 minutest accessory, he had it always before 
 him; and to the strict observance of this 
 rule he ascribed, in a great measure, his 
 continued improvement, and the genuine and 
 natural character which his pictures always 
 preserved.’ It seems a long way to have 
 travelled for a piece of wise counsel which, 
 (to judge by a knowledge of his work), he 
 needed less than most painters. However, 
 there can be no doubt that Raeburn’s stay in 
 Italy must have had great value in enlarging 
 his mind and extending his knowledge of the 
 best art of the past, although envious David 
 
Biographical and Personal 39 
 
 Martin is said to have expressed the opinion 
 that he did not paint so well as he did before 
 he went to Italy. No doubt he painted in 
 Italy, but we do not know. His admirable 
 portrait of James Byres was much later, when 
 his sage mentor was 77 years old. 
 
 Having returned home Raeburn at once 
 set to work with a will. He rented a studio 
 in George Street. The number is not noted 
 in the 1788 Directory, but the issue for 1796 
 gives it as No. 18, south side. ‘ He came at 
 once into full employment as a portrait 
 painter, says Andrew, early commissions 
 being given by the Harveian Society for 
 portraits of William Inglis and Alexander 
 Wood. He also painted at this period 
 Professor Andrew Duncan, for the Royal 
 Public Dispensary, and for the Senate Hall 
 of the University, Robertson the historian, 
 Dr. Adam Ferguson, and Lord Provost Elder, 
 of Forneth. From 1787 to the end of his life 
 thirty-six years later Raeburn easily held 
 his place as the Scottish master in portraiture : 
 a supremacy more complete even than that 
 of Reynolds in London, where Gainsborough 
 was continually a thorn in his flesh, Ramsay 
 engrossed much of the Court patronage, 
 Romney held the favour of many, and, in 
 his later years, Hoppner, Lawrence, Beechey, 
 Cosway, West, Opie, Peters, and others were 
 competitors of more than common ability. 
 Such competitors as Raeburn had were men 
 
40 Raeburn 
 
 of much less importance, and they were the 
 more easily to be disregarded because of 
 Raeburn’s comfortable financial position, 
 which enabled him to take his place socially 
 as a man of distinction, in a community 
 possessing at that time a very unusual 
 number of remarkable persons. His 
 friendships and intimacies were most likely 
 with the legal, scientific, and literary notables 
 of Edinburgh, rather than with other artists. 
 Farington, writing in 1801, noted that 
 ‘Raeburn and Nasmith do not associate 
 much with the other artists and hold them- 
 selves very high. Raeburn scarcely indeed 
 with any of the profession.’ 
 
 W. R. Andrew says: ‘about this time’ 
 (t.e. in his thirty-second year) ‘ he removed 
 with his family from Deanhaugh to the 
 neighbouring estate of St. Bernard’s, which 
 he had succeeded to on the death of his 
 elder brother William.’ Cunningham placed 
 him there a year earlier, but without killing 
 the brother, who, as a matter of fact, had 
 nothing to do with St. Bernard’s, and lived 
 until 1810. St. Bernard’s was occupied by 
 the eccentric Walter Ross, W.S., builder of 
 Ross’s Folly, until his death on 11th March, 
 1789. ‘ At his particular desire he was kept 
 full eight days, and interred in his garden in 
 the underpart of the tower which he had 
 built, with the top of the coffin kept open.’ 
 It was not until after the subsequent death 
 
Biographical and Personal AI 
 
 of the widow that Raeburn rented the house, 
 and removed to it; eventually, in or about 
 1809, he bought it. The slumbers of Mr. 
 Ross were not disturbed (although his 
 ‘Folly’ had so far fallen from favour that 
 latterly the ground floor of it was used as 
 a stable), until, about 1818, he was disinterred 
 and removed to St. Cuthbert’s Churchyard. 
 According to Cumberland Hill, who remem- 
 bered the tower and gave this account of it, 
 it was pulled down in 1825, and in the previous 
 year some of the curious carved stones that 
 had been built into it were sent to Abbots- 
 ford as a present to Sir Walter Scott. As 
 the tower stood on ground now occupied by 
 the north end of Ann Street, which was one 
 of Raeburn’s building achievements (and 
 named after his wife), one would think Hill 
 had erred as to this date, and that it was 
 demolished by Raeburn in his lifetime, 
 probably in 1818, after the removal of Ross’s 
 remains, and that the sculptured stones (from 
 the old Cross of Edinburgh), were sent by him 
 to his friend Scott. Dare a writer a full 
 century later venture to contradict the 
 statement of a man who says he saw the 
 tower demolished, even if, as he admits in 
 his preface (1887), he was then ‘aged’? 
 Raeburn’s reason for removing to St. 
 Bernard’s is probably to be found in the fact 
 that thereafter his step-daughter, Mrs. Ann 
 Leslie or Inglis, with her two sons, continued 
 
42 Raeburn 
 
 to occupy Deanhaugh House until she died. 
 James Leslie had bought the house in 1777, 
 and it probably became the property of one of 
 his surviving children; the mother only 
 occupying it during that child’s minority. 
 The other daughter, Jacobina, married 
 Daniel Vere, of Stonebyres, Sheriff-Substitute 
 of Lanarkshire. Her portrait by Raeburn 
 was in 1904 in the collection of Mr. W. A. 
 Coats. I quote a description of it from some 
 personal notes made during the great 1876 
 Raeburn Exhibition at Edinburgh, to which > 
 it was lent by Mr. James T. Gibson Craig. 
 ‘From the portrait of Raeburn’s step- 
 daughter, Mrs. Vere of Stonebyres, an 
 extremely charming work, we have a good 
 idea of what his wife must have been like in 
 her youth ; for there is a very strong likeness 
 between mother and daughter. The same 
 sweet, kind and affectionate expression 
 pervades both; and the fair, plump, glad 
 face of the latter is not without some share 
 of the peculiar charm with which the mother 
 is invested. The fine and full outlines of her 
 figure are well displayed by the easy, natural 
 pose and admirable drawing of the picture. 
 The white dress is well disposed and executed, 
 and well varied by an olive-coloured mantle.’ 
 
 Dr. John Brown mentions another picture 
 of Jacobina ‘lying asleep, her head on a 
 pillow—a fine study.’ I do not know of any 
 portrait by Raeburn of Mrs. Ann Inglis. I 
 
Biographical and Personal 43 
 
 am also without much information about her 
 husband, James Philip Inglis, beyond the 
 fact that, about 1806-8, he seems to have 
 been a partner with Raeburn’s son, Henry, 
 in a short-lived business which ended 
 disastrously, and that he died at Calcutta on 
 28th April, 1817, survived by two sons, 
 Charles Leslie Inglis and Henry Raeburn 
 Inglis. The Boy and Rabbit, the painter’s 
 Royal Academy diploma picture, was a 
 portrait of the latter, a deaf-mute, who is 
 said to have been the subject of at least one 
 other picture. These two children, accord- 
 ing to Hill, were with their mother at 
 Deanhaugh when Raeburn removed to St. 
 Bernard’s, but it is worthy of notice that 
 their father is not mentioned. There is 
 no reason to suppose that the separation 
 from the Inglis family arose from any serious 
 disagreement, for all evidence is to the 
 contrary. Without any such cause it may 
 have been found desirable to put an end to 
 the combination under one roof of two 
 families: Raeburn, his wife, and two 
 adolescent sons ; his step-daughter, her two 
 boys, and possibly her husband. 
 
 It was not until 1792 that Raeburn sent 
 pictures to the Royal Academy in London : 
 a portrait of a gentleman (No. 6), and a 
 portrait of a lady (No. 351, hung in the 
 Ante-room). Algernon Graves noted that 
 the former was of John Home, or Horne ; 
 
44 Raeburn 
 
 from a MS. note in my copy of the catalogue 
 the former was the correct name; probably 
 the small half-length of the once famous 
 author of Douglas which is now in the 
 National Portrait Gallery. The parson-poet, 
 long resident in Edinburgh and nearly 
 seventy years old, was a good selection, as 
 Douglas was still, thirty-five years after 
 its first English performance in London, at 
 Covent Garden Theatre, a favourite piece, 
 in which Mrs. Siddons excelled as Lady 
 Randolph. The death, early in the year, of 
 Sir Joshua Reynolds, may have influenced 
 the man of all others best fitted to fill his 
 place, to try his fortune in London. No 
 other Scottish painter was represented in 
 the Exhibition, which was still practically 
 confined to artists resident in London. 
 Apparently the result of his venture did not 
 greatly please Raeburn, for he did not send 
 again till six years later, when he was repre- 
 sented by his Portrait of Sir Wiliam Farquhar 
 (No. 28), probably sent because it was in 
 London to be engraved. However, he had 
 a Portrait of a Gentleman (578) hung in the 
 Antique Academy in the following year ; 
 after which there was a lapse until in 1802 he 
 showed his Portrait of Dr. Rutherford, 
 ‘Professor of Botany in the University of 
 Edinburgh, for Dr. Thornton’s Botanical 
 work’ (No. 269, in the Ante-room). The 
 presumption that this was in London for the 
 
Glasgow Corporation Art Galleries 
 MR Oo MRS; ROBERT CAMPBELL OF KAILZIE 
 
 SIR HENRY RAEBURN 
 
 (face p, 44) 
 
 
 

 
Biographical and Personal 45 
 
 use of an engraver is strengthened by the 
 fact that the painter is described, without 
 initial, as ‘Raeburn, 1 Hind Street, Man- 
 chester Square.’ Dr. Daniel Rutherford, 
 who was an uncle of Sir Walter Scott, was at 
 this time 54 years of age. Raeburn after this 
 allowed eight years to pass without again 
 sending to London. 
 
 To the labours of the Scottish Record 
 Society we are indebted for the fact that on 
 the east wall of St. Cuthbert’s Church there 
 is or was a large monument inscribed ‘ Henry 
 Raeburn, St. Bernard’s, 1792.” I am unable 
 to conjecture why Raeburn acquired this 
 place of burial in his Parish Churchyard, as 
 we know of no death in the family about 
 this time. It supplies evidence that he was 
 in 1792 established at St. Bernard’s. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 ASSOCIATION WITH ARTISTS. 
 
 N 1793 the veil which hides the life 
 | of Raeburn from us is lifted by 
 the distinguished miniaturist Andrew 
 Robertson (1777--1845). When about six- 
 teen years of age he went from Aberdeen to 
 Edinburgh to study landscape and scene 
 painting under Alexander Nasmyth. ‘ Being 
 very desirous of seeing Raeburn’s pictures, I 
 bravely knocked at his door, armed with a 
 shilling for his servant, requesting to see 
 the pictures. I had never seen such in pro- 
 gress before. My astonishment and delight 
 with the magical creations around me may 
 be more easily conceived than described ! ’ 
 While thus Robertson was getting full 
 value (even for an Aberdonian) for his 
 shilling, some ladies entered the gallery and 
 presently Raeburn himself, palette and 
 brushes in hand, came in. The brushes, he 
 tells us, were each a yard long, ‘for he 
 painted at arm’s length.’ His palette, 
 preserved at the Royal Scottish Academy, 
 is not large. ‘I could never till then,’ 
 writes Robertson, ‘form any idea of what 
 46 
 
Association with Artists 47 
 
 Apelles was like; but there he _ stood, 
 although in a modern dress, his aspect 
 noble and dignified but kind; in figure a 
 model to draw from.’ 
 
 The nervous lad turned his back to the 
 ladies and Raeburn, and went on looking at 
 the pictures. After a time they all went 
 out and he breathed freely again until, to 
 his great consternation, Raeburn returned 
 and came up to him. He expected to be 
 asked what business he had there, but the 
 painter kindly said: ‘“‘ You seem fond of 
 pictures? ’’ ‘Oh yes, very,” he stammered. 
 “Do you paint?” “I tried to do so, and 
 wish I could become a painter.’’ ‘‘ Have 
 you anything toshow me?” “ No, nothing: 
 I have a few miniatures in my pocket, but 
 I dare not show them to you.” “ Why 
 not?” “I have had no opportunity of 
 seeing good pictures, and had nothing to 
 copy from but Nature.” ‘“ You rouse my 
 curiosity. You have had the very best 
 instructor, in Nature, to guide you. I 
 shall expect to see something very good.” 
 Robertson at last produced his miniatures. 
 “Aye, I thought so; that'll do!” said 
 Raeburn. “‘ Go on, you are all right.” 
 
 After they had talked a little more the 
 youth plucked up courage to say that he 
 would much like to copy some of Raeburn’s 
 work. ‘You had better stick to the 
 fountain-head, Nature,’’ said Raeburn ; then, 
 
 ER 
 
48 Raeburn 
 
 on Robertson’s face showing the acuteness 
 of his disappointment, he continued: “ but 
 if you think it would do you any good, you 
 are welcome. You may copy this, or that, 
 but the others are not mine, they belong to 
 the parties, and I cannot allow them to be 
 copied without their consent.” Then with 
 due Scottish caution Raeburn remembered 
 that he was talking to an utter stranger of 
 whose honesty he knew nothing. Robertson, 
 on being reminded of this, offered to get 
 ‘ recommendations.’ Raeburn, however, 
 probably because he was interested, said he 
 had a small room not much used—Robertson 
 might come and paint there: “My man 
 shall clear it out, and you shall begin 
 to-morrow.” 
 
 The first picture copied was the half- 
 length of John Tait, W.S., of Harvieston and 
 Cumloden. Mr. Greig traced the miniature 
 by Robertson which resulted, and it is 
 illustrated in his Connoisseur monograph, 
 alongside the Raeburn picture of Tait with 
 his grandchild. The actual picture copied 
 may not have been this one, as an earlier 
 likeness was lent to the Raeburn Exhibition 
 of 1876 by Mr. Tait, the owner of both. 
 The picture with the child was probably a 
 replica painted some years later, as the child 
 was born in 1796; conjecturally in 1798, 
 as the boy appears to have been about two 
 years old. The grandfather died in 1800. 
 
Association with Artists 49 
 
 Robertson, with the fine audacity of youth 
 and despite his reverence for Raeburn, 
 disapproved of ‘a blazing warm sky on one 
 side close to the head,’ so considerably 
 lowered its tone in his copy. On seeing this 
 Raeburn stared, frowned, and then smiled. 
 “TI see you have improved upon my com- 
 position,” said he; ‘ Yes,’’ replied Robert- 
 son, “‘I think it an improvement; don’t 
 you think it is?” David Martin would 
 probably have thrown Raeburn into the 
 street if he had been so presumptuous. 
 Raeburn only laughed heartily and bid the 
 boy come to dinner with him and his family 
 on the morrow. The audacious Andrew 
 evidently captured the favour of Mrs. 
 Raeburn, for he continues: ‘I dined 
 repeatedly with him during my short stay 
 in Edinburgh, but he never forgot the joke 
 of my altering the composition. Some years 
 after, I saw the picture again and found 
 that he had adopted my alterations. This 
 enabled me to turn the joke against him, 
 but he said he “‘ did so merely to oblige me.”’’ 
 
 There was probably some quality of 
 fascination about the raw young student, or 
 else Raeburn, recognising his ability and 
 remembering his own early struggles, deter- 
 mined to help him in a_whole-hearted 
 manner. He got his patrons to allow his 
 portraits of them to be copied, and ‘ when- 
 ever he could take such a liberty with a 
 
50 Raeburn 
 
 sitter’ young Robertson was free to be in 
 the painting room and watch him at work. 
 
 ‘I thus write the portrait of Sir Henry 
 Raeburn,’ concludes Robertson; ‘and all 
 who had the pleasure to know him will 
 acknowledge that it is more like than any 
 I ever painted. Thus commenced my friend- 
 ship with one of the noblest and most 
 amiable of men.’ Let us be grateful to 
 Andrew Robertson for such a delightful 
 and lifelike portrait of Raeburn in his prime 
 at the age of 37: the first clear picture we 
 have of him. 
 
 In or about the following year, 1794, 
 Robertson studied under Raeburn during 
 another visit to Edinburgh, and seven years 
 later, writing to his father from London, he 
 mentioned that before he sailed from Edin- 
 burgh ‘he had been well received by Mr. 
 Raeburn and Mr. Nasmyth.’ To his friend 
 and staunch patron, John Ewen of Aberdeen, 
 he wrote about the same time: ‘ Messrs. 
 Raeburn and Nasmyth were happy to see 
 me, and you may believe the pleasure was 
 reciprocal. I was flattered in the extreme 
 by their kindness.’ Ewen, replying, said 
 “Mr. RAEBURN. I may be singular in my 
 Opinion, it is merely the private opinion of a 
 very private man, but, after Sir Joshua, I 
 have been taught to set him down as our 
 first painter in portrait. I know not if even 
 a visit to London would dispose me to yield 
 
Association with Artists 51 
 
 that opinion.” Mr. Ewen, could he return 
 to life to-day, would find that the opinion he 
 held a century and a quarter ago is pretty 
 generally accepted. 
 
 There are references to other pleasant 
 visits to Raeburn in 1802 and 1806, and in 
 the latter year Robertson writes to Ewen: 
 “He is an able artist, and by far the most 
 respectable character I know in_ the 
 profession. I am proud of his acquaintance.’ 
 To about the same date as Robertson’s first 
 interview we may assign the interesting 
 description, which Allan Cunningham had 
 from an unnamed sitter, of Raeburn’s 
 studio methods : 
 
 He spoke a few words to me in his usual brief 
 and kindly way—evidently to put me into an 
 agreeable mood ; and then having placed me in a 
 chair on a platform at the end of his painting-room, 
 in the posture required, set up his easel beside me 
 with the canvas ready to receive the colour. When 
 he saw all was right, he took his palette and his 
 brush, retreated back step by step, with his face 
 towards me, till he was nigh the other end of the 
 room; he stood and studied for a minute more, 
 then came up to the canvas, and, without looking 
 at me, wrought upon it with colour for some time. 
 Having done this, he retreated in the same manner, 
 studied my looks at that distance for about another 
 minute, then came hastily up to the canvas and 
 painted a few minutes more. I had sat to other 
 artists ; their way was quite different—they made 
 an outline carefully in chalk, measured it with 
 compasses, placed the canvas close to me, and 
 looking at me almost without ceasing in the face 
 
52 Raeburn 
 
 proceeded to fill up the outline with colour. They 
 succeeded best in the minute detail—Raeburn best 
 in the general result of the expression; they 
 obtained by means of a multitude of little touches 
 what he found by broader masses; they gave 
 more of the man—he gave most of the mind. I may 
 add that I found him well-informed, with no 
 professional pedantry about him; indeed, no one 
 could have imagined him a painter till he took up 
 the brush and palette; he conversed with me 
 upon mechanics and ship-building, and, if I can 
 depend upon my own imperfect judgment, he had 
 studied ship-architecture with great success. On 
 one of the days of my sittings he had to dine with 
 me at the house of a mutual friend ; our hour was 
 six, and you know how punctual to time we of the 
 North are; he painted at my portrait till within 
 a quarter of an hour of the time, threw down his 
 palette and brushes, went into a little closet, and 
 in five minutes sallied out to dinner in a trim worthy 
 of the first company. I can remember no more that 
 is noteworthy. I sat six times, and two hours 
 together. 
 
 Allan Cunningham also gives a descrip- 
 tion of Raeburn’s general way of life which, 
 although it could not be from his own 
 knowledge, may be taken as fairly accurate. 
 W. KR. Andrew, having nothing better to 
 offer, lifted it entire into his biography, 
 merely altering the studio address, and 
 thereby suggesting a later date than that 
 of Cunningham’s description : 
 
 The motions of the artist were as regular as 
 those of a clock. He rose at seven during summer, 
 took breakfast about eight with his wife and 
 
Association with Artists 53 
 
 children, walked in to George Street, and was 
 ready for a sitter by nine; and of sitters he gener- 
 ally had, for many years, not fewer than three or 
 four a day. To these he gave an hour and a half 
 each. He seldom kept a sitter more than two 
 hours ; unless the person happened—and that was 
 often the case—to be gifted with more than common 
 talents. He felt himself happy, and never failed 
 to detain the party till the arrival of a new sitter 
 intimated that he must be gone. For a head size 
 he generally required four or five sittings; and he 
 preferred painting the head and hands to any other 
 part of the body ; assigning as a reason, that they 
 required least consideration. A fold of drapery, 
 or the natural ease which the casting of a mantle 
 over the shoulders demanded, occasioned him more 
 perplexing study than a head full of thought and 
 imagination. Such was the intuition with which 
 he penetrated at once to the mind, that the first 
 sitting rarely came to a close without his having 
 seized strongly on the character and disposition 
 of the individual. He never drew in his heads, 
 or indeed any part of the body, with chalk—a 
 system pursued successfully by Lawrence; but 
 began with the brush at once. The forehead, chin, 
 nose, and mouth were his first touches. He always 
 painted standing, and never used a stick for resting 
 his hand on; for such was his accurateness of eye, 
 and steadiness of nerve, that he could introduce 
 the most delicate touches, or the utmost mechanical 
 regularity of line, without aid, or other contrivance 
 than fair, off-hand dexterity. He remained in his 
 painting-room till a little after five o’clock, when 
 he walked home, and dined at six. 
 
