48 ANIMAL PAINTERS 



Edwin, — a portrait of Vixen, a Scotch terrier, 

 and a picture of Lady Louisa Russell feeding a 

 donkey. With reference to the date of this lady's 

 birth, it must be observed that acceptance of "her 

 own statement " involves the assumption that her 

 first exhibit in the Royal Academy was painted 

 when she was six years of age. The catalogue 

 of the exhibition of 1816 contains mention of a 

 picture, by Jessica Landseer, "The Frugal Meal," 

 a number of dogs feeding. She died at Folkestone 

 in 1880. 



The life and works of Sir Edwin Landseer have 

 received such ample justice at other hands that it 

 is not proposed to consider them in this series at 

 the length their importance deserves. The excel- 

 lent article in vol. xxii. of the Dictionary of 

 National Biography leaves little to be said, but it 

 may be of interest to supplement that record with 

 a few hitherto unpublished details which have come 

 within the knowledge of the writer and his friends. 

 Landseer's artistic genius, as is well known, de- 

 clared itself at a very early age : before he was six 

 years old he made pencil drawings whose extra- 

 ordinary precocity were clearly indicative of the 

 future. A few of these early efforts, forming part of 

 the Sheepshanks Gift, are preserved in the South 

 Kensington Museum. In a frame on one of the 

 screens are nine drawings, eight in pencil and one 



