This portrait of Frances Dayell depicts her as a religious benefactress of the Order of St Ursula. She was a relative of a Catholic family in Aberdeenshire, the Leslies. The legend of Saint Ursula suggests that she was a nobly born British woman who embarked upon a pilgrimage to Europe before her impending marriage to a governor of present day Brittany. Accompanied by 11,000 virginal handmaidens, Ursula and her attendants were attacked by barbarians en route to Rome and executed. The Ursulines were an Order founded in 1535 who are dedicated to the education of girls, in memory of the virgins who perished alongside Ursula. Saint Ursula is the patron saint of students.