JOHN F. HERRING 3 I 



Rarely has an animal painter been more suc- 

 cessful than this artist coachman, who first made 

 a name by painting coach panels and signs for inns. 

 He received commissions from King George IV., 

 William IV. and Her Majesty. The Queen indeed 

 paid Herring more than ordinary attention ; in his 

 later years he suffered much from asthma, and 

 Her Majesty, learning that the malady confined 

 him to the house, sent down three of her horses 

 for him to paint. It may have been mere accident, 

 but it is quite likely that the Sovereign knew the 

 artist's love of the Arab, and therefore sent three 

 Easterns to stand for their portraits ; these were 

 Bagdad, a charger of the late Prince Consort's, 

 Korsaid, and Said the horse on which the Royal 

 children had been taught to ride. The portrait 

 of the last named, painted in an Eastern landscape, 

 is in the Royal collection at Osborne. For the 

 Due d'Orleans Herring went over to Paris to paint 

 portraits of five racehorses. 



Portraits of greyhounds, hunting and shooting 

 pieces, occur among Herring's pictures but, some- 

 what curiously, works inspired by his early ac- 

 quaintance with practical coachmanship are few. 

 We find works of this character wholly wanting 

 in the long lists of pictures which were reproduced 

 in the sporting publications of the time. It is by 

 his portraits of horses, and more especially portraits 



