Although apparently a straightforward trompe l’oeil (illusionist) still-life, an inscription on the back of this picture claims that it has a symbolic message. The note reads '2 Royalist Allegorical Pictures/Explanation in the Keeping of the/family'. This explanation having been lost, the precise meaning of the picture has defied convincing interpretation. In its general composition the painting evokes the still-life paintings of the seventeenth century Netherlandish artist Edwaert Colyer. This is Warrender’s only known easel painting.