1 86 MEMOIR OF THOMAS BEWICK. 



the "Tyne Mercury/' Count Raymond, French 

 teacher and fencing master, and my more constant 

 companion, David Sivright, gentleman. He was 

 a man of extraordinary abilities and attainments. 

 He belonged to an opulent family near Edinburgh, 

 had been brought up to business in a bank there, 

 and was afterwards a wine merchant in London, 

 where he had associated with the highest ranks 

 of society. I believe he failed, or at least did not 

 prosper in business. He had been in the West 

 Indies, and returned home in a merchant ship 

 in company with Rodney's fleet and the French 

 ships of war, his prizes, of which so remarkable 

 a destruction took place in the great storm they 

 had to encounter on their voyage to England. 

 Whether he had been a disappointed man in the 

 world, I know not, but to me he appeared so. 

 He had a rooted bad opinion of most of the 

 people in very high life, with respect to whom he 

 might be called a misanthropist, but to others he 

 was affable and kind, and felt most poignantly for 

 the distresses of the unfortunate, and was ever ready 

 to relieve them. Against the former description 

 he appeared to me to be too violent, to the latter 

 I think he showed something of a sickly sensibility. 

 He could make himself extremely pleasant in com- 

 pany he liked, but to such as he thought badly of 

 either as fools or knaves (and in this he was 

 whimsical) he became quite outrageous. I think I 

 was the last person he associated with, and 

 even with me he often showed petulance, and as 

 often apologized for it. He had long been used to 

 wander about alone, and took to drinking to 

 excess. He left Newcastle, and went to Blyth, 

 where he died, aged 68. 



