THOMAS BEWICK. 



23 



a witness of others working with the pencil must have assisted him consider- 

 ably in attaining- to proficiency in drawing. 



As may be observed from the work done during his early apprenticeship, 

 his hand frequently failed to depict what his imagination suggested or his 

 eye witnessed ; and it was only after practising hard as well as seeing the 

 progress of drawing in others that he arrived at his power of draughtsmanship. 

 Every one who has essayed to draw knows that watching an artist at work, 

 or even seeing a picture or drawing in progress from time to time, is in 

 reality as good a lesson as if the artist had taken some pains to explain the 

 reasons for his methods. Bewick, having been for some considerable time 

 an inmate of Beilby's house, must have heard much of that distinctive 

 talk which belongs to artistic families ; this being often repeated would 

 lead him to understand the mode of manipulating artistic tools, and thus 

 greatly smooth the way over the mechanical difficulties of his art. And, after 

 all, what teacher can do more than point the way a pupil ought to go, and 

 leave him by his own industry or genius to achieve greatness ?* 



Bewick appears to have been afraid that some day it might be asserted 

 that he received teaching from those more advanced in methods while he 

 was still learning. He seems only dimly to have recognised that it was 

 his personal genius alone which his contemporaries wondered at, and which 

 succeeding generations would so much admire. No one cares, in looking at 

 his works now, whether or not he received lessons at some remote period 

 in his history ; the desired result was obtained, and that being what had not 

 previously been accomplished, it was and is duly recognised and esteemed. 



Bewick may therefore be said to have been advantageously placed with 

 his first employer. Though Beilby could never ultimately have hindered 

 Bewick from becoming what he did, yet had the young artist been placed in 



* It is right to mention that Charnley, the bookseller, says that Bewick " employed his leisure hours in improving 

 himself in drawing under the care of a master ; " but he omits to give any authority for this statement, so con- 

 tradictory to the engraver's own testimony. 



