Lot Essay
Seven drawings by Turner were engraved, by a number of hands, for Lieutenant George Francis White's Views in India, chiefly among the Himalaya Mountains; they were based on drawings by White himself (three examples are in the Tate Gallery; see exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, Turner: the 5th Decade, February-March 1992, nos. 55 and 56, two examples illustrated). The first state of each engraving was dated 1836, the book was first published in 1838 and again in 1845. The engraving of this subject follows the original format of the watercolour, without the additions at the top and bottom. It may have been this commission that led Turner to consider a visit to India at about this time (see W. Thornbury, The Life of J.M.W. Turner, R.A., 1862, I, p.230).
White describes in his text how, after visiting Mussoorie, his party set off to explore the sources of the Ganges and Jumna rivers, climbing to Marma, or Tyne, situated at an elevation of about 10,000 feet: '...on the morning on which we reached this spot, the weather being remarkably clear, we had an opportunity of enjoying, to full perfection, the sublimity of mountain scenery'. Then, in a way that may have suggested Turner's treatment of the scene, he continues: 'The foreground was composed of a rich ridge, covered with timber, the growth of ages, - and contrasting, by its dark foliage, with the barer eminences around, which rising in all directions, appeared as if the tumultuous waves of a stormy ocean had suddenly been converted into earth, while the forest, standing forth in the middle, looked like a peninsula stretching far into the billows. Beyond this wild and confused sea, arose in calm majesty, those towering piles of unchanging snow, which, from whatever point they may be viewed, can never fail to inspire sentiments of awe and admiration'. White identifies the snowy peaks in the centre as those of Bandarpunch, above Jumnotri, the source of the Jumna. On the right is the Rudra Himala, near Gungotri, the source of the Ganges, while still further to the east is the highest peak, the Danlagin, 27,000 feet above sea level and 250 miles away.
White describes in his text how, after visiting Mussoorie, his party set off to explore the sources of the Ganges and Jumna rivers, climbing to Marma, or Tyne, situated at an elevation of about 10,000 feet: '...on the morning on which we reached this spot, the weather being remarkably clear, we had an opportunity of enjoying, to full perfection, the sublimity of mountain scenery'. Then, in a way that may have suggested Turner's treatment of the scene, he continues: 'The foreground was composed of a rich ridge, covered with timber, the growth of ages, - and contrasting, by its dark foliage, with the barer eminences around, which rising in all directions, appeared as if the tumultuous waves of a stormy ocean had suddenly been converted into earth, while the forest, standing forth in the middle, looked like a peninsula stretching far into the billows. Beyond this wild and confused sea, arose in calm majesty, those towering piles of unchanging snow, which, from whatever point they may be viewed, can never fail to inspire sentiments of awe and admiration'. White identifies the snowy peaks in the centre as those of Bandarpunch, above Jumnotri, the source of the Jumna. On the right is the Rudra Himala, near Gungotri, the source of the Ganges, while still further to the east is the highest peak, the Danlagin, 27,000 feet above sea level and 250 miles away.