Isaac Cruikshank was living in Duke Street, Bloomsbury, when his sons Robert, Isaac, and George were born, the latter on the 27th of September, 1792, the former on the same date in 1789. While the boys were in their early infancy, the family removed to 117, Dorset Street, Salisbury Square, a house commodious enough for the admission of lodgers, one of whom was Mungo Park. Among the constant visitors were Dr. Pettigrew, the family doctor (known afterwards as Mummy Pettigrew), and George Dawe, R.A., to whom Isaac Cruikshank had given lessons as a poor boy. It was a busy establishment. Isaac Cruikshank worked at his etchings on copper, while his wife coloured the plates, pressing her two boys into the service at a very early age. This Mary Cruikshank, if a hot-tempered, was a frugal and industrious wife, and an excellent mother. She used to boast how she had managed to save a thousand pounds, and at the same time to bring up her children in God-fearing ways (laying her hand on her Bible she said she knew Jerusalem as well as she knew Camden Town), sending them regularly to the Scotch Church in Crown Court, Drury Lane. She was a trifle too strict and serious, according to her husband; and often when the clergyman from Crown Court was coming to spend the evening, he would escape to the Ben Jonson Tavern in Shoe Lane, where he is said to have spent more time than was good for him. Her boys used to relate, as illustrative of their mother’s “Highland temper,” that on one occasion, when a tradesman had sent her two bad eggs, she told them to return with them and “throw them at the rascal’s head.” This command was obeyed to the letter, to the great delight of the pugnacious youngsters. The two brothers were educated at an elementary school at Edgeware, but they were very early cast into the rude business of life. Robert went to sea as a midshipman in the East India Company’s service, his head full of the wonderful stories he had heard from his mother’s lodger, Mungo Park. He made only one voyage. On his way home, having gone on shore at St. Helena in command of a boat’s crew, and a storm having suddenly arisen, he was left behind, and reported to be lost. He was passed home in a whaler, after having endured severe privations on the island; and would relate that the only noteworthy incident of the homeward voyage was the speaking with a vessel which gave the news of the battle of Trafalgar. When he presented himself in Dorset Street, Salisbury Square, he was astonished at the frantic excitement of his brother George on opening the door. The family were in mourning for him.