The marble Hagar and Ishmael originally belonged to George Banks, and was included in the exhibition on Gott in 1972 (op. cit.). George Banks was a prolific patron of Gott's, he commissioned busts and groups from Gott for his newly built house St. Catherine's. Banks probably purchased the marble of Hagar and Ishmael from the Northern Society, where the sculpture was exhibited in 1834. As the Walker Art Gallery exhibition catalogue states: "Hagar and Ishmael, 1832-34, compact and interlocking in design, is an outstanding example of Gott's technical virtuosity in a small piece of marble." (op. cit., p. 31).
The present terracotta model of Hagar and Ishmael differs quite dramatically from the marble. In the terracotta Hagar does not sit on a high seat, but rather on the ground with her legs folded to one side; she wears a small cap and her hair falls gracefully to her shoulders; and Ishmael is shown as a younger child, not seated against her thigh, but lying across her lap, his hand firmly closed about his mother's index finger. The present terracotta is a more graceful and tender rendering of the Biblical subject.
The group of Diana and Greyhound was a favourite with Gott. It relates to Gott's marble group of the same subject of 1826, formerly in the collection of Joseph Neeld and to the marble Nymph and Greyhound now in the Leeds City Art Galleries (op. cit., nos. 36 & G59). The terracotta appears to be earlier in date and may be a variant model for one of these marbles.