BELTURBET BENSLEY. 



291 



BELTURBET; a market-town in the county 

 of Cavan, province of Ulster, Ireland, situated on 

 the river Erne, on the road from Cavan to Bally- 

 connell, 67 miles N. W. from Dublin. The 

 town is irregularly built. A very extensive dis- 

 tillery was erected here in 1825, by Messrs Dick- 

 son, Dunlop, and Co., which employs a number of 

 persons. There are also some malting establish- 

 ments. A troop of cavalry is generally stationed 

 here. Population in 1831, 2026; in 1841, 2070. 



BENSLEY, THOMAS, an eminent English 

 printer, was the son of a printer in the neigbour- 

 hood of the Strand, where Mr Bensley was first 

 established; but he afterwards removed to Bolt 

 Court, Fleet Street, where he succeeded Mr 

 Edward Allen, the " dear friend" of Dr Johnson, 

 who died in 1780. Mr Allen's office was next door 

 to Dr Johnson's dwelling-house, which ultimately 

 became part of Mr Bensley 's printing office. Mr 

 Bensley's skill as a practical printer was not in- 

 ferior to that of his great contemporary Mr Bulmer. 

 Whilst Mr Bulmer astonished the public with his 

 magnificent edition of Boydell's Shakespeare, Mr 

 Bensley produced a rival production in Macklin's 

 Bible. To use the words of Dr Dibdin : " While 

 the Shakespeare Gallery and the Shakespeare press 

 were laying such fast hold of the tongues and the 

 purses of the public, a noble spirit of rivalry was 

 evinced by the Macklins of Fleet-street ; Reynolds, 

 West, Opie, Fuseli, Northcote, Hamilton, and 

 others, were engaged to exercise their magic pen- 

 cils in the decoration of what was called the Poet's 

 Gallery; and among other specimens of this na- 

 tional splendour and patriotism came forth an edi- 

 tion of Thomson's Seasons in 1797, in royal folio, 

 from the press of Mr Bensley, a volume quite 

 worthy of the warmest eulogies. It had also the 

 merit of not being debased by second-rate engrav- 

 ings. Meanwhile the pencil of Loutherbourg was 

 called into requisition to supply, in particular, head 

 and tail pieces, or vignettes, for the sumptuous edi- 

 tion of the Bible ; and that sacred book, in seven 

 broad folio tomes, came regularly before the public, 

 with every fascination of which a bold type (cast 

 by Joseph Jackson), raven-glossy ink, and What- 

 man's manufactured paper, could bestow upon it." 

 The Bible of Macklin wanted, however, the 

 Apocrypha ; and about 1815 this desideratum was 

 supplied, in the same manner, from the same press, 

 at the expense of Messrs Cadell and Davies, but 

 the passion for such splendid publications had evi- 

 dently passed away, as Messrs Cadell and Davies 

 experienced to their great loss. Dr Dibdin thus 

 continues : " Hume's History of England followed 

 hard upon the Bible, in ten volumes of a folio form, 

 of better proportion. The engravings which adorn 

 this magnificent work were executed from the 

 paintings in the fore-mentioned Gallery ; and upon 

 the whole I am not sure (probably from the uni- 

 form appearance of the solid body of the text, 

 compared with the same in the Bible, divided into 

 columns and broken into verses,) whether this lat- 

 ter work has not. greater admirers than its prede- 

 cessor. The medallic and emblematical engravings 

 in it are, many of them, quite admirable." Among 

 other splendid works printed by Mr Bensley may 

 be enumerated the following, in nearly a chrono- 

 logical order, as particularly deserving of commen- 

 dation on account of the beauty of their execution : 

 Lavater's Physiognomy, 5 vols. 4to. 1789. The 

 Gentle Shepherd and Allan Ramsay, in English 

 and Scotch, 8vo. 1790. Salmagundi, by Mr Hud- 



desford, 4to. 1791. Wyntown's Originale Crony- 

 kil of Scotland, 8vo. 1795. The Gardeners, trans- 

 lated from De Lille, 4to. 1798. The Sovereign, 

 a Poem ; addressed to his Imperial Majesty of all 

 the Russias, by Charles Small Pybus, Esq., with 

 the author's portrait prefixed. The hero of this 

 poem, as immediately afterwards appeared, was 

 most unfortunately chosen. It is erroneously attri- 

 buted by Dr Dibdin to Sir James Bland Burgess. 

