THOMAS STOTHARD, R.A. 1 83 



a sum of ;^i,200 which his father had bequeathed 

 to him. Always of active habit, physically no 

 less than mentally, his love of Nature led him 

 to seek the country every year as soon as the 

 Academy closed ; his sketch-book and pencil were 

 ever at hand, and whatever struck his alert fancy 

 was inevitably committed to paper. To this habit 

 of continually making sketches from nature, 

 Stothard's pictures owe not a little of their rich 

 variety of landscape and background. Mrs. Bray, 

 referring to his habit of drawing any natural object 

 with which he desired to make himself acquainted, 

 says that if his children asked him a question 

 relating to bird or animal, he took his pencil and 

 sketched the creature concerning which information 

 was sought by way of illustrating whatever verbal 

 description he might give. His appreciation of 

 the value of anatomical study is shown by his 

 frequent practice of drawing even the skeleton 

 of any animal he might have occasion to introduce 

 into a picture. One such sketch, in the possession 

 of his son Alfred, is described by Mrs. Bray ; it 

 is the skeleton of an elephant drawn with pen 

 and ink, and every bone is most carefully dis- 

 tinguished. 



His sketches of animals are as remarkable for 

 their grace of form and action as are his studies 

 of the human figure. One of his animal pictures 



