In the Spring of 1897, Yeats moved with his wife Cottie to Strete in Devon to a little cottage called 'Snail's Castle'. At this time the artist began to work on a group of watercolours Devonshire character studies to be exhibited in London in November 1897 (see H. Pyle, The Different Worlds of Jack B. Yeats His Cartoons and Illustration, Dublin, 1994, p.27).