This is undoubtedly one of the best works Joseph Clark ever painted. It exhibited at the British Institution in 1862. When English boys leave their homes clandestinely it is generally to get to the sea; and often one or two voyages curb their wandering spirits. But this “runaway” has evidently been absent for years, and has grown into manhood, so that when he again seeks the parental roof he is as a stranger to the old folk: the expression of doubt on the father’s face, as the seaman declares his relationship, is capitally rendered, while the mother fixes her eyes on him with a kind of half recognition, as if to trace out some line or mark that would set all uncertainty at rest