 To these sketches of Raeburn at work may 
 be added a briefer one by a stronger hand, 
 which is quoted by Andrew: Sir Walter 
 Scott said, ‘ His manly stride backwards, as 
 
54 Raeburn 
 
 he went to contemplate his work at a proper 
 distance, and, when resolved on the necessary 
 point to be touched, his step forward, were 
 magnificent. I see him in my mind’s eye, 
 with his hand under his chin, contemplating 
 his picture, which position always brought 
 me in mind of a figure of Jupiter which I 
 have somewhere seen.’ There must have 
 been some peculiar distinction about the 
 form, movement, and general aspect of 
 Raeburn so impressive that Robertson in 
 1793 saw in him a reincarnation of Apelles, 
 and Scott, thirty years later, likened him 
 to the ruler of Olympus. Raeburn himself 
 has preserved for us some suggestion of 
 his looks, in the wonderful self-portrait 
 which now hangs in the Scottish National 
 Gallery. 
 
 Active and constant as he was in the 
 pursuit of his profession, Raeburn did not 
 by any means neglect to live his life as a man 
 in the vigorous manner that his physique 
 and his temperament made natural to him. 
 His daily labours from nine to half-past five 
 in his studio must have occasionally have 
 been intermitted, for he had many hobbies 
 and pursuits. He was a keen golfer, he was 
 an equally hearty follower of the once 
 popular relaxation of archery, he was an 
 ardent angler, and one of the enthusiasts 
 who formed a society to restore the Ludi 
 A pollinares at Edinburgh, he‘ had considerable 
 
Association with Artists 55 
 
 skill in gardening, he was a learned and 
 enthusiastic florist, and to the mysteries of 
 hot-houses, flues, etc., he dedicated many 
 experiments.’ He had a passion for maritime 
 construction, (which may have been provoked 
 in him by Sir John Clerk) and, ‘he made 
 many ship-models with his own hands, neat, 
 clean-built, ingenious things, all about three 
 feet long in the keel ; and it was his pleasure 
 to try their merits frequently in Wariston 
 Pond.’ Once, not long before his death, 
 he over-balanced himself while so employed, 
 fell into deep water, and was with difficulty 
 rescued by his servant. He also laboured 
 hard at attempts to discover perpetual 
 motion. Cunningham tells us that he made 
 long fishing excursions, sometimes lasting 
 several weeks, and he took part in other 
 pleasant outings with parties of friends with 
 the ostensible purpose of exploring antiquities 
 in the surrounding country. 
 
 To all these distractions from the chief 
 business of his life Raeburn apparently 
 allowed himself to add a share in the 
 evening recreations of the city: dinners, 
 suppers, and the like. This was, of course, 
 all in the interests of business, and it doubt- 
 less led up to many desirable commissions, 
 but Raeburn was, in virtue of his vigour, 
 his fine presence and manners, and his 
 genial happy temperament, qualified not 
 only to give pleasure to his fellow men, but 
 
56 Raeburn 
 
 also to take keen pleasure in intercourse 
 with them. He possessed that invaluable 
 gift for a portrait painter, skill in talking, and 
 the art of telling stories inimitably. Scott, 
 an unquestionably good judge, said: ‘ His 
 conversation was rich, and he told his story 
 well.” A ‘nicht wi’ Raeburn’ must have 
 been an event to be remembered. Even so 
 late as 1820, when he was in his sixty-fifth 
 year, he was one of a party of thirty at 
 least who dined with Andrew Geddes in 
 honour of B. R. Haydon, visiting Edinburgh 
 to exhibit his pictures. ‘ Thompson,’ wrote 
 Haydon, ‘sang some of the songs of Burns 
 with great relish and taste, and at the chorus 
 of one’ (probably Auld Lang Syne) ‘to 
 my utter astonishment, the whole company 
 took hands, jumped up, and danced to the 
 tune all round till they came to their seats 
 again, leaving me sitting in wonder. Raeburn 
 was a glorious fellow, and more boisterous 
 than any.’ 
 
 During Raeburn’s life the expansion of 
 Edinburgh into ‘ the New Town’ was a very 
 fever in men’s veins, and it is not surprising 
 that he caught the infection of the building 
 craze. He determined to build himself a 
 studio after his own heart, and having 
 plenty of money he feued a plot of ground in 
 York Place, a continuation of Queen Street. 
 So far as can be made out from a bird’s-eye 
 view of the New Town, made by R. Barker 
 
Association with Artists 57 
 
 in 1792, which hangs in the Edinburgh 
 University, there were at that time no 
 buildings in either street (I believe some 
 houses in Queen Street had been built) ; 
 but a few years changed all that. Raeburn 
 set to work with a will and, whether with the 
 aid of an architect or not is not stated, 
 though one conjectures that neighbour 
 Nasmyth took a hand in the enterprise, 
 evolved a highly satisfactory building to 
 serve him as painting-room and exhibition 
 gallery. Cunningham describes it as consist- 
 ing of a sunk storey for domestic accommoda- 
 tion, a ground floor containing the painting 
 rooms, with a storey above, formed into one 
 fine gallery, fifty feet long, thirty-five feet 
 wide, and forty feet high, lighted from the 
 roof. On the walls of this stately apartment 
 he hung his works when finished, and the 
 doors were opened to all who had taste or 
 curiosity. 
 
 The date of removal to this new studio 
 is given by Cunningham as 1795, and 
 W. R. Andrew says the same. They were 
 perhaps mistaken: the inscription placed 
 on the house a few years ago by the Edin- 
 burgh Pen & Pencil Club is as follows :—‘ In 
 this house built by him Sir Henry Raeburn 
 painted from 1798 to 1809.’ One would 
 suppose that authorities more trustworthy 
 than those mentioned were consulted before 
 this was set up, but the date 1809 is almost 
 
58 Raeburn 
 
 certainly wrong; 1798 is probably right, 
 because of the fact that I find in the Edin- 
 burgh Directory for 1797-1798 ‘ Raeburn, 
 Henry, Portrait Painter, No. 18 George 
 Street, south side.’ I have not been able 
 to find Directories for the two following 
 years, but in that for 1800--1801 the address 
 is changed to No. 16 York Place. There was 
 no alteration until 1811, (except that for 
 three years Raeburn was described as a 
 landscape painter) when the number was 
 changed to 34. It so remained until in the 
 year of the painter’s death, 32, the correct 
 number when the street was renumbered, 
 was substituted. 
 
 It will be necessary to revert to these 
 changes of number; in the meantime it is 
 sufficient to say there seems no doubt that 
 the house now numbered 32 is the one that 
 Raeburn built, and it is probable that it 
 was not completed and occupied until 1798. 
 
 While thus, at the age of 42, on the top 
 of the tide of good fortune, Raeburn had his 
 first experience, so far as we know, of the 
 tragic side of life. His elder son, Peter, died 
 of consumption on 6th February, 1798, at 
 the age of 16 years and 9 months, and was 
 buried at St. Cuthbert’s, where a tombstone 
 recorded in eloquent Latin his merit and the 
 grief of his parents, until for some reason 
 it was obliterated in 1836. Andrew states 
 that the lad ‘ evinced great artistic genius ; 
 
Association with Artists 59 
 
 he painted a most impressive portrait of 
 himself, which he presented as a last gift 
 to his mother.’ I have not been able to 
 learn anything about this picture, though it 
 might have been expected that it would, 
 along with the fateful early portrait of the 
 boy’s mother, have been specially cherished 
 as a heirloom. A small portrait of Peter by 
 his father was in rg1z (according to the 
 Connotsseur list) in the collection of Mr. V. G. 
 Fischer of Washington. 
 
 Having tasted the alluring joys of building, 
 Raeburn naturally desired to dabble further 
 in the fascinating pursuit. He owned a 
 good deal of land in Stockbridge, and he 
 proceeded to lay some of it out for building 
 purposes. Without a practically impossible 
 examination of the title-deeds of half the 
 houses there one could not define exactly 
 how far he was responsible for its develop- 
 ment into a residential quarter. We know 
 that he planned Ann Street, which is named 
 after his wife, while Raeburn Place and 
 Leslie Place suggest his influence. St. 
 Bernard’s Crescent was probably built after 
 his time, although the general classical 
 design of it is said to have been suggested 
 to him by Wilkie; it was probably com- 
 menced soon after his death, and his son, 
 Henry, would be responsible for the demoli- 
 tion of St. Bernard’s and the building of the 
 Crescent that succeeded it. According to 
 
60 Raeburn 
 
 the Directories he lived there until 1826, 
 but in 1827 his address was No. 19 St. 
 Bernard’s Crescent. That he dabbled in 
 building in his father’s lifetime is shown by 
 an old policy of the Caledonian Insurance 
 Company in his favour in I81I, on two 
 houses in course of construction in Raeburn 
 Place. Neither of these was for his own 
 use, as he was then a bachelor, and after 
 he married in the following year he and his 
 wife and their children lived at St. Bernard’s. 
 
 On September the 23rd, 1801, Joseph 
 Farington, visiting Edinburgh betook himself 
 to York Place, and called first on ‘ Mr. 
 Nasmith,’ of whose art he did not think 
 highly. He then crossed the street to 
 “Mr. Raeburn, the portrait painter most 
 esteemed here.’ Golf, archery, building, a 
 law suit, or some other distraction had 
 claimed Raeburn, and Farington was shown 
 round by a servant who when asked what 
 other artists there were in Edinburgh, told 
 him ‘there was Mr. Nasmith, who was a 
 great landscape painter, the best in Scotland, 
 and superior to any in England.’ Farington 
 noted approval of Raeburn’s premises, and 
 “found pictures of a much superior kind 
 to those I saw at Mr. Nasmith’s. Some of 
 Mr. Raeburn’s portraits, he continued, 
 “have an uncommonly true appearance of 
 nature and are painted with much firmness, 
 but there is a great inequalityin his works. 
 
— 
 
 Association with Artists 61 
 
 That which strikes the eye is a kind of 
 Camera Obscura effect, and from those 
 pictures which seem to be his best, I should 
 conclude he has looked very much at nature, 
 reflected in a Camera... .’ 
 
 This odd criticism is interesting as coming 
 from a brother artist, and also as tending 
 to show that Raeburn’s pictures of inferior 
 quality are not necessarily assignable to the 
 later period when his financial difficulties 
 tended to make him produce hurried and 
 uninspired work. Farington noted that 
 Raeburn’s prices were 100 guineas for a 
 whole length, 50 for a half-length, 30 for a 
 kit-cat, and 25 for a three-quarter portrait. 
 It does not appear that he saw Raeburn, 
 which is a pity, as his pen portrait would 
 have been valuable. He noted that ‘he 
 has a house, called Stockbridge, situated 
 near the Water of Leith, where he resides 
 much.’ 
 
 The next definite fact in regard to Raeburn 
 is that he was, as already mentioned, an 
 original member of the Board of Directors 
 of the Caledonian Insurance Company, 
 founded in 1805. Interesting particulars as 
 to this are given in the History of a Hundred 
 Years issued by the Company in 1905. 
 “After the first year he found that a 
 Director’s duties demanded more time than 
 he was willing to spare from his art; and 
 he therefore left the Board.’ Enduring 
 
62 Raeburn 
 
 memorials of his connection with the Com- 
 pany are his portraits, which hang in the 
 Company’s Board Room, of William Braid- 
 wood and William H. Dickie, its first 
 manager and second secretary. Raeburn 
 also supplied the Company with an admirable 
 design for the heading of its policy forms, 
 which ‘ continued in use until 1838, when a 
 much feebler one took its place.’ This 
 unique example of Raeburn’s skill, outside 
 the province of portraiture, represents a 
 lady with a plumed helmet, spear, and 
 shield, (presumably Caledonia) seated on a 
 bank where thistles grow plentifully, with a 
 glimpse in the distance of the Forth, Edin- 
 burgh, and Arthur’s Seat. On the shield 
 is figured Saint Andrew, holding his 
 Cross. 
 
 In 1805, if not before, Raeburn’s son Henry 
 set up in business in Leith: ‘ Henry 
 Raeburn, Merchant, Broad Wynd,’ is the 
 entry in the 1805 Directory. In the following 
 year it became ‘Henry Raeburn & Co., 
 Merchants, Shore,’ and in 1807 the address 
 was ‘Citadel.’ There is no subsequent 
 entry of the name of this firm, which was not 
 successful, and became bankrupt. As to the 
 nature of its business there is no record: in 
 Scotland ‘merchant’ was commonly used 
 in the same sense as the French marchand, 
 and every petty shopkeeper was a ‘ mer- 
 chant.’ Raeburn & Co., however, were 
 
Association with Artists 63 
 
 probably something in the wholesale way, in 
 connection with shipping. Mr. Caw con- 
 jectured that they were marine underwriters, 
 because in Raeburn’s own bankruptcy pro- 
 ceedings he was described as ‘ Portrait 
 painter and underwriter.” The Co. seems 
 to have been James Philip Inglis, husband 
 of Henry’s half-sister Ann. Raeburn himself 
 was deeply involved in the disaster. Mr. 
 Caw quotes a letter from Alexander Cunning- 
 ham written on the 16th of February, 1808, 
 in which he tells a correspondent: ‘I had 
 a walk of three hours on Sunday with my 
 worthy friend, Raeburn. He had realised 
 nearly £17,000, which is all gone. He has 
 offered a small composition, which he is in 
 hopes will be accepted. He quits this to 
 try his fate in London, which I trust in 
 God will be successful. While I write this 
 I feel the tear start.’ Sir Walter Scott’s 
 account of the matter in a letter to Haydon 
 on the day when Raeburn died was that he 
 ‘had become totally embarrassed in his 
 affairs, from incautious securities in which 
 he was engaged for a near relative, who was 
 in the West India trade.’ 
 
 Mr. Greig, after quoting this letter, re- 
 marks: ‘ Raeburn may have intended at 
 that time to go to London, but though he 
 received his discharge in June 1808, the 
 affairs of Henry Raeburn & Co. were not 
 settled until March 1810, and no doubt the 
 
 FR 
 
64 Raeburn 
 
 artist delayed his projected change until he 
 was at ease in mind and finance. Within 
 a year after the failure he was in a position 
 to purchase St. Bernard’s, and by the spring 
 of 1810 he felt rich enough to risk the cost 
 of life as a fashionable portrait painter in 
 London.’ In the dim light of what we know 
 about this period of Raeburn’s life this 
 seems a sound pronouncement. It may 
 quite well be the case however that Raeburn 
 did visit London in 1808, although there is 
 no record of his having been there. 
 
 He was more fortunate than most bank- 
 rupts in the fact that his failure did not 
 proceed from or injuriously affect his main 
 business as a portrait painter: it is to his 
 credit as a man and artist that he did not 
 allow it to interfere with his studio activities. 
 It was in 1808 that he painted the famous 
 ‘Buccleuch ’ portrait of Walter Scott. This 
 was commissioned by Constable, in the height 
 of Scott’s new fame as a poet, which had 
 succeeded and superseded his early reputa- 
 tion as an antiquary, learned in old ballads, 
 and was in turn to be out-shone by his great 
 and enduring fame as a novelist. The Lay of 
 the Last Minstrel appeared in 1805, and 
 Marmion followed it in 1808. 
 
 The first public Exhibition in Scotland 
 by artists was opened on 2oth June, 1808, 
 at Core’s Lyceum in Nicolson Street. There 
 were 171 pictures, of which fourteen were 
 
In the possession of Sir William Raeburn 
 ROBERT HAY OF DRUMELZIER 
 
 SIR HENRY RAEBURN 
 
 
 
. 
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 " 23 
 Ny 
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 t 
 ‘ 
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Association with Artists 65 
 
 by George Watson, and one by John Watson 
 (Gordon), but none by Raeburn. 
 
 This abstention from the new Society was 
 probably due to the confusion in his affairs, 
 for the promotion of such an exhibition had 
 been one of his objects, and in the following 
 years he was a regular and large exhibitor. 
 Henry Cockburn judged that ‘in general 
 the works were below what would now be 
 admitted into any exhibition in Edinburgh. 
 The best were those of Nasmyth, Thomson 
 and Carse. ... However, this exhibition 
 did incalculable good. It drew such artists 
 as we had out of their obscurity: it showed 
 them their strength and their weakness: 
 it excited public attention: it gave them 
 importance.’ The gate-money taken was 
 not enough to pay the cost of the room, 
 but in the following years when the exhibi- 
 tion was held in Raeburn’s gallery there 
 was a handsome profit. This was in part 
 due to the better situation of the gallery, 
 for the people with money and _ leisure 
 were by that time nearly all removed to 
 the ‘New’ Town; but the additional 
 attraction of portraits by Raeburn was an 
 important contributory cause. G. Watson 
 was a rival portrait painter, a pupil of 
 Nasmyth and Reynolds, eleven years younger 
 than Raeburn, but even at his best inferior 
 to him. The one exhibit by his nephew, 
 John Watson, then a youth of 20, was The 
 
66 Raeburn 
 
 Lay of the Last Minstrel. He afterwards 
 adopted the name of Watson-Gordon, for 
 the sake of distinction from three relatives 
 who were painters. He is said to have lived 
 at Stockbridge and to have been intimate 
 with Raeburn. Cumberland Hill tells us 
 that: ‘after taking painting apartments in 
 Edinburgh the following was of almost 
 daily occurrence. Every morning at nine 
 o'clock, or perhaps a little before it, John 
 Watson left Ann Street, and walking down 
 the beautiful and picturesque footpath that 
 skirted the banks of the Water of Leith, he 
 passed St. Bernard’s, where, almost invari- 
 ably, he was joined by the portly figure of 
 Sir Henry Raeburn. Engaged in conversa- 
 tion, no doubt beneficial to the younger 
 but rising artist, they proceeded to 
 Edinburgh. .. .’ 
 
 It is not known that Raeburn’s young 
 friend had any teaching from him other than 
 in conversation, but he was strongly in- 
 fluenced by his art, and carried on the 
 Raeburn tradition in portraiture with bril- 
 liant success. He had been trained at the 
 Trustees’ Academy School, under John 
 Graham, who, appointed master of it in 1798, 
 became as a teacher a factor of great impor- 
 tance in the development of Scottish art. 
 Among his pupils were Sir David Wilkie, 
 Sir John Watson-Gordon, Sir William Allan, 
 and John Burnet. 
 
Association with Artists 67 
 
 The Reverend John Thomson, who was an 
 exhibitor of five pictures in 1808, was 
 another close friend of Raeburn, after he 
 came to Duddingston in 1805 as minister. 
 It is said that Raeburn thought of having a 
 seascape background painted by Thomson 
 for one of his portraits of an admiral, in 
 imitation of Sir Thomas Lawrence’s usage, 
 but thought better of it because he was 
 afraid, so he said, ‘that Mr. Thomson’s 
 background might put my part of the 
 picture in the shade.’ 
 
 The 1808 Exhibition was the outcome of 
 the formation of a Society of Artists,* and 
 after the first year the results of the annual 
 displays were so good that in 1813 they led 
 to the Society’s disruption. An _ exact 
 account of the matter is given in the historical 
 narrative by the late Dr. W. D. McKay, 
 R.S.A., prefixed to Mr. Frank Rinder’s valu- 
 able analysis of the Royal Scottish Academy’s 
 Exhibition catalogues. The exhibitions 
 
 * A writer, signing U.F., in the Scots’ Magazine for 
 1815, says the Society was projected and formed by a 
 class of persons who (with two exceptions at the most) 
 were at the very bottom of the profession.’ They 
 elected their President (G. Watson) over a bowl of 
 punch, and he immediately named as Secretary a 
 writer (John Russell), with a salary of £50. Afterwards 
 the better men camein, but ‘the public had the mortifi— 
 cation of seeing Raeburn a simple member of the Society, 
 with one vote, and no influence, under the presidency of 
 aman of some merit in his own way, but whose works 
 were then little heard of and as little admired.’ 
 
