"In his Memoir he has detailed his sentiments on the purity of representation and free government in a manner worthy the pen of a Bacon or Lockes a history of the art of wood-engraving; and obser-vations on the progress of his own mind. Though some of his less important opinions may, to persons who knew him not, appear but as whimsical fancies, they are the levities of a great and benevolent soul, that, like the brilliant air-bubbles of a deep clear fountain, rise playfully to the surface, without sullying its purity. The style is plain and simple, but sinewy and nervous, marking his character as much as his manners and even his dress, and is strongly tinctured, as was his conversation, with broad Northumbrian and Scottish provincialisms, which, particularly when he read it aloud, strengthened the efficiency. The narrative is replete with anecdote, especially in the earlier parts, wittily recorded and morally applied, and very much reminded me of that of the excellent Benjamin Franklin; indeed, to that good and great man, both in his religious and political sentiments, he appeared to bear a nearer resemblance than to any other. He was indefatigable and intrepid in his search after truth, dauntless and strenuous in the declaration of his matured sentiments, however opposite to received opinions, and fearless of any pains or penalties which the avowal of them might bring upon him from persecuting bigots. But the objects nearest to his heart were, to render the works of the Creator familiar to youth, by dressing them in their most alluring form, and thereby leading to the knowledge and admiration of their great Author, and to the principles of what he believed to be true religion, and what all believe to be those of sound morality. These were his constant aim and study, and to these he considered every thing else as subordinate. The success of his labours in this field he acknowledged, but was unconscious of it till made aware by the voluntary and unsought admiration of the world. When the admired preface to his Fables first appeared, letters from eminent men poured in upon him, particularly from the University of Cambridge, and one from the Bishop of Gloucester; numerous letters of thanks for the benefits he conferred on the rising generation, from men of talent and literary eminence, who were total strangers to him, except through his works, but who admired his modesty, his genius, his benevolence, his wit, his ingenuity, and his genuine religious principles.

"Frequently, as I walked with him along the streets, it was gratifying to witness how much and how generally his character and talents were respected; particularly when many who bowed to him differed totally from him in opinions, on a subject that ought to conciliate, but far too often sets little minds at inveterate hostility with great ones. An amiable touch of character showed itself in the many ragged children who followed him for halfpence, and would not leave him till he had imparted the customary largess. He turned to them several times, while he was talking to me, saying, 'Get awa', bairns, get awa; I hae none for ye the day.' As they still kept dogging him, and pulling at his coat, he turned into a shop, and throwing down a tester, said, in his broad dialect (which he neither affected to conceal, nor pretended to affect), 'Gie me sax penn'orth o' bawbees;' and throwing the copper among the children, said kindly, and with a merry flourish of his cudgel, 'There, chields, fit yoursels wi' ballats, and gae hame singing to your mammies.' He was particularly fond of playing with little children, who, notwithstanding his bulky appearance, and extremely rough face, suffered themselves to come unto him; and among the numerous and ill-sorted contents of his capacious pockets, he generally (like the all-hearted Dandy Dinmont) had an apple, a whistle, or a bit of gingerbread, together with pencil ends, torn proofs, scraps of sketches, highly tinted with the yellow ooze of huge pigtail quids, in divers stages of mastication.

"Yet gentle, generous, and playful as he was, his personal strength and courage was prodigious: and notwithstanding his ardent feelings of humanity towards all animals, particularly dogs, horses, and birds, in defending many whereof he had drawn himself into scrapes; yet, when his own safety was at stake, he could repel an attack with a vigorous neart and arm: for he told me, as how going into a tanyard, a great surly mastiff sprung upon him, and how he caught said mastiff by the hind legs, and 'fetched him, wi' his cudgel, such a thwacker owre the lumber vertebrae, that sent him howling into a hovel.'

"We enjoyed our evenings as may well be conceived, with such a host at our head; often till broad morning began to spread her bright drapery along the east; and even the admonishing sunbeams to keek through the shutters, laughing out the candles. Be up as early as I could, I always, were the morning fine, found him walking briskly in his garden for exercise. His ornithic ear was quick and discriminative; he one morning told me he had then first caught the robin's autumnal melody, and said we should have a premature fall of the leaf; we had so, after the excessively hot summer of 1825. I had heard this robin as I lay in bed, feeble and infrequent; and as we walked in the garden, a passerine warbler, Sylvia hortensis (whom, from his profusion of hurried and gurgled notes in May, I call the Ruckler), just gave a touch of his late song, which the fine ear of Bewick instantly caught, though in loud and laughing conversation. At meals he ate very heartily, and, after a plentiful supply, often said he could have eaten more. In early, and indeed late in, life he had been a hardish drinker; but was at this time advised by his medical friends to be more abstemious, which he abode by as resolutely as he could, though not without now and then what he called a marlock. It has been said that Linnaeus did more in a given time than ever did any one man. If the surprising number of blocks of every description, for his own and others' works, cut by Bewick, be considered, though perhaps he may not rival our beloved naturalist, he may be counted among the indefatigably industrious. And amid all this he found ample time for reading and conviviality. I have seen him picking, chipping, and finishing a block, talking, whistling, and sometimes singing, while his friends have been drinking wine at his profusely hospitable table. At nights, after a hard day's work, he generally relieved his powerful mind in the bosom of his very amiable family; either by hearing Scotch songs (of which he was passionately fond) sung to the piano-forte; or his son Robert dirl hornpipes, jigs, strathspeys, and reels, which failed not to put life and mettle in the heels of the females and younger friends, to his glorious delight. Occasionally his fondling Jane would read Shakspeare to him, or the delightsome romances of Shakspeare's congener (not to speak profanely), Sir Walter Scott. It has been supposed by many, and publicly asserted by a few, that Bewick never wrote his own works, but was wholly and solely employed on the designs; to this I have his positive contradiction, which would be enough; but that in addition to his own Memoir, which I have read in his own MS., I have seen him compose, extract, and translate passages for each bird he has engraved while I was in his house. If his works have any great defect, 'tis the defect of omission; every one laments he has given so little of the history of each bird. I have often offered him to re-write the whole of the birds wherewith from early and lasting habits I was well acquainted, their characters and manners, interspersed with anecdotes and poetry, particularly from good old Chaucer, the bard of birds, and passages of every bearing brought together, flinging over the whole what may be called the poetic bloom of nature, in which none have so sweetly succeeded as honest White of Selborne. But this he always resolutely refused; alleging that his descriptions, whether original, copied, or compared, were unimpeachably accurate; and that was enough. And not only did he write his own language, but I often thought his talent in that department not surpassed even by the other effusions of his genius; witness his unparalleled Preface to his Fables, and his other Introductions. He said, even to the last, he felt no deficiency of his imaginative powers, in throwing-off subjects for his tale-pieces (as I named them), which were always his favourite exercise; the bird or figure he did as a task, but was relieved by working the scenery and back-ground; and after each figure he flew to the tail-piece with avidity, for in the inventive faculty his imagination revelled. "Before I conclude this familiar account of my friend Bewick, you must, in justice, allow me to inform the public, that it was commenced, and (after its first portion) very considerably lengthened, at your request. Yet still, under the continual fear of dilation, I reluctantly omit innumerable incidents that are sparkling about the twilight of my memory, and hurry on to my last interview with my esteemed friend. Early in June 1827, he wrote to me from Buxton, that, for the gout in his stomach, he was hurried there by his medical friends, accompanied by his daughters Jane and Isabella. At sunrise I mounted the high-pacing Rosalind, and entered that naked but neat little town early the second morning; alighting at the Eagle - fit sign to a visitor of the king of bird-engravers.