MINNIE SMYTHE, RWS (1872-1955)
The daughter of Lionel Percy Smythe, Minnie Smythe was born in London in the early eighteen-seventies but grew up on the North Coast of France. Working in the style of her father; she exhibited watercolours of flowers and rural scenes at the Royal Academy, the Royal Society of Painters in Water-Colours and other venues. She was elected ARWS in 1901 and RWS in 1937.
Of course there were cats, too, tabby, black, white and tortoiseshell. Nearly all of them were strays, taken in because they were starving; one nervous little creature had been rescued from a mob of rough hooligans by (Lionel's wife] Alice single-handed. The newcomer was first called "Stray-cat,' then "Strekket,"' and lastly Strikketytick.' Poems were composed about the length and thickness of her tail, though in real life it was nothing out of the common.
'Our Pets', from Rose M Whitlaw and W L Wyllie, 1923: 95
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