68 Raeburn 
 
 from 1809 to 1813 were in Raeburn’s York 
 Place Gallery, and he was an important 
 contributor: showing 57 pictures in five 
 years. George Watson, the President, showed 
 67, but not all portraits as was the case with 
 Raeburn. The usage at that time of omit- 
 ting from the catalogue the names of persons 
 limned, robs us of what would have been 
 a valuable contribution to the chronology of 
 Raeburn’s work ; but as regards 1809 I am 
 able to supply from other sources the names 
 of several of those represented in his eleven 
 exhibits: No. 129 was General Maxwell, 
 which the editor of the Scots Magazine con- 
 sidered ‘an admirable picture, uncommonly 
 well drawn, finely coloured, and a striking 
 likeness. The foreshortening of the right 
 arm is not inferior to Rubens. On the 
 whole, this picture reminds us much of Sir 
 Joshua’s celebrated portrait of Lord Heath- 
 field, to which it would form a not unsuitable 
 companion.’ No. 144, Portrait of a Gentle- 
 man on Horseback, represents Mr. Harley 
 Drummond. This is highly praised. It 
 reminded the writer of Vandyck’s Charles I 
 and the Marquis of Hamilton at Donibristle. 
 He remarked on the great skill shown in the 
 management of the background, but thought 
 the right leg perhaps too long, and the curva- 
 ture of the horse’s neck overstrained. No. 
 156 was Dr. Adam. No. 183, Walter Scott. 
 This is praised at some length. ‘We 
 
Association with Artists 69 
 
 consider the present as a striking instance of 
 Mr. Raeburn’s scientific knowledge of the 
 harmony of colouring; the greenish tone 
 which pervades the whole is particularly 
 pleasing.” No. 192 was Mrs. Cochran. 
 
 In 1811 one of the full-length portraits 
 was the Adam Rolland of Gask, and in the 
 two following years the catalogues identify 
 a full-length of the Earl of Rosebery, the 
 Lord Bishop of Meath, (now in the Dresden 
 Gallery), Lady Innes Ker, and Sir James 
 Innes Ker in 1812 ; Lord Seaforth, and Lord 
 Elcho and Mr. Charters (sic) on one canvas, 
 in 1813. A Sherlock Holmes intelligence 
 would be required to evolve a complete list 
 of the remaining four noblemen, (two full- 
 length), twenty gentlemen (one full-length), 
 one young gentleman, one gentleman and 
 lady, fifteen ladies (one full-length), three 
 young ladies, two boys on one canvas, and 
 three children on another. 
 
 Mr. Caw says that as a consequence of his 
 bankruptcy Raeburn had to sell his York 
 Place premises, of which he was afterwards 
 only tenant. That he continued to occupy 
 it to the end of his life is generally accepted 
 by biographers, but the inscription carved 
 on the front of the house, already quoted, 
 suggests a doubt on the subject. The use 
 of Raeburn’s picture gallery for exhibitions 
 from 1809 might mean that he no longer 
 had control of it, and it would be reasonable 
 
70 Raeburn 
 
 to assume that the inscription on the house 
 was framed by some one who, after careful 
 enquiry, had full knowledge of the facts ; 
 but I think he was mistaken. By 1809 
 Raeburn had apparently recovered pretty 
 well from his financial collapse, although his 
 son was not then discharged, as in that year 
 he bought St. Bernard’s from the trustees 
 of the widow of Walter Ross. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 SOME CONTEMPORARY ESTIMATES 
 
 O far as we know, Raeburn took no steps 
 to act upon his despairing resolution 
 in 1808 to remove to London, until 
 
 two years later. Scottish caution probably 
 made him delay taking active measures until 
 he had so far amended his fortunes as to be 
 able to undertake such a great adventure 
 for a man of mature years and settled habits, 
 with a sufficient financial backing. The 
 death of Hoppner in January 1810 may have 
 quickened a dormant design into action, for 
 it certainly made an opening for a new 
 portrait painter of the first rank. Soon 
 after, on 2nd March, Wilkie noted in his 
 ‘ Journal’ that Raeburn intended to come 
 to London and take Hoppner’s house. His 
 portrait of Scott went before him, and duly 
 appeared at the Royal Academy’s Exhibition 
 —his first appearance there since 1802. 
 Here again the picture was in London to be 
 engraved, as was the case with some if not 
 all of his previous contributions to Somerset 
 House. Raeburn evidently went up at the 
 time of the Exhibition, for it was on the 12th 
 
 71 
 
72 Raeburn 
 
 of May that he called upon Wilkie and said 
 “he had come to London to look out for a 
 house, and to see if there was any prospect 
 of establishing himself.” Wilkie took him 
 to see Sir William Beechey, and next day 
 ‘called with him on several artists who 
 happened to be from home or engaged.’ 
 Fight days later he took Raeburn to Stoth- 
 ard, and on 4th June ‘went with Raeburn 
 to the Crown & Anchor to meet the gentle- 
 men of the Royal Academy. I introduced 
 him to Flaxman ; after dinner he was asked 
 by Beechey to sit near the President, where 
 his health was proposed by Flaxman ; great 
 attention was paid to him.’ 
 
 After all, nothing resulted. Raeburn went 
 home again and settled down cheerfully to 
 work in Edinburgh for the rest of his life. 
 Perhaps his survey of London failed to please 
 him, perhaps the artists he met gave him an 
 unfavourable impression as to the reception 
 awaiting a competitor, perhaps he could not 
 find a suitable house: it may be that he 
 realised the great difference between the 
 two capitals, and the obstacles that would, 
 in the metropolis, make success difficult and 
 life perhaps unpleasant for a Scot fifty-four 
 years old, with a wife aged sixty-six, who 
 talked the broadest of broad Scots. And so 
 English art missed having infused into it as 
 a vitalising corrective to the pretty-pretti- 
 ness of the decadent Lawrence school, the 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 73 
 
 influence and example of a supremely great 
 and virile individuality. Lawrence is said, 
 on no definite evidence, to have influenced 
 Raeburn to abandon his purpose ; it seems 
 quite likely that he may have done so, for 
 it was obviously to his interest that a greater 
 painter than he should not come to dispute 
 the supremacy he enjoyed. That he was 
 capable of doing so is not hard to believe, 
 by any one familiar with his career and his 
 philandering selfishness. In B. R. Haydon’s 
 copy of The Life and Correspondence of 
 Lawrence, by D. E. Williams (in the British 
 Museum), among the caustic notes is one on 
 the passage ‘I who have never in act or 
 even speech been illiberal towards a brother 
 artist.’ Haydon commented: ‘Oh, Law- 
 rence, Lawrence. Fuseli told me that Shee 
 had a picture hung in a centre that Lawrence 
 wanted. He called on Fuseli, who was a 
 hanger—staid with him till 2 in the morning 
 —persuading him to take down Shee’s 
 picture and hang up hisown. “ Good God,” 
 said I to Fuseli, “what did youdo?” ‘“ By 
 God,”’ said Fuseli, ‘ I was villain enough to 
 do it!’”—and yet Lawrence says he was 
 never in act illiberal to a Brother.’ 
 
 It was about the year 1810 (probably on 
 his way to London, in that year), that Allan 
 Cunningham, a raw young man from the 
 country, visited Raeburn’s Gallery and had 
 speech with the painter whose biography 
 
74 Raeburn 
 
 he was to bungle so badly twenty-three 
 years later. After giving the description 
 of the Gallery already quoted, the accuracy 
 of which is questioned by Mr. Caw, Cunning- 
 ham continues: ‘my astonishment was 
 beyond the power of painting to express : 
 I had never seen works of art, or at least of 
 genius, before, and had no conception of the 
 spirit and mind which colours could embody. 
 I was much struck at the first glance with 
 some Highland chiefs, ‘all plaided and 
 plumed in their tartan array,’’ whose pictu- 
 resque dress and martial bearing contrasted 
 finely with the graver costume and sterner 
 brows of the Lowlanders. What I next 
 dwelt on was several family groups of ladies 
 and children, with snatches of landscape 
 behind, where streams descended through 
 wild woods or loitered in little holms. But 
 that on which my mind finally settled, was 
 the visible capacity for thought which most 
 of the heads had, together with their massive 
 and somewhat gloomy splendour of colouring. 
 The artist came in and said a word or two in 
 a low tone of voice : some one was probably 
 sitting, for he had his palette on his 
 thumb.’ 
 
 Raeburn’s brother William died on Thurs- 
 day the 6th of December, 1810. Mr. Greig 
 gives the text of a letter first published in 
 the Scotsman, in which Raeburn writes 
 of the death as ‘unexpected,’ and adds, 
 
* 
 
 Some Contemporary Estimates 75 
 
 “a most excellent and worthy man, to whom 
 I was much attached.’ In it he also 
 mentions ‘the peculiar situation in which 
 I find myself at present, and the great 
 demand I have for money’; from which 
 it is to be inferred that although he had 
 recently purchased St. Bernard’s, perhaps 
 in part because of it, he had still financial 
 anxieties. 
 
 If the visit to London had no other result 
 for Raeburn it at least seems to have had 
 the effect of influencing him to be a regular 
 contributor to the Royal Academy Ex- 
 hibitions. In 181zr he sent his portrait of 
 the Rev. Sir Henry Moncrieff Wellwood, Bart., 
 and in 1812 three canvases, one of which 
 was his famous Chief of the Macdonells, now 
 in the Scottish National Gallery, which no 
 doubt influenced his election as an Associate 
 of the Academy, on 2nd November in that 
 
 ear. 
 
 At the Edinburgh Exhibition of 1812 he 
 had 14 pictures, and George Watson showed 
 the same number. The Scots Magazine 
 published a long critical notice of the ex- 
 hibition by ‘ Veritas,’ who wrote of Raeburn 
 as ‘a man who would have done honour to 
 any age, and whose exertions lately received 
 the public compliments of the present 
 venerable President of the Royal Academy.’ 
 The detailed criticism of Raeburn’s exhibits 
 is laudatory, but not without intelligent 
 
76 Raeburn 
 
 fault-finding as regards details. Of the full- 
 length of Lady Innes Ker he wrote: ‘it 
 does the highest honour to Mr. Raeburn as 
 a man of genius, and deserves our most 
 unqualified praise. The attitude is extremely 
 easy and natural and the drapery beautifully 
 disposed. The picture is entirely free from 
 any affectation of light and shadow, and the 
 colours of the background are broke in that 
 masterly manner, in which Mr. Raeburn 
 surpasses most of the artists of the present 
 age. In looking at such a picture we regret 
 the small field of action offered to such an 
 artist in our city, and believe that if he had 
 commenced his career in the Metropolis, 
 instead of this place, he would now have 
 ranked with any master of the present age.’ 
 Of one portrait he remarked that it was hung 
 too high to be seen, which is a useful side- 
 light on the happenings of this season. The 
 pushful President had taken full advantage 
 of the power his position gave him, in the 
 arrangement of the exhibition. Raeburn 
 _ entering the room one morning found two 
 of his pictures and nine of Watson’s had been 
 hung. He suggested that two more of his 
 pictures should be placed ‘in a situation 
 corresponding to two of Mr. Watson’s, 
 though not in so good a light.’ This however 
 could not be granted because ‘one of the 
 situations was already engaged for another 
 picture of Mr. Watson’s.’ This was too much 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 
 
 even for Raeburn’s equanimity, and he at 
 once decided, ‘as he cannot prevail upon 
 himself to act a second part in the eyes of 
 the public to any man in his own line,’ to 
 withdraw from membership. He did so 
 in a short and dignified letter, dated 2nd 
 April, stating no reasons, and assuring the 
 Society at large of his unfeigned regard. The 
 result was inevitable. The Society could 
 not afford to lose the support of its most 
 brilliant and influential member. Dr. 
 McKay records that : ‘ at a general meeting 
 held shortly afterwards, Raeburn was re- 
 quested to withdraw his resignation, and, 
 at the same meeting, he was proposed, 
 seconded and elected President for the 
 following year.’ The Society did its best 
 to placate Watson by a vote of thanks ‘ for 
 his long and faithful services’ and a piece 
 of plate to the value of twenty-five guineas. 
 He exhibited again in 1813, but attended 
 no more meetings. 
 
 Raeburn accepted office, but even his 
 powerful and urbane influence was unequal 
 to the task of repairing the rupture caused 
 by the displeasure of the Watson faction, 
 and the eager desire of a majority of the 
 members to divide the considerable sum of 
 money earned by the exhibitions, instead of 
 funding it, or part of it, as a reserve of 
 strength, and probably also as the basis of 
 more extended usefulness. After the 1813 
 
78 Raeburn 
 
 exhibition, which may be judged from the 
 notice in the Scots Magazine to have shown 
 a decided decline in merit, the balance in 
 hand was divided, and the Society came to 
 anend. In order to continue the exhibitions 
 Raeburn and his adherents formed an 
 ‘Edinburgh Exhibition Society,’ which 
 existed for three years, but with such 
 diminishing success that it then ceased. 
 Watson, with his nephew and all his faction, 
 held aloof, and the truth of the fable of the 
 bundle of sticks was never better illustrated. 
 In the three years Raeburn showed 52 
 canvases, of which there were only named 
 in the catalogues The Lord Justice Clerk, 
 General Sir David Baird, and Francis Horner, 
 all in 1815. The Scots Magazine notice 
 enables us to add to these a ‘ very fine full 
 length’ of Mr. J. J. Hope Weir, of Craigie 
 Hall. Besides these there were two noble- 
 men, twenty-seven gentlemen (one with his 
 horse, one with his daughter, and one with 
 his lady), a general officer, a Jew, four 
 young gentlemen, nine ladies and two 
 children. The Scots Magazine evidently 
 went over to the enemy camp. Its critic 
 attacked Raeburn for errors in drawing and 
 colouring, and ‘impropriety and want of 
 truth in his shadows, which are generally too 
 dark, and often quite purple.’ After a deal 
 of scolding, however, he at last gave a word 
 of praise ; ‘ the great merit of Mr. Raeburn 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 79 
 
 occurs to us to consist in the feeling of 
 manliness and genteelity (sic) which he 
 conveys in all his portraits of gentlemen, 
 and of the delicacy and tenderness he so 
 powerfully expresses in his pictures of the 
 other sex. He paints with a vigorous and 
 determined pencil, expresses well the 
 substances he has to depict ; and the glossy 
 sides and character of the war horse has long 
 been confessed in the number of his happiest 
 efforts.’ In a following issue of the maga- 
 zine a long letter by U. F. continued the 
 attack by praising the critic’s strictures. 
 He had ‘heard the same feeling expressed 
 in London a few weeks ago at Somerset 
 House.” The Kinnoul and Fife portraits 
 there were ‘ placed in the most conspicuous 
 part of the room,’ and their black and dingy 
 hue was rendered the more offensive by Sir 
 Thomas Lawrence’s magnificent portrait of 
 the Regent. Three months later the maga- 
 zine contained a spirited vindication, signed 
 ‘ Candidus,’ who wrote : 
 
 No one can read the remarks by U. F. without 
 perceiving that the direct and chief aim of the 
 writer is to lower the reputation of the most dis- 
 tinguished portrait painter that Scotland can boast 
 of; for the critic’s abuse is truly laborious. While 
 the public justly admire that artist’s progressive 
 and great improvement, the critic, on the contrary, 
 has discovered prevailing defects in his manner, a 
 black and dingy hue in his pictures, which his 
 admirers, it is said, attribute to some growing defect 
 
 GR 
 
80 Raeburn 
 
 of vision ! and after talking of the theatrical attitude 
 of one picture, he roundly tells us that the attitude 
 and dress of another are shocking! . . . was it on 
 account of prevailing defects—of dark and dingy 
 hues—of theatrical and shocking attitudes that 
 our renowned fellow-citizen has just been elected a 
 member of the Royal Academy in London? No, 
 Sir, I presume it was because that enlightened 
 body, and their venerable President, Mr. West, 
 deemed it an honour to have Mr. Raeburn one of 
 their number. This flattering test of his splendid 
 talents is a sufficient answer to all such attacks as 
 I now allude to; and the value of it was enhanced 
 tenfold by the manner in which the honour was 
 conferred; for it is known that with a modesty 
 characteristic of true genius, he never asked a 
 single individual to vote him that dignity which so 
 many solicit in vain. 
 
 Reverting to 1812 it only remains to be 
 noted that in this year Henry Raeburn the 
 younger, on 1st October, took unto himself 
 a wife, Charlotte, daughter of John White of 
 Kellerstane and Howden.* Mr. Lawrence- 
 Archer mentions ‘a very fine full-size 
 portrait’ of her by Raeburn. The young 
 couple took up their. residence at St. 
 Bernard’s, and remained there, apparently 
 to the satisfaction of allconcerned. Raeburn 
 was a benevolent grandfather and his wife 
 an indulgent grandmother to such of the 
 eight children as were born in their lifetime. 
 
 * In the Scots Magazine the notice of the marriage 
 describes the lady as ‘ Miss White, daughter of the late 
 James White, of Dunmore.’ 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 81 
 
 Mrs. Raeburn, now nearly a septuagenarian, 
 was doubtless relieved by her daughter-in- 
 law from some of her domestic cares, and the 
 eldest girl, Eliza, who died at the age of six, 
 was the subject of a charming portrait by 
 Raeburn. 
 
 Only one picture was sent by Raeburn to 
 the Royal Academy in 1813, his portrait of 
 Sir G. S. Mackenzie, Bart., but in the follow- 
 ing year he contributed four works: the 
 Right Hon. Lord Seaforth, General Sir David 
 Baird, a lady and a gentleman. Evidently 
 he was growing anxious to secure advance- 
 ment to full membership. Cunningham 
 quotes a letter to another artist (? Chantrey) 
 in 1814, in which he wrote: ‘ I observe what 
 you say respecting the election of an R.A. ; 
 but what am I to do here? They know I 
 am on their list; if they choose to elect 
 me without solicitation, it will be the more 
 honourable to me, and I will think the more 
 of it, for I would think it unfair to employ 
 those means. I am besides out of the way, 
 and have no opportunity ... Write and 
 tell me what artists are about, and whether 
 anything be indispensable for a person who 
 desires to be a member of the Royal Academy. 
 Were you sufficiently in health to see 
 Somerset House during last exhibition ? 
 I had some things there ; but no artist of my 
 acquaintance has been kind enough to write 
 me one syllable on the subject; to say 
 
82 Raeburn 
 
 either what he thought of them himself or 
 what others thought.’ 
 
 His pictures effected what Raeburn 
 desired, without the aid of ‘ solicitation.’ 
 He was elected R.A. on roth February, 
 and as ‘R.A. Elect’ he sent four portraits 
 in 1815: The Earl of Kinnoul, The Earl of 
 Fife, Professor Playfair, and a General 
 Officer. Cunningham tells us that on this 
 occasion he paid his last visit to London, and 
 “was welcomed warmly by all his brethren.’ 
 Apparently he omitted to comply with some 
 of the formalities required, for two years 
 later he wrote requesting that the President 
 should sign on his behalf. This was 
 duly authorised by the Council. Raeburn 
 tendered as Diploma Picture his self-por- 
 trait, now in the Scottish National Gallery, 
 but it was contrary to rule to accept 
 this, and it was not until 1821 that he 
 delivered the Boy and Rabbit, which was 
 found suitable. Cunningham regarded it as 
 ‘inferior coin’ which throws grave doubt 
 on his critical capacity. Further honours 
 soon after this time were election to the 
 Imperial Academy of Florence, the New 
 York Academy (1817), and the Academy of 
 Arts, South Carolina (1821). He was also 
 elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of 
 Edinburgh on 2oth January, 1820, his 
 sponsors being Lord Chief Commissioner 
 Adam, Dr. (afterwards Sir) David Brewster, 
 
Victoria and Albert Museum 
 MRS. HOBSON OF MARKFIELD 
 
 SIR HENRY RAEBURN 
 
 ( face p. 82) 
 
 
 

 
 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 83 
 
 Principal of the University, and the eminent 
 geologist and mineralogist, Sir George 
 Mackenzie, of Coul. 
 
 Five pictures at the R.A. in 1816, four 
 in 1817, 1818, and 1819, five in 1820 and 
 1821, three in 1822, and four in 1823 were 
 evidence that Raeburn valued the honour 
 conferred on him by the Academy, and 
 wished to show his appreciation of it by 
 sending work each year. He may be 
 absolved from any suspicion of doing so for 
 business purposes, as he was always fully 
 employed in Edinburgh. The named por- 
 traits were (1816) The Rt. Hon. David Boyle, 
 Lord Justice Clerk, J. Cowley; (1817) Lady 
 Gordon Cumming, W. H. Miller; (1818) 
 Lord Montgomerie, Rear-Admiral Sir D. 
 Milne, The Rt. Hon. A. Maconochie, Lord 
 Advocate; (1819) F. L. Chanirey, R.A, 
 A Highland Chief; (1820) The Earl of Hope- 
 toun, The Marquis of Huntly in the Highland 
 Garb and family tartan, The Duke of Bedford, 
 jJagar (presumably Jager), gamekeeper to 
 the Earl of Kintore, E. L. Livingston; (1821) 
 The Marquis of Bute, Sir John Hay, Bart., 
 Earl Compton, and (1822) Lord Douglas. 
 Those unnamed were of an Officer of the 
 Royal Navy, an Officer, eight Gentlemen, 
 two Young Gentlemen, a Boy, Two Ladies, 
 and a Lady and Child. 
 
 In 1819 the Duke of Buccleuch desired to 
 have a portrait of Scott to hang in his new 
 
84 Raeburn 
 
 Library at Bowhill. He wrote to Scott 
 about it, adding: ‘Raeburn should be 
 warned that I am as well acquainted with 
 my friend’s hands and arms as with his nose 
 —and Vandyck was of my opinion. Many 
 of R’s works are shamefully finished—the 
 face studied, but everything else neglected. 
 This is a fair opportunity of producing some- 
 thing really worthy of his skill.” To this 
 Scott replied on 15th April: ‘I hesitate a 
 little about Raeburn, unless your Grace is 
 quite determined. He has very much to do ; 
 looks just now chiefly for cash, poor fellow, 
 as he can have but a few years to make 
 money ; and has twice already made a very 
 chowder-headed person of me. I should like 
 much (always with your approbation), to 
 try Allan, who is a man of real genius, and 
 has made one or two glorious portraits, 
 though his predilection is to the historical 
 branch of the art.’ This reply must have 
 been written after deliberation, for three 
 weeks earlier Scott wrote to Lockhart: ‘ the 
 Duke wants me to sit for a picture in his fine 
 new Library and names Raeburn. I should 
 like much better to sit to Allan, but it is a 
 sin to take up his time with chowder- 
 pates.’ 
 
 Exactly what meaning Scott attached to 
 the words ‘ chowder-pates ’ and ‘ chowder- 
 headed’ is not apparent. Evidently he 
 wished to give the Duke’s commission to 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 85 
 
 Allan, and the context relieves us from the 
 necessity of inferring that Scott lacked 
 perception of Raeburn’s greatness in por- 
 traiture. His purpose evidently was a 
 characteristically kindly desire to help Allan, 
 who had painted some ambitious subject 
 pictures, the fruit of travel in Circassia, 
 which he was unable to sell. Scott, to 
 relieve and encourage him, got up a lottery 
 for two of these, which produced something 
 like a thousand guineas for Allan, who by 
 way of grateful response set to work upona . 
 picture of The Murder of Archbishop Sharp 
 on Magus Moor, a scene in ‘ Old Mortality.’ 
 Scott knew well enough that by this time 
 Raeburn was again in comfortable circum- 
 stances, and could afford to do without the 
 commission ; while Allan, ‘a very enter- 
 taining person’ for whom he had a great 
 liking, was still struggling. 
 
 Were further justification of Scott needed 
 it would be found in the fact that his definite 
 and reasoned opinions on art were such as 
 to place Allan higher than Raeburn. He 
 wrote in his ‘ Journal,’ seven years later, 
 about the opening of an exhibition: ‘ All 
 the Fine Arts have it for their highest and 
 most legitimate end and purpose, to affect 
 the human passions, or smooth and alleviate 
 for a time the more unquiet feelings of the 
 mind—to excite wonder, or terror, or pleasure 
 or emotion of some kind or other.... In 
 
86 Raeburn 
 
 painting it is different; it is all become a 
 mystery, the secret of which is lodged in a 
 few connoisseurs, whose object is not to 
 praise the works of such painters as produce 
 effect on mankind at large, but to class them 
 according to their proficiency in the inferior 
 rules of the art, which though most necessary 
 to be taught and learned, should yet only be 
 considered as the Gradus ad Parnassum— 
 the step by which the higher and ultimate 
 object of a great popular effect is to be 
 attained. They have all embraced the very 
 style of criticism which induced Michael 
 Angelo to call some Pope a poor creature, 
 when, turning his attention from the general 
 effect of a noble statue, his Holiness began 
 to criticise the hem of the robe. This seems 
 to me the cause of the decay of this delightful 
 art, especially in history, its noblest branch. 
 As I speak to myself, I may say that a 
 painting should, to be excellent, have some- 
 thing to say to the mind of a man, like 
 myself, well educated, and susceptible of 
 those feelings which anything strongly 
 recalling natural emotion is likely to inspire. 
 Wilkie, the far more than Teniers of Scot- 
 land, certainly gave many new ideas. So 
 does Will. Allan, though overwhelmed with 
 their rebukes about colouring and grouping, 
 against which they are not willing to place 
 his general and original merits... . 
 
 It is not at all improbable that Raeburn 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 87 
 
 himself would have accepted as sound this 
 expression of an opinion so entirely wrong 
 from the present-day standpoint, when 
 “proficiency in the inferior rules of art’ is 
 ranked higher than imagination. Raeburn 
 practised his art as a tradesman, and gave, 
 or at any rate has left us, no evidence that 
 he had any imaginative capacity behind his 
 unique and wonderful power of seeing, under- 
 standing, and representing the pictorial 
 possibilities of what was before him. He 
 lacked the yearnings of Reynolds for 
 ‘history,’ and though his background land- 
 scapes show a fine perception of scenic 
 beauty, he so little shared Gainsborough’s 
 passion for it that he never, so far as we 
 know, painted a single landscape or even 
 made an outdoor sketch. He went to his 
 studio daily like a tradesman to his shop, 
 and was only a painter from g to 5.30; the 
 rest of his time being given wholly to various 
 hobbies, athletic games, family intercourse, 
 and social pleasure. 
 
 The Duke of Buccleuch died at Lisbon on 
 the 2oth April, before Scott’s letter reached 
 him, and so the matter ended. Seven years 
 later Scott had the satisfaction to see at 
 Bowhill the destined space over the library 
 fireplace occupied by the portrait painted 
 for Constable in 1808, part of the wreckage 
 of the disaster which involved Scott in 1825: 
 a repetition on a larger scale of that which 
 
88 Raeburn 
 
 nearly twenty years earlier had interrupted 
 Raeburn’s placid and prosperous career: in 
 each case the result of being tempted into 
 meddling with business ventures without 
 adequate business knowledge. 
 
 In 1819 there was formed in Edinburgh 
 an organisation of the sort much in vogue 
 about that time, the Institution for the 
 Encouragement of the Fine Arts in Scotland. 
 This, with a membership of as many art 
 lovers as were willing to pay £50 for the 
 privilege, held an exhibition of old masters 
 in Raeburn’s gallery in 1819, and a second 
 one in the following year ; after which, find- 
 ing that the supply of suitable material was 
 being used up, it was decided to have modern 
 pictures ; and the artists, who had had no 
 opportunity of showing their work since 
 1816, were ready to comply. Raeburn 
 contributed to the 1821 exhibition his full- 
 length of the Earl of Hopetoun, and the Earl 
 of Kinnoul’s gamekeeper (both in the R.A. 
 the previous year), and a portrait of a lady. 
 In 1822 his contributions were Professor 
 Pillans, Sir John Hay, Bart., and H. W. 
 Williams (Grecian Williams, now in the 
 National Portrait Gallery). 
 
 All might have gone well with the Institu- 
 tion if its directorate had been more judicious 
 in dealing with the artists, whose pictures 
 were essential to the success of the exhibi- 
 tions. Warned, it may be, by recollections 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 89 
 
 of the mess the artists had made of their 
 own enterprise, they excluded them from 
 membership and denied them any voice 
 in the management of the Institution. 
 Artists, though very often singularly incom- 
 petent to succeed in concerted action, are 
 invariably hostile to lay interference in their 
 affairs, and therefore it is not surprising that 
 those of Edinburgh grew restive under the 
 well-meant but not wholly wise rule of the 
 Institution, and set about forming a new 
 society.* 
 
 Raeburn alone among them was exempt 
 from the ban against full membership of the 
 Institution and so he had no _ personal 
 grievance ; but when it came to action he 
 did not hesitate to throw in his lot with his 
 fellows. On 24th December, 1822, he sent 
 a letter to James Skene, the Secretary, 
 setting out in a very able manner the case 
 of the artists. What the result might have 
 been, had he lived, it is only possible to 
 conjecture. The exhibitions were held each 
 year until 1826, although the discontent 
 of the artists continued. In that year a 
 Scottish Academy was at last formed; 
 George Watson coming into his own again 
 
 * A similar case was that of the Liverpool Academy 
 of Arts, formed in 1810, which was brought under the 
 control of the Liverpool Royal Institution, founded 
 some years later ; from which, after much friction, it at 
 last freed itself in 1830. 
 
go Raeburn 
 
 in the office of President, which, had Rae- 
 burn lived, would no doubt have been his. 
 
 Raeburn’s letter is given im extenso in 
 Mr. Caw’s valuable Scottish Painting, Past 
 and Present, so I need only quote one 
 passage which is of biographical interest : 
 ‘As for myself, I have nothing to gain by 
 the measure. I have in my own possession 
 as many of the means of improvement as I 
 have time to attend to, and my business, 
 though it may fall off, cannot admit of 
 enlargement. In so far, therefore, as I am 
 personally concerned I am quite indifferent 
 about it, but I wish well to the arts of this 
 place, which I think this measure would 
 rather tend to improve, and I wish well to 
 the Artists, because I believe them to be 
 as worthy a set of men as can be found in 
 any profession, and I have uniformly 
 received so much kindness and regard from 
 them, that I cannot refuse to go along with 
 them in any matter that appears reasonable.’ 
 
 In a letter to Wilkie in September 1819 
 Raeburn lamented his isolation from the 
 artists of London: ‘I know almost as little 
 about them as if I were living at the Cape of 
 Good Hope.’ He asked for information as 
 to the charges of portrait painters, ‘for I 
 am raising my prices too, and it would be 
 a guide to me.’ 
 
 Except for his election as a Fellow of the 
 Royal Society on 24th January, 1820, the 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates gI 
 
 years 1820 and 1821 passed without eventful 
 happenings in Raeburn’s busy, cheerful 
 life. A writer in the Scots Magazine for 
 May 1821, dealing with the Edinburgh 
 Exhibition, made some interesting critical 
 comments. For two years there had been 
 only displays of old masters. The critic 
 opined that this had had a good effect on 
 the painters, and found ‘the symptoms of 
 expanding talents very conspicuous.’ Of 
 Raeburn, he said he 
 
 maintains his wonted ascendancy in portrait 
 painting ; and his picture of Lord Hopetoun, as 
 well as of the gamekeeper to Lord Kinnoul, may 
 justly be ranked among the first works of the kind 
 which this island has produced. To this distin- 
 guished gentleman, indeed, the arts are indebted 
 for the first rapid advance which painting made in 
 this country ; and if his works are compared with 
 any of the artists who preceded him, the step made 
 is indeed immense. It is probably owing therefore 
 to the vast accumulation of business with which 
 he has so long been overloaded, that there are so 
 many symptoms of haste and imperfect finishings 
 in his compositions ; and that the spectator, whose 
 admiration has been awakened by the vigour and 
 life which his countenances exhibit, is compelled 
 to acknowledge with regret that the remainder of 
 the picture seems to have been completed by a 
 very inferior hand. That he himself should finish 
 all parts of his pictures with the same care as the 
 countenance is indeed impossible; but we can 
 conceive no reason why he and all other celebrated 
 artists should not, like Vandyke and Titian, employ 
 young men to assist them in their works, who 
 would both imbibe, early in life, the excellencies of 
 
92 Raeburn 
 
 their manner, and enable them by directing their 
 individual attention to the principal objects to 
 produce much more perfect compositions than the 
 single efforts of any individual could accomplish. 
 
 Several descriptions of Raeburn relate 
 to 1820: the best being Haydon’s brief 
 thumb-nail sketch already quoted. That 
 by John Wilson’s eldest daughter, Mrs. 
 Ferrier (writing fifty years later), is a stock 
 piece in Raeburn biography since W. R. 
 Andrew printed it, so it will suffice to extract 
 her description of the man: ‘The great 
 portrait painter, as far as I can recollect 
 him, had a very impressive appearance, his 
 full, dark, lustrous eyes, with ample brow 
 and dark hair, at this time scant. His tall 
 frame had a dignified aspect. I can well 
 remember him, seated in an arm-chair 
 in the evening, at the fireside of the small 
 drawing room, newspaper in his hand, with 
 his family around him. His usual mode of 
 address to us when we were spending the 
 evenings, while he held out his hand with a 
 kind smile, was “ well, my dears, what is 
 your opinion of things in general to-day? ” 
 These words always filled us with consterna- 
 tion, and we all huddled together like a 
 flock of scared sheep, vainly attempting 
 some answer by gazing from one to the 
 other ; and with what delight and sense of 
 freedom we were led away to be seated at 
 the tea-table covered with cookies, bread 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 93 
 
 and butter, and jelly! From this place of 
 security we stole now and then a fearful 
 glance at the arm-chair in which Sir Henry 
 reclined.’ 
 
 The contrast between this rather torpid 
 elderly gentleman and Haydon’s ‘ glorious 
 fellow, and more boisterous than any’ at 
 Geddes’ dinner table is worthy of note. 
 Mrs. Ferrier’s pen-portrait is followed by an 
 entertaining description of old Mrs. Raeburn, 
 evidently an ideal grandmother. Her daugh- 
 ter-in-law, ‘ the beautiful Charlotte White of 
 Howden’ and her husband, Henry the 
 second, are just mentioned. There is a 
 neat word-picture too of a ‘daft’ beggar- 
 man, a village ‘ natural’ who said, pointing 
 to the banks of the Water of Leith, ‘ Ou ay, 
 bairns, I can weel remember Adam and 
 Eve skelpin’ aboot naket amang the gowans 
 on the braes there.’ He was kindly used 
 by Raeburn, and was given his old clothes. 
 As he was rather short, and Raeburn stood 
 six feet two, the tails of his coat nearly 
 reached the ground. 
 
 A younger daughter of John Wilson, Mrs. 
 Gordon, also described Raeburn in her 
 memoir of her father, who in 1820 set up 
 house at 20 Ann Street, ‘the culminating 
 point of the suburb of Stockbridge... 
 then quite out of town and still (1879) a 
 secluded place . . . The old mansion of St. 
 Bernard’s . . . offered its hospitality and 
 
94 Raeburn 
 
 kindly intercourse. No one can forget how, 
 in the circle of his own family, that dignified 
 old gentleman stood himself a very picture, 
 his fine intellectual countenance lighted 
 up by eyes most expressive, whose lambent 
 glow gave to his face that inward look of 
 soul he knew so well to impart to his own 
 unsurpassed portraits. Genius shed its 
 peculiar beauty over his aspect, yet memory 
 loves more than aught else the recollections 
 of the benevolent heart that lent to his 
 manner a grace of kindliness as sincere as it 
 was delightful.’ 
 
 In March 1822 Lord Montagu, in writing 
 to Scott, took occasion to remind him of his 
 old promise to sit to Raeburn for a portrait 
 of himself, to be hung at Bowhill, just before 
 the death of the fourth Duke of Buccleuch. 
 Sir Walter replied: ‘I think it will be as 
 well to let Duke Walter, when he feels his 
 own ground in the world, take his own taste 
 in the way of adorning his house. Two or 
 three years will make him an adequate 
 judge on such a subject, and if they will not 
 make me more beautiful, they have ak 
 chance of making me more picturesque. . . 
 If the portrait had been begun, that were 
 another matter ; as it is, the Duke, when he 
 is two or three. years older, shall command 
 my picture...’ Lord Montagu acquiesced 
 as to the portrait for Bowhill, but asked 
 Scott to sit without delay for a smaller 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 95 
 
 picture on his own behalf. Scott, in replying, 
 assured him of the pleasure with which he 
 would contribute the desired head to the 
 halls of Ditton, and promised to arrange 
 with Raeburn on returning to Edinburgh in 
 May. Allan was still in his mind, and he 
 added a remark to the effect that he was a 
 really rising historical painter, and he 
 “should be sorry to see him seduced into 
 the lucrative branch which carries off most 
 artists of that description.’ 
 
 This portrait, as well as two replicas, one 
 for his own gallery, was in due course painted 
 by Raeburn. Lockhart described it as ‘ the 
 very last work of MRaeburn’s pencil’: 
 perhaps one of these was the last he 
 completed. 
 
 In August there were very great happen- 
 ings in Edinburgh. George the Fourth, 
 although he did many things better left 
 undone, had a fine instinct for doing, and 
 did much that was wise and statesmanlike ; 
 and in this category we may class his visit 
 to Scotland in August 1822. No reigning 
 British monarch had set foot in the country 
 since the accession, more than a century 
 earlier, of the House of Hanover. The 
 visit was an excellent corrective for lingering 
 Jacobitism, warmed by traditions of ‘ Bonnie 
 Prince Charlie ’—his picturesque raid in 
 1745, and his romantic adventures after 
 Culloden. Edinburgh, with Sir Walter as 
 
 HR 
 
96 Raeburn 
 
 stage-manager, rose to the occasion and in- 
 dulged in a fortnight of exuberantly loyal 
 demonstration. Lockhart gives a good de- 
 scription of it, not neglecting mention of such 
 comical incidents as Sir Walter’s assumption 
 of Highland garb, his mishap with the 
 glass that the king drank from, the grotesque 
 appearance of Alderman Sir William Curtis 
 in a kilt, the untimely arrival of the parson 
 poet Crabbe on a visit to Sir Walter Scott, 
 and his attempt to talk to Highlanders in 
 French. What part, if any, Raeburn took 
 in the festivities is not recorded, except that 
 on the last day, 29th August, he attended by 
 command at Hopetoun House, about nine 
 miles west of the capital. The king, who 
 had his head-quarters at Dalkeith Palace, 
 made a ceremonial progress through Edin- 
 burgh to Queensferry, and thence to Hope- 
 toun House, where there was a _ great 
 assemblage of Scottish notables. Taking 
 the sword of Sir Alexander Hope he knighted 
 Adam Ferguson, Deputy Keeper of the 
 Regalia of Scotland, and Henry Raeburn. 
 He left at 2.45 for Port Edgar, where he 
 embarked on the royal yacht. 
 
 According to W. R. Andrew it was reported 
 that His Majesty was so struck with Rae- 
 burn’s fine person and dignified bearing, 
 that he said to Scott, who was in constant 
 attendance, he would have made Raeburn a 
 baronet could he have done so without 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 97 
 
 injustice to the memory of Reynolds. Andrew 
 said also that the king expressed a wish 
 to have his portrait painted by Raeburn, 
 which we may assume to be true, as in the 
 following May, Raeburn was appointed His 
 Majesty’s “ Limner and Painter in Scotland, 
 with all fees, profits, salaries, rights, privileges 
 and advantages thereto belonging.’ The 
 pleasure that this honour no doubt gave 
 Raeburn was the only advantage he enjoyed, 
 and the portrait was never painted.* 
 
 On the day after the happenings at Hope- 
 toun House there was a jovial dinner at 
 St. Bernard’s, at which the other new knight, 
 Wilkie, and a good many others were present, 
 and there was an abundance of jollity and 
 joking. Sir Henry’s health having been 
 drunk, he made ‘a very modest reply’: 
 Sir Adam, not feeling equal to rivalling him 
 as a speaker, when he had been toasted 
 offered a song instead, and gave ‘ The Laird 
 of Cockpen’ and ‘ The Turnemspike,’ with 
 much acceptance. Mrs. Raeburn, said 
 Wilkie, would on no account allow herself 
 to be called ‘My Lady ’—which seems odd, 
 as she had in her early days been the wife 
 of a so-called Count. A public dinner was 
 given to Raeburn on 5th October, at which 
 
 * An enterprising Edinburgh publisher, D. Hatton, 
 did his best to supply the deficiency by getting the 
 king’s head substituted for that of Dr. T. C. Hope on an 
 old mezzotint plate by T. Hodgetts. 
 
98 Raeburn 
 
 Alexander Nasmyth presided and proposed 
 the principal toast. 
 
