Notwithstanding this, having regard to his other engagements and the elaborate nature of the drawings, he made but slow progress, and fully four years elapsed from the commencement to the completion of the work. During this time he had been elected a member of the Royal Society of Painters in Water Colours, and from the day he exhibited his first picture there, there was an ever-increasing demand for examples from his brush, and a corresponding delay in his completing this commission. It is somewhat interesting to state that the last drawing of this series was the very last he made in black and white for the wood-engraver's purpose.
Instead of the fifty principal subjects and the fifty small vignettes contracted for, at his earnest request we consented to reduce the fifty large pictures to thirty, and forgo altogether the fifty small vignettes.
"Come awa, come awa,
An' o'er the march wi' me, lassie:
Leave your Southron wooers a',
My winsome bride to be, lassie.
Lands nor gear I proffer you,
Nor gauds to busk ye fine, lassie,
But I've a heart that's leal an' true,
And a' that heart is thine, lassie."
"Come Awa, Come Awa."—Thomas Pringle.
FROM "HOME AFFECTIONS WITH THE POETS."
By Birket Foster, R.W.S.
By permission of Messrs. George Routledge & Sons.