A watercolour showing studies of peasant women in Cherbourg, the same subject as in RCIN 981176. The woman are all shown in peasant dress, with tall white caps and coloured shawls. The central figure is shown three-quarter-length, standing and facing forward. She is holding a bundle of wheat under one arm and is carrying a jug in the other hand. Studies to either side shown women carrying jugs on their shoulders, which are attached to a sting and held over their heads. A figure with a child is shown above and a carriage driver on horseback is shown from behind to the lower left. Inscribed lower right: Cherbourg August 1857
Inscribed below mounted sheet: PAR LA PRINCESS ROYALE.

Madame Louise Rollande was the French Governess to Queen Victoria's children from 1849 to 1859. The children often wrote her letters and presented her with drawings, such as this watercolour executed by Victoria, Princess Royal on a family holiday to France.

Queen Victoria and her family sailed to Cherbourg from Osborne on 17 August 1857 in the Royal Yacht, Victoria and Albert. The Royal Family stayed on the Royal Yacht, making visits to the mainland during the day, until returning to Osborne on 19 August 1857. On 18 August, Queen Victoria, Prince Albert and their children, went on a day trip to Bricquebec, just outside Cherbourg. They visited the old Château there and waited in the Le Vieux Chateau Inn, while their horses rested. Queen Victoria described the visit in her journal entry of that day and records how they "decided to wait upstairs in a small bedroom, where we sat with the Children & Ladies, Vicky & I sketching the picturesque women, & children standing below."

This drawing is housed in an album of works presented to Madame Rollande. For other items in the volume see Madame Rollande's Album.