104 Life, Genius, and Personal Habits of Bewick. 
without our reciprocally thinking it would be the last; but 
this time we both thought otherwise, for his health was very 
much ameliorated. Black Monday at length came ; and 
though the sun shone broad on every thing around, they 
walked slowly, and methought strangely silent, with me (I 
leading Rosalind, heavy as a nightmare), about two miles on 
the road, where, after saluting the young ladies, and shaking 
the good old Bewick’s hand though I. hope to enjoy jheie 
friendship * yet many years, it was on that mountain side that 
with him T parted for ever; and looking back, till the road 
turned the corner of a rock, dimly saw athena kindly gazing 
after me: and this was the ne time I ever beheld the portly 
person of my benevolent and beloved friend. We continued, 
however, to correspond frequently; not only on natural his- 
tory, Bae (as the Irish scholar said) “‘ de omnibus rebus, et 
quibusdam aliis,” on the manners of both feathered and unfea- 
thered bipeds. The next summer, he visited London about 
his works: and thence he wrote me several very humorous 
letters on the utterly artificial life of the cockneys ; with the 
mass of whom, since he was among them half a century betore, 
he thought the march of spseilect had not equalled the march of 
bate nce. He was, however, ver y honourably received by 
many learned societies and individ luals, of whom, and of whose 
collections, he wrote in raptures. On his return, the London 
and provincial papers had many paragraphs respecting this 
visit, his reception, and his life ; to amend the errors of which 
statements, I must have been wr iting one at the ver V hour of 
his death; for I had not time to stop ae insertion in one of the 
Shrewsbur y papers, when I received a short, but most affec- 
tionate and affecting letter from his son, informing me, “ as his 
father’s most valived friend,” that he expired, in fall possession 
of his fine and powerful mental faculties, in quiet and cheer- 
ful resignation, on the 8th of November, 1828. On the morn- 
ing of his death, he had the aot tact of seeing the first 
proof-impression of a series of large wood- -engravings he had 
undertaken, in a superior style, for the walls of farm- houses, 
inns, and cottages, with a view to abate cruelty, mitigate pain, 
and imbue the mind and heart with tenderness and humanity ; 
and this he called his last legacy to suffering and eulicd 
Nature. . 
I strongly feel that some apology is due to the public for 
the freedom, haste, and familiarity with which I have thrown 
off these pages; and I cannot better express it than by a 
stanza from fine old Spenser, and which my intrepid and in- 
genious friend frequently applied to his own works : — 
