Life^ Genius.^ and Personal Habits of Bewick, 103 



ous planets of heaven, or emblazoned, in golden emeralds, the 

 panoply of the smallest insects of earth. He fully felt that 

 organised orbs or atoms tell equally of their ineffable Archi- 

 tect : and this it was his incessant desire to impress on the 

 minds of all. Having exhausted the quadrupeds and British 

 birds as vehicles to his art, instruction, and amusements, he, 

 late in life, took up a fervent resolution to engrave all the Bri- 

 tish FisheSi and write their histories. To this his mind was 

 well trained, having been ever a lover of the fountains and 

 rills, the still pools and broad waters, the majestic rivers and 

 the mighty ocean. Here he felt the seeds of his talent stirring 

 all a-life, where he should have to display the beauties of the 

 finny tribe, and treat of the wonders of the great deep. When 

 I was last in Northumberland, they showed me thirty fishes 

 he had cut by way of trial, with the spirit and execution 

 whereof himself was well satisfied, and his judicious friends 

 enraptured ; together with more than a hundred tail-pieces, 

 conceived and cut, '' ay, every inch," with all his usual ima- 

 ginative appropriation and power. His mind and conversa- 

 tion now dwelt forcibly and fondly upon this work, which it 

 was his extreme wish to see complete, and then placidly to 

 resign his soul to his Creator, the short and nearing approach 

 to whom he contemplated with even cheerful contentedness. 

 His art here got entirely into a new element ; for, as he was 

 forced to show the fishes out of water, he was deprived of his 

 favourite excellence, motion; yet such motion as a fish new- 

 landed has, he has given with elasticity and life : brilliance to 

 the scaly, and lubricity to the smooth ; so as to remind the 

 naturalist of excellent old Chaucer's touches of nature, where 



" They swommin full of smale fishes lighte, 

 With finnis rede, and scalis silver brighte." 



A single impression of his John Doree sold lately in London 

 for ten guineas. And when they do come out, though every 

 admirer will lament he was, long ere completion, called to his 

 blessed account, their sorrow will be softened at beholding 

 with what effect and spirit his animated graver has been caught 

 up by his son. We love to talk over sweet or bitter adven- 

 tures ; for the ruminating mind, chewing the cud of past life, 

 extracts a cordial from the one, and a salubrity from the other, 

 which we are ever desirous of im})arting : so that I feel as 

 heavy at taking leave of my narrative of these pleasures, as I 

 was of the bright and alluring friends by whom they were 

 enkindled. But "good times, bad times, and all times get 

 over ; " and morning after morning was named for my retrac- 

 ing my long and lonely journey. I had never parted from him 



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