Painted for Queen Victoria. Barber was paid £27 2s on 3 June 1891 for 'Painting of Her Majesty's Collie Dog "Darnley"' which was placed at Osborne House. The picture has sometimes been mistaken for a portrait of Oswald, a favourite collie belonging to Princess Beatrice. The frame is by Brooks. A rough coated collie called Darnley II, born 8 January 1888, by Champion Charlemagne out of Champion Peggie II, bred by Rev. Hans F Hamilton, won the open collie class for Queen Victoria at Crufts dog show held at the Royal Agricultural Hall in 1891, the first dog show of that name.

Charles Burton Barber was a nineteenth century British artist best known for his paintings of animals. Born in Great Yarmouth in 1845, from 1863 he studied at the Royal Academy and exhibited there between 1866 and 1893. Barber was an admirer of Sir Edwin Landseer, the preeminent animal painter of the period. He was unable to compete with Landseer in the painter of highland scenes and larger animals and instead specialised, with some success, in the painting of small, domestic and farmyard animals, in particular dogs.

Between 1872 and 1894 Barber was frequently employed by Queen Victoria.