240 Josiah Wedgwood CHAP. 



Mr. Walton on chemistry. Dr. Priestley's last discovery 

 was described as not only quite new, but exceedingly 

 interesting. Walton described the Doctor as "the 

 Newton of the Age." Wedgwood made haste to have 

 the model of Priestley's portrait finished, so as to supply 

 the general demand. No doubt these studies of the 

 young Wedgwoods ended in the discovery of photo- 

 graphy, principally by Thomas Wedgwood. 



Wedgwood enters in his diary : " Much trouble, yet 

 many blessings." One of the greatest of these troubles 

 was the death of his dear friend Bentley, who had 

 long been ailing, but no one thought of his illness 

 as fatal. He was only forty-nine, comparatively a 

 young, or at least a middle-aged man. Wedgwood was 

 constantly telling him, when he felt unwell, to take a 

 ramble somewhere. On the 30th of June 1780 the 

 year of his death Wedgwood wrote to him : " Come to 

 Etruria, I will willingly go with you to Buxton, Matlock, 

 or any other place. ... I have blamed myself for not 

 going oftener to Buxton. The air of that calcareous 

 country is always grateful to my animal frame. The 

 ride does me a great deal of good, and I generally excite 

 some attention after my pots and pipkins, and draw 

 some of the company after me to Etruria." 



Bentley, however, did not go to Buxton, but to 

 Margate, for the benefit of the sea air. While there, 

 Wedgwood requested him to collect some shells for 

 him, as he had begun the study of conchology. Bentley 

 sent him many select shells, which Wedgwood copied 



