Antiquaries in the Age of Romanticism: 1789-1851 - Queen Mary ...

novels and poetry; the sporran of Rob Roy, the keys of the old Tolbooth and some of the
Napoleonica gathered after Waterloo are all objects that played prominent parts in his work and
Figure 36 Sir Walter Scott in his study, by William Allan, 1831
bind together history and romance through the person of the author. Scott’s position in literature
is suggested by his physical placement between the two writers he most admired, represented
here by artefacts, the bust of Shakespeare and the neo-classical urn that was a present to Scott
from Byron. The image is tamed somewhat by comparison with Oldbuck’s study. The room is
untidy rather than chaotic, the sinister cat has been replaced by the more comfortable presence of
Maida, Scott’s favourite stag-hound, but this is nonetheless a romantic interior, a speaking scene.
Allan, in his account of the picture when it was shown at the Royal Academy in 1832, provided a
detailed list of the objects portrayed. 16
By comparison John Britton, Scott’s admirer and close like him both by personality and
experience to the theatre, inhabited what might be called, unkindly, a poor man’s Abbotsford. In
his home, as in his publications, Britton was just one step ahead of his public and his suburban
villa at St Pancras showed how far and deep, a decade after Scott’s death, the romantic interior
had penetrated in middle-class society. In June 1843 Britton published a description of his house.
16
For the list and a full account of the painting see Russell, Portraits of Sir Walter Scott, pp.26-27.
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