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

The morning did not look very propitious: there was a heavy swell rolling into the sound, and the wind rising. The sea had that dirty, perturbed appearance which is sometimes the forerunner as well as the follower of a gale. We worked out into the sound, where the breakwater had been just commenced, keeping towards Penlee and Rame-head [see folio 265 verso; D09456; CXXXI 176a], to obtain an offing. As soon as we saw we were clear of the nearer headlands on the east, we got well off the land, and while still running to the eastward, the sea rose higher. Off Stoke’s point it became very boisterous; but our boat mounted the ridges bravely.3

When we were off the island, and saw the sea breaking upon it, there seemed no possibility of our landing, the line of white surf being connected and unbroken. There was a river called the Avon within the island, running up the main; we made towards it, and getting under the lee of the island, landed without much difficulty, with a little wetting. All this time I could see Turner silently glancing over the boisterous scene. The little island and solitary house or hut upon it, the bay in the bight of which they lay, and the Bolthead stretching darkly to seaward, against the precipitous rocky shore of which the sea broke furiously – all formed a striking scene, and Turner thought so. While the unfortunate shell-fish were preparing to be seethed, I missed Turner, and found him, with a pencil and small book, near the summit of the island. I observed, too, he was [or, in the 1858 and 1866 accounts, ‘seemed’] writing rather than drawing. The tumultuous waves boiling below were seen to great advantage from thence. I imagined he had observed something novel in their appearance, but this, whatever it might be, I did not comprehend. We soon sat down to our repast, to which the artist did ample justice.5

to see the house, at Dodbrook, in which Dr. Walcot (Peter Pindar) [John Wolcot (sic), 1738–1819, poet and satirist7] was born. The artist made a sketch of it [in the 1866 account: ‘Walcot sold it, and there had been a new house erected there since; of this the artist took a sketch.’] and of another house, a picturesque place not far distant. We had now more than twenty miles to travel home. A vehicle was provided, but we walked much of the way, for Turner was a good pedestrian, capable of roughing it in any mode the occasion might demand.’8

‘When we came to the La[i]ra passage, we met Lord Boringdon (afterwards Earl of Morley), who invited Turner, Demaria, and myself to Saltram, to dine and sleep, the following day. We went accordingly. In the morning we ascended the high ground in the park, whence there is a fine view. There is also some fine scenery near the eastern entrance, at the mouth of the Plym, and Turner made some sketches here.’9