 The painting of the portrait for Lord 
 Montagu apparently brought Sir Henry 
 more closely in touch with Sir Walter, al- 
 though they had probably been long 
 acquainted : indeed since Scott’s youth, if 
 the portraits of him as a boy in Highland 
 costume and as a young man be authentic: 
 I have not seen them, but they are apparently 
 accepted as genuine. Scott, soon after 
 Raeburn’s death, said to John Morrison : 
 “T never knew Raeburn, I may say, till 
 during his painting my last portrait.” 
 Scott’s impression that his was the last 
 portrait painted by Raeburn is probably 
 erroneous. 
 
 The account given by the venerable Dr. 
 Andrew Duncan of his last meeting with 
 Raeburn is probably credible, although the 
 ‘Tribute of Regard,’ in which it occurs, is 
 rich in blunders. ‘I was his opponent in 
 the last game at golf which he ever played. 
 On Saturday, the 7th of June, 1823, I called 
 at his painting-rooms, after concluding the 
 business I had allotted for the day. After 
 he had also finished his business we walked 
 together to Leith Links. There, removed 
 from the smoke of the city of Edinburgh, 
 we conjoined, with pleasing conversation, 
 a trial of skill at a salutary and interesting 
 exercise, to which we had both a strong 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 99 
 
 attachment.’ Thereafter they took ‘a 
 temperate meal’ in the company of friends 
 in the Golfers’ Hall ; where hung Sir Henry’s 
 portraits of John Gray, Esq., ‘a social 
 spirit,/ and James Balfour Esq., singing a 
 joyous song, ‘thought by many to be one 
 of the best he ever painted.’ A _ third 
 picture, of Mr. John Taylor of the Exchequer, 
 “one of the best golfers in Scotland,’ was 
 commissioned (Sir Henry knew how to 
 combine pleasure and business) and then, 
 “after partaking of a sober but social glass, 
 we returned to Edinburgh in the same 
 carriage, making plans for another such 
 meeting. 
 
 John Morrison met Miss Edgeworth (on a 
 visit to Scott), in York Place ‘in the paint- 
 ing gallery of Sir Henry Raeburn, who told 
 me there was an excursion projected to Fife, 
 to visit the castle of Ravensheugh, and may 
 be as far as St. Andrews.’ Scott wrote to 
 B. R. Haydon on the day after Raeburn’s 
 death: ‘this has been a severe season for 
 the arts: about a fortnight since I had a 
 very merry party through Fifeshire, with 
 our Chief Baron (Sergeant Sheppard) and 
 the Lord Chief Commissioner, and, above all, 
 Sir Henry Raeburn, our famous portrait 
 painter. No one could seem more healthy 
 than he was, or more active, and of an 
 athletic spare habit, that seemed made for 
 a very long life.’ 
 
I0o Raeburn 
 
 Morrison, continuing his story, says the 
 weather was hot; and Sir Henry, not 
 accustomed to long walking, and exposed, 
 although in summer, to the keen air of Fife, 
 had taken cold; Sir Walter observed that 
 he walked with his hat in his hand, Miss 
 Edgeworth having hold of his other arm. 
 On the day after his return to Edinburgh he 
 walked as usual to his gallery in York Place, 
 and proceeded to touch the portrait of a 
 Mrs. Dennistoun, but was unable to proceed. 
 He walked home, and with considerable 
 headache went to bed, from whence he 
 never arose. Morrison was some miles away 
 from Edinburgh when Raeburn was taken 
 ill, on his business as a surveyor, but having 
 occasion to return to have instruments 
 repaired, he heard of his friend’s illness, 
 and went down late in the day to St. 
 Bernard’s. ‘The servants told me that 
 every hope of his recovery was over, that 
 he was lying motionless on his bed, and the 
 family had retired. I mentioned to the 
 servant who was in waiting and used to 
 arrange his palette, that I wished much to 
 have a last look, to which he readily agreed. 
 It was about twenty-four hours before his 
 death; he was lying motionless, with his 
 eyes shut, but not asleep. I touched softly 
 the hand that was lying across his breast, 
 the hand which had been so often stretched 
 out to welcome me.’ 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 01 
 
 The cause of Sir Henry’s sudden, unex- 
 pected death is not stated, and is beyond 
 diagnosis by a layman. Duncan, although 
 a physician, only says, ‘ Sir Henry returned 
 in bad health; and the aid of his medical 
 friends to resist the progress of his disease 
 was of no avail. It proved fatal in a few 
 days.’ Morrison tells us that ‘prior to 
 this excursion with Miss Edgeworth Sir 
 Henry had symptoms of falling off.’ ‘I 
 sometimes,’ he had previously said, ‘lose 
 sight of the picture and stand still in a kind 
 of dream; while the picture changes its 
 aspect, and sometimes looks to be composed 
 of many figures. A few days ago one of my 
 teeth fell out ; it was fresh and good, and 
 gave me no pain. To-day the same thing 
 happened, the tooth was one of my best. 
 It came out, or rather fell out, without giving 
 me any pain ; and no blood followed.’ On 
 my mentioning this to Dr. Saunders, who 
 attended him at his death, ‘I wish,’ said 
 the Doctor, ‘that I had known of these 
 symptoms sooner.’ One may easily 
 imagine the look of sagacity with which 
 this was uttered. It has to be remembered 
 that Raeburn’s parents were both short- 
 lived, and that his brother died at about 
 the same age as the painter. 
 
 Sir Henry was buried, not in his burying- 
 ground at the parish church of St. Cuthbert’s, 
 but at the adjoining new Bishop Sandford’s 
 
I02 Raeburn 
 
 Chapel (Scottish Episcopal), now known as 
 St. John’s Church, in the enclosed ‘ dormi- 
 tory’ at the east end. No memorial was 
 erected until many years after, when a 
 tablet was placed on the wall anonymously, 
 I believe by the late J. Irvine Smith. Lady 
 Raeburn, although nearly eighty years of 
 age at the time of her husband’s death, is 
 said to have survived him for ten years. 
 Henry Raeburn the younger continued at 
 St. Bernard’s until 1826, after which he re- 
 moved to No. 19 St. Bernard’s Crescent. 
 Eventually he bought the estate of Charles- 
 field, Midlothian,“ a snug old house near 
 Midcalder,’’ where he and his family continued 
 formany years. Dr. John Brown’s account of 
 the place is extremely interesting. Henry had 
 a family of eight children. One daughter died 
 in childhood, but threesons and four daughters 
 survived their parents. The sons all died 
 without issue. The eldest surviving daughter 
 married Sir William Andrew, and their son, 
 W. R. Andrew, M.A., Oxon., Barrister at 
 law, was author of a biography of his great- 
 grandfather. John Peter Raeburn, of 
 Charlesfield, who lent a number of pictures 
 to the R.S.A. in 1863, was presumably a son 
 of Henry, and brother of L. W. Raeburn, 
 mentioned by Dr. John Brown in 1874, and 
 of Miss Charlotte Raeburn of Edinburgh, 
 who was lender to the exhibition in 1881 of 
 D. G. Steell’s Pepper, a favourite terrier. 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 103 
 
 This granddaughter of Raeburn I distinctly 
 remember a few years before that date: a 
 dashing, handsome, fashionably appointed 
 dame of middle age, remarkable for her fine 
 pink and white complexion and dazzlingly 
 bright and beautiful large dark eyes, an 
 inheritance from her grandfather, which at 
 the time reminded me of Scott’s description 
 of the eyes of Robert Burns. She was 
 generally attended by ‘Pepper’ or some- 
 thing else of that sort. She is said to have 
 been the last Raeburn, and so far as I know 
 and have been able to ascertain, there is 
 now no living descendant of Sir Henry. 
 The unfinished pictures left in Raeburn’s 
 painting room were so numerous, according 
 to Dr. Andrew Duncan, that it would take 
 three or four years for them to be completed 
 by John Syme (afterwards R.S.A.), who had 
 been employed for the purpose. Syme was 
 probably a pupil and assistant, and from 
 this and other indications we may reasonably 
 infer that although Raeburn did not carry 
 the practice as far as Ramsay, Reynolds, 
 and other contemporaries, he did have 
 assistance in the production of his portraits, 
 especially towards the end of his life, when 
 he was overwhelmed with business. In this 
 way the inferiority of some of his works may 
 best be accounted for. In 1834 Syme showed 
 at the R.S.A. Exhibition an equestrian 
 portrait of Henry Raeburn of St. Bernards ; 
 
104 Raeburn 
 
 the horse painted by the late Sir Henry 
 Raeburn. 
 
 According to an article in the European 
 Magazine for November 1823 Raeburn’s 
 practice was reported to have been worth 
 about £3,000 a year, and there was a proposal 
 that Thomas Phillips, R.A., should go to 
 Edinburgh to take his place. That artist 
 and his wife actually went there to look into 
 the matter, but nothing resulted. 
 
 David Wilkie succeeded to Raeburn’s 
 Royal appointment. Soon after the latter’s 
 death he was gazetted as Historical Painter 
 to His Majesty for Scotland, wee Sir H. 
 Raeburn deceased. 
 
 In April 1824 there was an exhibition of 
 57 portraits by Raeburn in his Gallery, 32 
 York Place. From the sixpenny Catalogue 
 it is interesting to learn that the charges for 
 admission were two shillings in the daytime, 
 and three shillings in the evening: the 
 increased price then being no doubt due to 
 the fact that ‘the Gallery is brilliantly 
 lighted up with Oil Gas.’ A season ticket 
 admitting at any time cost seven shillings. 
 In 1863, forty pictures by Raeburn were 
 included in an exhibition at the R.S.A., and 
 in 1876 the great Raeburn Exhibition, 
 privately organised, was held there. There 
 were 325. exhibits, Its was; 1. believe, 
 organised in order to help Raeburn’s descen- 
 dants to sell some of the pictures in their 
 
Some Contemporary Estimates 105 
 
 possession. The result was not in that 
 respect very satisfactory, and at a sale in 
 London a year later, a number of pictures 
 brought small prices. Gradually it was 
 borne in upon the dealers that Raeburn was 
 worthy their attention—James Orrock is 
 said to have been instrumental in opening 
 their eyes—and during the present century 
 fine examples of the master have commanded 
 great prices. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 INFLUENCE ON CONTEMPORARIES AND 
 SUCCESSORS. 
 
 AEBURN has been styled the Reynolds 
 R of Scotland: it might be claimed for 
 him that he was something more ; 
 for, while the English master had at least 
 one rival of equal, perhaps greater, genius 
 in Gainsborough, the Scot enjoyed an undi- 
 vided supremacy. Reynolds was a potent 
 influence in his own time and afterwards, 
 but so was Gainsborough ; and one of the 
 most brilliant of their immediate successors, 
 John Hoppner, certainly looked to the latter 
 as a model. The Book of Beauty style of 
 portrait that Lawrence evolved eventually 
 became the dominant type for a considerable 
 time, in fact until the Pre-Raphaelite upheaval 
 came to correct the vice of trivial pretty- 
 prettiness that had corroded the English 
 school during the darkness of the early 
 Victorian period. 
 
 Raeburn encountered no rivalry in his 
 lifetime more serious than that of George 
 Watson, a second-rate follower of Reynolds ; 
 and he lived to see growing up around him 
 
 106 
 
National Gallery 
 
 -COL. BRYCE MCMURDO 
 
 SIR HENRY RAEBURN 
 
 face p. 106) 
 
 
 

 
Influence on Contemporaries 107 
 
 younger painters like Sir John Watson 
 Gordon, Andrew Geddes, Colvin Smith, 
 Samuel Mackenzie, John Syme, and William 
 Yellowlees (nicknamed the little Raeburn), 
 all strongly influenced by him. Subse- 
 quently to his death that influence is obvious 
 in the portraiture generally of later men like 
 Sir George Reid and John Pettie, and at the 
 present time, Mr. Fiddes Watt. No equal 
 to him in portraiture ever appeared, even 
 among the distinguished Scott Lauder group, 
 or the men of that Glasgow school which 
 brought valuable new impulses into our 
 Northern painting. Raeburn did not, for a 
 long time, have much influence on any 
 English painters, for the sufficient reason 
 that they knew nothing about him. Even 
 so late as 1866 we find those well-informed 
 writers, the Redgraves, bracketing him with 
 the followers of Lawrence, frankly adding 
 to their futile estimate of his art that in 
 forming it they laboured under the difficulty 
 of having little opportunity of seeing his 
 works. ‘Those possessed by the National 
 Gallery of Scotland,’ they continued, ‘do 
 not impress us with so high an opinion of 
 Raeburn’s merits as his reputation among 
 his brother artists wouldimply . . . it may 
 fairly be assumed that he owed part of the 
 reputation which he enjoyed to his somewhat 
 isolated position as the head of his profession 
 in Scotland, and might not have been able 
 
108 Raeburn 
 
 to sustain it to the full, had he removed to 
 London.’ 
 
 In England generally, and even among 
 portrait painters and other artists, it was 
 my experience that, up toa couple of decades 
 later than this pronouncement, Raeburn was 
 either entirely unknown, or else regarded as 
 of little account. Now that he is coming at 
 last into his own it may well be that he will 
 become a greater influence in English art 
 than either Reynolds or Gainsborough. 
 
 It has been usual to write of Raeburn as a 
 phenomenon: an ignoramus who became 
 a great painter without climbing to excellence 
 up the usual ladder. This may be regarded 
 as due less to the facts of the case than to 
 our ignorance of them. We know a little 
 more about those relative to Reynolds and 
 Gainsborough, and on examining their 
 record we find nothing in the way of external 
 influence to account for their excellence, 
 which was due to innate genius just as much 
 with them as with Raeburn. Reynolds 
 spent a couple of years in the studio of 
 Thomas Hudson, and he also derived some, 
 perhaps more, benefit from William Gandy. 
 After that, such teaching as he had was from 
 the old masters of Italy and the Nether- 
 lands. Gainsborough no doubt picked up 
 much useful knowledge during his early 
 years (1741-1746) in London, but from the 
 little we know about him during that period 
 
Influence on Contemporaries 109g 
 
 it is a safe inference that he was not a regular 
 student or apprentice under any master, but 
 rather a struggling young craftsman, who 
 arrived at painting by way of drawing and 
 engraving: first with a silversmith, then 
 with illustrators like Gravelot, Hayman, and 
 Grignon. After Gainsborough married and 
 left London in his twentieth year for Ipswich, 
 he had practically no association with other 
 painters for more than a dozen years. Joshua 
 Kirby, the sole exception, is negligible as an 
 influence, and so is Lieutenant-Governor 
 Thicknesse, though he took credit to himself 
 for setting Gainsborough on the right path. 
 After going to Bath about 1759 Gainsborough 
 made good use of the opportunities it afforded 
 of seeing and studying old masters, especially 
 Vandyck. 
 
 Raeburn’s growth to great excellence as a 
 painter does not seem to have been more 
 accidental than that of his two most dis- 
 tinguished contemporaries. There is no 
 evidence in his case such as there was in 
 theirs of a determined passion even in child- 
 hood for art, but at school he showed unusual 
 cleverness in drawing, and earned prizes for 
 ‘writing.’ That the classes of the ‘ Trustees’ 
 Academy ’ were actually held in the building 
 where he lived and was taught, is a fact to 
 be remembered. The selection for him of a 
 jeweller as master when the time came for 
 him to be apprenticed presupposes his having 
 
ILO Raeburn 
 
 shown some artistic capacity: just as the 
 boy Gainsborough was sent by his father 
 to a London silversmith as a first step in an 
 art career. 
 
 Either before or early in his apprenticeship 
 Raeburn began to paint miniatures, and this 
 having been noticed by his master and by 
 David Deuchar, the latter undertook to give 
 him lessons. Deuchar was quite capable of 
 teaching him a good deal, and some two 
 years later he, or Gilliland, brought Raeburn 
 under the notice of David Martin, who gave 
 him pictures to copy, and helped him suffi- 
 ciently to earn a grateful acknowledgment 
 by Raeburn in after-life. It is a reasonable 
 inference, and probable, that Martin 
 employed Raeburn, as Allan Ramsay had 
 employed him, and as was the common 
 usage of the period, to work as a journeyman 
 in his studio. Those portraits by Raeburn 
 which we know to be or find reason to class 
 as early productions have qualities in 
 common with the few pictures by Martin 
 that are to be found in public galleries, 
 which, although they do not fully represent 
 his range, suffice to show that he was a 
 sound, capable portraitist in the Ramsay 
 manner, though they are much drier in 
 quality, and otherwise inferior to the work 
 of his master. We have to bear in mind that 
 Martin must have had considerable merit 
 if the story be true that Ramsay, when in 
 
Influence on Contemporaries III 
 
 Rome, sent for him to come there and bring 
 his ‘drawings’ in order that he might 
 exhibit them to confound the pretensions of 
 the Italian artists. So few of Martin’s 
 pictures are available as material for study, 
 that we may be rating him as unjustly as 
 the Redgraves rated Raeburn ; and for the 
 same reason. He may have been the author 
 of accepted Raeburns: I have been told by 
 a connoisseur that on one or more such he 
 had detected Martin’s signature. 
 
 After the eventful rupture with Martin, 
 (the date of which we do not know and so 
 are not able to measure the duration or 
 importance of the connection) Raeburn went 
 to Rome, and there spent a matter of two 
 years, in emulation of Sir Joshua’s example : 
 an advantage which Gainsborough did not 
 enjoy. 
 
 A brief summary of what is known about 
 the state of pictorial art in Scotland up to 
 the time when Raeburn emerged will suffice 
 to show under what conditions he became a 
 painter. In George Jamesone (1587 ?- 
 1644), Scotland produced a capable portrait 
 painter rather earlier than England; but 
 it should be remembered that William 
 Dobson (1610-1646) was a contemporary. 
 They both derived from the Flemish school ; 
 Jamesone is said to have been a pupil of 
 Rubens, and Dobson was an assistant to 
 Vandyck. After Jamesone’s day Scotland 
 
 IR 
 
II2 Raeburn 
 
 was never without painters, mainly of 
 portraits, although national poverty and 
 Calvinistic prejudice were both unfavourable 
 to the encouragement of pictorial art, which 
 seems to be expressly prohibited in the 
 second commandment of the Mosaic 
 decalogue. 
 
 The principal men between the time of 
 Jamesone and the advent of Raeburn were 
 the Scougalls and Sir John Medina: the 
 latter a foreigner who found it worth his 
 while to settle in Edinburgh. There is 
 significance in the fact that as early as 1729 
 a ‘School of St. Luke’ was established in 
 Edinburgh for the encouragement and 
 teaching of the fine arts. Its President was 
 George Marshall, a pupil of Scougall, and on 
 the original list of members we find Roderick 
 Chalmers, portrait painter (the Secretary), 
 William Adam, architect (father of the 
 famous Adam brothers), Allan Ramsay, 
 John Alexander, portrait painter (a 
 descendant of Jamesone), and the Nories. 
 
 Although this School ceased sooner or 
 later to exist, the intellectual movement of 
 which it was a manifestation continued, 
 resulting in the formation in 1760 of that 
 ‘Trustees’ Academy’ which endured for a 
 century and a half, and in the present 
 century was merged in the new Edinburgh 
 College of Art. 
 
 Allan Ramsay, ‘the most sensible man 
 
Influence on Contemporaries 113 
 
 of all living artists,’ who was only sixteen 
 years old when the School of St. Luke was 
 established, lived and practised his art in 
 Edinburgh until about 1756 (the year of 
 Raeburn’s birth), with the exception of an 
 early visit to London, two years or so (1736- 
 1738) spent in Italy, and a second, shorter 
 visit. Mr. Caw is of opinion that ‘ most of 
 his best work was done during the eighteen 
 years he remained in Scotland’ (after his 
 return from Italy). 
 
 On the art and artists of Edinburgh 
 Ramsay’s influence as the leading portrait 
 painter there until his middle age must have 
 been very potent. It was strengthened as a 
 factor in Raeburn’s development by the 
 return in 1775 to Edinburgh of David Martin, 
 Ramsay’s pupil and assistant. The ill- 
 founded conjecture of Redgrave was that 
 “no doubt, Raeburn in some degree founded 
 his art upon that of Reynolds, though... 
 we suspect that he studied Reynolds through 
 the fine mezzotints of McArdell and others, 
 rather than direct from his paintings.’ It 
 is much more probable that he was influenced 
 by the paintings of Allan Ramsay, of which 
 there were many in Edinburgh, and which 
 Martin would almost certainly recommend 
 to him as models. 
 
