Matthew William Peters, , his life and work . onfor 1767 was, however, an oil painting, catalogued as Portrait of a Lady: wholelength, which, Mr. Algernon Graves tells us, Horace Walpole sets down in his cataloguefor that year as (Mary) Duchess of Ancaster. The painting of this picture shows thatPeters was beginning to number some of the leaders of society among his sitters, for theDuchess was emphatically one of the great ladies of her time. She had already sat toHudson and Reynolds, and, though no longer young, still possessed a considerableportion of those charms which had secured for h
Matthew William Peters, , his life and work . onfor 1767 was, however, an oil painting, catalogued as Portrait of a Lady: wholelength, which, Mr. Algernon Graves tells us, Horace Walpole sets down in his cataloguefor that year as (Mary) Duchess of Ancaster. The painting of this picture shows thatPeters was beginning to number some of the leaders of society among his sitters, for theDuchess was emphatically one of the great ladies of her time. She had already sat toHudson and Reynolds, and, though no longer young, still possessed a considerableportion of those charms which had secured for her one of the greatest matches in thekingdom. Horace Walpole tries to deny this when, in 1763, he complains that the Frenchpreferred her before either the Duchess of Hamilton—one of the beautiful Gunnings—or the Duchess of Richmond. The Duchess of Ancaster, he writes, who is notyoung, was at best but a pretty figure, is now repaired by very evident art, and is aheap of minauderies and affectations, which have not even the stamp of a woman of. w > HIS LIFE AND WORK 5 quality; but then Walpole, with his pronounced aristocratic leanings, never forgaveher for being only the daughter of Tom Panton, the racing trainer. The portrait—thepresent whereabouts of which is altogether unknown—must have been a success, for in1769 Peters was again entrusted with the perpetuation of the charms of the Duchess, hissecond picture of her appearing at the Academy of that year. Walpole criticised it inhis catalogue as too faint. About the time that Peters first painted her, or evenearlier, he also painted the portrait of her eldest daughter. Lady Mary CatherineBertie, who died on the 13th April, 1767. The picture is well known by the finemezzotint executed from it by John Dixon. Peters was also destined to paint theportrait of the Duchesss other daughter. Lady Charlotte Bertie—then a child ofthree—when she had grown into a beautiful young woman. During the three years 1767-9 Peters suc
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookidmatthewwilli, bookyear1913
