J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

From the Military Road that runs along the north side of the Pass of Leny, about two and a half miles west-north-west of Callander, this sketch looks west towards the southern slope of Ben Ledi, with the River Leny and the Falls of Leny to the left. The mountain, sketched in more detail elsewhere, is depicted here in outline alone, but it looms over the foreground with its slightly exaggerated size. However, the main interest in this sketch is the turbulence of the water to the left, which has just flowed over the waterfall. A shaded, jagged shape depicts a large rock that divides the waterfall in two. Turner has used diagonal hatching to indicate the diagonal layers of the striated rock; see also folio 34 (D26692; CCLXXII 14a).

This is one of a series of mountain views that David Wallace-Hadrill and Janet Carolan have identified as likely to have been made in the Pass of Leny, to the west of Callander: folios 34–37 (D26692, D26691, D26690, D26689, D26698, D26697, D26687; CCLXXII 14, 14a, 13a, 13, 17a, 17, 11a).1

For references to further sketches of the Pass of Leny and other sites nearby, see folio 33 (D26741; CCLXXII 39a).