86 MEMOIR OF THOMAS BEWICK. 



preceptor ; and some are carrying the art to a stage 

 of advancement, at which he himself had the candour 

 to acknowledge, on the inspection of Northcote's 

 Fables, he had never conceived that it would arrive. 

 It is almost needless to mention the names of Nes- 

 bit and Harvey. Others were cut off by death, or 

 still more lamentable circumstances, who would 

 otherwise have done great credit to their master ; as 

 Johnson, whose premature death occurred in Scot- 

 land, while copying some of the pictures of Lord 

 Breadalbane, Clennel, Hanson Hole, whose exqui- 

 site vignette in the title-page of Mr Shepherd's 

 Poggio gave the highest promise, was stopped in a 

 more agreeable way, by succeeding to a handsome 

 fortune. 



The last project of Mr Bewick was, to improve 

 at once the taste and morals of the lower classes, 

 particularly in the country, by a series of blocks on 

 a large scale, to supersede the wretched, sometimes 

 immoral, daubs with which the walls of cottages are 

 too frequently clothed. A cut of an Old Horse, in- 

 tended to head an Address on Cruelty to that noble 

 animal, was his last production : the proof of it was 

 brought to him from the press only three days before 

 ne died. 



It may be observed, that, in the works of the early 



