The Doctor Sketching the Lake
Pen and watercolor drawing for "The Schoolmaster's Tour" in The Poetical Magazine (May 1810) with text by William Combe; reprinted in book form as The Tour of Doctor Syntax in Search of the Picturesque (1812)
Gift of J. P. Morgan, Jr.
William Gilpin's success in popularizing the Picturesque inspired this parody by Rowlandson working in collaboration with the hack writer William Combe. Following Gilpin's example, the curate-schoolmaster Dr. Syntax visits picturesque locales in hopes of making his fortune by publishing a book about his artistic adventures. He views fashionable attractions, such as a country churchyard and a Gothic ruin, but the hapless pedant overlooks the true beauty of his surroundings and instead blunders into a series of comic predicaments and ridiculous situations. This pratfall in the Lake District is a typical example of the accidents he endures, sketchbook in hand.