A Wayward Philosopher

Learning about the English eccentric, 'wayward philosopher' George John Cayley (1826–1878) this week, through his vibrant snapshot sketches at Algiers, 1874–5. Accomplished metalworker (collaborating with George Frederick Watts RA), talented artist, travel writer, war correspondent in Crimea, and perhaps most famously, early proponent of Lawn Tennis.

His views at Algiers, where he relocated with his young family in 1870 on account of ill-health, tell a story of French colonial rule: a world of grand villas, sprawling estates of cactus and palm, of cobalt seas and vermillion sunsets. The son of Yorkshire MP Edward Stillingfleet Cayley, George moved amongst the ruling colonial elite—his children perform amateur dramatics at the home of Consul-General Sir Robert Lambert Playfair. But George was also a man of contradictions, 'part Bohemian, part conventional', unable to completely renegue on his aristocratic roots but left-wing in his politics and outward-looking. A trained barrister, he shunned material wealth but 'with what he had he was open-handed'. He attempted to assimilate into the societies he visited, dressing in Andalusian garb in his travels across Spain, and often adopting Arab dress in Algiers. 'He had seen many places, known many people in many lands…. He was a man of the world, citizen of the world.'