James Howe was from Skirling in Peeblesshire, and was best known as an animal painter. Horses were his main subject, so much so that the only comprehensive biography of him is called ‘The Man who Loved to Draw Horses’. In 1824 fourteen of his drawings were published as engravings in ‘Drawings of the Horse’. His major sporting pictures were of the Leith Races and the Musselburgh Races, which he painted at least three times.