The early portion of the diary includes financial receipts and expenditure; the early part of the year records the time at which he rose and hours of work conducted; names of portrait sittings are recorded, as are social engagements and correspondence received; one entry on 12th September has an additional later note stating it was the first meeting of Richmond with
John Ruskin, who brought a letter of introduction from
Henry Acland; later in September he writes that he then visited Rome a second time with his brother, before returning in February 1841 to the 'drudgery' of portrait painting; at the rear of the volume there is a list of names, possibly completed commissions. Includes a loose note on a work by
Paolo Veronese in the Louvre.