M‘Lachlan .v Agnew and Others should never have happened at all. It came about mainly because Lachlan M‘Lachlan was a Scotsman and a photographer, and knew that he knew everything about art—in which he mistakenly included photography—whilst the defendants, Sir William Agnew, Sir Joseph Heron, and Mr. Alderman King, knew that they knew better than M‘Lachlan.
Each set out to prove his thesis to Mr. Anderson, Q.C., in his dingy chambers in Rolls Court. Neither succeeded, but perhaps Anderson learned something about art and the parties something about law.
Lachlan M‘Lachlan’s pet idea was that a camera not only could not lie, but that it could tell the truth, and even interpret new or historic truths pictorially. He conceived the loyal and patriotic idea of a great picture, to be entitled “The Royal Family,” which was to depict a group consisting of every member of the Royal Family surrounding our Gracious Sovereign Queen Victoria in one of the rooms at Windsor. Each individual was to be separately photographed, the room and its furniture were to be photographed in detail, and then the photographs were to be enlarged, cut out, and pasted on a huge canvas, from which was to be painted a picture of great size. When this was done the camera again came into play.
Negatives of various sizes were to be taken, and the ultimate prints sold to the public.
I have very little doubt there was some artistic value in the original design of the group, for that was the work of that sincere artist Frederic Shields, and his sketch group, which was prepared in 1871, won the approval of her Majesty the Queen, who not only gave M‘Lachlan several sittings herself, but issued her mandate to the various members of the Royal Family that they were to be photographed in such dresses, uniforms, and attitudes as Lachlan M‘Lachlan desired. The various adventures of M‘Lachlan in pursuit of his Royal victims would fill a volume. This part of the work took some two or three years, and the great scheme nearly failed because a Princess who had in the meanwhile grown out of short skirts refused to put them on again to satisfy M‘Lachlan’s passion for historical accuracy. This matter was—so M‘Lachlan used to tell us—referred to her Majesty and decided in his favour.
In 1874 the first photographs were completed, but the plaintiff had exhausted his means in working on his great project, which required new capital before it could be finished. There is, I think, no doubt that the defendants were actuated in the first instance by the kindest motives, and through their influence about twenty guarantors found £100 apiece in order that the wonderful historical picture might be made.
M‘Lachlan had the faith and enthusiasm of a patentee. No expense could be too great, no time
too long to assure the perfection of his work. The defendants, on the other hand, regarded themselves as the kindly patron of the poor artist, ready to lend him some money, but eager to see it return again with that huge additional interest that is the modern Mæcenas’s expectation when he deigns to encourage literature or art. Such a combination could but end in one place—the law courts, though it took many years to reach its natural destination.
I think it was nearly 1877 before the great canvas picture was produced. It measured 17 ft. by 10 ft. 6 in., and was insured by the defendants for £10,000. Even when the picture was finished there were long delays in producing the negatives of different sizes. More money was wanted, and deeds and agreements were drawn up, unauthorised prints were condemned by M‘Lachlan and issued by the defendants, and meanwhile the portraits were becoming more and more historical, and a picture that might have had some popularity in 1871 had little chance of success some ten years later.
It was in March of 1885 that the case was opened at Manchester Assizes. Dr. Pankhurst was for the plaintiff. No one on the circuit could have trumpeted forth the wrongs of M‘Lachlan with more eloquent indignation, and few juniors could have enveloped the court in a foggier atmosphere of financial complications. In tones of emotion and excitement the learned doctor’s voice would soar into a falsetto of denunciation of his opponents’ chicanery, winding