 He says of it : " If the Emperor Paul had after- 

 wards ' cut as good a figure ' as this beautifully 

 printed book will always continue to do, he might 

 have been master of all the Russias. Mr Bensley 

 has probably never gone beyond this volume in his 

 typographical achievements." Enchanted Plants, 

 tables in verse, 8vo. 1800. Dulau's Virgil, 8vo. 2 

 vols. Festival of the Rose, 4to. 1802. Astle's 

 Origin of Writing, 4to. 1803. Hume's History of 

 England, 1803, 10 vols. Shakspeare, 7 vols. 1803. 

 The Shipwreck, 1804; published by Mr Miller. 

 An edition of Junius, 1804, 2 vols. DuRoveray's 

 edition of Pope's Works, and Pope's Homer's 

 Iliad, 1805. Smith's Antiquities of Westminster, 

 1807, 4to. On the 5th of November 1807, a fire 

 broke out in Mr Bensley's warehouses, supposed to 

 have been occasioned by boys letting off fire-works, 

 which destroyed 700 copies of Mr Smith's West- 

 minster, a splendid 4to edition of Thomson's Sea- 

 sons, a fine edition of Juvenal, another of Pope's 

 Works, many copies of Edwards's Guide to Brigh- 

 ton, and other works. But as the printing office 

 was not much injured, Mr Bensley's labours at the 

 press were not materially impeded.* 



The next works we shall notice are Religious 

 Emblems, 1809, 4to.; Riddell's History of Moun- 

 tains, 1809, 4to. 3 vols.; Dallaway's Sussex, 4to. 

 1815 and 1819; Singer's History of Playing Cards, 

 &c. 1616, 4to. ; and Fairfax's "Tasso, 1817, 8vo. 

 Dr Dibdin notices, with high commendation, many 

 of the peculiarities of each of the above splendid 

 productions. See Bibliographical Decameron, vol. 

 ii. pp. 397 401, and closes his account with a 

 very correct portrait of Mr Bensley. 



It would have been well for Mr Bensley's peace 

 of mind if he had confined his attention to his old 

 presses, and to flue printing, in which he so much 

 excelled. But, in an evil hour, he was induced to 

 embark his fortune in the establishment of the 

 Printing Machine invented by Mr Koenig, (which 

 was first used in this country in printing the Times 

 newspaper, on the 29th of November 1814.) Mr 

 Bensley adapted the machine to the printing of 

 books ; and after great toil, much trouble, and very 

 heavy expenses, Mr Bensley succeeded in printing 

 both sides of the sheet by the same operation. 

 But he had scarcely brought his exertions to a suc- 

 cessful issue, before a second unfortunate and very 

 rapid fire, June 26, 1819, again destroyed his ware- 

 houses and printing office, with their valuable con- 



WHS taen ntr> em : u te ront remane unaltered. It 

 is engraved in the. Ktiropean Magazine for May 1810-1 1 ; and 

 more elegantly in the "Graphic Illustrations of the Life and 

 Times of Dr Johnson." just published by Mr Murray. Bishop 



' 



* ( )n the subsequent repair and enlargement of Mr Bens- 

 ley's premises, the interior of the residence of Dr J.ilnis n 

 WHS taken intr> them : but the front remained unaltered. It 



d 

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Jchh, writing to A. Knox, Esq., June 10, 1815, say's " I was 

 t'other evening in Sam Johnson's house, in the apartment 

 where lie hrcatlied liis last, in Bolt Court You may judge 

 with what reverence ! The premises are now partly bare 

 rooms, partly ;i printing i.lnce in the occupation of Mr Bensley. 

 formiii!.' but a minute prt of his vnst concerns. 1 could not 

 help comparing the pabce of the printer with the humble 

 dwelling of the sage; and then asking myself IMW poor a 

 tiling is pelf! how unworthy of our cnre : fid competition'" 

 At n subsequent period, June, 181f>, this house was totally de- 

 troyed. 



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