g, are hung with portraits of officers present
at the great siege in 1779-83, executed in a style which proves that
Pre-Raphaelite painters existed in those days. One of these portraits
represents my grandfather. To judge from a painting of him by Sir
Joshua, and a small miniature likeness, both still in possession of
the family, he must have been rather a good-looking old gentleman,
with an affable, soldier-like air, and very respectable features. The
portrait at the Convent is doubtless a strong likeness, but by no
means so flattering; it represents him much as he might have appeared
in life, if looked at through a cheap opera-glass. A full inch has
been abstracted from his forehead and added to his chin; the bold nose
has become a great promontory in the midst of the level countenance;
the eyes have gained in ferocity what they have lost in speculation,
and would, indeed, go far to convey a disagreeable impression of my
ancestor's character, but for the inflexible smile of the mouth.
Altogether, the grimness of the air, the buckram rigidity of figure,
and the uncompromising hardness of his shirt-frill and the curls of
his wig, are such as are to be met with in few works of art, besides
the figure-heads of vessels and the sign-boards of country inns.

However, my grandfather is no worse off than his compeers. Not far
from this one is another larger painting, representing a council of
officers held during the siege, where, notwithstanding the gravity of
the occasion and the imminence of the danger, not a single face in the
intrepid assembly wears the slightest expression of anxiety or fear,
or, indeed, of anything else; and though my progenitor, in addition to
the graces of the other portrait, is here depicted with a squint, yet
he is by no means the most ill-looking individual present. But the
illustrious governor, Eliott, has suffered more than anybody at the
hands of the artist. Besides figuring in the production aforesaid, a
statue of him stands in the Alameda, carved in some sort of wood,
unluckily for him, of a durable nature. The features are of a very
elevated cast, especially the nose; the little legs seem by no means
equal to the task of sustaining the enormous cocked-hat; and the
bearing is so excessively military, that it has been found necessary
to prop the great commander from behind to prevent him from falling
backwards.

My grandfather, John Flinders, joined the garrison of Gibraltar
as a major of inf