TOWARDS the end of the month of October, 1876, I received, somewhat unexpectedly, a commission to paint a picture for the Indian Government, as a present to her Majesty the Queen on the occasion of the assumption of the title of Imperial India. The subject was to be the Imperial Assemblage of Delhi. I had to make my arrangements at once, for I was obliged to leave England early in November, so that I might be sure of reaching Delhi before Christmas. Such a commission would naturally fill the mind of an artist with anxiety, not so much from the magnitude of the picture to be produced as from the vast amount of necessary memoranda which would have to be collected from a country artistically unknown. The time required for this preliminary labor was most uncertain, and the climate and its evil effects on the constitution of a person not inured to it were much to be dreaded.
To many artists the latter consideration would have caused much apprehension, but I had the advantage of belonging to what is called an Indian family. India was the land of my birth, and, although I left Calcutta at an early age, I was still connected with Hindustan by many ties.