'John Meller's Black Coachboy' (painted over an early 18th century portrait of John Hanby, aged...

British (English) School. Oil painting on canvas, 'John Meller's Black Coachboy' (painted over an early 18th century portrait of John Hanby, aged 25), British (English) School, late 18th century, was inscribed: top left, painted out, but revealed by infra-red reflectography: John Hanby/Ætatis suae 25 (the inscription itself look as if it were from the second half of the eighteenth century), possibly by John Walters, circa 1790s. After another earlier hand, inscribed later with 26 lines of verse on a scroll, top right: "Of the Condition of this Negre Our information is but megre; However here, he was a dweller, And blew the horn for Master Meller. Here, too he dy'd, but when or how, Can scarcely be remember'd now, But that to Marchwiel he was sent, And had good Christian interment. Pray Heav'n may stand his present friend, Where black, or white; distinctions, end. For sure on this side of the grave, They are too strong, tw'ixt Lord & Slave. Here also liv'd a dingy brother, Who play’d together with the other, But, of him, yet longer rotten, Every particular's forgotten, Save that like Tweedle-Tum & dee, These but in notes, could [n]e'er agree, In all things else, as they do tell ye, We’re just like Handel and Corelli. O had it been in their life's course T'have met with Massa Wilberforce, They wou'd in this alone, have join'd, And been together of a mind, Have raisd their Horns to one high tune, And blown his Merits, to the Moon". A head-and-shoulders portrait of a horn-blower called John Meller's coachboy, according to inscription, possibly posthumous, looking to left, facing, wearing livery, and holding a French horn. Erddig, Wrexham (Accredited Museum)