Turner used the page vertically. At the top are the jotted names of paper-related businesses. ‘Spalding and Hodge’ were stationers in Drury Lane, London,
1 while ‘Grosvenor and Chater’ evidently refers to Grosvenor, Chater and Company, Wholesale Stationers, a long-established firm located at this time at 11 Cornhill, London, who later supplied the watercolourist David Cox (1783–1859).
2 The reference to ‘Dodd, Drury Lane’ is as yet unclear.
Across the middle of the page is a study of a low sun behind clouds with trees or other vertical features to the right. Towards the bottom left is a related study, of the sun alone. Below a horizontal pencil line dividing the page between the two sketches is a half-legible note, tentatively readable as ‘[?not to be ... the last | Light of the sun until morng]’.
Above the gutter, below the second sketch is another two-line note of which the two occurrences of ‘sky’ in the first line are the only clear words. The second passage is disrupted by a slight continuation of the bridge from the view of Sandwich on folio 6 recto opposite (
D35767), where there are other notes concerning sunset effects at Margate.
Matthew Imms
September 2016
