Carus was a natural scientist, anatomist, gynaecologist, philosopher, author of books on osteology and landscape painting, and a respected German Romantic painter. The small oil sketch was made in Pillnitz, where he spent many summers as the personal physician to the Saxon royal house. From a low vantage point, as if the viewer were sitting on the riverbank, the gaze travels across grasses, reeds, and river. Carus has set a narrow skiff in the picture with brushstrokes so rapid they seem to demonstrate its speed.