6 4 



THOMAS BEWICK. 



Bewick should have apprentices. After due consideration Bewick decided 

 that his younger brother John would prove a suitable pupil, and he was 

 bound as an apprentice and received into the workshop. 



John Bewick, having been born at Cherryburn early in 1760, was, at the 

 time of his entering business, more than seventeen years of age. Details 

 concerning his childhood are singularly scanty, but it is understood that he 

 went through a training similar to his brother's. Most probably when at 

 Cherryburn he had assisted, even more than Thomas is said to have done, in 

 the coal mine held by their father ; the authority for this is, however, rather 

 inadequate. John did not show the same early love and aptitude for drawing 

 that his brother displayed, yet, after training, he executed some designs quite 

 equal to many by Thomas ; but, at the same time, his best were far behind 

 the choicest of his brother's. He was hasty and impatient in the execution of 

 his engravings, and from a letter from Thomas to him in 1788 we find the 

 elder earnestly impressing on the younger the need there then was that he 

 should take more pains with his work. 



John, being a young man of different temperament from Thomas, was 

 more inclined for company — though his brother, as has been said, was no 

 hermit — and being of a very lively and pleasing disposition, his presence was 

 considered an acquisition to any friendly meeting. He was never engrossingly 

 devoted to his art in the way the elder was, and appeared to be of the opinion 

 that other duties of life were more entertaining, and he sometimes severely 

 tried his brother's temper by showing himself too fond of these pursuits, 

 though it must be said he never went very far into the wrong road. He 

 learned his art rapidly, and, as we shall see, was able in a comparatively short 

 time to make shift for himself. 



The two brothers now went together on the weekly visits to their parents 

 at Cherryburn, rambling at the same time over the country. Bewick's descrip- 

 tion of the scenery through which they passed is one of the most delightful 

 passages in the Memoir. As it is an aim of this volume to point to 