 Alexander Nasmyth was another pupil of 
 Ramsay who was in practice in Edinburgh 
 as a portrait painter from about 1778, and 
 
I14 Raeburn 
 
 painted, as well as he could, in the manner of 
 his master. He seems to have been 
 Raeburn’s closest professional friend. He 
 spent two years (1782-1784) studying in 
 Italy, and it is very likely that his report to 
 Raeburn when he returned was the prime 
 cause of the latter’s visit to that country 
 in 1785. 
 
 As regards Raeburn’s early miniature 
 work, of which we know so little, there were 
 some very fair practitioners in Edinburgh 
 at the time : among them Deuchar’s friend, 
 John Brown ; but his long absence in Italy 
 (civca 1770-1781) tends to exclude him as a 
 direct influence. 
 
 There is nothing beyond what has already 
 been mentioned to show what intercourse 
 Raeburn had with other artists in Edinburgh. 
 Farington, in 1801, said that: ‘ Raeburn 
 and Nasmith do not associate much with 
 the other artists, and hold themselves very 
 high. Raeburn scarcely indeed with any of 
 the profession.’ This, however, is, I think, 
 discounted by Haydon’s lively picture of 
 a convivial evening at the house of Andrew 
 Geddes which I have quoted. We know 
 also that Raeburn was a prime mover in 
 the efforts by the artists which resulted after 
 his death in the formation of the Scottish 
 Academy, and that the exhibitions of the 
 Associated Artists, with the exception of 
 the first in 1808, (when his affairs were 
 
Influence on Contemporaries II5 
 
 disordered) were in his gallery. He may 
 have ‘held himself very high’ as regards 
 friendly association, (perhaps he had not 
 unbent sufficiently to please his English 
 visitor) but clearly he was, up to the end of 
 his life, keenly alive to the well-being of his 
 fellow artists, and desirous of doing all in 
 his power to advance their interests. 
 Nasmyth, two years his junior, we know 
 to have been a friend of long standing, which 
 makes it, at first blush, seem the more 
 remarkable that Raeburn should never have 
 met Robert Burns, who was one of Nasmyth’s 
 cronies : that is if he did not meet him, as to 
 which we have only negative evidence. It 
 should be borne in mind, however, that 
 probably Raeburn was not in Edinburgh at 
 all during the poet’s first visit, which ended 
 on the 5th May, 1787. Raeburn returned 
 from Italy some time in the course of that 
 year. Burns came again to Edinburgh in 
 September, and remained for some months— 
 he was back in Mauchline in February or 
 March 1788—but during this second stay 
 he was for a considerable time laid up with 
 a broken leg. He made several excursions, 
 and he was also much occupied by his 
 sentimental adventure with Clarinda. Rae- 
 burn was, we may assume, pretty fully 
 occupied after his recent return from Italy, 
 establishing himself in a studio, picking up 
 the threads of his activities and interests, 
 
r16 Raeburn 
 
 professional and social; feeling acutely the 
 need to repair his finances after a costly two 
 years of travel and study: not at all in the 
 mood for unremunerative portraiture, how- 
 ever interesting the subject. The portrait 
 of Burns required for the Edinburgh edition 
 of his poems had been painted by Nasmyth 
 during the first visit, so there was no business 
 reason for painting another ; and as a matter 
 of etiquette it would have been sailing pretty 
 close to the wind to ask Nasmyth’s friend 
 to sit to him, so soon after Nasmyth had 
 painted him. 
 
 There is no evidence that Raeburn was 
 sensitive to beauty in poetry: his bias was 
 towards mechanical and scientific subjects, 
 and it probably never had entered his head, 
 even if he met Burns, that he was more than 
 an ephemeral wonder, made a fuss of for a 
 short time before being relegated to oblivion ; 
 indeed already on his way there, for the 
 furore of admiration he experienced from 
 notable people on his first visit was by no 
 means repeated during the second. 
 
 There are several reputed portraits of 
 Burns by Raeburn, but only one has half- 
 persuaded me to believe in it, and if it 
 represents the poet it must have been painted 
 before the first visit to Edinburgh, judging 
 by the apparent age. It is of the period, 
 it is on twilled canvas, it looks like a poet, 
 and it is a skilful piece of work, much in the 
 
Influence on Contemporaries 117 
 
 Raeburn manner ; but it does not specially 
 concern us here. The fact that Raeburn 
 in 1803 made a copy of the Nasmyth portrait 
 for Cadell & Davies proves nothing either 
 way. The Nasmyth portrait was the known 
 one, these publishers wanted a copy of it, 
 they commissioned Raeburn, with whom 
 they had other dealings, to make it, and, 
 with accustomed business promptitude, he 
 did so. It seems odd that they did not 
 apply to Nasmyth, but we have to remember 
 that he had by this time given up portrait 
 painting in favour of landscape. 
 
 Nasmyth, then, was a friend of Raeburn : 
 he was also a very near neighbour, for he 
 built himself a house and studio at 47 York 
 Place, from his own designs. Probably he 
 also was the architect of Raeburn’s studio 
 opposite, at No. 32, and he may have been 
 connected with his friend’s building ventures 
 at Stockbridge, for he was not only a painter 
 but an architect of considerable skill. The 
 beautiful little classic temple at St. Bernard’s 
 Well was designed by Nasmyth, and he is 
 said also to have taken a leading part in 
 designing the famous Dean Bridge. These 
 structures are both on the Water of Leith 
 near the house in which Raeburn lived, who 
 was concerned in the erection of the temple 
 over the mineral well, for he and his brother 
 were signatories to the feu contract for the 
 site. Even more than Raeburn, Nasmyth 
 
18 Raeburn 
 
 was one of the poterit influences that brought 
 about in Edinburgh during the last quarter 
 of the eighteenth century a remarkable 
 increase in the number of good artists, and 
 a public interest in the fine arts. His 
 versatile genius included great skill in 
 mechanics and engineering, which quality 
 found fuller expression in the achievement 
 of his famous son James, inventor of the 
 steam hammer. This characteristic would 
 be a great attraction to Raeburn, who 
 seems to have dabbled in the same way. 
 There were other portrait painters in 
 Raeburn’s early days, now little more than 
 names : among them George Willison (1741- 
 1797), Alexander Reid (1747-1823) and John 
 Thomas Seaton, a very vague figure : son it 
 is said of Christopher Seaton, a gem engraver 
 in London, an exhibitor, chiefly of portraits, 
 in London from 1761 to 1777. In 1772 and 
 1774 the exhibition catalogues gave the ad- 
 dress of John Thomas Seaton as Edinburgh ; 
 in1777,as East Indies. According to Bryan’s 
 Dictionary of Painters he returned to 
 Edinburgh, practised there successfully, and 
 was still living in 1806. His name suggests 
 a Scottish origin. Alexander Runciman has 
 already been mentioned; Raeburn would 
 almost certainly know him well, even if he 
 did not attend the Trustees’ Academy. 
 Mr. Caw says: ‘ Raeburn is said to have 
 taken his tone of colour from Runciman’s 
 
Influence on Contemporaries 119 
 
 portraits.’ As the latter was much pat- 
 ronised by Sir John Clerk, contact between 
 the two painters was almost inevitable. 
 Another contemporary Raeburn knew well 
 was Archibald Skirving (1749-1819), who 
 executed excellent portraits in crayon. 
 Raeburn painted a portrait of him for his 
 own gallery. He also painted the land- 
 scapist, the Rev. John Thomson, with whom 
 he became intimate after the latter was 
 appointed Minister of Duddingston, near 
 Edinburgh, in 1805. Did Raeburn meet 
 Turner? There is no record of a meeting, 
 but it is probable that they came together 
 when Turner paid his second visit to 
 Edinburgh, in 1818, and was Thomson’s 
 guest. 
 
 While it is clear that Raeburn knew his 
 brother artists in Edinburgh and never 
 failed in his duty as the recognised head 
 of the profession, it seems equally certain 
 that, with a few exceptions, he found his 
 intimate friends in other walks of life. 
 Nasmyth was an exception, so were Thomson, 
 and ‘ Grecian ’ Williams, a landscape painter 
 of some power; and his generous friendliness 
 to younger men is illustrated by incidents 
 that have been mentioned relative to David 
 Roberts, Andrew Robertson, and John 
 Watson Gordon. 
 
 The Royal Scottish Academy preserves 
 several relics of Sir Henry, such as his 
 
120 Raeburn 
 
 mahogany sitter’s chair, upholstered in 
 dark red plush, his palette, the toddy ladle 
 he is said to have made, his brass door- 
 plate, and a light easel he gave to Edward 
 Mitchell, an engraver. This last item illus- 
 trates the painter’s ready, friendly help to 
 other artists in practical matters, of which 
 another instance is given by John Morrison 
 in the Reminiscence from which I have 
 already quoted: ‘When you are in Edin- 
 burgh,’ he had said, ‘take your lodgings 
 near York Place, and Robert will bring you 
 up a palette and canvas at any time; or, 
 having little else to do, he will grind you a 
 set of colours; and any query you think 
 necessary to put shall be readily answered. 
 But indeed, a word goes in at one ear and 
 out at the other ; so, if you will write down 
 your query, I will write the answer under it.’ 
 Morrison, acting on this suggestion, provided 
 a book for his queries and Sir Henry’s 
 answers. These reached the number of 
 thirty-six. Sir Walter Scott asked Morrison 
 to let him see the book, and, after reading 
 its contents, said: ‘this will, some day, be 
 worth a hundred pounds.’ Undoubtedly 
 it would to-day have a considerable com- 
 mercial value, and to the student its contents 
 would be of intense interest as furnishing a 
 better knowledge of Raeburn’s practical 
 methods and ideas. Where is it now? 
 Raeburn’s life, and the history of his 
 
Influence on Contemporaries Tar 
 
 development as a painter, have been so 
 successfully obscured by his earlier bio- 
 graphers that it is exceptionally difficult to 
 arrive at a satisfactory estimate of the man 
 and his attitude towards life and art. He 
 has left ample evidence that he possessed 
 genius of very rare quality, but none what- 
 ever that he had a due enthusiasm for his 
 profession, or any interest in it beyond its 
 value as a means of making money. The 
 contrast between Raeburn and Reynolds 
 and Gainsborough in this respect is remark- 
 able. Raeburn painted portraits when 
 people wanted, and were prepared to pay for 
 them; but he never, so far as we know, 
 attempted anything in any other branch of 
 art, except that he is said to have dabbled in 
 modelling during his stay at Rome. A 
 Tassie medallion portrait of him is supposed 
 to be his work. His backgrounds tell us 
 that he had a keen perception of. the beautiful 
 in landscape, and even suggest that he might 
 have rivalled Gainsborough in this direction, 
 but there is no record of the existence of a 
 single landscape picture, study, or sketch by 
 him. He could draw and compose as well 
 as the Englishmen whenever he chose, and 
 his management of lighting and grouping 
 was admirable ; he had science sufficient to 
 justify him in trying his hand at imaginative 
 work, even ‘history painting,’ beloved of 
 Sir Joshua, but no attempt was made. 
 
122 Raeburn 
 
 Daily, more or less, he set out with the 
 mechanical punctuality of a banker’s clerk 
 for his studio, did his work there regularly 
 and well like an honest craftsman, till the 
 clock marked the time for ‘ down tools’ ; 
 then he went home again and found his 
 recreation in domestic joys or other pursuits 
 more or less inartistic. It looks as if Rae- 
 burn was that very unusual phenomenon— 
 a man possessed of the rarest artistic gifts 
 and at the same time indifferent to them: 
 interested chiefly in the purposes, thoughts, 
 and pursuits of ordinary people. 
 
 Some explanation may perhaps be found 
 in the conditions of his early years. A child- 
 hood in the home of a yarn-boiler was 
 succeeded by a boyhood in a charitable 
 school, where the excellent educational 
 ideal was to turn out youths ready to become 
 industrious apprentices, and_ thereafter 
 worthy tradesman citizens. The desired 
 results were probably obtained with a better 
 average of success than could be claimed 
 for any present-day Board School. Young 
 Raeburn, all ignorant of his special endow- 
 ment, took to miniature making as a business 
 proposition in aseemly tradesman-like spirit ; 
 then, developing from that branch of por- 
 traiture, he began to paint full-size portraits 
 in oil, and to see his way clear to a more 
 immediately profitable way of life than that 
 of being a jeweller’s assistant, with no 
 
Influence on Contemporaries 123 
 
 capital or influential friends to enable him 
 to set up for himself in a trade, for which, 
 more than most, money is requisite. 
 
 At this stage there came into his life a 
 handsome and well-to-do widow, with three 
 children, and by twelve years his senior. 
 The advantage to a struggling young man 
 of taking such a woman as his wife is obvious : 
 far more obvious than the truth of the story 
 with which Cunningham laboured to make 
 it seem the result of an overmastering attack 
 of love at first sight. In such cases it is the 
 woman who marries the man. 
 
 That Mrs. Ann Edgar or Leslie was an 
 estimable woman and an excellent wife to 
 Henry Raeburn need not be doubted. It 
 seems a sure inference, however, that by 
 his marriage with her the young painter 
 deliberately, though perhaps unwittingly, 
 altered the course of his life ; adopting from 
 her and her surroundings a wholly different 
 outlook as regards his future. From being 
 an unattached and struggling member of 
 the trading class he was at once raised on 
 approbation into that prouder social rank 
 of the gentry who were landowners, and 
 marked their superiority by tacking a 
 territorial appendix to their names. James 
 Leslie of Deanhaugh had married Ann, the 
 daughter of Peter Edgar of Bridgelands. 
 The ‘of’ in eighteenth-century Edinburgh 
 was equivalent to the German ‘ von,’ without 
 
124 Raeburn 
 
 which you are in Berlin more or less an 
 ‘untouchable.’ 
 
 James Leslie’s widow yielded sufficiently 
 to her good judgment in choosing Henry 
 Raeburn for her husband, but it was not to 
 be expected that she would descend to his 
 station in life: the alternative was to raise 
 him to hers. It has to be added that she 
 did so successfully. Henry Raeburn of 
 Deanhaugh, and afterwards of St. Bernard’s, 
 was not only a handsome, accomplished, 
 and charming person, but he filled his part 
 with dignity and became wholly acceptable, 
 not only to the best intellectual society of 
 Edinburgh, but even to the ‘ ofs ’ into whose 
 sacred circle he had intruded. To any one 
 who knows what the exclusiveness of coteries 
 was, even in the relatively lax days of Queen 
 Victoria, in that ‘east-windy, west-endy 
 city,’ it is a surprising thing that Raeburn 
 succeeded so thoroughly, and a proof that 
 he had very unusual genius as well as power 
 of fascination. 
 
 The ‘ ofs ’ not only accepted him, but they 
 gave him of their substance, as one may 
 easily see by looking over a list of his 
 portraits. Necessarily Raeburn had to give 
 something in exchange for the advantages 
 he enjoyed: he gave up the life of the 
 normal artist, with its hopes, fears, vicissi- 
 tudes, and aspirations; lived comfortably 
 under matriarchal rule, and cultivated 
 
Influence on Contemporaries 125 
 
 genteel society ; pursued his profession, but 
 as a business, not as the outlet of a fervent 
 passion to express himself in the creation of 
 beautiful art. Under such conditions it was 
 only his exceptional genius that kept him 
 from degenerating into a mediocrity. It is 
 only fair to add it is arguable that to a man 
 of his placid, evenly balanced, happy tem- 
 perament, rare in artists, the absence of the 
 goading incentive of necessity may have 
 been a favourable influence : this is possible, 
 but improbable. 
 
 The great surplus of mental energy which 
 might have been expended by Raeburn in 
 trying to climb still higher in art, was worked 
 off by him in various directions, notably in 
 his extensive building projects, which he 
 dreamed would enable him to attain to 
 immortality as the creator of Raeburnville ; 
 an enterprise which seems to have kept him 
 busy in various ways, especially in litigation 
 with speculative builders and other trouble- 
 some people of that sort. He is said to have 
 had a pretty taste for the law. The healthy 
 man’s need for muscular toil was worked off 
 by Raeburn on the golf-links, the archery 
 ground, and in country excursions; and 
 these recreations were not without result in 
 the way of occasional commissions. Quasi- 
 scientific hobbies interested him: the 
 eighteenth century being devoid of the joys 
 of listening-in, gramophones, and cross-word 
 
126 Raeburn 
 
 puzzles, had to sharpen its intellect on such 
 problems as the perpetual motion and 
 squaring the circle. On the whole, Raeburn 
 undoubtedly had an exceptionally conifort- 
 able life, with only one disastrous break, 
 when, as a result of taking risks in order to 
 get rich quicker, he lost all that he had 
 accumulated, and became bankrupt. A 
 remarkable thing about that episode is that 
 although in 1808 he bewailed to a friend 
 that he had lost everything (nearly £17,000), 
 he was able in 1809 to buy St. Bernard’s. 
 In accumulating money Raeburn’s chief 
 object was probably one appropriate to the 
 ideas of the class into which he had entered 
 by way of marriage: to found a family 
 which could take its place among the ‘ ofs.’ 
 Any hope he may have had of a continuation 
 of his genius in a son were defeated by the 
 death of Peter, of whom, according to Dr. 
 John Brown, ‘ his father used to say that if 
 he had lived he would have far surpassed him.’ 
 Henry showed no trace of artistic bias, 
 and his venture as a merchant disclosed no 
 genius in that direction. Either with money 
 in land or the funds, however, the young 
 man was capable of gracing society as a 
 gentleman, so an endowment had to be 
 provided. Henry dutifully accepted this 
 feather-bed conception of his destiny ; and, 
 after his father’s death, was a creditable 
 Raeburn of St. Bernard’s until, on acquiring 
 
Influence on Contemporaries 127 
 
 a property in the country, he became Rae- 
 burn of Charlesfield and a Justice of the 
 Peace for the County: an undistinguished 
 but doubtless useful member of the com- 
 munity. He was thoroughly imbued with 
 his mother’s class ideas, and it was probably 
 with him that the story about descent from 
 Border Raeburns originated, or at any rate 
 began to be believed in as fact: Sir Henry, 
 knowing about Scott of Raeburn, Sir Walter’s 
 relative, may have joked on the subject. 
 There is no evidence, however, that he made 
 any claim to armorial bearings, and the 
 contrary is proved by the grant of arms to 
 his son in 1841. 
 
 Allan Cunningham naturally went to this 
 son for help in preparing his Life of Sir 
 Henry, and from him received a good deal 
 of the material which he worked up with 
 the facility of a ready writer who lacked any 
 instinct for careful sifting of fact from fiction. 
 Hence the wealth of misinformation about 
 Raeburn which is now so difficult to cope 
 with. W. R. Andrew, half a century later, 
 showing no genius, though a barrister, for 
 weighing evidence, did little more than copy 
 Cunningham. Following him, Sir Walter 
 Armstrong, though a better writer and a 
 competent art critic, accepted too readily 
 some of the established errors. Later, Mr. 
 James L. Caw and Mr. James Greig have 
 worked in a more critical spirit, and made 
 
 KR 
 
128 Raeburn 
 
 valuable amendments and additions; and 
 a tribute of praise is due also to the labours 
 of Mr. Edward Pinnington, whose account of 
 the painter is sympathetic, understanding, 
 and charmingly written. The definitive Life 
 of Raeburn is, however, still to come. The 
 writer of it will, I hope, find some help in 
 the present narrative, which embodies a 
 good deal of new material; in providing 
 which I have preferred research to imagina- 
 tion, even at the risk that Raeburn’s friend, 
 Sir Walter Scott, was thinking of when he 
 wrote in his Journal: ‘ Better a superficial 
 book, which brings well and _ strikingly 
 together the known and acknowledged facts, 
 than a dull, boring narrative, pausing to see 
 further into a millstone at every moment 
 than the nature of the millstone admits.’ 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 THE QUALITY OF THE ARTIST. 
 
 N attempt to trace the growth of 
 A Raeburn’s powers as a painter is at 
 the outset defeated by the scarcity of 
 evidence as to the dates of his works. It 
 seems probable that he kept a record of his 
 commissions, but that it has disappeared. 
 John Dickie, W.S., who was his legal adviser, 
 died in 1839, and it does not seem possible to 
 trace what became of the documents which 
 were entrusted to him or his brother, H. D. 
 Dickie, Secretary of the Caledonian Insurance 
 Company. We find the latter, writing on 
 the 3rd October, 1823, to the Earl of Hard- 
 wicke: “Mr. Raeburn has put into my 
 hands the books of the late Sir Henry 
 Raeburn, in order to ascertain the sums due 
 to him.’ So there were books. 
 
