Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 40.djvu/21

 James I; the Countess of Newcastle, 1624 (Duke of Portland); George Calvert, lord Baltimore, 1627 (Wentworth Woodhouse); Charles I, with architectural background by H. Steenwyck, 1627 (Turin Gallery); Charles I, 1629, and Henrietta Maria, 1630, both engraved by W. J. Delff; Robert Rich, earl of Warwick, 1632 (Sir C. S. Rich, bart.); Anne Clifford, countess of Dorset, 1632 (Knole, half-length); Philip, earl of Pembroke, 1634 (Hardwick). Among others may be noticed a large picture of Charles I, Henrietta Maria, and the dwarf, Sir Jeffrey Hudson, with horses, dogs, and servants, of which versions exist at Windsor Castle, Serlby, and Knowsley; Sir Jeffrey Hudson (Hampton Court); Charles I (Cobham Hall); George, duke of Buckingham (formerly at Blenheim Palace); William, second duke of Hamilton (Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh, from Hamilton Palace); Charles Howard, earl of Nottingham (at Arundel Castle, Greenwich, and elsewhere); Henry Wriothesley, earl of Southampton; and his own portrait by himself (Hampton Court). Portraits of Henry, prince of Wales (d. 1612), at Hampton Court and Knole, are ascribed to Mytens, and are probably copies from some older picture.

Mytens returned to Holland in 1630, and died there in 1642; but there is great uncertainty as to the end of his life. Mytens married at the Hague, in 1612, Gratia Clejtser. He was remarried, on 2 Sept. 1628, at the Dutch Church, Austin Friars, London, to Johanna Drossaert, widow of Joos de Neve, by whom he had two children, Elisabeth and Susanna, baptised at the same church on 1 July 1629 (, Register of the Dutch Church, Austin Friars). Care must be taken to distinguish his works from those of his younger brother, Isaac Mytens (d. 1632), his nephew (son of his elder brother, David), Johannes Mytens and his son, Daniel Mytens the younger, and another nephew (son of Isaac), Maerten Mytens, who all became portrait-painters, but in no instance worked in England. [Walpole's Anecd. of Painting, ed. Wornum; Redgrave's Dict. of Artists; Seguier's Dict. of Painters; Catalogues of Exhibitions and Picture Galleries; information from George Scharf, esq., C.B., and E. W. Moes (Amsterdam); authorities cited in the text.] 

MYTTON, JOHN (1796–1834), sportsman and eccentric, born on 30 Sept. 1796, was the only son of John Mytton of Halston, Shropshire, by his wife Harriet, third daughter of William Mostyn Owen of Woodhouse in the same county. Before he was two years old his father died, and he became the heir to a fortune which by the time he came of age amounted to an income of more than 10,000l. a year, and 60,000l. in ready money. On 5 June 1807 he was admitted to Westminster School, where he remained until 1811. It is said that he was also educated at Harrow, that he was expelled from both schools, and that he knocked down the private tutor to whom he was subsequently sent. He became a cornet in the 7th hussars on 30 May 1816, and served with them in France for a short time, but left the army in the following year. From 1817 to 1821 he was master of foxhounds, hunting what was afterwards known as the Albrighton country. He was on the turf from 1817 to 1830, but though he kept a large racing stable he never once bred a good horse. At a by-election in May 1819 he was returned in the tory interest for Shrewsbury, but resigned his seat at the dissolution in February 1820. He served the office of high sheriff for Shropshire and Merionethshire respectively, and in May 1831 unsuccessfully contested Shropshire as a reformer. ‘Jack Mytton,’ as he was popularly called, was a man of great physical strength and foolhardy courage, with an inordinate love of conviviality and a strongly developed taste for practical joking. He was a daring horseman and a splendid shot. Of his foolhardiness there are numberless stories. On one occasion he is said to have actually galloped at full speed over a rabbit warren just to try whether or not his horse would fall, which of course it did, and moreover rolled over him. On another occasion he drove a tandem at night across country for a wager, and successfully surmounted a sunk fence three yards wide, a broad deep drain, and two stiff quickset hedges. He would sometimes strip to the shirt to follow wild fowl in hard weather; and once he is said to have followed some ducks in puris naturalibus. One night he even set fire to his night-shirt in order to frighten away the hiccoughs. His average allowance was from four to six bottles of port daily, which he commenced in the morning while shaving. Owing to his reckless way of living Mytton lost his entire fortune, and his effects at Halston were sold up. In the autumn of 1831 he was obliged to take refuge from his creditors at Calais. He died of delirium tremens in the King's Bench prison on 29 March 1834, aged 37, and was buried on 9 April following in the private chapel at Halston.

Mytton married first, on 21 May 1818, Harriet Emma, eldest daughter of Sir Thomas Tyrwhitt Jones, bart., of Stanley Hall, Shropshire, by whom he had an only daugh-