Monsieur Trottman en Ecosse: A Frenchman's View of Scotland.
Editions of Le Charivari, Quatorzieme Annee, nos. 341, 342, & 346.
I first came across Monsieur Trottman when I purchased a set of original caricature drawings which depicted a French tourist's experience of Scotland.
Original drawings featuring Monsieur Trottman.
It was only later that I discovered that these were (presumably) copies of a series that had been published in Le Charivari in 1845 (Quatorzieme Annee, nos. 341, 342, & 346).
Monsieur Trottman, it turned out, had visited a number of countries, and left his impressions in cartoon format.
The artist signed himself 'Cham': Charles Amedee de Noe (1818 - 1879). His work was popular not only in France, but also in England, where it can be found in publications like Punch and the Illustrated London News. His work could be topical, as in these two images featuring Tsar Nicolas, threatened by British and Turkish soldiers at the time of the Crimean War. The British soldier was often portrayed in highland dress, such was the fame of the Scottish fighting regiments.
Monsieur Trottman was a regular series, with visits to Belgium, Holland, and Russia as well as to Great Britain. It is his trip to Scotland that concerns us now. What did he find there? A land of mountains, of course:
General View of Scotland.
Lots of dancing, difficult Highland innkeepers, a diet predominatly of milk, and Crick Crac Crackfort, chief of the Mic Mac clan! These are the images in the series:
