The Nut Brown Maid, 1874. Oil on canvas; 54 x 36 inches (137.2 x 91.4 cm). Private collection. Ex. Sotheby's. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]
Leslie exhibited this painting at the Royal Academy in 1874, no.197. The title is derived from a popular ballad that was first published in The Customs of London, also known as Arnold's Chronicle, in 1502. Leslie's composition, however, has little in common with the ballad that was a vigorous defense about the fidelity of women. It shows an attractive young woman in a simple brown dress, likely a servant or farm labourer, who is filling two large wooden buckets with water from a spring. She holds a yoke under her left arm which she will use to carry the buckets once full. In her right hand she holds a wooden hoop. She is standing on a rocky outcrop with trees in the background and the sky is not visible.
When the work was shown at the Royal Academy it was, in general, favourably reviewed. The reviewer for The Architect in particular admired Leslie's handling of the foreground and background: "And the Nut Brown Maid (197), albeit she is not very strongly drawn, is a sweet, slim, rustic beauty, while the dripping well, and the bank of ferns, and grey stone and lichens, and coppice wood behind her are quite exquisite in truth of colour and texture" (276). The critic of The Art Journal ranked the work highly: "The Nut-brown Maid (197) is another of the happiest successes of G. D. Leslie, A.; and for a perfect accord between motive an executive power, this portrait-picture of a peasant-girl drawing water at a well must be ranked very highly" (164).
F. G. Stephens in The Athenaeum felt this was not the strongest of Leslie's contributions to the Royal Academy that year: "Mr. Leslie's contributions have great charms this year…There is rare pathos in this otherwise acceptable work [Five o'Clock], which is to us preferable to the somewhat too well-known sweetness of The Nut-brown Maid (197), a pretty damsel, standing, yoke in hand, at a spring, while her pails are filled by the current that falls brightly over rock and from under lush ferns" (602). The critic of The Builder disliked the facial features of the maiden while admiring the painting's background: "The Nut-brown Maid (197), with a very small head, and eyes that are too near, does not honour quite so much her cleverly represented and tastefully selected background and belongings. Mr. Leslie's preference is obviously for tall young ladies" (430).
The Illustrated London News also found this the less memorable of Leslie's compositions: "His Nut Brown Maid (197), with her yolk and her pails, beside the shady moss-grown spring, where the glint of light above cannot penetrate, will hardly take a place in memory beside the lovely Lavinia' (446).
Joseph Southall produced a version of The Nut Brown Maid much later in 1904 that echoes much more closely the content of the original ballad on which the composition is based.
Bibliography
"Another Look at the Royal Academy." The Builder XXXII (23 May 1874): 429-30.
"Paintings at the Royal Academy. –II." The Architect XI (16 May 1874): 276-77.
"The Royal Academy." The Art Journal New Series XIII (June, 1874): 161-66.
"The Royal Academy Exhibition." The Illustrated London News LXIV (9 May 1864): 446-47.
Stephens, Frederic George. "The Royal Academy." The Athenaeum No. 2427 (2 May 1874): 599-602.
Created 8 August 2023