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Lot Essay
The Rightful Heir is the modello for the painting exhibited at the Royal Academy, in 1874, no. 675. The R.A. picture, considered Smith's masterpiece, was formerly the property of the novelist Evelyn Waugh, who formed a distinguished collection of genre pictures in the middle years of the last century. It was sold at Christie's London, 2 February 1979, lot 184.
The composition was no doubt prompted by the sensational coverage of the trial of 'the Tichborne claimant' to a baronetcy, one of several such cases to pass through the courts in the 1870s. Anthony Trollope also treated the theme in his novels Ralph the Heir of 1871 and Is he Popenjoy ?, of 1874-5, though serialized a few years later. The Athenaeum, reviewing the R.A. picture, described the young widow arriving with her son to claim 'from a wicked, cruel, but courteous usurper the estate which is in debate between them'. The usurper, 'horribly handsome, in a gorgeous dressing-gown of Chinese embroidery, the outlandishness of which, added to his well-waxed black moustache and oiled hair, to say nothing of a furtive, rascally look in his dark eyes, and his naughty habit of smoking in the morning, make all good people consider him diabolical'. His companions who 'drink champagne and smoke before lunch - all three being good looking men, but sadly wicked, of course' ... are contrasted with the child, who resembles Little Lord Fauntleroy, dressed 'quite like his noble ancestor, whose picture by Van Dyck hangs on the wall ...'.
The relation to the picture's Hogarthian pendant, currently known as 'The Coming of Age' but bearing some resemblance to Smith's R.A. exhibit of 1876, entitled Into the Cold World, is not entirely clear. Is the viewer to be reminded of the dangers of flirtation (to the left), drink (carried by the maid in the doorway) and the temptation to sell heirlooms to finance high living (the group of connoisseurs to the right)? The meaning of the picture is ambiguous and less clear than in comparable moralizing works such as Robert Martineau's Last Day in the Old Home of 1861 and Frith's series The Road to Ruin of 1878.
The subjects are more urbane than is usual in Smith's work. A pupil of Charles West Cope, and the Royal Academy schools, he more often painted rustic scenes of children in the manner of Thomas Webser, F.D. Hardy, and other members of the Cranbrook Colony. His early paintings, and those of William Mulready, hung in the collection of John Sheepshanks and can now be seen in the Victoria and Albert Museum.
The composition was no doubt prompted by the sensational coverage of the trial of 'the Tichborne claimant' to a baronetcy, one of several such cases to pass through the courts in the 1870s. Anthony Trollope also treated the theme in his novels Ralph the Heir of 1871 and Is he Popenjoy ?, of 1874-5, though serialized a few years later. The Athenaeum, reviewing the R.A. picture, described the young widow arriving with her son to claim 'from a wicked, cruel, but courteous usurper the estate which is in debate between them'. The usurper, 'horribly handsome, in a gorgeous dressing-gown of Chinese embroidery, the outlandishness of which, added to his well-waxed black moustache and oiled hair, to say nothing of a furtive, rascally look in his dark eyes, and his naughty habit of smoking in the morning, make all good people consider him diabolical'. His companions who 'drink champagne and smoke before lunch - all three being good looking men, but sadly wicked, of course' ... are contrasted with the child, who resembles Little Lord Fauntleroy, dressed 'quite like his noble ancestor, whose picture by Van Dyck hangs on the wall ...'.
The relation to the picture's Hogarthian pendant, currently known as 'The Coming of Age' but bearing some resemblance to Smith's R.A. exhibit of 1876, entitled Into the Cold World, is not entirely clear. Is the viewer to be reminded of the dangers of flirtation (to the left), drink (carried by the maid in the doorway) and the temptation to sell heirlooms to finance high living (the group of connoisseurs to the right)? The meaning of the picture is ambiguous and less clear than in comparable moralizing works such as Robert Martineau's Last Day in the Old Home of 1861 and Frith's series The Road to Ruin of 1878.
The subjects are more urbane than is usual in Smith's work. A pupil of Charles West Cope, and the Royal Academy schools, he more often painted rustic scenes of children in the manner of Thomas Webser, F.D. Hardy, and other members of the Cranbrook Colony. His early paintings, and those of William Mulready, hung in the collection of John Sheepshanks and can now be seen in the Victoria and Albert Museum.