 In the Connoisseur list of Raeburn’s 
 paintings dates are attached to about 150, 
 but these are for the most part conjectural, 
 and to the years between 1776, when the 
 Chalmers of Pittencrieff was undoubtedly 
 painted, and 1790, only two portraits are 
 assigned. In 1790 Raeburn was in full 
 
 129 
 
I30 Raeburn 
 
 possession of his powers, if we accept as 
 evidence the pictures ascribed to that year, 
 especially those of Siv John and Lady Clerk, 
 and Siv John Sinclair: both masterpieces. 
 But the danger of relying upon any opinion, 
 even when it is based upon careful conjecture 
 by expert students, is shown by the fact that 
 in the monograph on Raeburn by Mr. James 
 Greig, which forms part of the Connoisseur 
 volume, the Sinclair portrait is assigned to 
 1796, and that of Sir John Clerk and Wife 
 is classed among those that date before 
 1790. Were it necessary it would be easy 
 to multiply instances of this kind, gathered 
 from writers on Raeburn, to show how much 
 we are groping in the dark on the subject. 
 The difficulty is accentuated by the 
 unusual continuity of Raeburn’s work, the 
 absence of marked changes in it, the steady, 
 quiet growth from beginning to end of his 
 career. This was, no doubt, due to his 
 - intense individuality. His style grew as a 
 tree grows : it seems never to have interested 
 him to know how a thing was done by other 
 painters ; he was content with such improve- 
 ment as came from continued effort to see, 
 and to reveal on canvas the uttermost 
 possible in regard to the subject before him. 
 Evidence of grafts such as occur in the work 
 of other portraitists—grafts from the style 
 of someone else—are practically not to be 
 found in that of Raeburn. Mr. Greig traced 
 
In.the possession of Sir William Raeburn 
 LADY INGLIS 
 
 SIR HENRY RAEBURN 
 
 (face p. 130) 
 
 
 

 
The Quality of the Artist 131 
 
 a resemblance to the style of Largilliére in 
 one portrait of a lady (Lady Inglis), and 
 inferred that it might have been painted 
 under temporary French influence in Rome. 
 Mr. Caw thought that the Lord President 
 Dundas, painted soon after the Rome period, 
 betrayed reference to the Julius II of 
 Raphael (at Florence), Armstrong detected 
 ‘a strong flavour of Sir Joshua,’ after the 
 return from Rome, John Burnet supposed 
 that the Professor Robison (an outstanding 
 example of bold and original craftsmanship) 
 was the result of Raeburn’s seeing some 
 picture by Velasquez in the collection of the 
 Earl of Lauderdale. Occasionally, in por- 
 traits of fair women, such as the Mrs. Scott 
 Moncneff, and the Mrs. Wiliam Urquhart, 
 a reference to the vision of Lely or Lawrence 
 may be imagined: if there be any, which I 
 doubt, it is so superficial and slight as to be 
 negligible as a quality when set against the 
 presence of excellencies which these painters 
 lack, especially the power to express along 
 with and without deducting from a woman’s 
 beauty a penetrating statement of her 
 temperament and character. 
 
 Raeburn, from first to last, was essentially 
 self-contained, and of such innate strength 
 and self-sufficiency that he had no need for 
 external influence, beyond that inevitable 
 minimum which must enter into all human 
 work as a result of the impalpable effect of 
 
132 Raeburn 
 
 surroundings. It may be that now and 
 then Raeburn consciously set himself to paint — 
 a portrait in the manner or spirit of one 
 that he admired: a species of serious 
 caricature (if one may use the word out of 
 its accepted meaning) similar to Millais’ 
 well-known piece of bravura, A Souvenir of 
 Velasquez. But the manner of no man, 
 however great, suited Raeburn so well as 
 that which he had thought and worked out 
 for himself, and which at the end of more 
 than half a century after his choice of art 
 as his business, was at its fullest and finest 
 expression, rich in promise of further great 
 achievement, when the sudden call came. 
 
 ‘Broadly considered,’ says Mr. Caw, 
 ‘Raeburn’s art shows no marked periods.’ 
 This in a few words sums up the matter. 
 When, if ever, we are put in possession of 
 certain information as to the dates of 
 Raeburn’s pictures it will be time enough 
 to set to work upon an elaborate comparison 
 and analysis, with a view to a study of the 
 growth and variation of his technical 
 methods. At present it is prudent to be 
 content with something less. 
 
 We know that from the very beginning 
 his essential merit as a portraitist was 
 inherent. The miniature of Deuchar, said 
 to have been his second attempt, though 
 obviously the work of an inexperienced 
 hand, is all alive, and gives a clear impression 
 
The Quality of the Artist 133 
 
 of the man limned: clearer, I think, than 
 the much more expert and beautiful pencil 
 miniature by Brown which Miss Deuchar 
 also possesses. In the Chalmers of Pitten- 
 crief{ portrait we have the essentials of one 
 of Raeburn’s schemes for a full-length 
 picture, used throughout his career. There 
 may be doubts about the legs, the chair is 
 certainly out of drawing, and though the 
 composition is well managed it conveys an 
 impression that it was laboured, as it doubt- 
 less was, for the painter was only twenty 
 years of age and but recently accustomed 
 to express himself on two or three inches of 
 ivory. The glimpse of landscape seen 
 through a window to the left is a recurrent 
 device in Raeburn’s work: for instance, in 
 the seated portrait of The Hon. Henry 
 Erskine. The brushwork has no trace of the 
 miniature method: the characteristic 
 “square” touch, which reached its fullest 
 expression in the Professor Robison, is 
 already in use. 
 
 The Mrs. Ferguson of Ratth, with her 
 Children, which it is generally agreed is an 
 early work (c. 1780), shows a great advance 
 on the Chalmers of Pittencrieff in the grace 
 and ease of the composition and the charm 
 of the portraiture. The landscape setting 
 is cleverly composed, but too obviously 
 lowered in its lighting for the purpose of 
 giving due prominence to the figures: even 
 
134 Raeburn 
 
 the dog which the boy holds by a handker- 
 chief is out of the lighting. Dr. W. D. 
 McKay, in his Scottish School of Painting, 
 says of this and the more or less contemporary 
 picture of the lady’s husband and third son : 
 ‘already . . . we have a manner of seeing 
 and painting unlike that of any of his 
 Scottish forerunners. In these earliest can- 
 vases one finds the direct painting, the broad 
 flat surfaces, and the precise square touch— 
 afterwards such a weapon for the seizure of 
 the character—in the management of the 
 narrow shadows and the modelling of the 
 features. As yet he avoids effects.’ There 
 follows much more subtle and wise criticism 
 of details, for which the curious reader may 
 be referred to the book. 
 
 Any shortcomings in these early works 
 that are apparent to us as compared with 
 the achievement of the ultimate Raeburn, 
 were doubtless even more obvious to the 
 painter, keenly alive to what he felt he had 
 it in him to do. So he went to Rome. 
 Among the early achievements of his studio 
 after his return we find examples again in 
 the Kilrie collection which suffice to justify 
 his expedition. That fascinating boy picture 
 of William Ferguson of Kilvie is the work of 
 a full-grown craftsman, who had mastered 
 the handling of light in portraiture. The 
 wonder is that a portrait so unconventional 
 and striking was accepted. The Fergusons 
 
The Quality of the Artist 135 
 
 must have been unusually intelligent patrons. 
 If so, they would have another agreeable 
 shock of surprise on receiving the Szv Ronald 
 and Robert Ferguson, practising archery 
 which is at once masterly and unconventional 
 in arrangement. It is of interest to notice 
 that in a somewhat later full-length of Sir 
 Ronald Ferguson with gun and dog, the 
 landscape setting is almost identical with 
 that of the picture of Mrs. Ferguson with her 
 children. Probably it was an actual scene 
 observed at Raith. But how much more 
 cleverly is the relation managed between the 
 figure and the background. Dr. McKay 
 notes of this: ‘both face and figure are 
 modelled with a fuller brush and more graphic 
 touch. There is less of the flatness of the 
 mosaic, and the accessories are executed with 
 the increasing ease and fluency which come 
 of experience.’ 
 
 Here we have an early example of 
 Raeburn’s plan of painting a man ‘in his 
 habit as he lived,’ which resulted in a 
 number of his most original and masterly 
 productions: the Dr. Patrick Spens as an 
 archer, Siv John Sinclaiy arrayed in a 
 uniform, the splendours of which excel the 
 utmost inventions of the ‘ twopence- 
 coloured’ draughtsmen employed by Skelt, 
 Lieutenant Colonel McMurdo as a fisherman, 
 The Glengarry chieftain posing with his 
 noblest air in his native halls, and the 
 
136 Raeburn 
 
 inimitable Macnab, even more gorgeous and 
 spectacular than any of them, looking 
 defiance at all the world, with his foot upon 
 his native heath. In the hands of almost 
 any other painter, however great, none of 
 these things would have been possible : they 
 would have resulted in creations as comical 
 as most of the Georgian presentments of 
 Generals and Admirals striking attitudes, 
 surrounded by cannons, ships, forts, smoke, 
 and other appropriate emblems of their 
 trade. Raeburn intuitively saw that he 
 could best realise his penetrating perception 
 of a subject’s character at its most typical 
 expression by showing him at play, his whole . 
 nature engrossed in the pastime; or, if a 
 Highlander, warmed to his utmost expressive- 
 ness by sentiments of warlike pride. The 
 Sir Ronald Ferguson is all the better portrait 
 because the moment immortalised is one of 
 intense preoccupation with the game at 
 which both gun and dog point. Spens is 
 seen transfigured by his pastime to a truer 
 self than was ever disclosed to patients or 
 dinner comrades ; its veracity is such that 
 the mind of the spectator is not even dis- 
 tracted by the portentous emblematical 
 thistle in the foreground. Sinclair, in spite 
 of all his ‘ braws’ is handsome, majestic, 
 impressive,—a withering commentary on 
 Farington’s description of him as ‘a dirty 
 Scotsman.” McMurdo, who as a mere 
 
The Quality of the Artist 137 
 
 military officer would have been of little 
 interest, becomes an ever fresh source of 
 pleasure as a fisherman, painted with true 
 zest by a brother disciple of Izaak Walton, 
 seated in entire content and enjoyment in 
 one of the most charmingly romantic settings 
 devised by Raeburn. Glengarry’s spectacu- 
 lar attitude is made subordinate and con- 
 tributory to the complete statement of 
 character, and the skilful scheme of lighting. 
 And the rugged, fierce, untamed Macnab is 
 so perfect a realisation of a grand Gaelic type 
 that it is worthy of the criticism attributed 
 to Sir Thomas Lawrence—(where did he 
 see it ?)—that it is the best representation 
 of a human being he had ever seen. That is 
 what one felt on finding it again at Wembley 
 in 1924, hanging among other choice ex- 
 amples of the chief British masters. The 
 picture well seen is even more impressive 
 than the great price that was recently paid 
 for it; though that, no doubt, is for some 
 the most convincing proof of its excellence. 
 
 In all these portraits, as in many others, 
 the commanding merit is the vivid statement 
 of the subject’s appearance, combined with 
 a revelation of his or her mind by the magic 
 of subtle observation. Raeburn’s portraits 
 never, it is said, failed to be convincing 
 likenesses at a period when the same could 
 not be said of all other painters’ work. 
 Reynolds was notoriously uncertain in this 
 
138 Raeburn 
 
 respect. Indeed it may be doubted it any 
 other British painter was over careful about 
 it before the discipline of the camera wiped 
 out the minor men, and put the others on 
 their mettle. A photographic portrait is 
 apt to be soulless, but, if the work of a 
 competent operator, it is at least a likeness. 
 Raeburn’s powers of observation were so 
 perfect, and were so admirably served by a 
 hand that never faltered—needing no mahl- 
 stick or the guidance of a charcoal outline— 
 that he could express exactly in two dimen- 
 sions the physical appearance before him, 
 and at the same time keep his mind detached 
 for keen observation of character and tem- 
 perament, aiding this by conversation that 
 tended to provoke self-revelation. 
 
 For Raeburn the painting of the head was 
 the easiest part of his task : not that he was 
 less capable of reproducing the rest, but that 
 was more nearly mechanical, and therefore 
 less interesting. He seldom failed in any 
 detail of importance, and spared no pains 
 to make all his design, however complex, 
 contributory to the main purpose. Thus, 
 in his Adam Rolland of Gask, one can see 
 that, after he had been at the pains to paint 
 a vase of flowers on the table, he came to 
 the conclusion that it was undesirable, and 
 forthwith painted it out. The six great 
 full-lengths above referred to are full of 
 various detail, all evidently painted with 
 
The Quality of the Artist 139 
 
 due attention to the golden rule laid down by 
 Byres of Tonley ; but by fine management 
 of light, tone, and colour, nothing is ever 
 allowed to sound a disturbing note in the 
 harmony of the composition. 
 
 Illustrative of Raeburn’s mastery in 
 vision and representation is the certainty 
 with which he introduced animals, although 
 he did not paint them often. His dogs and 
 horses are always excellent, often super- 
 excellent. It is remarkable that a detail 
 he was apt to fail in was the hands. These 
 he could paint, and often did paint exceed- 
 ingly well, and with excellent effect in the 
 composition ; especially when ancillary to 
 his design, as in the group of The Macdonald 
 Children; but he did not like them, was 
 adroit in hiding them, and when they were 
 Shown they sometimes show remarkable 
 carelessness: at times, in this respect he 
 could almost sink to the level of Goya. 
 
 Single-minded devotion to the essential 
 duty of faithful portraiture, to the exclusion 
 of everything else, was with Raeburn a 
 first principle. He was a great painter, but 
 his greatness found no expression in any 
 other direction. As a result he created a 
 gallery of memorable, ever fresh and vital, 
 portraits of contemporary Scottish people. 
 It has been said of him that he was peculiarly 
 fortunate in having to practise his art in a 
 city which was especially rich in strong 
 
140 Raeburn 
 
 types of humanity ; and part of the credit 
 due to his excellence is thus transferred to 
 his sitters. This seems to be a fallacy. 
 England in his day was equally rich in men 
 and women of outstanding character and 
 appearance : Edinburgh to-day could prob- 
 ably muster just as strong a selection of 
 distinguished types of humanity ; certainly 
 it could have done so in the later Victorian 
 days, when I knew it well. The remarkable 
 character of Raeburn’s portraits was not 
 due to his sitters, but to his power of seeing 
 and representing them, with a fulness and 
 certainty only paralleled by Hals, Moroni, 
 and Velasquez. 
 
 According to Alexander Fraser, R.S.A., 
 Raeburn’s range of pigments was limited 
 and simple : vermilion, raw sienna (or yellow 
 ochre), Prussian blue, burnt Sienna, ivory 
 black, crimson lake, and white. His medium 
 was linseed oil, mixed with mastic varnish 
 and sugar of lead: he called it ‘ Gumption,’ 
 which is Scotch for common sense. All his 
 materials, as we learn from Morrison, were 
 prepared by his servant under his direction, 
 not bought from acolour-man. He generally, 
 if not always, used a twilled canvas. As a 
 result of sound painting with a small range 
 of safe colours, almost all Raeburn’s pictures 
 now, though from a century to a century 
 and a half old, are unfaded and in excellent 
 condition, save where they have suffered 
 
The Quality of the Aritst I4I 
 
 from careless keeping or bad varnish. The 
 state of the Mrs. Scott Moncrieff before it 
 was restored suggested that in it Raeburn 
 might have used one of the bituminous 
 pigments that came into vogue and worked 
 so much mischief in and after his day. 
 That, however, so far as my opportunities 
 for observation have served, seems to be an 
 exceptional case. 
 
 So much has been written on the subject 
 of the painter’s ‘square touch’ and its 
 supposed development and eventual modifica- 
 tion in favour of subtler brushing, that it 
 is unnecessary to revert to it. The chief 
 value of such analytical study is in helping 
 to form conjectures as to the dates of the 
 pictures, and it is not a very certain guide, 
 for the handling of a master varies according 
 to the task in hand; and the marked 
 differences between, say, the Lord Newton, 
 and the James Wardrop of Torbanehill do 
 not necessarily imply a long distance of 
 time between the two pictures. What 
 matters, after all, in regard to such pictures 
 is not when and how they were painted, but 
 what they are. Both are masterpieces in 
 the smaller, simpler style of portrait, in 
 which Raeburn, undisturbed by accessories, 
 put his whole strength into making relatively 
 immortal the mortal beings sitting to him. 
 Newton died a dozen years before him, but 
 he is still vividly alive in this picture so 
 
142 Raeburn 
 
 deftly described by Dr. John Brown: ‘ full- 
 blooded, full-brained, taurine with potential 
 vigour. His head is painted with a Rabe- 
 laisian richness; you cannot but believe 
 when you look at the vast countenance the 
 tales of his feats in thinking and in drinking, 
 and in general capacity of body and mind.’ 
 
 The Wardrop, R. L. Stevenson thought 
 a picture ‘which you might palm off upon 
 most laymen as a Rembrandt.’ This was 
 a fantastic way of saying what is very true, 
 that it is differentiated technically from 
 almost all other Raeburn portraits. It is 
 the top of his achievement in simple male 
 portraiture, and all Raeburn lovers must 
 deplore the fact that it is going or gone to 
 the antipodes. When it hung for a short 
 time in the National Gallery, after Mr. 
 Rinder had bought it for Melbourne under 
 the Felton Bequest, one felt its presence 
 there a silent protest against obsession for 
 continental old masters on the part of the 
 Trustees so great that they let pass the 
 opportunity of securing the masterpiece of 
 a native painter, who is as yet deplorably 
 under-represented in the English national 
 collection. The only grain of comfort is 
 that the picture, though exiled, will be in a 
 Dominion Gallery. 
 
 Other outstanding examples of single 
 portraits which illustrate the force and range 
 of Raeburn’s genius are the early Nez Gow, 
 
The Melbourne Art Gallery 
 JAMES WARDROP OF TORBANE HILL 
 
 SIR HENRY RAEBURN 
 
 (face p. 142) 
 
 
 

 
The Quality of the Artist 143 
 
 Henry Mackenze, Dr. Adam, Lord Braxfield, 
 Francis Horner, John Clerk (afterwards 
 Lord Eldin), Byres of Tonley, John Wauchope, 
 and, last, but by no means least as regards 
 either subject or achievement, the Montagu 
 Sir Walter Scott, of 1822. 
 
 R. L. Stevenson found fault with Raeburn 
 in regard to his portraits of young women, 
 which he pronounced ‘by no means of the 
 same order of merit’ as his other portraits. 
 Here it seems necessary to join issue with 
 R.L.S., for it is not possible to agree with 
 him that ‘they do not seem to be made of 
 good flesh and blood. They are not painted 
 in rich and unctuous tones. They are dry 
 and diaphanous. . . . In all these pretty 
 faces you miss character, you miss fire, you 
 miss that spice of the devil which is worth 
 all the prettiness in the world ; and what is 
 worst of all you miss sex. His young ladies 
 are not womanly to nearly the same degree 
 as his men are masculine ; they are so in a 
 negative sense ; in short, they are the typical 
 young ladies of the male novelist.’ 
 
 It may be allowed at once that the student 
 of femininity who comes to the study of 
 Raeburn’s women fresh from enjoyment of 
 ladies limned by, let us say, Greuze, Boucher, 
 Nattier and Fragonard, must find something 
 wanting : he may even do so when comparing 
 them with some of the fair damsels of Rae- 
 burn’s English contemporaries. These latter 
 
 LR 
 
144 Raeburn 
 
 were accustomed to devote spare time to 
 portraiture of ladies of the theatre, and other 
 ladies who did not even enjoy the Bohemian 
 respectability of the stage. Demi-mondaines 
 are to be found in the lists of pictures 
 exhibited by Reynolds and Gainsborough, 
 and every one knows of Romney’s obsession 
 by the charms of Emma Hart, which inspired 
 him into something approaching genius. 
 Mr. Francis Watt, writing of Raeburn, 
 remarks: ‘it has been said of a greater 
 than he that the one thing wanting to raise 
 his genius into the highest possible sphere 
 was the chastening of a great sorrow, or the 
 excitement of a great passion.’ Sorrow 
 and trouble came to him as they do to every 
 one, though his share was a relatively small 
 one. But the great passion almost certainly 
 never entered into his life, nor do we find 
 in his art the slightest evidence that he was 
 ever influenced by amatory sentiment. 
 Certainly that quality is lacking, but is that 
 to be reckoned a fault? Raeburn may fail 
 in the expression of sensuous charm, though 
 I think not, but that rather enhances the 
 value of his portraits of fair young contem- 
 poraries. He painted them as he painted 
 men, unflinchingly representing faces as he 
 saw them, without any enhancement by 
 excusable artistic touches, and made them 
 expressive of mind as he sensed it. If some- 
 thing seems to be lacking, the blame must be 
 
 es 
 
The Quality of the Artist 145 
 
 charged to the account of the very artificial, 
 and (to us) unnatural position in life of the 
 Georgian young woman of the better classes, 
 whose intellects were as carefully repressed 
 as her liberties were restricted. We have 
 no surer evidence of what she was and what 
 she lacked than is supplied by Raeburn’s 
 portraits. 
 
