Collections : [Yale University -Yale Center for British Art]

Rutherston encloses a check and discusses possible times to come judge his portion of the show. He further asks that he might no longer be included on the list of prize givers, as he feels he should devote any money to his own students.

Includes title leaf (now loose): "98 plants done by the Honble. Booth Grey." The first two preliminary leaves (now loose) are of cream laid paper; the remaining leaves of pink laid paper.

Inscribed at front: "Baldwin Leighton, Loton Park, Shrewsbury, Augst. 1846"; but whether this is Mary's husband or son is uncertain. Though the younger Leighton took the spelling "Baldwyn" in contrast to his father's "Baldwin," in his youth he seems to have alternated between the two. The scrapbook again reveals the children's practice of copying from book and journal illustrations to develop their skills. Included among the drawings are Baldwyn's awkward copy of the engraving "General Tom Thumb Got up as Frederick the Great," published in an 1845 issue of The Illustrated London News; Frances's adept reproduction of David Wilkie's The Enthusiast, drawn from The Wilkie Gallery (London, 1848–50); and Isabella's drawing after a print of George Stubbs's Mambrino (1794).

Contains numerous caricatures in pen-and-ink and watercolor; many of these satirize contemporary women's fashion. Mary's comic drawings are interspersed with landscapes, copies after Old Masters, and prints clipped from various sources. Among these are twenty-three lithographs from Keller and Füssli's Collection des costumes de la Suisse (Zurich, n.d.); seven illustrations from an unidentified volume of natural history; satirical prints; an article on the construction of the Thames Tunnel, dated 1 July 1828; and bust portraits of contemporary figures. These include the Archbishop of Canterbury Reverend Charles Manners-Sutton (1755–1828), Irish lawyer Daniel O'Donnell (1775–1845), and journalist William Cobbett (1763–1835), suggesting that Mary may have followed developments leading to the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829. The final images in the scrapbook—pages taken from what appears to be a children's book that cast Catholicism in pejorative terms—underscores Mary's attention to matters both political and ecclesiastical.

Inscribed at front: "Mary Parker, 1829." Album reveals Mary's ongoing interest in comic scenes, picturesque views, and fine art. It includes drawings from key tourist sites, such as Northern Italy's Lago Maggiore and Switzerland's Lake Lucerne, as well as a series of copies after works in the British Museum. These drawings occasionally identify the collection from which the artworks come; many are from the bequests of Reverend Clayton Mordaunt Cracherode (1730–1799) and Richard Payne Knight (1751-1824). Her copies include drawings after artworks by such figures as Ludolf Backhuysen, Jan van der Meer, Carlo Maratti, and Giuseppe Cesari d'Arpino, among others. In addition to drawings and copies in her own hand, she includes two etchings of ecclesiastical ornament and a graphite drawing by her brother, John Parker. Though the scrapbook focuses on her life before marriage, it also features a watercolor sketch of Halston Chapel in Shropshire by her daughter, Frances.

Inscribed "Drawings by Mary Parker Lady Leighton" on front pastedown. Leighton made the album during an extensive tour of the Rhineland, Switzerland, and northern Italy, in the company of her mother and brother. The journal and drawings of the tour by her brother, John Parker, are at the National Library, Aberystwyth. See: Parry, Edward, "The Revd John Parker: 'a warm partizan of Gothic art'", Transactions of the Ancient Monuments Society, vol. 64, (2020), pp. 90-114.

Bound by Shrewsbury bookseller R. Davies, the scrapbook features drawings primarily by Baldwyn and Stanley. These provide a clear sense of how Mary guided her children in art instruction, encouraging them to copy from illustrations. Though the original sources for the drawings are unclear, the family must have had in its possession at least one illustrated copy of Pilgrim's Progress, from which Baldwyn drew two scenes. Stanley seems to have been interested as well in social types, as evidenced by a series of drawings that portray, among others, a dandy, a sailor, and third-class passengers. Drawings from life include Baldwyn's portraits of the Cuthbert children, Frances's drawing of the cupola of St. George's, and an unattributed watercolor of ice skaters and men engaged in the winter sport of curling. Folded into the scrapbook is also a map of Scotland, with a detailed itinerary of Mary and her husband's August 1846 tour.

Inscribed "Mary Leighton / Scraps from her Children / Loton Park 1847–50" on front pastedown. Drawings by Baldwyn, Stanley, and Frances comprise much of the scrapbook, with only a few additions by Charlotte and Isabella. There is also a loose silhouette interleaved among the pages, captioned "Eton 1852," which portrays Baldwyn during his study there. Drawings by Baldwyn and Stanley focus on notable battles and include figures from contemporary campaigns—such as soldiers from the Anglo-Sikh Wars—as well as historical ones waged by Sir William Wallace and Jack Cade. Frances's drawings possess a more delicate sensibility, often depicting romanticized views of peasant life. Among them is her 1850 graphite and watercolor drawing of a flower-seller, inscribed with a passage from Carlo Pepoli's La pastorella dell'Alpi, which was set to music by Gioachino Rossini in 1835. In view of errors in the Italian, the passage was likely written from memory.

Scrapbook features prints clipped from various sources; several business cards from shops in London, Florence, and Chiavenna; and a small group of drawings by Mary and Baldwyn. The collection of prints is peculiar in its range of subjects: among portraits, picturesque scenes, and fine-art reproductions, there are several newspaper engravings that suggest especially lurid stories. The most notable include the beheading of a prisoner—an undated journal illustration, likely for a report on the First Opium War—and an image of two men fishing a body from a pond, published in The Morning Chronicle and The Observer in November 1823. The engraving illustrated an article reporting the sensational murder that year of William Weare, who was killed by a gambling acquaintance. The case gained notoriety for the gruesome circumstances surrounding his death.