Jameson, Anna: Companion to the most celebrated private galleries of art in London: containing accurate catalogues, arranged alphabetically, for immediate reference, each preceded by an historical & critical introduction, with a prefactory essay on art, artists, collectors & connoisseurs (London: Saunders and Otley, 1844)

INTRODUCTION.

The pictures which now constitute the private gallery
of her Majesty at Buckingham Palace, were principally
collected by George IV., whose exclusive predilection
for pictures of the Dutch and Flemish schools is well
known. To those which he brought together here, and
which formerly hung in Carlton House, her present Ma-
jesty has made, since her accession, many valuable addi-
tions; some purchased, and others selected from the royal
collections at Windsor and Hampton Court; others have
been added by Prince Albert, from the collection of the
late Professor D’Alton, of Bonn.
The pictures, excepting the royal portraits, are hung in
a gallery constructed especially for their reception when
Buckingham House was altered for the residence of
George IV.; it runs from north to south through the body
of the edifice, and forms a corridor opening into suites of
apartments on either side. It appears to me too lofty,
and the light not well contrived for such small and delicate
pictures. Each picture has the name of the painter and
the title by which it is known attached to it legibly, but as
they are neither numbered nor classed, I have, for the sake
of present and future reference, arranged the pictures in
the gallery according to the classification adopted through-
out this volume, and already explained; and added thereto
a list of the Royal Portraits, which are now hung in the
state rooms adjoining the gallery, and to which the visitors
are usually admitted.

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