156 MEMOIR OF THOMAS BEWICK. 



journey, crowned as it was with hospitality and 

 kindness which could not be surpassed. 



In the year 1790, I was employed much in the 

 same way as I had been in other years about that 

 period; but this was besides marked by an event 

 which enwarped and dwelt on my mind. Xo doubt 

 all thinking men in their passage through life must 

 have experienced feelings of a similar kind. My 

 old and revered preceptor, the Rev. Christopher 

 Gregson, died this year. No sooner did the news 

 of his extreme illness reach me, than I set off, in 

 my usual way, and with all speed, to Ovingham. 

 I instantly rushed into his room, and there I 

 found his niece, Miss Dinah Bell (afterwards Mrs. 

 Johnson) in close attendance upon him. With her, 

 being intimately acquainted, I used no ceremony, 

 but pulled the curtain aside, and then beheld my 

 friend, in his last moments. He gave me his last 

 look, but could not speak. Multitudinous reflec- 

 tions of things that were passed away, hurried on 

 my mind, and these overpowered me. I knew not 

 what to say, except " Farewell for ever, farewell ! " 

 Few men have passed away on Tyneside so much 

 respected as Mr. Gregson. * When he was 

 appointed to the curacy of Ovingham, I under- 

 stand his income was not more than thirty pounds 

 per* annum. Thus set down, he began by taking 

 pupils to board and educate, chiefly as Latin 

 scholars; and Mrs. Gregson (late Miss Longstaff), 

 after my mother left him, did everything in her 

 power to make the seminary respectable. He after- 

 wards, however, commenced teaching on a more 



[ * There is a silhouette portrait by Bewick of his old school- 

 master, the block for which was sold at the Bewick sale of August, 

 1884.] 



