100 
JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
THE LATE WILLIAM EASTLAKE. 
By the death on the 12th of October, 1881, of William Eastlake, 
Admiralty Law Agent and Deputy Judge Advocate, Plymouth has 
lost one of the truest friends of Art it ever had, and the Plymouth 
Institution a much-valued member. Mr. Eastlake's family had 
been settled in Plymouth for over two centuries, and the offices 
which he held had been hereditary for three generations. His 
uncle was Sir Charles Lock Eastlake, President of the Eoyal 
Academy. Coming of an artistic family, it was but natural that 
Mr. Eastlake should himself be artistic. From early manhood he 
was well known as an excellent Art critic, whose judgment might 
always be relied upon. He was, in a sense in which no one 
left behind can be regarded, the chief link between the elder 
school of Plymouth artists and those of the present day. Through 
his uncle and father he first had associations with Haydon and 
Prout and their contemporaries ; and later he himself became the 
moving spirit of the Plymouth Society of Artists and Amateurs. 
Originally formed some sixty years since, and dying out for a 
while, it was resuscitated in 1848, with Mr. Eastlake as honorary 
secretary, and for several years continued its genial fortnightly 
meetings. An artist himself of freshness and vigour and refined 
taste, Mr. Eastlake had the pleasure of knowing that the hereditary 
talent was continued in his own family. For many years, while 
occupations and health permitted, Mr. Eastlake joined in annual 
sketching excursions with various artist friends — among others 
Sir Kobert Collier, S. Cook, Talfourd, Mr. Philip Mitchell, and his 
son-in-law, Mr. Leader. To the late Samuel Cook, the most gifted 
water-colour artist of the West, he was one of the truest and 
heartiest friends; and one of the most valuable contributions to 
the last volume of the Transactions of the Plymouth Institution 
is a paper by Mr. Eastlake on Cook's life and work. There is so 
much necessarily of the autobiographical in it that the paper now 
has a melancholy interest. It was Mr. Eastlake's intention to have 
followed it up with sketches of other Plymouth artists that he had 
known. Now hand and brain are stilled, and valued reminiscences 
are lost for ever. 
