By that time Mr. A. J. Finberg was nearing the end of his vast work of cataloguing the Turner water-colours, and the 'nineteen thousand pieces of paper,' belonging to the nation. The two volumes known as the _Inventory_ are the monument of his labour, which has been thoroughly done, indeed, with an attention to detail that wins the gratitude of all students. Wisely a strictly chronological arrangement was determined upon. The difficulties were immense, owing to the almost entire absence of reliable chronological information as to Turner's movements. He was not the kind of man to babble his plans, and Mr. Finberg admits that some of his judgments as to date and place are tentative; but we now have a guide, trustworthy as extreme care could make it, to the infinite variety of Turner's structural plans, his daily visions, his notes of things seen and quickly recorded, upon which his life-work was based.
The _Inventory_ begins with 1787, when he was twelve; it proceeds, year by year, to almost the end of his life, to 1846, when he was seventy-one. Almost every summer, one might say every summer, with painting materials, knapsack, and umbrella, he was off on his travels through England, Scotland, Wales, or the Continent, and, roughly speaking, to each year there is a sketch-book. Perhaps general-utility book would be the better name, for Turner drew and scribbled anything and everything on the leaves in his almost unintelligible handwriting. Mixed up with his sketches, we read how he got from place to place; of articles of clothing in use and wanted; the numbers of bank-notes; elemental French and German phrases; fragments of poetry, his own and others; extracts from Sir Joshua's _Discourses_; a cure for the bite of a mad dog; a recipe for surfeit; criticism of pictures, including Rembrandt's 'Mill,' Titian's 'Entombment,' and Rubens's 'Rainbow'; notes on the colours of hills; the names of flowers; descriptions of skies; fragments of letters, such as 'Give my love to Miss Wickham,' and so on, and so on.
Such things are for the general, for anybody and everybody who is interested in the commerce with daily life of a man of genius. For the student of Turner's work, these details of his sketching tours, chronologically arranged, are invaluable.