THOMAS STOTHARD, R.A. 1 87 



the lover of nature ; nevertheless, many of his 

 works display rare power in delineating incidents 

 nearly pertaining to sport. His greatest talent lay 

 in the historical designs by which his most con- 

 spicuous successes were won. Drawings of an 

 historical character were among the first to occupy 

 his brush when he was yet a lad, and we recognise 

 his affection for this school of art in his maturer 

 years. Many of the pictures exhibited by him at 

 the Royal Academy were historical subjects ; his 

 gift for handling such topics was undoubtedly far 

 above that possessed by the majority of painters. 



Of his landscape paintings Mrs. Bray remarks 

 "the backgrounds are generally distinguished by 

 richness of colour and warm glowing sunsets : they 

 display execution in pencilling, but are seldom 

 highly finished. Indeed, very few of his pictures 

 are so ; yet that he could finish highly and elabo- 

 rately when leisure or inclination led him on to the 

 task, witness his beautiful little picture of ' The 

 Cock and the Fox,' from Chaucer." 



Among the more important books illustrated 

 from designs by Stothard may be mentioned Boy- 

 dell's Shakespeare, Bunyan's Pilgrims Progress and 

 Rogers' Poems. His "Canterbury Pilgrims" and 

 " The Wellington Shield," are works to which refer- 

 ence has already been made ; and "The Ceremony 

 of the Dunmow Flitch " must not be forgotten. 



