Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beconsfield, MP, PC, FRS, KG (1804-1881) being sworn as Rector at Glasgow University
Jemima Blackburn (1823 - 1909)
Category
Art / Drawings and watercolours
Date
19 Nov 1873
Materials
Sepia ink and wash on paper
Measurements
320 mm (Height); 243 mm (L)
Order this imageCollection
Hughenden, Buckinghamshire
NT 428454
Summary
Sepia ink and wash on paper, Benjamin Disraeli, 1st Earl of Beconsfield, MP, PC, FRS, KG (1804-1881) being sworn in as Rector at Glasgow University by Jemima Wedderburn, Mrs Hugh Blackburn (1823-1909). Disraeli being sworn in as Rector at Glasgow University. Disraeli seated in centre at lectern, in academic dress, with man to one side holding a book over his head. Other man behind Disraeli, holding cloth in his hands. Surrounded by crowd of people, with pillars and arches behind. Inscribed 'JB/ 19 Nov/ 1873' and 'Creamus Te Legum Doctorem'. In pink mount inscribed 'Mr. Disraeli at Glasgow University/ 1873'. Pair to NT/HUG/D/140a,b. Inscribed on a label on the back: '156 The Earl of Beaconsfield being sworn in as the Lord Rector (Dr) of the University [of] Glasgow 1873. Drawing in sepia by Mrs. Professor Blackburn' Jemima: The Paintings and Memoirs of a Victorian Lady, ed. Rob Fairley, Edinburgh, revised edn., 1998. In the Memoirs (op.cit.supra, pp.176-77) she says that: 'The greatest of all our Rectors was Disraeli', and contains a long description of his visit. In this, she not only mentions (p.176) making a sketch of Disraeli watching her dog, Besom, with a blue ribbon bow on his tail in honour of the occasion, performing his tricks, 'a copy of which the Queen now has' [not amongst the nine watercolours by Jemima Blackburn now in the Royal Collections: cf. Delia Millar, The Victorian Watercolours and Drawings, 1995, vol.I, nos. 255-263, pp.96-97], but also that (p.177): 'While waiting in College, I showed him some of my Egyptian sketches. He most liked one of an Arab shepherd boy sitting on the overturned head of a memnon. He asked me to do a copy of it for him, which I did, and also gave him some a scenes in the College, which he hung in his sitting room at Hughenden. His secretary Montagu-Corry (afterwards Lord Rowton) told me when I met him some years after at Pau, that in his will, when he ordered his pictures to be sold, some of mine were to be kept; and I heard from a friend who had been to Hughenden that they were still there.'
Marks and inscriptions
'Mr. Disraeli at Glasgow University/ 1873' (mount)
Makers and roles
Jemima Blackburn (1823 - 1909), artist