xvn Wedgwood and Flaxman 217 



price on it until it is finished. I should also be par- 

 ticularly obliged to you for instructions respecting the 

 thickness. If it might be done as thin as the work on 

 the before-mentioned vase, it would be more perfect, and 

 the blue ground might show through the thin parts of 

 the drapery, which several Artists and other Persons of 

 taste have remarked to me is a great advantage where 

 it can be done ; but if it must be thicker, you will be 

 so kind as to let me have a pattern. Your answer when 

 leisure will permit will add to the obligations already 

 conferred on, sir, your much obliged and humble ser- 

 vant, J. FLAXMAN, jun." 



Wedgwood's next letter to Flaxman related to the 

 designs for the famous plaques which the sculptor was 

 preparing, to represent Peace between England and 

 France. 



" Etruria, 2nd November 1*786. Dear Sir I should 

 have returned you the enclosed drawing with a few 

 lines upon it before now, but have been to visit a sick 

 friend at Buxton, which, with other necessary matters, 

 has taken up almost the whole of my time since my 

 return home. 



" Nothing in my opinion can more properly or more 

 forcibly express the ideas we wish to bring forward 

 than the group of figures you gave me, and which I 

 now enclose ; but as it will be necessary to have them 

 divided into two parts, in order to have a pair of me- 

 dallions, that circumstance will call for a little altera- 

 tion in the disposal of the figures. The three middle 



