I I 2 MEMOIR OF THOMAS BEWICK. 



with us, and had plenty of work to do. He was 

 almost entirely employed by the publishers and 

 booksellers in designing and cutting an endless 

 variety of blocks for them. He was extremely 

 quick at his work, and did it at a very low rate. 

 His too close confinement, however, impaired his 

 health. He revisited Cherryburn, where he did 

 not remain long till he thought himself quite 

 recovered, and he then returned to London, where 

 he continued a few years longer, and where the 

 same kind of confinement affected his health as 

 before. A similar visit to his native air was found 

 necessary ; his health was again restored to him : 

 and again he returned to London. He, however, 

 found that he could not pursue the same kind 

 of close confinement, on which account he engaged 

 to teach drawing at the Hornsey Academy, then 

 kept by Mr. Nathaniel Norton, which obliged him 

 to keep a pony to ride backwards and forwards ; 

 thus dividing his time between his work-office in 

 London and the school for some years, when his 

 health began again to decline, and he finally left 

 London early in the summer of 1795, and returned 

 once more to the banks of the Tyne. Here he 

 intended to follow the wood engraving for his 

 London friends, and particularly for Wm. Bulmer, 

 for whom he was engaged to execute a number 

 of blocks for the "Fabliaux" or "Tales of Le 

 Grand," and for " Somerville's Chace." Many of 

 the former he had, I believe, finished in London, 

 and had sketched others on the blocks, which he 

 finished at Cherryburn. He had also sketched 

 the designs on the blocks for the " Chace ;" and 

 to these I put the finishing hand, after his decease, 

 which happened on the 5th of December, 1795, 