 His power of expression where his personal 
 interest was involved may be best seen in 
 the portrait of his wife. It reveals to us 
 that though she was middle-aged she was a 
 woman he loved and admired. With every 
 touch of the brush he tells us: ‘In this 
 woman I see a disposition full of sweetness 
 and excellence, and a mind that I can 
 reverence.’ So great is his art that he has 
 even given the picture some of the force of 
 attraction the original had for himself; a 
 glamour that makes one linger and look 
 again. Without beauty it fascinates. 
 
 I have already quoted a description of 
 the portrait of a step-daughter for whom he 
 had fatherly affection. However latent 
 Raeburn’s capacity for passion may have 
 been, there is no doubt as to his warmth of 
 family affection if we turn to such pictures 
 as the Boy with a Rabbit, the Leshe Boy, 
 and Henry Raeburn on a Pony. But always 
 his pictures of children are admirable and 
 lovingly painted. 
 
 Reverting to the ladies, I advance as 
 
146 Raeburn 
 
 evidence in contravention of Stevenson’s 
 opinion the portraits of Lady Drummond of 
 Hawthornden, Mrs. Boswall of Blackadder 
 (a very late work), Lady Suttie and her two 
 winsome daughters, Mrs. Campbell of Possil, 
 Mrs. Urquhart, Lady Carmichael, Mrs. 
 Lauzun, Mrs. Scott Moncrieff, The Hon. Mrs. 
 Wharton, and The Hon. Mrs. Spiers. Of 
 middle-aged ladies who, thanks to Raeburn’s 
 genius, have power to charm there is no lack, 
 and his old women are even finer. Let it 
 suffice to name the Mrs. James Campbell, 
 which ranks beside the Wardrop at the 
 summit of his achievement. 
 
 How completely Raeburn created for us a 
 gallery of the female sex of the better classes 
 as it existed in Scotland before and after the 
 beginning of the nineteenth century might 
 be shown by illustrating the Seven Ages of 
 Woman, with reproductions of paintings by 
 him. This sequence I would begin with 
 his Helen Stirling, an exquisite and delightful 
 little girl, who looks out at one with just the 
 vacant, happy expression of a young child. 
 The Portrait of a Young Girl, seated, and 
 leaning on a portfolio would stand for the 
 second age, and for the third we could not 
 choose better than Miss Janet Sutive, or her 
 sister, Margaret. Next in order, for the 
 fourth stage of life, there is none better than 
 Mrs. Campbell of Possil, but there is some- 
 thing to be said also for Lady Hume Campbell 
 
The Quality of the Artist 147 
 
 of Marchmont, looking with fond delight at 
 her infant son; also we must not overlook 
 that very fine recent addition to the Glasgow 
 Collection: Mr. and Mrs. Robert Campbell, 
 of Katze, which would easily hold its own 
 if hung beside Gainsborough’s Morning 
 Walk. The fifth age might well be allotted 
 to Mrs. Elizabeth Ord, wife of Lord 
 Braxfield, haughty and austere; or Lady 
 Muller of Glenlee. Either dear Mrs. Campbell 
 of Park or Mrs. James Campbell would be 
 perfect for the sixth age, and a sort of con- 
 necting link with the seventh is Mrs. Pitcairn, 
 sitting with an amazing Sunday cap on her 
 head, looking at nothing, and gently smiling 
 at nobody. For the last stage of all we have 
 poor old Lady Hamilton apparently in her 
 dotage: an apathetic and _ expressionless 
 invalid, propped up in her chair, ear-trumpet 
 in hand, and looking past doubt ‘ sans teeth, 
 sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.’ 
 
 It is obvious that an equally striking and 
 picturesque sequence illustrating the Seven 
 Ages of Man might be compiled from Rae- 
 burn’s paintings ; it would be less easy to 
 construct similar sequences from the works 
 of any other painter of portraits in or before 
 his time. Of each sitter who came to him 
 he was able to make a convincingly true 
 record, thanks to the intense wisdom that 
 looked through his lustrous eyes; not only 
 a likeness of the physical appearance, but 
 
148 Raeburn 
 
 also a revealing record of the character and 
 spirit. Neither age nor sex made a differ- 
 ence: the flower-like charm of childhood, 
 the blooming grace of youth, the lusty vigour 
 and beauty of early maturity, the strength 
 and force of full manhood, the dignity of 
 later years, and the pathetic beauty of age: 
 all were recorded by him with the complete- 
 ness possible to a sure hand and eye, guided 
 by rare knowledge and power of vision. 
 Raeburn may not have been a great artist 
 in the wider sense, because of his limited 
 range; but by concentration on a single 
 branch of the painter’s craft he undoubtedly 
 became one of the greatest of portrait 
 painters. 
 
APPENDIX I. 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY AND AUTHORITIES. 
 
 Edinburgh Directories, v.y. 1773-1830. 
 Catalogues of Royal Academy Exhibitions, 1792- 
 1823. 
 
 The Scots Magazine, 1808-1826. 
 
 Elogiorum Sepulchralium Edinensium  LDelectus, 
 A. Duncan, Senr., M.D. 1815. 
 
 The British Gallery of Contemporary Portraits. 
 2 vols. 1822. 
 
 Memoirs of George Heriot . . . With a historical 
 account of the Hospital founded by him in 
 Edinburgh. 1822. 
 
 The European Magazine, November, 1823. 
 
 The Gentleman’s Magazine, November, 1823. 
 
 The Annual Register, 1824. . 
 
 A Tribute of Regard to the Memory of Sir Henry 
 Raeburn, R.A. By Andrew Duncan. 1824. 
 The Life and Correspondence of Sir Thomas Lawrence. 
 By D. E. Williams (B. R. Haydon’s annotated 
 
 copy in the British Museum). 1831. 
 
 The National Portrait Gallery . . . With Memoirs 
 by W. Jerdan. 1832. 
 
 Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott. By J. G. 
 Lockhart. 7 vols. 1837. 
 
 A Bibliographical, Antiquarian, and Picturesque 
 Tour in the Northern Counties of England and in 
 Scotland. By the Rev. Thomas Frognall Dibdin, 
 DD; 2) vols. . 1635, 
 
 149 
 
150 Appendix I 
 
 The Popular Scottish Biography. By Wm. Anderson. 
 1842. 
 
 Tait’s Edinburgh Magazine. 1843. 
 
 The Life of Sir David Wilkie. By Allan Cunning- 
 ham. 1843. 
 
 The Life of B. R. Haydon from his Autobiography 
 and Journals. By Tom Taylor. 1853. 
 
 A Century of Painters of the English School. By 
 R. & S. Redgrave. 2 vols. 1866. 
 
 The Life of David Roberts, R.A. Compiled from 
 his. journals, and other sources. By James 
 Ballantine. 1866. 
 
 Historical Records of the Family of Leslie, from 1067 
 to 1868. By Colonel C. Leslie, K.H. 3 vols. 
 1869. 
 
 History of George Heriot’s Hospital. By Wm. 
 Steven, D.D., third edition revised and enlarged 
 by F. L. Bedford, LL.D. 1872. 
 
 An Account of the surname Edgar. By J. H. 
 Lawrence-Archer. 1873. 
 
 A Biographical Dictionary of Eminent Scotsmen. 
 By R. Chambers, revised by Thomas Thomson. 
 Voli 3: 1875. 
 
 Benjamin Robert Haydon: Correspondence and 
 Table Talk. With Memoir by his son F. W. 
 Haydon. 2 vols. 1876. 
 
 Christopher North : A Memoir of John Wilson. 
 By his daughter Mrs. Gordon. New edition 
 (first edition, 1862). 1879. 
 
 The Lives of the Most Eminent British Painters. 
 By Allan Cunningham. Revised edition, by 
 Mrs. C. Heaton. 3 vols. (first edition, 1833). 
 1879. 
 
 Virginibus Puerisyue and other Papers. By R. L. 
 Stevenson. 1881. 
 
 John Leech and other Papers. By John Brown 
 M.D., &c. 2nd edition. 1882. 
 
Appendix I 151 
 
 James Nasmyth, Engineer: An Autobiography. 
 Edited by Samuel Smiles. 1883. 
 
 British Mezzotint Portraits. By John Chaloner 
 Smith, B.A. 1884. 
 
 Life of Sir Henry Raeburn. By his great-grandson, 
 William Raeburn Andrew, M.A., Oxon. 2nd 
 edition (first edition, 1886). 1894. 
 
 Historical Memorials and Reminiscences of Stock- 
 bridge, &c. By Cumberland Hill. 2nd edition, 
 enlarged (first edition, 1874). 1887. 
 
 Scottish Painters: A Critical Study. By Walter 
 Armstrong, B.A., Oxon. 1888. 
 
 Art in Scotland: Its Origin and Progress. By 
 Robert Brydall. 1889. 
 
 The Journal of Sir Walter Scott, 1825-32. From 
 the original MS. 1890. 
 
 An Ordinary of Arms contained in the Public Register 
 of all Arms and Bearings in Scotland. By Sir 
 James Balfour Paul. 1893. 
 
 Familiar Letters of Sir Walter Scott. 2 vols. 1894. 
 
 John Thomson of Duddingston, Pastor and Painter. 
 By Wm. Baird, F.S.A., Scotland. 1895. 
 
 Letters and Papers of Alexander Andrew Robertson, 
 A.M. Edited by Emily Robertson. 2nd edition 
 (first dated 1895). 1897. 
 
 Publications of the Scottish Record Society, v.y. 
 1898-1922. I0 vols. 
 
 Caledonian Jottings for Private Circulation (Cale- 
 donian Insce. Co.). Igo00. 
 
 Sir Henry Raeburn. By Sir Walter Armstrong, 
 with an Introduction by R. A. M. Stevenson, 
 and a biographical and descriptive Catalogue 
 by J. L. Caw. Igor. 
 
 Views and Reviews: Essays in Appreciation. By 
 W.E. Henley. 1902. 
 
152 Appendix I 
 
 Bryan’s Dictionary of Painters and Engravers. 
 New edition. Edited by G.C. Williamson, Litt. D. 
 1904. 
 
 Sir Henry Raeburn, R.A. By Edward Pinnington. 
 1904. 
 
 Caledonian Insurance Company: History of One 
 Hundred Years (1805-1905). 1905. 
 
 The Royal Academy of Arts: A Complete Dictionary 
 of Contributors from 1769 to 1804. By Algernon 
 Graves. Vol. 6. 1906. 
 
 Chambers’ Encyclopedia. Vol. 8. 1906. 
 
 The Scottish School of Painting. By William D. 
 McKay, R.S.A. 1906. 
 
 Nineteenth Century Mezzotinters : Charles Turner. 
 By Alfred Whitman. 1907. 
 
 Sir Henry Raeburn (Newnes). Memoir by R. S. 
 Clouston. 1907. 
 
 Scottish Painting, Past and Present. By James L. 
 Caw. 1908. 
 
 The Masterpieces of Raeburn: Sixty Reproductions. 
 1908. 
 
 Catalogue of Engraved British Portraits preserved 
 in the Department of Prints and Drawings in the 
 British Museum. By F. O’Donoghue, F.S.A. 
 5 vols. 1908-1922. 
 
 The Studio, No. 179, February 18. 1908. 
 
 Memorials of his Time. By Henry Cockburn. 
 New edition. 1909. 
 
 Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 16. Reprint 
 1909. 
 
 The National Gallery: One Hundred Plates in 
 Colour. 1909. 
 
 Masterpieces in Colour: Raeburn. By James L. 
 Caw. 1909. 
 
 Portraits by Sir Henry Raeburn, with an Introductory 
 Essay. By James L. Caw. 1909. 
 
Appendix I 153 
 
 British Portrait Painting to the Opening of the Nine- 
 ‘teenth Century. By M. H. Spielmann, F.S.A. 
 2 vols. IgI0. 
 
 A History of Painting. By Haldane Macfall, with 
 a Preface by Frank Brangwyn. 8 vols. 1911. 
 
 Sir Henry Raeburn, R.A., his Life and Work, with a 
 Catalogue of his Pictures. By James Greig. 
 FO11. 
 
 The Royal Scottish Academy, 1826-1916 : A Complete 
 List of the Exhibited Works by Raeburn, and by 
 Academicians, Associates, and Hon. Members. By 
 Frank Rinder, with a Historical Narrative of the 
 Origin and Development of the R.S.A., by W. D. 
 McKay, R.S.A. 1917. 
 
 John Thomson of Duddingston, Landscape Painter. 
 By R. W. Napier, F.R.S. 1919. 
 
 A Collection of Engravings after Raeburn, with a 
 Record and Appreciation. By John Mallett. 1920. 
 
 The Farington Diary. Vol. 1. 1922. 
 
 Henry Raeburn, 1756-1823. By T. C. F. Brotchie. 
 1924. 
 
 Also Exhibition Catalogues, Magazines, News- 
 papers, Edinburgh Directories, Biographical 
 Dictionaries, Encyclopedias, etc., referred to in 
 the text. 
 

 
APPENDIX II. 
 
 List oF PICTURES BY SIR HENRY RAEBURN 
 IN BRITISH GALLERIES OPEN TO THE PUBLIC 
 
 Lonpon, THE NATIONAL GALLERY. 
 
 Miss Mary Hepburn (934in. by 59in.). 
 
 Lieut. Colonel Bryce McMurdo (9qin. by 58in.). 
 Mrs. H. W. Lauzun (294in. by 24fin.). - 
 
 Henry Dundas, Viscount Melville (30in. by 25in.). 
 Miss Forbes (29}in. by 24in.). 
 
 Lady Dalrymple (Tate Gallery) (29}in. by 24}in.). 
 
 LONDON, THE NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY. 
 
 John Home (2gin. by 24in.). 
 
 Francis Horner, M.P. (494in. by 394in.). 
 
 Henry Mackenzie (293in. by 24#in.). 
 
 John Playfair, F.R.S. (49?in. by 394in.). 
 
 Sir John Sinclair of Ulbster, Bart., LL.D. 
 (484in. by 38#in.). 
 
 Hugh Williams (z94in. by 24}in.). 
 
 Lonpon, THE VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM. 
 
 The Rev. Alex. Dyce, when a boy (29}in. by 
 24%in.). 
 
 Mr. Hobson, of Markfield (513in. by 4o#in.). 
 
 Mrs. Hobson, of Markfield (51%in. by 4ofin.). 
 
 155 
 
156 Appendix II 
 
 LonpDon, THE RoyvaLt ACADEMY OF ARTS DIPLOMA 
 GALLERY. 
 
 Boy with Rabbit. 
 
 EDINBURGH, THE NATIONAL GALLERY OF SCOT- 
 LAND. 
 
 Alexander Adam, LL.D. (49in. by 39in.). 
 
 Alexander Bonar (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 Mrs. Sarah Bonar (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 Mrs. Christina Campbell of Ballimore (50in. by 
 401n.). 
 
 Lady Hume Campbell of Marchmont and Child 
 (79in. by 6oin.). 
 
 Major William Clunes (96in. by 60in.). 
 
 Mrs. Justine Finlay of Glencorse (864in. by 
 59}in.). | 
 
 Dr. Gardiner (35in. by 26#in.). 
 
 Mrs. Harriet Hamilton of Kames (94in. by 6o0in.). 
 
 Mrs. Kennedy of Dunure (5o0in. by 4oin.)- 
 
 George Kinnear (344in. by 27in.). 
 
 Mrs. George Kinnear (344in. by 26in.). 
 
 Lieut. Colonel Lyon (35in. by 26#in.). 
 
 Colonel Alastair Macdonell of Glengarry (96in. by 
 6o0in.). 
 
 Mrs. R. Scott Moncrieff (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 Lord Newton (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 Sir Henry Raeburn, R.A. (36in. by 28in.). 
 
 Henry Raeburn on a Grey Pony (panel) (14in. 
 by toin.). 
 
 Adam Rolland of Gask (78in. by 6oin.). 
 
 John Smith of Craigend (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 John Wauchope, W.S. (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 Study of a Dog (27}in. by 354in.). 
 
 A Gentleman (not identified) (oval miniature on 
 parchment) (1fin. by 14in.). 
 
 PICTURES ON LOAN. 
 
 Mrs. Robert Bell (30in. by 25in.). 
 Lady Carnegie (934in. by 6oin.) 
 
Appendix II 157 
 
 Jas. Hamilton, Sen., M.D. (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 William, Sixth Marquis of Lothian. 
 
 Mrs. Colin Mackenzie of Portmore (5o0in. by 4oin.). 
 
 Sir John Sinclair, of Ulbster, Bart. (934in. by 
 6oin.). 
 
 Rev. Sir Henry Moncrieff Wellwood, Bart. (49}in. 
 by 4oin.). 
 
 EDINBURGH, THE Roya SCOTTISH ACADEMY. 
 
 Mr. Pitcairn (30in. by 25in.). 
 Mrs. Pitcairn (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 EDINBURGH, THE ScotTisH NATIONAL PORTRAIT 
 GALLERY. 
 
 Sir Francis Chantrey, R.A. Three pencil outlines 
 on paper (a pencil portrait of Raeburn by 
 Chantrey on the reverse) (1o#in. by 6#in.). 
 
 Professor Andrew Dalzel (494in. by 39in.). 
 
 Neil Gow (484in. by 384in.). 
 
 Francis Horner, M.P. (30in. by 24in.). 
 
 Robert Montgomery, Advocate (484in. by 384in.). 
 
 Professor Dugald Stewart (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 Professor John Wilson (93in. by 58in.). 
 
 PICTURES ON LOAN. 
 
 Professor Thos. Reid (294in. by 25in.). 
 
 DUBLIN, THE NATIONAL GALLERY OF IRELAND. 
 David, Eleventh Earl of Buchan (30in. by 25in.). 
 A Soldier (49in. by 39in.). 
 
 DUNDEE, THE ALBERT INSTITUTE AND VICTORIA 
 GALLERIES. 
 Mrs. Moir of Leckie, Stirlingshire (33in. by 26in.). 
 
158 Appendix II 
 
 GLasGow, THE ART GALLERIES. 
 Alex. Campbell of Hallyards (30in. by 25in.). 
 Mrs. Ann Campbell (30in. by 25in.). 
 Colin Campbell of Park (30in. by 25in.). 
 Mrs. Elizabeth Campbell (30in. by 25in.). 
 Mrs. General Campbell (30in. by 25in.). 
 John Campbell, Sen., of Morriston (30in. by 25in.). 
 Mungo Campbell of Hundleshope (30in. by 25in.). 
 Robert N. Campbell of Kailzie (30in. by 25in.). 
 Mr. and Mrs. Robert N. Campbell, of Kailzie 
 (952zin. by 6o}in.). 
 — Campbell (30in. by 25in.). 
 Robert Cleghorn, M.D. (30in. by 25in.). 
 Colonel Gordon of Aitkenhead (30in. by 25in.). 
 William Jamieson, Jun. (30in. by 25in.). 
 George McIntosh (30in. by 25in.). 
 William Mills (30in. by 25in.). 
 William Urquhart (30in. by 25in.). 
 Mrs. William Urquhart (30in. by 25in.). 
 A Gentleman (not identified) (30in. by 25in.). 
 
 LrEEps, THE City ART GALLERY. 
 Charles James Fox (50in. by 41in.). 
 
 LIVERPOOL, THE WALKER ART GALLERY. 
 
 ON LOAN. 
 Adam Rolland of Gask (73in. by 594in.). 
 MANCHESTER, THE CiTy ART GALLERY. 
 Alexander, Fourth Duke of Gordon (30in. by 
 25in.). 
 Alexander Campbell (294in. by 244#in.). 
 Mrs. Shafto Clarke and Daughter (49}in. by 
 
 394in.). 
 NotTTINGHAM, CiTy MusEUM AND ART GALLERY. 
 A Lady (not identified) (384in. by 254in.). 
 PortT SUNLIGHT, LADY LEVER ART GALLERY. 
 Mrs. Peat and two Daughters (49}4in. by 314 in.). 
 

 

 
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