The present work is one of four known paintings of the view from Nicholson's apartment looking across the Cours des Dames quayside into La Rochelle harbour. These were painted between November 1938 and Spring 1939 and this example closest in composition to ‘Harbour in Snow, La Rochelle’ now in the collection of the Tate. In each of the paintings, some maritime activities have captured the artist's attention, here the single figure walking out to the water’s edge. In early March, when the present work was likely painted, Nicholson wrote to his son Ben to describe the joyful view; 'Harbour full of Sailing Fleet with sails from the brightest blue to aggressive red rust and peroxide blonde and pale flesh' (quoted in A. Nicholson (ed.), ‘William Nicholson, Painter’, London, 1996, p.261). Patricia Reed wrote that in this painting, 'the air seems heavy with warm moisture and the pellucid quality of the light suggests the promise of spring.' (Patricia Reed, ‘William Nicholson, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings’, London: Modern Art Press, 2011, p.623).