Chiefswood Cottage, on the Abbotsford estate, was the summer home of Sir Walter Scott’s eldest daughter, Charlotte Sophia (1799–1837), and her husband John Gibson Lockhart (1794–1854). Turner depicts the cottage like a fairy-tale retreat, bathed in sunshine and framed by trees. He worked up this watercolour from earlier sketches after Scott’s death in 1832. The empty chair in the shade and the desk set with an inkwell and stool are poignant references to the great writer’s absence. This watercolour was engraved and published as a title-page illustration in Scott’s Miscellaneous Prose Works (1834–6).